I am an adjunct Professor in Earth Science and I specialize in Chemical Mineralogy. After doing geology and chemistry at Monash University, I decided that minerals were more interesting when considered as naturally occurring inorganic compounds and there reactions and structures show that geological processes ultimately operate at the molecular scale.  I choose to do a Ph.D. in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Cambridge under the supervision of Prof Sir John M Thomas.   I spent most of my career  South Australian Museum as a Curator of Mineralogy . This was largely a research position and this enabled me to undertake a wide range of mineralogical research on minerals, particularly sulfide minerals. At the same time I held affiliated and adjunct positions in all three Universities in Adelaide. I have been fortunate to have had continuous financial support from the Australian Research Council since 1985. While at the SA Museum I supervised or co-supervised over 20 Ph.D. students and 10 post doctorial research fellows. In 2014 I joined Flinders University as Professor of Chemical Mineralogy and my research group moved me to Flinders.  I retired from Flinders University in June 2021 and now have adjunct positions at Adelaide and Flinders,  I no longer taking research students.