Nonlinear Signal Processing: Optimisation and Tracking on Manifolds. Most hi-tech electronic devices must process signals. A mobile phone, for example, must encode, transmit, decode and receive voice signals. This project will use specialised mathematical theories applied in novel ways to advance the theoretical foundations of signal processing and develop better signal processing algorithms for practical applications. Companies with access to better signal processing algorithms have an edge ov ....Nonlinear Signal Processing: Optimisation and Tracking on Manifolds. Most hi-tech electronic devices must process signals. A mobile phone, for example, must encode, transmit, decode and receive voice signals. This project will use specialised mathematical theories applied in novel ways to advance the theoretical foundations of signal processing and develop better signal processing algorithms for practical applications. Companies with access to better signal processing algorithms have an edge over their competitors, and consumers benefit too from better and more advanced products.Read moreRead less
Vector quantization approaches to nonlinear stochastic estimation. Many problems in health, economics, telecommunications and industrial control can be formulated as estimation problems with uncertain data. This project is aimed at developing a novel class of algorithms aimed at high complexity estimation problems. If successful, the project will provide new approaches to these problems.
Cognitive Radars for Automobiles. Automobile radar systems are an important technology for improving road safety by providing advanced driver warnings in vehicles. Though such devices currently exist in practice there is no guarantee that they will operate successfully when deployed on a mass scale in every vehicle given the limited allocated frequency spectrum. The spectral interference due to radar access becomes a major issue when several radars operate in a confined bandwidth simultaneously, ....Cognitive Radars for Automobiles. Automobile radar systems are an important technology for improving road safety by providing advanced driver warnings in vehicles. Though such devices currently exist in practice there is no guarantee that they will operate successfully when deployed on a mass scale in every vehicle given the limited allocated frequency spectrum. The spectral interference due to radar access becomes a major issue when several radars operate in a confined bandwidth simultaneously, potentially leading to a complete system failure during mass deployment. This project will conduct fundamental research intended to enable dynamic spectrum accessing in automobile radars and redesign the radar systems in the form of sequence and waveform designs to suit requirements.Read moreRead less
Privately owned public space: noise cancellation over multiple regions. This project aims to advance fundamental research in active noise control over spatial regions. It has a broad range of industry applications, such as eliminating road and engine noise for multiple passengers inside car/airplane cabins, and creating individual quiet zones in a public environment. It will focus on developing new theories and techniques to generate multiple quiet zones in indoor/outdoor noisy environments with ....Privately owned public space: noise cancellation over multiple regions. This project aims to advance fundamental research in active noise control over spatial regions. It has a broad range of industry applications, such as eliminating road and engine noise for multiple passengers inside car/airplane cabins, and creating individual quiet zones in a public environment. It will focus on developing new theories and techniques to generate multiple quiet zones in indoor/outdoor noisy environments with performance prediction, robust control, and effective implementation. In many practical applications, especially in consumer electronics and medical instruments, the creation of quiet zones is desirable so that in a shared environment people can have their own audio space without physical isolation or using headphones, creating a healthy living and working environment.Read moreRead less
A Novel Inline High-Efficiency Motor/Pump System. Around 19% of the world’s and 30% of the Australia’s electric energy is consumed by pump technologies. Significant energy savings are possible if the major components of pump systems, including inverter, motor and pump, operate at their maximum possible efficiency under varying loads. A novel pump design in this project accommodates integrated electronics in a submersible housing. A seal-less design helps mitigate several aspects of pump failure ....A Novel Inline High-Efficiency Motor/Pump System. Around 19% of the world’s and 30% of the Australia’s electric energy is consumed by pump technologies. Significant energy savings are possible if the major components of pump systems, including inverter, motor and pump, operate at their maximum possible efficiency under varying loads. A novel pump design in this project accommodates integrated electronics in a submersible housing. A seal-less design helps mitigate several aspects of pump failure and its in-line structure reduces assembly cost. Accurately measured efficiency maps will be utilised to demonstrate the non-linear relationship between motor and pump quantities as well as developing models for indirectly estimating feedback quantities and achieving the highest system efficiency.Read moreRead less
