“It’s all about the numbers,” says Distinguished Professor Geoff Chase from the University of Canterbury’s Faculty of Engineering.
Chase combines his mechanical engineering background with clinical medicine and physiology to improve patient healthcare with a clinical focus in intensive and acute care medicine, and cardiovascular disease and metabolic systems in diabetes.
Chase arrived in New Zealand from California in August 2000. His history includes six years working for General Motors and five years consultingand research in Silicon Valley.
“I could have stayed in industry and made a lotmore money, but I became an academic because I liked working with people and mentoring;I liked the teaching aspect of mentoring students.”
He has now supervised 102 PhD students to completion, and they are nowspread across the globe in a wide range of industry and academic roles.
“I get the most satisfaction from seeing my students develop. I like the coaching aspect. Yes, I’ve got a lot of publications which is what people point to, but it’s much more than that. I’m helping these students to be the best researchers they can be, able to compete with the best in the world.”
“My students are the engine room of my engineering research world. They’re how the work gets done. There’s less than one of me because technically I’m a 0.4 FTE researcher. But I’m currently supervising 18 PhD students who can work on research projects, and that gives so much more reach.”
Back to the numbers.
“I’ve supervised 46 master's theses,25 postdoctoral fellows, 123 master's students from France, Germany, the Netherlands, and Denmark, 220 final year project honours fourth year students or independent research courses, and another 105 summer students. For a grand total of 621,” says Chase.
“If we break those numbers down a little more, 76 of the PhD students are in medtech or biomedical engineering, and then there’s energy systems, structural engineering, earthquake engineering, and other areas.”
The mention of medtech prompts Chase to look to the future.
“Medtech is a big and growing area in terms of both demand and the need to innovate in this space. I’ve picked up a new phrase that I like: Much of medicine worldwide is like walking backwards into the future. We imagine the future of medical care is much like today's, but with more computers and a little bit less paper and better outcomes. But it's not going to work that way. I think there's going to be increasingly strong evolution slash revolution in how healthcare is delivered, or we're simply going to not deliver enough of it to anybody.”
Back to his students. Chase cites a text he received just before our interview.
“A former student is a research director and a big name at a university in Malaysia with a new National Energy Centre which needs staff. I recently graduated a PhD student doing interesting agent-based modelling around energy demand and usage and how it's going to change with electric vehicles and other kinds of charging. That leads us into asking how we get better equity around costs because while rich people can afford EVs and photovoltaics, poorer people rent and cannot, and thus may pay for a strong grid in their energy bill while not being able to access the benefits. So, in Jersey-boy vernacular, I'll put my Notre Dame base guy in touch with her, and two of my ‘academic children’ will work together.”
Publishing is also about numbers; it’s critical in getting noticed, employed, or funded. With a PhD, you’re creating someone who’s invested three years of their life with you, but they can then compete against the best from around the world. The differential is publishing because people tend to hire what they know and understand. It tells a prospective employer this is someone worth considering. Publishing shows completion.
“I personally have been hired by industry because they’ve seen that I can publish and that I can complete things. And in this increasingly AI world where a machine reads a CV, publishing will make one candidate stand out over another.”
What about AI?
“I started my career 40 years ago, and PCs were barely a thing. Within three years, the typing pool (Google it!) was gone. PCs have changed how we do business and they have changed productivity. AI will do the same, but it's another two-edged sword. Yes, it can help my students gather and process their thoughts, but we’re also seeing are turn to students handwriting their exam answers in a blue book. With any advance, you have to know how best to use it.”
Technology is not the only big challenge. “A lot of New Zealanders lack self-confidence on the international stage. We're small and we're not rich and we tend to believe others can therefore do it better than we can. Equally, recent governments seem to value outputs more than people, but it is the second that makes the first and makes them sustainable. But one of the big learning experiences we’re seeing is New Zealand researchers canbe unique and competitive, and that is where the big wins are to be had.”
For Chase, the numbers matter because behind every one of them is a person, a problem worth solving and a future still being engineered.
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