Luke Davies

Luke Davies is an Associate Professor and Principal Research Fellow at the International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research (ICRAR) at the University of Western Australia. He currently holds an ARC Future Fellowship and has previously held positions including ICRAR Senior Research Fellow, ICRAR Fellow, and John Stocker Fellow at the same institution. He has also held research positions at the University of Bristol and University of Portsmouth in the UK, where he completed his PhD in 2011.

Dr. Davies serves as Principal Investigator of the Deep Extragalactic VIsible Legacy Survey (DEVILS), Deputy Project Scientist for 4MOST, and Project Scientist for the Wide Area VISTA Extragalactic Survey (WAVES). He leads the 4MOST extragalactic analysis pipeline working group and is a core member of the GAMA survey team, where he has established himself as an international expert on star-formation and galaxy interactions. His research focuses on parameterizing three central components of galaxy evolution in the local Universe: star-formation, the effect of environment on sub-Mpc scales, and how star-formation and mergers combine to form and redistribute stars.

His recent publications demonstrate a strong focus on galaxy evolution through the DEVILS survey, examining galaxy mergers, size-mass relations, star formation rates, and scaling relations across cosmic time. His work integrates data from multiple large surveys including DEVILS, GAMA, and WAVES to build a comprehensive understanding of how galaxies form and evolve. He has developed extensive data products for GAMA and created online tools like GAMA-PSI and astroMap for data access and analysis.

• Young Tall Poppy Science Award (2018)

Dr. Davies is actively involved in science communication and public outreach, having organized TedX-Perth, hosted events with prominent scientists like Neil DeGrasse Tyson, and developed citizen science projects like AstroQuest. He regularly presents at schools, astronomy clubs, and public events to promote astronomy to diverse audiences. He leads multiple research grants including 'Looks aren't everything - the coevolution of galaxy structure & environment' (2025-2028) and 'How Location Governs Longevity in the Lifecycle of Typical Galaxies' (2020-2025), demonstrating his ongoing commitment to advancing our understanding of galaxy evolution.