Analysis and Design of Multi-objective Optimal Multirate Filter Banks. Multirate filter banks are a fundamental subsystem and play a key role in many applications in information technology, such as digital communications and digital audio and video signal processing. Most of the existing design methods of multirate filter banks are based on idealized operation conditions, so often they do not provide practically desirable performance. This project will develop innovative design methods for multi ....Analysis and Design of Multi-objective Optimal Multirate Filter Banks. Multirate filter banks are a fundamental subsystem and play a key role in many applications in information technology, such as digital communications and digital audio and video signal processing. Most of the existing design methods of multirate filter banks are based on idealized operation conditions, so often they do not provide practically desirable performance. This project will develop innovative design methods for multirate filter banks under the worst operational conditions and multiple conflicting design objectives. The results will fill in the gap between the theoretical design and the practical requirements to provide enhanced performance of systems using multirate filter banks.Read moreRead less
Spatial sound control for testing multi-channel audio devices. Spatial sound control for testing multi-channel audio devices. This project aims to test Alternative Listening Devices/Personal Sound Amplification Devices (PSAPs), multi-input audio devices fast replacing hearing aids due to their affordability and easy accessibility. With more consumers choosing PSAPs, proper testing is needed to assess the devices’ safety and benefit in real-life acoustic situations. This project will test PSAPs i ....Spatial sound control for testing multi-channel audio devices. Spatial sound control for testing multi-channel audio devices. This project aims to test Alternative Listening Devices/Personal Sound Amplification Devices (PSAPs), multi-input audio devices fast replacing hearing aids due to their affordability and easy accessibility. With more consumers choosing PSAPs, proper testing is needed to assess the devices’ safety and benefit in real-life acoustic situations. This project will test PSAPs in laboratory setups that use spatial audio processing techniques to mimic realistic acoustic environments, and develop theoretical frameworks to overcome existing limitations to accurate spatial sound reproduction. This research is expected to provide innovative solutions to safeguard Australia's future hearing health.Read moreRead less
Tooth-mic Devices for Monitoring the Efficacy of Home-based Continuous Positive Airway Pressure (CPAP) Technology. Over 800,000 Australians suffer from Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA). OSA patients use twice the health resources compared to healthy people. They are 7 times more likely to cause traffic accidents; in NSW up to 43000 accidents/year are due to OSA. OSA is treatable & consequences such as strokes, diabetes & heart attacks are preventable. The standard OSA treatment is home-based Contin ....Tooth-mic Devices for Monitoring the Efficacy of Home-based Continuous Positive Airway Pressure (CPAP) Technology. Over 800,000 Australians suffer from Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA). OSA patients use twice the health resources compared to healthy people. They are 7 times more likely to cause traffic accidents; in NSW up to 43000 accidents/year are due to OSA. OSA is treatable & consequences such as strokes, diabetes & heart attacks are preventable. The standard OSA treatment is home-based Continuous Positive Airway Pressure Therapy. Unfortunately, no effective technique exists to measure the efficacy of the treatment. We propose enabling solutions to this problem via developing technology centered on breathing sound analysis. The project proposes joint work with a US-company facilitating access to advanced technology highly beneficial to Australia.Read moreRead less
Non-contact Instrumentation for the Home Monitoring of Upper Airway Obstructions in Sleep. Over 800,000 Australians suffer from obstructive sleep apnoea costing billions of dollars annually to the nation. Obstructive sleep apnoea patients use twice the health resources compared to a normal person, and 7 times more likely to cause traffic accidents. In NSW alone up to 43000 accidents per year are due to obstructive sleep apnoea. Obstructive sleep apnoea is treatable and thus consequences such as ....Non-contact Instrumentation for the Home Monitoring of Upper Airway Obstructions in Sleep. Over 800,000 Australians suffer from obstructive sleep apnoea costing billions of dollars annually to the nation. Obstructive sleep apnoea patients use twice the health resources compared to a normal person, and 7 times more likely to cause traffic accidents. In NSW alone up to 43000 accidents per year are due to obstructive sleep apnoea. Obstructive sleep apnoea is treatable and thus consequences such as stroke and heart attacks are preventable. At present over 90% patients remain undiagnosed. Current diagnosis is expensive and requires hospitalization; no acceptable mass screening device exists. This project proposes an enabling technology for the population screening of obstructive sleep apnoea based on analysing snoring sounds. Outcomes of the project have the potential to revolutionize the diagnosis of obstructive sleep apnoea.Read moreRead less
Joint modelling and recognition of linguistic and paralinguistic speech information. A new modelling framework will be developed exploiting interdependence between linguistic and paralinguistic cues to improve automatic recognition of emotion-related information. Applications in the high-tech industry include automatic routing of angry telephone customers or pre-suicidal crisis centre callers to specialist operators/clinicians.