AURORA 2025 Grand Final & Awards Ceremony

The first AURORA Scientific Research Awards Grand Final was held in Hanoi in December 2025, marking a landmark moment for NIC AU and the Vietnamese research community in Australia.

Award Winners:

• 🥇 1st Prize: Flexible multifunctional silicon carbide for biologically interactive cancer cell treatment — Huỳnh Minh Anh (PhD candidate)
• 🥈 2nd Prize: Optimising the wheat rhizosphere in acid soils for drought tolerance — Phạm Thị Thanh Huyền (PhD candidate)
• 🥉 3rd Prize: A comprehensive model for microplastic remediation in the Mekong River basin — Lưu Thị Trang (PhD candidate)
• ⭐ Merit Award: Recycling durian husks for wastewater treatment — Ninh Đức Bảo (Master’s)
• ⭐ Merit Award: Developing a fire ignition prediction model under climate change — Nguyễn Hà Ninh (PhD candidate)

Several winning projects were subsequently connected with enterprises, research institutes and investment funds for commercialisation and technology transfer.