Vision Model Based Perceptual Digital Video Coding. Digital video coding and compression is an enabling technology and has diversified applications in audiovisual communications, multimedia computing, digital television broadcast and electronic entertainment industries. The project aims at spearheading research in theory, techniques and implementation of perceptual video coding in order to achieve constant and guaranteed quality in visual communications and services. It will explore a new appr ....Vision Model Based Perceptual Digital Video Coding. Digital video coding and compression is an enabling technology and has diversified applications in audiovisual communications, multimedia computing, digital television broadcast and electronic entertainment industries. The project aims at spearheading research in theory, techniques and implementation of perceptual video coding in order to achieve constant and guaranteed quality in visual communications and services. It will explore a new approach to digital video coding other than the constant bit rate coding techniques which have dominated digital video research for the past four decades. It will form a part of the theoretical foundation and principles for the next generation video coding and compression techniques, and may lead to new standards and practice.Read moreRead less
Identifying Malingered Posttraumatic Stress Disorder: Biological Markers for Legal Assessment. Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is the most common psychiatric disorder that is claimed in compensation claims in Australia. There are currently no reliable means to distinguish malingered from genuine PTSD. This project aims to develop the most accurate means of identifying malingered PTSD by using the most recent technology to index biological responses, including fMRI, in participants with PT ....Identifying Malingered Posttraumatic Stress Disorder: Biological Markers for Legal Assessment. Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is the most common psychiatric disorder that is claimed in compensation claims in Australia. There are currently no reliable means to distinguish malingered from genuine PTSD. This project aims to develop the most accurate means of identifying malingered PTSD by using the most recent technology to index biological responses, including fMRI, in participants with PTSD, without PTSD, and malingered PTSD. This study will lead to a biological assessment that can objectively index PTSD and be resistant to intentional feigning. These data will significantly enhance legal assessments of PTSD and facilitate compensation resolution.Read moreRead less
Development of an Integrated Platform for Performance-Based Safety Assessment. Building fires are the cause of major fatalities and injuries amongst all types of accidental fires in Australia. With significant advancement in numerical simulation technique, computer models are becoming acceptable tools for fire safety designs. Nonetheless, these methods still suffer from large amount of manual inputs and lengthy computational times. This research project will address the prevalent deficiency in m ....Development of an Integrated Platform for Performance-Based Safety Assessment. Building fires are the cause of major fatalities and injuries amongst all types of accidental fires in Australia. With significant advancement in numerical simulation technique, computer models are becoming acceptable tools for fire safety designs. Nonetheless, these methods still suffer from large amount of manual inputs and lengthy computational times. This research project will address the prevalent deficiency in many of these computer models and develop a novel and innovative design methodology. The success of this project will revolutionize the computational tools for the industry realizing a convenient, robust and time-saving integrated platform catering for increasing future market demand.Read moreRead less
Computational Intelligence for Complex Structured Data. This project aims to use computational intelligence techniques to reliably learn adaptive natural human pointing and gestures to control an interface on a pseudo-3D display. Highly complex data with interconnections between elements is hard to visualise on screens. Most current tools are operated using point/click/drag on 2D screens. The physical technology to capture appropriate human behaviours exists already, but not the adaptive learnin ....Computational Intelligence for Complex Structured Data. This project aims to use computational intelligence techniques to reliably learn adaptive natural human pointing and gestures to control an interface on a pseudo-3D display. Highly complex data with interconnections between elements is hard to visualise on screens. Most current tools are operated using point/click/drag on 2D screens. The physical technology to capture appropriate human behaviours exists already, but not the adaptive learning of the syntax and semantics of individual gestures and actions, nor the multi-gesture information fusion required for understanding, which could significantly enhance efficiency, for example, in sorting through named entities in an investigation. All of this is done naturally by most human beings, using biological neural networks.Read moreRead less
Collaborative Sensing and Learning for Maritime Situational Awareness. We aim to demonstrate coordinated autonomous sensing of naval assets in dynamic maritime environments, reducing the operational load required to deliver a high quality maritime situational awareness. A realistic simulation based approach will help us develop novel artificial intelligence technology including: self-adaptive strategies for dynamic asset allocation, embedded smart sensing capabilities for naval observation syste ....Collaborative Sensing and Learning for Maritime Situational Awareness. We aim to demonstrate coordinated autonomous sensing of naval assets in dynamic maritime environments, reducing the operational load required to deliver a high quality maritime situational awareness. A realistic simulation based approach will help us develop novel artificial intelligence technology including: self-adaptive strategies for dynamic asset allocation, embedded smart sensing capabilities for naval observation systems and novel approaches to continuous collaborative learning from multi-spectral media. In addition to the emerging partnership between participants, the project will advance sovereign capability to develop maritime intelligence gathering technology for the Royal Australian Navy to underpin stability in our region. Read moreRead less
Investigating the effectiveness of teacher education for early career teachers in diverse settings: a longitudinal study. This project investigates the effectiveness of teacher education programs in Victoria and Queensland in preparing teachers for the variety of school settings in which they begin their careers. The findings will inform state and national policy, as well as the work of professional regulation authorities and teacher education providers.
