Assessing absolute sustainability of global cities. The project aims to create a quantitative modelling framework for assessing the absolute sustainability of cities by combining global multi-region input-output analysis with the 'safe and just space' concept for human development. The model will allow assessment of the full supply chain environmental and social impacts of urban economic activities against biophysical planetary limits as well as social foundation thresholds defined in the litera ....Assessing absolute sustainability of global cities. The project aims to create a quantitative modelling framework for assessing the absolute sustainability of cities by combining global multi-region input-output analysis with the 'safe and just space' concept for human development. The model will allow assessment of the full supply chain environmental and social impacts of urban economic activities against biophysical planetary limits as well as social foundation thresholds defined in the literature. The project will advance sustainability science methodology and will greatly benefit worldwide initiatives for urban sustainability. Case studies on Australian cities will assess where interventions can be most practically, realistically and effectively implemented.Read moreRead less
Architecture and industry: the migrant contribution to nation-building. This project aims to explore the post-war architectural, rural and industrial landscapes of Australia as shaped by the labour of displaced persons. Migrants after the Second World War were critical to the spatial making of modern Australia. Major federally-funded industries driving post-war nation-building programs depended on the employment of large numbers of war-displaced persons. While the immigrant contribution to natio ....Architecture and industry: the migrant contribution to nation-building. This project aims to explore the post-war architectural, rural and industrial landscapes of Australia as shaped by the labour of displaced persons. Migrants after the Second World War were critical to the spatial making of modern Australia. Major federally-funded industries driving post-war nation-building programs depended on the employment of large numbers of war-displaced persons. While the immigrant contribution to nation-building in cultural terms is well-known, its everyday spatial, architectural and landscape transformations remain unexamined. This project aims to bring to the foreground post-war industry and immigration to comprehensively document a how Australia has uniquely shaped its built environment.Read moreRead less
The impact of work-from-home environments on comfort and productivity. This project aims to quantify the effect of indoor environmental quality (IEQ) in work-from-home (WFH) settings on worker comfort, productivity and household energy use, by employing a longitudinal field monitoring approach. This project expects to generate new knowledge that will inform current indoor environment standards and regulations to make them more relevant to our “new WFH normal”. Quantifying the impact of decentral ....The impact of work-from-home environments on comfort and productivity. This project aims to quantify the effect of indoor environmental quality (IEQ) in work-from-home (WFH) settings on worker comfort, productivity and household energy use, by employing a longitudinal field monitoring approach. This project expects to generate new knowledge that will inform current indoor environment standards and regulations to make them more relevant to our “new WFH normal”. Quantifying the impact of decentralised workforces on shifting energy usage between sectors can also help in the formulation of relevant energy efficiency policies and building codes. The project will provide significant benefits such as enhancing the quality of work-life of workers and enabling better management of residential energy use.Read moreRead less
Planet Chicken: Chemical Entanglements in Asia's Poultry Boom . This project aims to study the effects of Asia’s rapidly expanding chicken meat industry on environmental degradation, social inequality, public health and animal welfare. Agricultural chemicals and veterinary drugs saturate this industry, with little regulation or data on types, quantities and applications. Deploying interdisciplinary methods at key nodes of the chicken value chain in India, Thailand and Vietnam, this study will 1) ....Planet Chicken: Chemical Entanglements in Asia's Poultry Boom . This project aims to study the effects of Asia’s rapidly expanding chicken meat industry on environmental degradation, social inequality, public health and animal welfare. Agricultural chemicals and veterinary drugs saturate this industry, with little regulation or data on types, quantities and applications. Deploying interdisciplinary methods at key nodes of the chicken value chain in India, Thailand and Vietnam, this study will 1) examine practices and market structures that shape chemical use and 2) uncover chemical presence and socio-ecological impacts. The project intends to expose how toxicity, biodiversity, and health interact with global food systems and to propose interventions for effective governance of factory farming in Asia.Read moreRead less
Parametric VR: An Interactive Virtual Reality System for Parametric Design. This project aims to create a new and intuitive set of user interactions for Virtual Reality (VR) to support parametric designers in architecture and design. Parametric tools are an emerging design technology dominating contemporary practices, yet their interfaces are on traditional desktop computers while VR is only employed to visualise the geometric models produced by the end design. This project will generate Paramet ....Parametric VR: An Interactive Virtual Reality System for Parametric Design. This project aims to create a new and intuitive set of user interactions for Virtual Reality (VR) to support parametric designers in architecture and design. Parametric tools are an emerging design technology dominating contemporary practices, yet their interfaces are on traditional desktop computers while VR is only employed to visualise the geometric models produced by the end design. This project will generate Parametric VR, a system of VR tools to support parametric design. Key outcomes include software tools and demonstrators to support parametric algorithms and processes in VR. This will have significant benefits for design industries, allowing designers to directly edit parametric design entirely in VR across the project lifecycle.Read moreRead less
The future of forests under climatic stress. This project aims to measure the vulnerability of forest trees to more extreme drought as global temperatures inevitably rise. Australian forests face the immediate threat of increased mortality associated with intensifying drought stress in the future. Understanding the magnitude of this threat is of the utmost urgency. This project aims to predict future mortality of forest communities in Australia and worldwide using recent breakthroughs enabling t ....The future of forests under climatic stress. This project aims to measure the vulnerability of forest trees to more extreme drought as global temperatures inevitably rise. Australian forests face the immediate threat of increased mortality associated with intensifying drought stress in the future. Understanding the magnitude of this threat is of the utmost urgency. This project aims to predict future mortality of forest communities in Australia and worldwide using recent breakthroughs enabling the rapid quantification of lethal stress in trees. This new understanding will provide a basis upon which to make far-reaching decisions about land management, conservation and restoration.Read moreRead less
Nature futures: mapping pathways to prosperity for people and nature. Population growth, consumption and trade are direct socio-economic drivers of land use change and climate change, which determine where species can persist. The UN Sustainable Development Goals and national policies acknowledge the dependence of people on nature and the impact of socio-economic drivers on nature. However, few analyses of impacts on nature explicitly incorporate socio-economic drivers. Utilising a novel modelli ....Nature futures: mapping pathways to prosperity for people and nature. Population growth, consumption and trade are direct socio-economic drivers of land use change and climate change, which determine where species can persist. The UN Sustainable Development Goals and national policies acknowledge the dependence of people on nature and the impact of socio-economic drivers on nature. However, few analyses of impacts on nature explicitly incorporate socio-economic drivers. Utilising a novel modelling framework and high-performance computing we will integrate economic, land use and biodiversity models to evaluate: (i) policies and incentives for increasing national vegetation cover for carbon sequestration and habitat, and (ii) global risks to nature posed by land use change under future geopolitical scenarios.Read moreRead less