Robert Mahony is a Professor in the Research School of Engineering at the Australian National University.  He received a PhD in 1995  (systems engineering) and a BSc in 1989 (applied  mathematics and  geology) both from the Australian National University.   He worked  as a marine seismic geophysicist and an industrial research  scientist before completing a postdoctoral fellowship in France and a Logan Fellowship at Monash University in Australia.  He has held his post at ANU since 2001.  His research interests are in non-linear control theory with applications in robotics, geometric optimisation techniques and systems theory.