Robust Reformulation Methods. Many decision problems in engineering, business and economics are modeled as nonlinear continuous optimization problems. Often these are made difficult by the existence of constraints. In this project, we reformulate such problems as constrained nonsmooth equations, rather than optimization problems, and develop generalized Newton and quasi-Newton methods for solving them. The expected outcomes of this project include a systematic theory of reformulation methods, ....Robust Reformulation Methods. Many decision problems in engineering, business and economics are modeled as nonlinear continuous optimization problems. Often these are made difficult by the existence of constraints. In this project, we reformulate such problems as constrained nonsmooth equations, rather than optimization problems, and develop generalized Newton and quasi-Newton methods for solving them. The expected outcomes of this project include a systematic theory of reformulation methods, and robust and efficient algorithms for solving some important nonlinear continuous optimization problems. There is high potential for applications in engineering, business and finance.Read moreRead less
Efficient and Fair Traffic Control for a Multi-Service Internet. Australia relies very heavily on its
telecommunications infrastructure due to its
geographic dispersion. For the same reason,
it cannot afford to invest in inefficient infrastructure.
Our novel and practical Internet congestion control scheme will overcome current weaknesses in the Internet, and will enable the Australian telecommunication service industry to provide a better quality of service to the customers (including Aust ....Efficient and Fair Traffic Control for a Multi-Service Internet. Australia relies very heavily on its
telecommunications infrastructure due to its
geographic dispersion. For the same reason,
it cannot afford to invest in inefficient infrastructure.
Our novel and practical Internet congestion control scheme will overcome current weaknesses in the Internet, and will enable the Australian telecommunication service industry to provide a better quality of service to the customers (including Australian industries and rural communities) and at lower cost. This project will put Australia on the international stage as a leading contributor to Internet technology. We will provide training for PhD students and postdoctoral fellows in the important area of Internet traffic engineering and control.Read moreRead less
Driving Large Scale Live Internet Broadcasting of Streaming Video. Recent experience of Internet service providers has seen a booming market demand for live Internet broadcasting services. Live broadcasting of high-profile events, such as the Live Earth concerts in July 2007 by MSN, has drawn a global audience of the order of millions of viewers across the Internet. The technology developed in this project will drastically reduce Internet bandwidth consumption for provisioning such large-scale I ....Driving Large Scale Live Internet Broadcasting of Streaming Video. Recent experience of Internet service providers has seen a booming market demand for live Internet broadcasting services. Live broadcasting of high-profile events, such as the Live Earth concerts in July 2007 by MSN, has drawn a global audience of the order of millions of viewers across the Internet. The technology developed in this project will drastically reduce Internet bandwidth consumption for provisioning such large-scale Internet broadcasting services while meeting user satisfaction with guaranteed Quality of Service. It is crucial for Australia to invest in this frontier technology since Australian service providers rely on expensive Internet infrastructure to communicate with major data hubs in other continents.Read moreRead less
Porous beta-titanium bone implants optimised for strength and bio-compatibility: design and fabrication. The project aims to develop the scaffold-design and manufacturing techniques that will underpin the next generation of bone implants. The scaffolds will be specifically designed to match the key biomechanical properties of bone, and fabricated from novel titanium alloys using the latest generation of advanced manufacturing technologies.
