CQUniversity has been praised for showing chutzpah, setting the bar high and 'strutting its stuff', in a week where it is staging more than 100 ResearchExpo events across more than 10 locations...

Federal Member for Capricornia Kirsten Livermore addressed the Expo launch, praising the University for sending a signal about change and promising more to come by "heralding a new direction and a new future".

MP Kirsten Livermore at the launch .... ABC Radio's Jacquie Mackay featured a range of CQUniversity staff members during ResearchExpo, including Professor Scott Bowman and Dr Alison Jones (both pictured)

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Showcasing current research in the School of Humanities and Communication were L-R Dr Mike Danaher (Flying Foxes); Associate Professor Steve Mullins (Goldie in New Guinea); Associate Professor Errol Vieth (Dispute resolution); Kate Ames (Regional Radio); Professor Denis Cryle (Globalisation and the media) and Dr Barbara Webster (Gladstone power station).

Ms Livermore agreed it is important to invite the community to consider what is happening, how they can contribute to research and how they can use knowledge to grow their own endeavours.

She said a lot has happened in the 20 years since CQUniversity first set out its research ambitions by allocating $250,000 towards water resources, timber and wood products and bulk materials. The scale of finance involved had since grown greatly and there was now a much wider scope for identified research strengths.

"We can see when a University sets bold ambitions it can certainly make good on those claims. I'm confident the Uni is up to the challenge," she said.

Ms Livermore said CQUniversity was right to be ambitious about its research capability and its research agenda.

"The Federal Government is setting out a challenge to all universities in its higher education reform framework which has research at the very heart of what it is to be a university and at the heart of a university's mission. That's a challenge but it's one that CQUni is stepping up to," she said.

The federal MP said her colleagues in Canberra have been wanting to gauge "whether CQUniversity 'gets it' in terms of the environment it is operating in and what is going to be required of it in the new higher education framework".

Queensland Chief Scientist Professor Peter Andrews AO was a guest speaker for a formal lunch during ResearchExpo

"Today's ResearchExpo says an emphatic 'yes' to that question and I am already taking back to Canberra that the Uni definitely 'gets it'.

"The question is then whether my colleagues and the policy makers in Canberra 'get it' as to how important the University is to Central Queensland and our ambitions as a region, how important to the aspirations and opportunities of individuals in the region and what the University has to contribute to the region and to Australia.

"I look forward to working with the Vice-Chancellor and his whole team to make good on the University's ambitions and to make sure there are the partnerships at community, industry and national levels to realise this ambitious agenda. Today is a strong signal that future is bright and the future starts now."

Meanwhile, Vice-Chancellor Professor Scott Bowman commented that the Expo illustrated the University's "power of place where our region and our communities are the petri dishes and test tubes that we use in our research".

Professor Bowman said he was constantly amazed at what there was to find when he poked his head around doors on campus, with diverse projects including vaccines and genetics, metal forensics, toad abnormalities, sugar subsitutes, regional economics and the local effects of climate change.

"We have world-class researchers and all our work is of very high standard. It's time we started talking more about it as it is fundamentally important."