Former University of Technology Sydney dean of science Dianne Jolley is accused of sending colleagues and herself fake threats after the university planned to cancel a Chinese medicine course.

Her lawyer Aaron Kernaghan on Tuesday told a Sydney court the brief of evidence for charges laid in January was yet to be served on the defence.

"The officer in charge (of the investigation) had an issue in signing for it," Mr Kernaghan told Downing Centre Local Court.

But the solicitor for the Director of Public Prosecutions the file was served the last time the matter was in court, only for it to be rejected.

The court file supported that version of events, magistrate Erin Kennedy said.

"There is no time for games," she told Mr Kernaghan.

"This is a serious matter."

The court heard the brief will be served again.

The case will now head to confidential, mandated negotiations before returning to court in late September.

The 50-year-old academic faces 17 charges of giving false information that a person was in danger between July 2019 and January 2020.

She's also accused of mailing three letters addressed to her and two other UTS staff last November that created the impression UTS employees were in danger.

Two further offences relate to alleged false reports causing a police investigation and the $157,000 UTS spent on security in response to the reports.

According to social media, Jolley left her post as UTS Dean of Science in March after joining in December 2018.

The environmental chemist was previously sat on the board of Science and Technology Australia and spent almost two decades at the University of Wollongong.

Australian Associated Press