Making human place knowledge digestible by computers. This project aims to develop the tools that will enable people to interact intuitively with computers about places and the relations between places. People understand their environment in a different way to computers; they think of places and their relations, while computers use coordinates and maps. People’s interaction with maps is cognitively costly and error-prone, which is becoming untenable in situations needing time-critical decision m ....Making human place knowledge digestible by computers. This project aims to develop the tools that will enable people to interact intuitively with computers about places and the relations between places. People understand their environment in a different way to computers; they think of places and their relations, while computers use coordinates and maps. People’s interaction with maps is cognitively costly and error-prone, which is becoming untenable in situations needing time-critical decision making. The project will revolutionise the design of information services where computers deal with humans and location in time-critical or stressful situations, including emergency calls, disaster response and local search queries. The uptake of this design by industry will lead to economic benefits as well as a safer society living in a smarter environment.Read moreRead less
MoistureMonitor: A multi-mission soil moisture monitoring system for a water limited future. A long-term soil moisture record for Australia is critical to understanding climate change feedback mechanisms and their impacts on water management. This project will validate, downscale and harmonise soil moisture retrievals from three satellite missions across this decade, each using a new and different low resolution antenna technology and interpretation approach. Moisture Monitor, the framework to d ....MoistureMonitor: A multi-mission soil moisture monitoring system for a water limited future. A long-term soil moisture record for Australia is critical to understanding climate change feedback mechanisms and their impacts on water management. This project will validate, downscale and harmonise soil moisture retrievals from three satellite missions across this decade, each using a new and different low resolution antenna technology and interpretation approach. Moisture Monitor, the framework to deliver this soil moisture record, will be verified using airborne campaigns and hydrological monitoring infrastructure in the Murrumbidgee catchment. Important outcomes will be validation of a new soil moisture satellite and development of a high resolution soil moisture product for improved land and water management and policy for Australia.Read moreRead less
Towards an Active and Passive L- and P-band soil moisture satellite mission. This project tests alternate configurations for remote sensing of soil moisture using a new state-of-the-art Active/Passive (ie radar/radiometer) P-/L-band (ie microwave) satellite concept through a series of airborne field experiments. Timely soil moisture information is critical to improved water management for food production in the face of climate variability. The challenge is to do this accurately over large areas ....Towards an Active and Passive L- and P-band soil moisture satellite mission. This project tests alternate configurations for remote sensing of soil moisture using a new state-of-the-art Active/Passive (ie radar/radiometer) P-/L-band (ie microwave) satellite concept through a series of airborne field experiments. Timely soil moisture information is critical to improved water management for food production in the face of climate variability. The challenge is to do this accurately over large areas with an appropriate spatio-temporal detail, and for a soil depth that closely approximates the layer which impacts crop/pasture growth and influences management decisions. The longer P-band allows deeper penetration into the soil while the active/passive combination uses the respective resolution and accuracy characteristics.Read moreRead less
DESIGNING LAND ADMINISTRATION SYSTEMS TO SUPPORT MODERN LAND MARKETS. Economies require successful land markets to generate wealth. Our land administration systems are expensive but essential infrastructure for land markets. However, since they were designed 150 years ago, the market has invented complex commodities: time shares, unit and property trusts, financial instruments, mortgage backed certificates, insurance products, options, corporate development instruments, vertical villages, and ....DESIGNING LAND ADMINISTRATION SYSTEMS TO SUPPORT MODERN LAND MARKETS. Economies require successful land markets to generate wealth. Our land administration systems are expensive but essential infrastructure for land markets. However, since they were designed 150 years ago, the market has invented complex commodities: time shares, unit and property trusts, financial instruments, mortgage backed certificates, insurance products, options, corporate development instruments, vertical villages, and more. The project will explain how modern land markets evolved and how land administration systems can be adapted to provide more efficient land trading and better support for trading in new complex commodities. Read moreRead less
P-band soil moisture sensing from space. This project aims to develop radiative transfer models to demonstrate that a P-band radiometer capability can remotely sense the top ~15cm layer of soil moisture, through a series of tower and airborne field experiments. Timely soil moisture information on this near-surface layer is critical to improved water management for food production in the face of extreme climate variability. Current satellite technologies are limited to the top ~5cm layer of soil ....P-band soil moisture sensing from space. This project aims to develop radiative transfer models to demonstrate that a P-band radiometer capability can remotely sense the top ~15cm layer of soil moisture, through a series of tower and airborne field experiments. Timely soil moisture information on this near-surface layer is critical to improved water management for food production in the face of extreme climate variability. Current satellite technologies are limited to the top ~5cm layer of soil using an L-band radiometer. This project is expected to give farmers the soil moisture data they need to optimise their available water resources to maximise food productionRead moreRead less
From environmental monitoring to management: extracting knowledge about environmental events from sensor data. New, high-detail sources of environmental sensor data are useless without new methods for identifying patterns and extracting knowledge from that data. This project will develop improved techniques for interacting with environmental sensor data to assist environmental scientists and manager in understand the important events that are occurring.
