EBE NEWSFACULTY OF ENGINEERING AND BUILT ENVIRONMENT

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EBE NEWSFACULTY OF ENGINEERING AND BUILT ENVIRONMENT

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Dr Moss has extensive leadership experience in industry and brings to the University great experience in chairing boards and a strong business and financial acumen. He graduated from the University of Newcastle with a Bachelor of Engineering degree (Hons) in mechanical engineering in 1968 and gained his doctorate in 1974 with a topic that investigated roof support in underground structures. I am very pleased that the university Council has shown the wisdom of appointing one of its own to this important role, and more so because he is a distinguished graduate of this Faculty and a member of the Faculty Advisory Board!I would like to take this opportunity to thank all my colleagues in the Faculty, including all our highly valued research students, for their support of the Faculty and all their hard work over the past 12 months. 2011 has been a year of significant change as well as significant achievement for the Faculty. I hope you enjoy reading about a selection of those achievements in this newsletter. May I also wish all our staff, students, alumni and supporters the compliments of the season.

Welcome to the latest issue of EBE News, in which you will find description of the some of the latest exciting achievements and events of the Faculty of Engineering and Built Environment.It is now almost trite to say that we live in a changing world. But nevertheless, that seems to be our lot. The university and the faculty have undergone some significant changes recently. We have a new vice-chancellor, with Professor Caroline McMillen taking over the reins from Professor Nicholas Saunders, who led the university through a significant period of change, including substantial growth in student numbers, over the past seven years, some of which occurred in our Faculty. Professor McMillen was welcomed to the Faculty at a recent function and captured the attention and imagination of our staff with an off-the-cuff speech that explained a little of her background and a vision of where she wished to lead the university. I had the pleasure of presenting her with a pink hard hat as a symbolic gesture of welcome and inclusion.Professor McMillen’s arrival is not the only change at the very top of our university’s leadership. Our Chancellor, Professor Trevor Waring, has announced that he will step down at the end of April 2012 after an illustrious period of leadership of the university’s governing body. Trevor can look back on a period of stability and great achievement by the university. He retires with the sincere thanks and best wishes of our Faculty and indeed the entire university community. The university announced recently that Trevor will be succeeded as Chancellor by Dr Ken Moss.

MESSAGE FROM PRO-VICE CHANCELLOR JOHN CARTER

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BRIGHT RESEARCH FUTUREFour mid-career and three emerging researchers from the University of Newcastle have secured significant funding from the Australian Research Council (ARC) to support their cutting-edge work. Four of the seven recipients were researchers from the Faculty of Engineering and Built Environment The ARC Future Fellowships scheme and the new Discovery Early Career Researcher Awards (DECRAs) acknowledges and provides support to Australia’s most promising young researchers.“The University is focused on attracting and retaining up-and-coming researchers and today’s funding supports those efforts,” said Professor Mark Jones, Acting Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research).Future Fellowships awarded to Faculty researchers are:• $700,000 to Dr Christopher Kellett from

the School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science for research into the emerging area of hybrid dynamical systems, including next generation electricity distribution networks.

• $625,000 to Dr Peter Ireland from the Centre for Multiphase Processes to develop a dry particle separation process based on triboelectric separation, a novel way to refine mineral ores without using water.

• $620,000 to Dr Sarah Johnson from the School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science to develop new error correction codes to underpin the success of next-generation communications technologies.

• Dr Lawrence Ong from the School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science was one of three recipients of a Discovery Early Career Researchers Award (DECRA’s) to develop new coding techniques to increase the data transmission speed of wireless networks. DECRAs provide $375,000 to researchers over the next three years.

AMAZING ARCHITECTS APPOINTED TO FACULTYNewcastle architecture students will have access to the best design minds in the country following the appointment of five leading Australian architects.The internationally-renowned architects behind a range of prestigious works have been enlisted as specialist mentors for students.The professional architects in residence are:• Laurence Nield (BVN Architecture) who

designed four successive Olympic villages in Sydney, Athens, Beijing and London.

• Kerry and Lindsay Clare (Directors, Architectus) who won the Australian Institute of Architects 2010 Gold Medal for the design of Brisbane’s Gallery of Modern Art.