Intercultural understanding in primary and secondary schools. What facilitates or impedes intercultural understanding in children, adolescents and schools? How can this be addressed? How can we know what makes a difference? This project answers these questions at the individual, school and national level using a novel cultural systems approach and methodological and technological innovations.
Supporting teachers and teaching in flexible and non-traditional schools . This project aims to address a critical gap in knowledge about the experiences and conditions of people who teach in flexible and non-traditional schools in Australia. These schools provide a second chance at education for young people with challenging behaviours and/or learning problems. This project expects to generate new knowledge about the experiences and needs of these teachers, using a combination of in-depth resea ....Supporting teachers and teaching in flexible and non-traditional schools . This project aims to address a critical gap in knowledge about the experiences and conditions of people who teach in flexible and non-traditional schools in Australia. These schools provide a second chance at education for young people with challenging behaviours and/or learning problems. This project expects to generate new knowledge about the experiences and needs of these teachers, using a combination of in-depth research methods. Expected outcomes include detailed understanding of support needs for this workforce. This will significantly benefit teachers, sponsors and principals through recommendations on best practice management of this important work, along with evidence-based training artefacts for staff recruitment and retention.
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Would more highly-qualified teachers and trainers help to address quality problems in the Australian vocational education and training system? This project examines whether and how higher-level qualifications for vocational education and training (VET) teachers would improve quality in the VET system. Government documents and public commentary indicate that the VET sector suffers from some fairly serious quality problems. This is significant because VET provides training that underpins all Austr ....Would more highly-qualified teachers and trainers help to address quality problems in the Australian vocational education and training system? This project examines whether and how higher-level qualifications for vocational education and training (VET) teachers would improve quality in the VET system. Government documents and public commentary indicate that the VET sector suffers from some fairly serious quality problems. This is significant because VET provides training that underpins all Australian industries. Most VET teachers are qualified only to a Certificate IV level. A more highly qualified VET teaching workforce is likely to lead to improvements in quality; however there is currently no firm evidence to establish this link, as the 2011 Productivity Commission report on the VET workforce pointed out. This project aims to provide much-needed evidence to guide policy.Read moreRead less
Understanding biological pathways underlying social behaviour in humans. This project aims to show for the first time how oxytocin interacts with neural social and reward pathways to guide social behaviour. Oxytocin is a natural neuropeptide and hormone that has a critical role in the regulation of social behaviour across mammalian species. In animals, direct evidence demonstrates how endogenous and exogenous oxytocin interacts with social and reward neural pathways to alter social behaviour, in ....Understanding biological pathways underlying social behaviour in humans. This project aims to show for the first time how oxytocin interacts with neural social and reward pathways to guide social behaviour. Oxytocin is a natural neuropeptide and hormone that has a critical role in the regulation of social behaviour across mammalian species. In animals, direct evidence demonstrates how endogenous and exogenous oxytocin interacts with social and reward neural pathways to alter social behaviour, including social recognition, relationship formation, and long-term bonds. The project intends to use radio-labelling techniques in combination with positron emission tomography to track oxytocin and show what regions of the brain oxytocin impacts to then influence social cognition and behaviour in humans.Read moreRead less