When Suzie Reichman was a little girl, she loved bugs. One day at school holiday program, the kids got to meet a bug expert who taught them how to make their own ant farms. It was easy. You got a jar and half-filled it with dirt.

Then found an ant mound – a little rise of dirt with a hole in the middle. Then you dug a small shovel-full of dirt, making sure to get some ants and eggs and hopefully a bigger queen ant as well. You put the ant-dirt into the jar and covered it with paper poked with pin-prick holes too small for the ants to climb through. The expert told the kids to wrap the jar with black paper so that the ants would feel like they were underground in the dark.

Even though they’re tiny, ants can eat grasshoppers! Suzie would search her garden for grasshoppers and find one for her ants. She was amazed at how the ants all worked together to make the grasshopper into dinner. When she peeled back the black paper from around the jar, she could see all the tiny burrows the ants had made in the soil. She also watched the ants develop from eggs to pupae to grown-up ants.

One day at school, something weird happened. Melbourne had been in the grip of a severe drought and a dust-storm blew in over the city. The skies turned a hazy pink and the kids were scared. Luckily, Suzie’s teacher sat the class down and explained what happened. Drought conditions had dried the landscape and turned fields to dust. Suzie listened in wonder. The spooky eerie haze outside the classroom had a scientific explanation. That day in the mist of dust, Suzie understood how important it was to look after the land, especially soil.

When she was 11, Suzie’s interest moved from bugs to growing things in the garden. Her mum and dad gave her a space in the backyard to experiment. Suzie started with herbs. They’re easy to grow if you plant them in good soil and water them. Suzie was a curious child. She began to wonder about how herbs could be used in medicines and cooking. In the days before internet and Google, Suzie went to her local library and borrowed books to help her.

If she couldn’t find what she was looking for at the library, her dad loved buying her books. Through reading, Suzie learnt how to make hand lotions out of herbs. She also loved using herbs in cooking, and realised that cooking is kind of like a science experiment. You take a list of ingredients, measure them, and mix them together, then see what happens.

Suzie came from a science family. Her dad was a chemical engineer and her mum was a biochemist. When it was time to go to university, she knew she too wanted to study something in the scientific world. She settled on environmental science and was drawn towards soil – that day back in the classroom had made a big impression on her.

At first, she researched mining. Like all of us, Suzie had seen photos of huge mines cut into the landscape. But what happens to the earth when the mining finishes? Are there chemicals in the soil leftover from mining that might be bad for planting trees? Suzie wanted to try and answer these questions. Because if scientists knew the best trees to plant, then that knowledge could be used to help turn mines back into the landscape. Suzie wrote a paper that won a prize and was published all around the world so that everyone could share the knowledge from her research.

When Suzie chooses projects to research, she really wants to make a difference. In the days before the laws regulated pollution, people could dump all sorts of chemicals into the ground.

She’s a city girl at heart, so now, her interest is looking at soil pollution in urban areas and keeping people, plants and animals safe from pollution.

So, if people have a veggie garden or keep chickens in their yard, Suzie’s research wants to find out how these might affect vegetables.

From a little girl with an ant farm and a herb garden, Suzie is now an Associate Professor at the University of Melbourne and the Director of the Centre for Anthropogenic Pollution Impact and Management (CAPIM).

Associate Professor Suzie Reichman says, ‘Pollution is unfortunately all around us.’ She suggests putting this to the forefront of our thinking and everyday, look around your world and wonder how you could make a difference to this today.

• Could you leave ten minutes earlier and walk to school instead of getting a lift?
• Could you carry reusable shopping bags to reduce the need for plastic bags?

Suzie suggests that people begin in the home. Reduce rubbish and recycle and repurpose. We can all do our bit to reduce the pollution on our planet and make it a healthier and safer place.

And of course, you could always try making an ant farm.