Eduardo Trifoni is the Director of the Space Test Program and Head of the National Space Test Facility, the largest space testing infrastructure in Australasia.

He is an Academic at the Research School of Astronomy and Astrophysics, Member of the Advanced Instrumentation & Technology Centre and InSpace Mission Specialist. At the College of Engineering, Computing and Cybernetics he supervises honours projects and has convened and taught "Engineering Thermodynamics".

Eduardo got his Master’s Degree summa cum laude in Mechanical Engineering in 1999 and joined ANU in 2019. He has 25 years of experience carrying out independent research in technology frontier fields from Experimental Aerothermodynamics to Hydrogen Energy, with major breakthroughs in hypersonic and space testing, PEM fuel cells and electrolyzers and a track record of over 90 publications and 4 international patents granted.

He dealt with the management, engineering, operations and maintenance of SCIROCCO 70 MW Plasma Wind Tunnel (PWT), the world's largest and most powerful space test facility for the simulation of the hypersonic entry phase of space vehicles. He has seen things you wouldn't believe. Thermal Protection Systems on fire at atmospheric pressure and snowfalls under vacuum. He has watched shockwaves glitter in the dark near the diffuser throat and meteorites melt at entry conditions.

Eduardo has been instrumental in the experimental development of many space vehicles capable of operating in Low Earth Orbit and withstanding the hypersonic entry phase, including nineteen spacecraft successfully sent into orbit in the last four years.

Working in hypersonics, he started to rethink the distances on our planet and no place seems too far away. He likes the sky, the water and the wildlife and he is a sincere advocate of an open society.