Pioneering physicist Michelle Yvonne Simmons is hopeful being named Australian of the Year will help challenge gender expectations and encourage more girls to pursue careers in science.
Professor Simmons leads a team at the University of NSW developing a silicon quantum computer able to solve complex problems in minutes rather than thousands of years
Their work has the potential to drive seismic shifts in drug design, weather forecasting, self-driving cars and artificial intelligence.
Professor Simmons was named Australian of the Year for 2018 by Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull at the Great Hall of Parliament House on Thursday night.
A global trailblazer, she hopes to shatter expectations of what careers women ought pursue and what they can achieve.
"I think one of the important things - and the message I hope to get out there - is to defy those expectations," Professor Simmons said.
"Don't live your life according to what other people think. Go out there and do what you really want to do."
In 2012, Professor Simmons and her team created the world's first transistor made from a single atom and the world's thinnest wire.
The breakthrough has placed Australia at the forefront of what she describes as the space race of the computing era.
