Cathy Foley

Catherine Patricia Foley AO PSM FAA FTSE (born 10 October 1957) is the Chief Scientist for the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO). Prior to this Dr Foley was the science director and deputy director of CSIRO's Manufacturing business unit with around 700 staff and a budget of $60M and previously she was the chief of CSIRO’s Materials Science and Engineering Division.Her research expertise covers solid state physics, such as semiconductors, magnetics, superconductivity and nanotechnology."

Foley and her group at CSIRO performed pioneering work on SQUID systems for geomagnetic exploration of minerals, which were transitioned to industry and resulted in the discovery of mineral ores worth many billions of dollars. "Her team is responsible for the development and commercialization of LANDTEM which has led to the discovery of over $6B of mines worldwide."

Foley got a diploma in education, High School Physics, at Macquarie University in 1979. A BSc (Hons 1), majoring in Physics from Macquarie University in 1980 and PhD in Physics, Macquarie University, 1984. She spent six months on a scholarship as a Research Fellow, Department of Electrical Engineering, at Oregon State University, USA in Corvallis while writing up her PhD."

At Macquarie University, Foley and T. L. Tansley authored a series of highly regarded papers on indium nitride semiconductor films.The work of Tansley and Foley is consideredcentral to the development of semiconductor lasers in the blue-green region of the spectrum.

Most recently, her awards include the 2015 Australian Academy of Science's Clunies-Ross Award, 2013 Premier's Award for Woman of the Year, and in 2011 she won the AUSIMM MIOTA prize. Preceding this award, she was a fellow of the Institute of Physics in the UK, past president of the Australian Institute of Physics, and a fellow of the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering (ASTE). Adding to the list of her achievements, she is the immediate past president of Science and Technology Australia, where she represented 68,000 Australian scientists and technologists. Due to all of her accomplishments, she was awarded a public service medal on Australia Day in 2003 and in the same year won the Eureka Prize for the promotion of science. She sits on the Scientific Advisory Committee of Australia's ARC Centre of Australian Biodiversity and Heritage. In May 2020 Foley was elected Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science and in the 2020 Queen's Birthday Honours she was made an Officer of the Order of Australia (AO) for "distinguished service to research science, to the advancement of women in physics, and to professional scientific organisations".

Foley has helped raise six kids including three step-children.