We lost a dear friend in 2019, with the passing of Shaun Johnstone.
We are deeply saddened for the loss of this quietly brilliant, lovely young man, and for the grief of his wife, Melissa, family Phil, Judy, Grace and Mark, and his wide circle of friends in the physics community and beyond.
Shaun was a brilliant physicist, with outstanding grades, awards and results through school, undergraduate and PhD studies: his thesis on Bose-Einstein condensates was described as ‘one of the best I’ve ever read’ by one reviewer. Only months before Shaun suddenly suffered a seizure, caused by a stage 3 lesion on the brain, his research in quantum turbulence was published in the leading journal Science.
We also remember Shaun’s generosity, both in giving back to his local community and family in Warrandyte, and equally evident in his worklife, for example in his support of the Monash undergrad physics community, optics society and the remarkable number of hours he spent in schools outreach on behalf of Monash and FLEET.
We saw and delighted in Shaun’s love for physics, which saw him frequently explaining concepts to students, family, friends and colleagues. (We know he would have loved, and found hilarious, the physics lessons in his memorial service at Monash University.)
Shaun’s clear, intuitive understanding of one such complex physics puzzle can be seen in his ‘negative-temperature’ video.
We remember his creativity, as evident in solving technical issues with experimental formation of quantum condensates as it was in beaming videos across the road to a friend’s share-house, ripping a laser out of an early Bluetooth player to use as a laser pointer, or in fitting a killer sound system to a billy-cart, aged nine.
We miss you Shaun.
Australian Postgraduate Award | Faculty of Science Dean’s Postgraduate Research Scholarship | J. L. William honours scholarship | Monash University Jubilee Honours Scholarship | Dean’s list fellow Chris Ash Prize Dean’s list fellow | Australian Vocational Student Prize | Premiers Award