Optimizing steel industry supply chains through constraint and market-oriented programming. Supply chain optimization is a difficult problem, but of considerable significance to business enterprises. Constraint programming technology is a promising approach to solving such problems, but is inadequate in the context of dynamic supply chains. Market-oriented programming solves resource allocation problems by setting up artificial computational economies of trading software agents and holds promise ....Optimizing steel industry supply chains through constraint and market-oriented programming. Supply chain optimization is a difficult problem, but of considerable significance to business enterprises. Constraint programming technology is a promising approach to solving such problems, but is inadequate in the context of dynamic supply chains. Market-oriented programming solves resource allocation problems by setting up artificial computational economies of trading software agents and holds promise both as an optimization tool and as a tool that supports explicit market negotiation. This project seeks to address several open questions relating to the integrated deployment of these two classes of techniques, in the context of building a practical supply chain optimization system for BHP Steel.Read moreRead less
Managing quality of experience delivery in new generation telecommunications networks with e-negotiation. New generation telecommunications networks are required to support increasingly demanding services, including interactive multimedia and conferencing. The success of these networks will rely on the users' perception of their quality of experience. The management of these networks will rely on the ability of informed decision making that competes effectively for limited resources in such a ....Managing quality of experience delivery in new generation telecommunications networks with e-negotiation. New generation telecommunications networks are required to support increasingly demanding services, including interactive multimedia and conferencing. The success of these networks will rely on the users' perception of their quality of experience. The management of these networks will rely on the ability of informed decision making that competes effectively for limited resources in such a highly dynamic environment. This project will design information distribution strategies and smart decision making agents that negotiate a user's quality of experience using market mechanisms. Designs from this project will be trialled and validated in the partner's commercial networks.Read moreRead less
Smart communications network management: Delivering bundled interdependent services across internetworked heterogeneous domains. Sophisticated communications network management (data, voice, video) is crucial to the global economy. The field is worth several billion dollars per annum. This project will generate expertise that addresses and solves an important problem in communications management, will enable Australia to use communications networks more effectively, and will advance communicatio ....Smart communications network management: Delivering bundled interdependent services across internetworked heterogeneous domains. Sophisticated communications network management (data, voice, video) is crucial to the global economy. The field is worth several billion dollars per annum. This project will generate expertise that addresses and solves an important problem in communications management, will enable Australia to use communications networks more effectively, and will advance communications technology. Read moreRead less
Integrated constraint-based planning and scheduling. Constraint programming is a relatively new technology based on artificial intellgence techniques that is becoming a popular tool for developing industrial optimisation solutions. While constraint programming has been used extensively for solving industrial scheduling problems, very little has been done in developing constraint-based integrated producting planning and scheduling systems. The size and complexity of typical production planning a ....Integrated constraint-based planning and scheduling. Constraint programming is a relatively new technology based on artificial intellgence techniques that is becoming a popular tool for developing industrial optimisation solutions. While constraint programming has been used extensively for solving industrial scheduling problems, very little has been done in developing constraint-based integrated producting planning and scheduling systems. The size and complexity of typical production planning and scheduling problems requires the innovative use of the latest developments in constraint programming technology, together with a variety of other artificial intelligence techniques. This project seeks to develop and implement a new conceptual framework for integrated constraint-based planning and scheduling, using BHP Steel as a test - bed.Read moreRead less
Visual methods for advanced automation of underwater manipulation. This project will increase the autonomy of underwater robotic systems engaged in intervention and inspection tasks. Such activities are essential for the operation of subsea robotic systems used in offshore industries, scientific exploration and defence. Our approach will improve perception and situational awareness through the principled fusion of multiple navigation and camera sensors. We will use this improved scene understand ....Visual methods for advanced automation of underwater manipulation. This project will increase the autonomy of underwater robotic systems engaged in intervention and inspection tasks. Such activities are essential for the operation of subsea robotic systems used in offshore industries, scientific exploration and defence. Our approach will improve perception and situational awareness through the principled fusion of multiple navigation and camera sensors. We will use this improved scene understanding to effectively plan the motion of vehicles and manipulators through larger and more complex workspaces, enabling semi-supervised and autonomous task execution. Our project will demonstrate these capabilities in real-world deployments relevant to industry and marine science.Read moreRead less
Learning Medical Image Knowledge. We aim to develop Machine Learning and Knowledge Acquisition techniques for automated recognition of features in medical images, and to provide decision support for diagnosis from medical images. The project is innovative in its use of layered learning, where the computer first learns to recognise low-level image features that are then used to learn more complex features. The project is also innovative in combining a variety of automatic learning methods, includ ....Learning Medical Image Knowledge. We aim to develop Machine Learning and Knowledge Acquisition techniques for automated recognition of features in medical images, and to provide decision support for diagnosis from medical images. The project is innovative in its use of layered learning, where the computer first learns to recognise low-level image features that are then used to learn more complex features. The project is also innovative in combining a variety of automatic learning methods, including relational learning, with human-assisted knowledge acquisition methods. The expected outcomes will be new techniques for image understanding, particularly for our test domain, namely, High Resolution Computed Tomography scans of the lung.Read moreRead less
Reconceiving Machine Learning. The proposed research will develop a new way to consider problems to which machine learning can be applied. Machine learning is crucial enabler of the digital economy. The research will provide better opportunities for Australian industry to gain a competitive advantage with machine learning technology. The framework developed will enable better opportunities for collaborative research and will build and strengthen international linkages.
A more intelligent knowledge-based system apprentice. Our previous techniques already had an impact on Australian industry, with five Australian companies marketing such technology, and for three of these it is a central technology. We expect an early uptake of the enhancements we propose by these companies, greatly increasing their international competitiveness against other rule technologies. Three of these companies are very recent, so we would expect other company uptake of the new enhance ....A more intelligent knowledge-based system apprentice. Our previous techniques already had an impact on Australian industry, with five Australian companies marketing such technology, and for three of these it is a central technology. We expect an early uptake of the enhancements we propose by these companies, greatly increasing their international competitiveness against other rule technologies. Three of these companies are very recent, so we would expect other company uptake of the new enhanced technology. In turn Australian companies using the technology will improve their competitiveness in an increasingly knowledge-based economy by being able to more rapidly and easily deploy knowledge-based systems. Our previous techniques have already had a significant impact in medical practice.Read moreRead less
Reasoning about Rational Agents from a Programming Languages Perspective. Rational agents are complex system components inspired by models of rationality, in which beliefs, desires and intentions are represented explicitly. Intelligent agents are fast becoming mainstream and have wide-ranging industrial application. However, a serious obstacle to the deployment of rational agents is a lack of understanding of how to design and reason about agents to provide performance and correctness guarantees ....Reasoning about Rational Agents from a Programming Languages Perspective. Rational agents are complex system components inspired by models of rationality, in which beliefs, desires and intentions are represented explicitly. Intelligent agents are fast becoming mainstream and have wide-ranging industrial application. However, a serious obstacle to the deployment of rational agents is a lack of understanding of how to design and reason about agents to provide performance and correctness guarantees. This project will investigate extensions to intelligent agent architectures and develop tools for reasoning about complex systems built using those architectures. This will not only enable reliable prediction of performance, but contribute to a general methodology for intelligent agent design.
Read moreRead less