Student topics

Legume-supported value chains, from production to consumption, provide benefits to people and nature that include improved ecosystem functions and resource use efficiency, as well as farmed animal and human health provisions. Environmental co-benefits of legumes include reduced nitrate leaching, increased food sources for pollinators, a greater structural diversity of farmland, and improved soil fertility. Despite the potential of legumes to improve the sustainability of cropping systems and enhance human health, the production and consumption of legumes in Australia is low.Multiple …

Study level

Master of Philosophy, Honours

Faculty

Faculty of Science

School

School of Biology and Environmental Science

Research centre(s)

Centre for Agriculture and the Bioeconomy

Cancer is the single biggest clinical problem facing the world and will account for half of all global deaths by 2030. Even though there have been significant advances in immunotherapy, we are still unable to cure most cancers. New therapeutic targets, individualised to patient needs, must be identified and validated in order to improve cancer outcomes.Brain cancer causes more deaths in people under the age of 40 than any other cancer and more deaths in children than any other disease. …

Study level

PhD, Master of Philosophy, Honours

Faculty

Faculty of Health

School

School of Biomedical Sciences

Research centre(s)

Centre for Genomics and Personalised Health

Dementia exhibits the presence of Lewy bodies in the cerebral cortex, which are composed of α-synuclein (αSYN) or Amyloid-β (Aβ) plaques, as well as hyperphosphorylated tau (P-tau) tangles in various forms of dementia. The exact pathological mechanisms underlying this disease are not well understood; however, there is evidence suggesting the involvement of inflammatory activity. Microglia, macrophage cells residing in the brain responsible for clearing external pathogens and dead cells, are of particular interest.Our study aims to investigate whether Lewy bodies …

Study level

Master of Philosophy, Honours

Faculty

Faculty of Science

School

School of Biomedical Sciences

Research centre(s)

Centre for Microbiome Research

In vision, objects are frequently occluded behind other objects, such as when a dog walks behind a fence. How does the brain represent objects that are either wholly or partially invisible? This project investigates this using an advanced new EEG analysis technique that we recently developed to decode the brain's visual predictions. We have previously used this new technique to show that the brain predicts what you are going to see, to allow you to see them more quickly, and …

Study level

PhD, Master of Philosophy, Honours

Faculty

Faculty of Health

School

School of Psychology and Counselling

Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) is a chronic, relapsing inflammatory disorder driven by complex interactions between environmental, microbial and immune-mediated factors. An unfavourable shift in gut microbiome composition, known as dysbiosis, is now considered a key feature of IBD, however it is unclear how specific microorganisms and their interactions with host cells contribute to disease onset and progression. Previous IBD studies have been largely limited to older sequencing methods with low resolution. Furthermore, these studies have predominantly focused on bacterial populations, …

Study level

PhD

Faculty

Faculty of Health

School

School of Biomedical Sciences

Research centre(s)

Centre for Microbiome Research

The health outcomes from traumatic brain injuries (TBIs) and concussion depend on the nature of the injury, but response also varies greatly between individuals, suggesting that genetic factors may play a role. In particular, due to effects of head trauma on balances of ions, neurotransmitters and energy use in the brain, there is suggestion that variation in the genes that encode proteins involved in these pathways, e.g. ion channels, may affect the risk of, as well as response to a …

Study level

PhD, Master of Philosophy, Honours

Faculty

Faculty of Health

School

School of Biomedical Sciences

The Statistical and Genomic Epidemiology Laboratory (SGEL) studies the role of genetics in the development and mechanism of human traits, with particular emphasis on migraine, and the specific goal of identifying genetic risk factors and detecting common genetic links with other disorders, in particular depression, endometriosis, and epilepsy.

Study level

PhD, Master of Philosophy

Faculty

Faculty of Health

School

School of Biomedical Sciences

Research centre(s)

Centre for Genomics and Personalised Health

Autonomous and non-autonomous vehicles face a wide range of challenges in identifying and safely traversing terrain across a wide range of environments from mine sites to farms to forests to deserts. We are looking for PhD students interested in developing new techniques for improving terrain traversability detection, using both "traditional" methods as well as modern deep learning-based pipelines. …

Study level

PhD

Faculty

Faculty of Engineering

School

School of Electrical Engineering and Robotics

The gut microbiome refers to the collection of micro-organisms that are living symbiotically in the human or animal gastrointestinal tract (defined as the “microbiota”), their genetic material as well as the surrounding environmental habitat. It is now appreciated that the microbiome plays an important role in human health and diseases. Many neurodegenerative diseases, such as Parkinson's Disease have been linked to dysregulation of the gut microbiota. However, it is difficult to study gut-brain axis using animal models due to inter-species …

Study level

PhD, Master of Philosophy

Faculty

Faculty of Engineering

School

School of Mechanical, Medical and Process Engineering

Research centre(s)

Centre for Biomedical Technologies
Centre for Microbiome Research

Our built environment changes our brain function. There is considerable interest from many research fields upon the positive and negative health and wellbeing effects of our environments. This research area explores how architectural environments and spaces impact experience and mood using wearable brain-imaging technology.

Study level

PhD, Master of Philosophy

School

School of Architecture and Built Environment

Software vulnerability is a major threat to the security of software systems. Thus, the successful prediction of security vulnerability is one of the most effective attack mitigation solutions. Existing approaches for software vulnerability detection (SVD) can be classified into static and dynamic methods. Powered by AI capabilities, especially with the advancement of machine learning techniques, current software has been produced with more sophisticated methodologies and components. This has made the automatic vulnerability proneness prediction even more challenging. Recent research efforts …

Study level

PhD, Master of Philosophy

Faculty

Faculty of Science

School

School of Computer Science

Expansive soil/active soil has wide applications in geotechnical engineering and other engineering disciplines due to its desirable special properties - for example, low permeability and swelling pressure under saturated condition. But these materials are highly susceptible to experiencing huge volume change and even damage due to moisture content reduction. However, the underlying mechanism of this phenomenon is still not clear for geotechnical engineers. Therefore, there is no optimum solution available to solve the problem.In this project, a special modelling approach …

Study level

PhD, Master of Philosophy

Faculty

Faculty of Engineering

School

School of Civil and Environmental Engineering

Research centre(s)

Centre for Materials Science