• Peter Stutchbury, who has designed several Newcastle campus buildings, including the Birabahn Indigenous centre and the Design building.

• Richard Leplastrier, whoworked on the Sydney Opera House design and is known most recently for his environmentally sustainable designs, particularly his prolific use of wood.

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EBE NEWSFACULTY OF ENGINEERING AND BUILT ENVIRONMENT

SMART BUILDING DESIGN DELIVERS ITS OWN RESOURCESA $1.2 million facility, purpose-built to provide thousands of litres of rainwater for sophisticated water engineering research, has recently been opened at the University’s Callaghan campus.The extension to the University’s civil, surveying and environmental engineering space is one of two Australian Government funded buildings opened by the Minister for Tertiary Education, Senator Chris Evans.The second building – the Architecture and Built Environment workshop – is a $2 million state of the art facility that brings together engineering, architecture and industrial design students in a multi-disciplinary environment that is unique to the sector.Professor John Carter, Pro Vice-Chancellor of the Faculty of Engineering and Built Environment, said the new spaces provided engineering and built environment students and researchers with world class facilities.“Newcastle has a well established reputation for leading teaching practices and research in the areas of engineering and built environment,” he said. “We are one of only two universities in Australia that are rated ‘well above the world standard’ for civil engineering research under the Excellence in Research Australia (ERA) system.”Over the past five years, the University’s enrolments in undergraduate civil engineering have increased by approximately 50 per cent. There has been an even greater percentage

increase in construction management students over the same period and the Faculty’s number of PhD students has doubled.“These cutting edge facilities will fortify the University’s reputation in engineering and built environment, and help us to continue to draw students and researchers from across the world to study and work in Newcastle,” Professor Carter said. The extension was funded b the University and the Australian Government’s Better Universities Renewal Fund (BURF), while the workshop was in part funded by the Government’s Teaching and Learning Capital Fund.

NEW ERA FOR WATER MANAGEMENT AND RESEARCHWhat if the Hunter’s treated wastewater could be used to heat homes and office buildings?This and other concepts could become reality thanks to a new research partnership between Hunter Water and the University of Newcastle.The collaboration between the University’s Professor Geoffrey Evans and colleagues at Hunter Water is one of a range of projects established under a new Memorandum of Understanding.The MOU negotiated and signed by the University’s Newcastle Institute for Energy and Resources (NIER) provides opportunities to expand the University’s technical, social and environmental expertise in water management alongside Hunter Water.NIER Director Dr Alan Broadfoot said the MOU

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would deliver a significant research program and substantial benefits to the Hunter and beyond. “Together, we will focus on the areas of water quality, security of supply, and local and global environmental impacts, and increase the understanding of the social impact of urban water management.”Professor Evans, a chemical engineer, is working with Hunter Water to investigate the potential for heat to be harvested from the region’s wastewater system for use in residential and commercial buildings and sewerage treatment facilities. He has also participated in a project to better understand how Hunter Water uses energy in its wastewater treatment works.To address this, Professor Evans developed a new operating model that has delivered substantial reductions in power consumption without any loss in operational performance. The new model is being applied across all Hunter Water treatment plants.

FELLOWSHIP WINNER HAS EYE ON URBAN RENEWAL Lessons learned from a Brazilian city could be the key to revitalising Newcastle’s central business district. Natalie Cook, the 2011 winner of the Parker Fellowship for architecture students at the University of Newcastle, will spend six months in the city of Curitiba to study its urban renewal and sustainability projects.Curitiba has become world renowned for improvement of its urban landscape, earning it the Globe Sustainable City Award in 2010. The Brazilian city has applied a number of

innovative and sustainable public strategies to improve transport, industry and tourism. Natalie said she was looking forward to what she hoped would be a beneficial opportunity not only for herself but also for the city of Newcastle. “I’m really interested to see how the city has managed to succeed and I hope to bring that knowledge back with me and see how we can use their ideas in Newcastle. “I’m hoping I will be able to meet with architect Jaime Lerner who has played a major role in establishing the sustainability and renewal projects there.” The scholarship is named in honour of Eric Parker, who was the first permanent teacher of architecture at the University of Newcastle. The scholarship aims to inspire students to share his global view of architecture. The $10,000 scholarship is funded by the Architecture Foundation, a group of University of Newcastle architecture graduates. Chair Bob Donaldson said the group was looking forward to Natalie bringing back innovative ideas to renew Newcastle.