Intelligent Self-Organizing Transport. The project aims to develop smart transport solutions for Australia's sprawling mega-cities with their complex challenges to provide mobility and equitable access, and with their susceptibility to failure in cases of disasters. In particular, the project will develop software establishing intelligent and self-organizing transport management in urban environments. The project has potential to increase the mobility of citizens, even in low-density suburbs, by ....Intelligent Self-Organizing Transport. The project aims to develop smart transport solutions for Australia's sprawling mega-cities with their complex challenges to provide mobility and equitable access, and with their susceptibility to failure in cases of disasters. In particular, the project will develop software establishing intelligent and self-organizing transport management in urban environments. The project has potential to increase the mobility of citizens, even in low-density suburbs, by reducing the desire for individual car traffic at the same time. Since a self-organizing transport management works ad-hoc, it can be deployed also in devastated areas, e.g., after disasters.Read moreRead less
Remote sensing of biotic stress with hyperspectral-fluorescence imaging. This project aims to investigate new indicators of crop biotic stress using innovative airborne remote sensing and imaging spectroscopy for biosecurity applications. Current satellites used to monitor crops and forests do not meet the spectral and spatial details that are required for the early -previsual- detection of biotic and abiotic stress. Accordingly, this project's significance focuses on new insights to detect the ....Remote sensing of biotic stress with hyperspectral-fluorescence imaging. This project aims to investigate new indicators of crop biotic stress using innovative airborne remote sensing and imaging spectroscopy for biosecurity applications. Current satellites used to monitor crops and forests do not meet the spectral and spatial details that are required for the early -previsual- detection of biotic and abiotic stress. Accordingly, this project's significance focuses on new insights to detect the alteration of photosynthetic indicators of plant functioning, building on recent breakthroughs with airborne hyperspectral imaging and remote sensing technologies. The outcomes will provide significant benefits to Australia in the detection of harmful diseases and improved water and nutrient monitoring methods.Read moreRead less
Quantifying Uncertainty in Predictions of Global Change. This project will develop and apply quantitative risk management models to assess whether data sources used in the predictions of global changes, in: (i) land use and land cover; (ii) biodiversity; and (iii) carbon emissions, are adequate. It will focus on the issues of data accuracy, scale and temporal resolution in order to assess whether spatial data sources meet environmental decision-making needs. The research has the potential to ( ....Quantifying Uncertainty in Predictions of Global Change. This project will develop and apply quantitative risk management models to assess whether data sources used in the predictions of global changes, in: (i) land use and land cover; (ii) biodiversity; and (iii) carbon emissions, are adequate. It will focus on the issues of data accuracy, scale and temporal resolution in order to assess whether spatial data sources meet environmental decision-making needs. The research has the potential to (a) aid the federal and state government(s), and international agencies, in making informed policy / management decisions and to increase their effectiveness in implementing international treaties and protocols; and (b) help ensure the future capacity of terrestrial ecosystems to provide resources for the world's growing population and their ability to absorb the associated carbon emissions.Read moreRead less
High-Accuracy Geopositioning from High-Resolution Satellite Imagery. The new technology of high-resolution satellite imaging (HRSI) is revolutionising geospatial information generation for digital mapping, GIS and remote sensing. This project will investigate the metric potential of HRSI and specifically high-accuracy 3D geopositioning. The research will address fundamental issues of imaging sensor orientation modelling, multi-image matching and terrain model extraction. New and refined algorith ....High-Accuracy Geopositioning from High-Resolution Satellite Imagery. The new technology of high-resolution satellite imaging (HRSI) is revolutionising geospatial information generation for digital mapping, GIS and remote sensing. This project will investigate the metric potential of HRSI and specifically high-accuracy 3D geopositioning. The research will address fundamental issues of imaging sensor orientation modelling, multi-image matching and terrain model extraction. New and refined algorithms and computational schemes will be formulated and implemented in software. These developments will then be evaluated through comprehensive experimental testing using Ikonos and Quickbird satellite imagery, with the expected project outcomes being new, experimentally validated computational models, which will advance geospatial information generation from HRSI.Read moreRead less