Optimisation of piezoelectric metamaterials: Towards robotic stress sensors. This project aims to design new piezoelectric material microstructures that can enhance the measurement of complex local stress states within robotic limbs. The project expects to generate new knowledge of the achievable properties of multi-poled piezoelectric materials and develop computational tools for the analysis and structural optimisation of such materials. The designed microstructures may revolutionise piezoelec ....Optimisation of piezoelectric metamaterials: Towards robotic stress sensors. This project aims to design new piezoelectric material microstructures that can enhance the measurement of complex local stress states within robotic limbs. The project expects to generate new knowledge of the achievable properties of multi-poled piezoelectric materials and develop computational tools for the analysis and structural optimisation of such materials. The designed microstructures may revolutionise piezoelectric sensor technology. Expected outcomes include manufactured proof-of-concept sensors that enable measurement of local stress fields. This should provide significant benefits, such as improved future robot capability and reliability, and research training for next-generation Australian computational mathematicians. Read moreRead less
Computer Assisted Research Mathematics and its Applications. The mathematics community will benefit from infusion of new computer-assisted techniques and modalities for research and training post-graduate students, both from my pure research project and through development of an associated research centre. Ultimately, this should also help more school students learn mathematics well and so play a part in addressing Australia's skill shortage. Also, the work on optimization algorithms promises to ....Computer Assisted Research Mathematics and its Applications. The mathematics community will benefit from infusion of new computer-assisted techniques and modalities for research and training post-graduate students, both from my pure research project and through development of an associated research centre. Ultimately, this should also help more school students learn mathematics well and so play a part in addressing Australia's skill shortage. Also, the work on optimization algorithms promises to improve the performance and quality of many practical signal reconstruction methods. These are used by varied Australian industries from telecommunication to mining and by researchers in the digital arts and fields such as astronomy, physics, chemistry, bioscience, geoscience, engineering and medicine.Read moreRead less
Unlocking the potential for linear and discrete optimisation in knot theory and computational topology. Computational topology is a young, energetic field that uses computers to solve complex geometric problems, such as whether a loop of string is tangled. Such computations are becoming increasingly important in mathematics, and applications span biology, physics and information sciences, however many core problems in the field remain intractable for all but the simplest cases. This project unit ....Unlocking the potential for linear and discrete optimisation in knot theory and computational topology. Computational topology is a young, energetic field that uses computers to solve complex geometric problems, such as whether a loop of string is tangled. Such computations are becoming increasingly important in mathematics, and applications span biology, physics and information sciences, however many core problems in the field remain intractable for all but the simplest cases. This project unites geometric techniques with powerful methods from operations research, such as linear and discrete optimisation, to build fast, powerful tools that can for the first time systematically solve large topological problems. Theoretically, this project has significant impact on the famous open problem of detecting knottedness in fast polynomial time.Read moreRead less
Parallel and Distributed Machine Learning - Smart Data Analysis in the Multicore Era. In large data centres our research will lead to reduced energy consumption by using graphics cards which have a much better computation to power ratio than traditional processors. On desktop computers, it will make machine learning practical by enabling efficient algorithms for spam filtering and content analysis. On networked systems it will lead to distributed inference, caching and collaborative filtering ap ....Parallel and Distributed Machine Learning - Smart Data Analysis in the Multicore Era. In large data centres our research will lead to reduced energy consumption by using graphics cards which have a much better computation to power ratio than traditional processors. On desktop computers, it will make machine learning practical by enabling efficient algorithms for spam filtering and content analysis. On networked systems it will lead to distributed inference, caching and collaborative filtering applications which will both reduced the bandwidth required and make the internet safer for users. Finally, it will enable rapid deployment of sensor networks for monitoring and detection, such as for environmental monitoring and safeguarding Australia's borders.Read moreRead less
Stationarity and regularity in variational analysis with applications to optimization. This project will significantly develop the theoretical basis of variational analysis and optimization. Improving the understanding of regularity and stationarity issues in optimization theory will lead to major national benefits in increasing efficiencies and reducing costs in many fields of human endeavour on a national and international level.
Designing minimum-cost networks that are robust and avoid obstacles. The goal of this project is to construct a mathematical framework for the design of minimum-cost networks that are robust and avoid obstacles. Physical networks such as those required for communication, power and transportation are vital for our society, but are costly from economic and environmental viewpoints. There is a need for mathematical optimisation tools to design minimum-cost networks that take into account practical ....Designing minimum-cost networks that are robust and avoid obstacles. The goal of this project is to construct a mathematical framework for the design of minimum-cost networks that are robust and avoid obstacles. Physical networks such as those required for communication, power and transportation are vital for our society, but are costly from economic and environmental viewpoints. There is a need for mathematical optimisation tools to design minimum-cost networks that take into account practical considerations such as surviving local connectivity failures and avoiding pre-existing obstacles. These are recognised as mathematically challenging problems. Current approaches employ restrictive models that do not capture the flexibility of modern infrastructure networks. This project aims to develop geometric design methods using variable ‘Steiner points’, leading to fast algorithms for optimally solving these problems.Read moreRead less