  Fellowship winner Natalie Cook will travel to Brazil

EBE NEWSFACULTY OF ENGINEERING AND BUILT ENVIRONMENT

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POSTGRADUATE POSTER PRIZEWINNERSThe winners of the 2011 Faculty of Engineering and Built Environment Postgraduate Research Prize have been announced.Winners in each of the eight, discipline-based categories will take home a $1000 cash prize and certificate to be awarded at the Newcastle University Postgraduate Student Association Dinner, November 4th.Entrants to the annual competition were required to submit a poster based on their research and answer questions from judges. Chanel Hopkinson, organiser and Faculty Research and Research Training Officer said, “The event helps students prepare to present their research at conferences here and overseas.”Each category was judged by two Faculty academics on the basis of originality and innovation, technical and intellectual difficulty, scope, depth, degree of contribution and overall presentation.“The Assessors were very impressed by the quality of all research posters entered and would like to thank all students who participated in presenting their work,” said Andrew Abbo, Assistant Dean Research Training.2011 Postgraduate Research Prize Winners:• Rongrong Yu (Architecture and Industrial

Design) for “Evaluating creativity in paramet-ric design environment.”

• Sharifah Syed Zakaria (Building) for “Behavioural Dimensions of Technology Adoption Decision Making: The Case of

Industrialised Building Systems (Ibs) in the Malaysian Construction Industry.”

• James Edward Dickinson (Chemical Engi-neering) for “Enhancing Foam-Liquid Seg-regation in Continuous Foam Fractionation using Multiple Parallel Inclined Channels.”

• Yousef Ansari (Civil Engineering) for “A Study on the Piezocone Interpretation Meth-ods for Hydraulic Conductivity of Clays.”

• AhmedShamsulArefin (Computer Science & Software Engineering) for “GPU-FS-kNN: A Fast and Scalable kNN Computation Tech-nique using GPU.”

• Rodrigo Carvajal (Electrical, Computer & Telecommunications Engineering) for “EM-based channel estimation in OFDM systems with phase noise.”

• Seyed Mohammad Mortazavi Naeini (En-vironmental Engineering and Surveying) for “Efficient Multi-Objective Ant Colony Optimi-zation for Computationally-Intensive Water Resources Systems Planning.”

• Christoph Veyhl (Mechanical and Mecha-tronics Engineering) for “Novel Numerical Analysis of Advanced Porous Composites.”

Ahmed Arefin, Postgraduate Research Prize Recipient

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WEIR WARMAN DESIGN AND BUILD COMPETITIONMechanical Engineering Design students Thomas Hudson, Tyler Plowright, Jon Littlewood and Brendon Walsh have won the 2011 National Finals of the prestigious Weir Warman Design and Build Competition.The competition is open to students in mechanical engineering who are in their first or second year of study. Campus heats are held as part of design engineering courses, with heat winners converging on the national final to determine the Asia-Pacific region’s best budding designers.This years challenge was to design, build and prove a prototype system in a laboratory environment that serves to transfer a payload of game balls on a track. The Newcastle team was one of only two teams in the national finals who completed both runs with perfect scores, and was awarded first place based on the quickest run time.Newcastle University Campus Organiser, A/Prof Craig Wheeler said, “The hybrid mechanical and mechatronics device developed by the Newcastle team utilised sonar sensors to guide the robot along the competition track and individual servo motors to pick and place the payload. While the device was one of the most technically complex designs at the finals, it performed very reliably and accurately.”The Warman Competition is an excellent example of problem based learning, where engineering students are involved in a highly creative, yet practical, design and build project in their second year of study.

WOMEN IN ENGINEERING GOLD COAST SITE VISITFrom 6th – 8th October 2011, 13 female students from a range of disciplines across the Faculty took part in a visit to the Gold Coast.Students toured Carlton Brewery at Yatala and attended the offices of Rapid Transit for a presentation on the Gold Coast Light Rail Project, after which they were taken to inspect a site along the route.The trip was a great opportunity for female engineering students to meet, create support networks, visit operational sites and gain industry insights, as well as develop a better understanding of how a major project works, how different disciplines are interconnected and how professionals from diverse disciplines work together to achieve project goals.“The Rapid Transit tour was particularly interesting,” said trip organiser Melanie D’Arbon. “The engineers discussed each stage of the process including compulsory acquisition of land, community consultation, traffic management, design and construction.”

 The winning team of the Weir Warman competition

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EBE NEWSFACULTY OF ENGINEERING AND BUILT ENVIRONMENT

AUTONOMOUS AIRCRAFT FLY TO THE FOREFRONTResearch underway at the Faculty of Engineering and Built Environment could someday improve the capabilities of autonomous aircraft, including their potential use in hazardous situations. Associate Professor, Tristan Perez, is working in collaboration with Boeing Research & Technology – Australia to improve autonomous aircraft technology. The initial focus is the development of a framework for quantifying the autonomy during design and qualification.“The research aims to measure the safety, reliability and effectiveness of autonomous aircraft,” he said. “As the level of autonomy in aircraft increases, a framework needs to be in place to ensure levels of safety that meet regulations,” he said.The number of applications for which autonomous aircraft can be used is growing significantly as the technology improves.“Unmanned aircraft systems are increasingly going to be part of the solution for niche applications where manned aircraft are unsuitable and although we have already

achieved so much in the industry, the best is yet to come. Studies show that unmanned aerial vehicles will continue to be the most dynamic growth sector of the aerospace industry worldwide.“Improving the abilities and safety of autonomous aircraft will lead to increased use,” he said.A/Professor Perez leads the area of mechatronics in the School of Engineering. Mechatronics is a young discipline that combines mechanical, electrical and software engineering to design and develop complex products.

PRO VICE-CHANCELLORS AWARD FOR RESEARCH EXCELLENCEThe Faculty is proud to announce the recipients of the 2011 Pro Vice-Chancellor’s Award for Research Excellence: Dr Maria Seron, Dr Olivier Buzzi, and Dr Alexandre Mendes.The award recognises the achievements of early and mid-career researchers. The recipients’ research reflects the quality and scope of research activities across the Faculty: Dr Mendes research focus is on optimization and data mining, with applications mainly in operations research and bioinformatics; Dr Buzzi is a Principal Researcher at the Centre for Geotechnical and Materials Modelling; and Dr Seron is a Program Leader for Control Systems Design in the Priority Research Centre for Complex Dynamic Systems and Control.

 Image source: http://www.futuretimeline.net/21stcentury/2040-2049.htm

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COMPUTATIONAL TOOLS TO ENRICH COAL MININGA research team from the University of Newcastle, including Dr. Alexandre Mendes, from the School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, were awarded an Australian Research Council Linkage grant. The project “Mathematics and Computing for Integrated Stockyard-centric Management of Mining Supply Chains” will run from 2012 to 2014 and develop new mathematical and computational tools to improve coal production, blending and transportation between Hunter region mines and the Newcastle Harbour.Academics and students from Computer Science, Software Engineering and

Mathematics will collaborate to maximize the value realised from blended products, and the efficiency with which they are delivered through the supply chain. Industrial partners in the project are QMastor, a software development company, and the Hunter Valley Coal Chain Coordinator, who oversees the coal transportation in the Hunter Region.This project will develop new mathematical and computational tools for operational stockyard and supply chain planning, to maximize the value realised from blended products, and the efficiency with which they are delivered through the supply chain.

COMBINING COMPUTER SCIENCE AND MEDICINEProfessor Pablo Moscato and Dr. Regina Berretta, from the School of Computer Science and Software Engineering, will join three researchers from the USA and Spain to study new mathematical models and algorithms for complex optimisation problems, which have pervasive applications throughout the fields of science and technology. For the five challenging problems under consideration, all in the area of Bioinformatics, the research will develop algorithms based on a combination of exact algorithms, integer programming, evolutionary computation methods and adaptive memory metaheuristics. The Australian Research Council Discovery project will run from 2012 to 2014 and involve academics and students from the Faculty’s Priority Research Centre for Bioinformatics, Biomarker Discovery and Information-Based Medicine

EBE NEWSFACULTY OF ENGINEERING AND BUILT ENVIRONMENT

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STUDENTS RECIEVE FIRE SAFETY SCIENCE AWARDSTwo research students from the Faculty have received awards at the 10th Fire Safety Symposium, held at the University of Maryland, US, in June 2011. The Fire Safety Symposia constitute the most prestigious gatherings of fire scientists internationally and have been organised triennially since 1985. Dr Kai Chen has received the IAFSS Best Thesis Award “Excellence in Research”, for the best Masters and PhD thesis in fire science submitted over the last three years. The International Association for Fire Safety Science offers three of these awards for each of the three geographical regions of its operation: Americas, Europe-Africa and Asia-Oceania. There have been 8 other nominations from Asia-Oceania, making this year’s competition particularly intense in our region. The Award includes a plaque and a US$2000 cash payment. Kai has graduated earlier this year and now holds a position of Research Engineer with Agilent in Shanghai.Ms Sindra Summoogum was presented a FORUM Student Travel Award for the best paper authored or co-authored by a student, and accepted for the Symposium, in the area of Fire Chemistry and Fire Toxicity. The Awards are sponsored by the International FORUM of Fire Research Directors. Four of these awards are presented every three years. The Award includes a plaque and a US$1,250 cash payment. Sindra is now in the final stages of her PhD with submission of her thesis expected by Nov 2011.

SMARTER POWER SUPPLY An Australian-first research centre will help electricity networks become greener and more efficient by maximising the benefits of smart grid intelligent electricity networks. The Centre of Intelligent Electricity Networks (CIEN) is built on a five-year collaboration between the University of Newcastle, the University of Sydney and Ausgrid.Chair of CIEN, Professor Joe Dong from the Faculty of Engineering and Built Environment at the University of Newcastle, said a key focus for the Centre was developing smart grids to best handle the renewable energy boom.“Australia is moving from a century-old network built for a one-way supply of electricity to an intelligent system that can manage the two-way movement of energy,” Professor Dong said.“CIEN is helping Ausgrid ensure smart grid systems are developed to best manage the rapidly expanding supply of renewable energy being fed into the grid by households.”

 Dr Kai Chen and Ms Sindra Summoogum

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EDUCATOR EXCELLENCELaureate Professor Graham Goodwin has been awarded the prestigious ACA Wook Hyun Kwon Education Award for the Asia-Oceania region. The award recognises teaching excellence and outstanding contributions in the field of control theory and applications.In selecting the recipient, the judging panel considers impact and influence of text books and teaching methodology, impact in educating a generation of students, influence on PhD students and creation or introduction of new teaching methods.Professor Goodwin is director of the University of Newcastle’s Priority Research Centre for Complex Dynamic Systems and Control, and has spent 37 years of his esteemed career at the University. This award adds to a vast number of professional accolades for Professor Goodwin, including the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Control Systems Field Award (the top award in this field in the world), the 2011 Asian Control Education Award and the 2010 Nordic Process Control Award.

FIRST YEAR FINALISTS DEVELOP SUSTAINABLE INDIAN TRANSPORTA team of first-year students from The University of Newcastle was selected as a finalist in the 2011 New South Wales Engineers Without Borders (EWB) Challenge.

The team was one of four groups nominated to submit their design projects for the annual competition from the Faculty’s ‘Introduction to Engineering Practice’ course. EWB judges then selected the group as one of three teams to present their work at the EWB Challenge NSW Showcase in Sydney on 21 November. Along with groups representing The University of Sydney and University of Wollongong, the team presented their innovative project aimed at supporting the development of a rural community in the Nadukuppam Panchayat area of Tamil Nadu, India.The team’s project, entitled ‘Nadukuppam Sustainable Transport Program,’ aimed to solve some of the community’s transportation problems by implementing a sustainable program that would provide new and re-used bicycles as well as a network of bicycle paths for residents of the region.After outstanding presentations by each of the teams, the group from The University of Sydney was selected to present their project at the National Finals.

 Back row: Cameron Burns, Brady Casey, Mitchell Clune,

David Caesar, Samuel Buttenshaw. Front row: Kelsie Clarke, GENG 1803 Coordinator Dr. James Hambleton.