QUT offers a diverse range of student topics for Honours, Masters and PhD study. Search to find a topic that interests you or propose your own research topic to a prospective QUT supervisor. You may also ask a prospective supervisor to help you identify or refine a research topic.
Found 18 matching student topics
Displaying 1–12 of 18 results
Application of fluorescence-activated cell sorting and confocal microscopy for the study of the microbial communities responsible for nutrient removal from domestic wastewater
The removal of nutrients like carbon, nitrogen and phosphorus from wastewater is critical to the prevention of eutrophication in receiving water systems and is carried out by complex microbial communities.Eutrophication can have devastating consequences on aquatic life and natural ecosystems, with toxic algal blooms also posing a risk to human health.Understanding the microbiology of phosphorus (P) removal from wastewater is considered essential to knowledge-based optimisation of enhanced biological P removal (EBPR) systems.Most of the species in these systems are novel …
- Study level
- Honours
- Faculty
- Faculty of Health
- School
- School of Biomedical Sciences
- Research centre(s)
-
Centre for Microbiome Research
The impact of automotive interior materials on user experience in the era of EVs
Materials play a crucial role in shaping people's perceptions, experiences, and emotional responses to the products they encounter. In automotive design, this significance is particularly pronounced within the interior cabin space, especially in the age of sustainability and electric vehicles (EVs).The materials utilised heavily influence how customers and users perceive the value, quality, and emotional aspects of their interactions. While numerous studies have examined the link between interior materials and traditional internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicles, the advent of EVs …
- Study level
- PhD
- Faculty
- Faculty of Creative Industries, Education and Social Justice
- School
- School of Design
- Research centre(s)
-
Design Lab
How do healthy people sleep? Biomechanics, physiology, and environment - what matters most?
In the Westernized world a person typically spends one third of their life in bed, with more time spent sleeping in a bed than in any other single activity. Sleep amount and quality of sleep have a direct impact on mood, behaviour, motor skills and overall quality of life. Yet, despite how important restful sleep is for the body to maintain good health, there is a comparatively small amount of studies evaluating key multi-factorial and biomechanical determinants of restful sleep …
- Study level
- PhD
- Faculty
- Faculty of Engineering
- School
- School of Mechanical, Medical and Process Engineering
- Research centre(s)
- Centre for Biomedical Technologies
Green polymer-inorganic composite materials
Composite materials are widely researched and widely used in applications such as aircraft, automobiles, ships, structural components and even the space industry.There is a need to create new composite materials which are environmentally friendly and do not use fossil fuel based products. Moreover, the properties of the composites need to be improved while at the same time minimising the costs involved.Consequently our research group is working on composite materials which not only include inexpensive inorganic fillers from the mining sector …
- Study level
- PhD, Master of Philosophy, Honours
- Faculty
- Faculty of Engineering
- School
- School of Mechanical, Medical and Process Engineering
Advanced electron microscopy for sustainable nanocatalysis
The systematic and detailed characterisation of heterogeneous catalysts is critical for design of effective and stable catalytic materials, since it allows one to understand the correlation between their structure and physicochemical properties.Especially, it is important to monitor the structural evolution of catalytic materials and their active sites in a controllable environment and under realistic reaction conditions.Thus, we propose to use a powerful combination of aberration-corrected high-resolution TEM and in situ TEM experiments which allow us to gain extensive knowledge about …
- Study level
- PhD
- Faculty
- Faculty of Science
- School
- School of Chemistry and Physics
- Research centre(s)
- Centre for Materials Science
Phase separation and atmospheric water exchange in droplet nuclei
Several PhD positions are available for motivated individuals to investigate phase separation and glassy state formation inside airborne droplet nuclei and its impact on water uptake and loss during atmospheric transport.Marine and continental atmospheric aerosols play an important role in the global climate hydrological cycle while respiratory aerosols released during breathing speech and coughing are responsible for the airborne transmission of human respiratory viral infections such as SARS-CoV-2. These processes can limit the availability of cloud seeding nuclei with implications …
- Study level
- PhD, Master of Philosophy
- Faculty
- Faculty of Science
- School
- School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences
Gesture-based control of underwater helper-bots
Underwater robotic systems have been in use for several decades. In recent years, various groups have been adding manipulators and other payloads to increase their utility. The next frontier is to have human divers and robotic system collaborate safely and productively in the same space to jointly complete complex tasks. In this project, you'll explore gesture-based interaction to allow a diver and underwater robotic system to collaborate to complete various tasks. This will involve exploring vision processing and fusion algorithms, …
- Study level
- PhD
- Faculty
- Faculty of Engineering
- School
- School of Electrical Engineering and Robotics
Gesture-based control of underwater helper-bots
Underwater robotic systems have been in use for several decades. In recent years, various groups have been adding manipulators and other payloads to increase their utility. However, their role has primarily been monitoring and mapping the oceans without human interaction.The next frontier is to have human divers and robotic system collaborate safely and productively in the same space to jointly complete complex tasks. This will involve the robotic system directly understanding and interacting with the diver in a non-verbal manner. …
- Study level
- PhD
- Faculty
- Faculty of Engineering
- School
- School of Electrical Engineering and Robotics
- Research centre(s)
- Centre for Robotics
Adaptive evolution of anaerobic methanotrophic (ANME) archaea mediating methane oxidation in freshwater environments (PhD)
The as-yet-uncultured archaeal lineage Methanoperedenaceae are anaerobic methanotrophs with a key role in mitigating the atmospheric release of methane in freshwater environments. The metabolic diversity of these microorganisms directly links methane with several key biochemical cycles and suggests a remarkable ability of these microorganisms to adapt to diverse environmental conditions.The overall aim of this PhD project will be to uncover the metabolic diversity of the Methanoperedenaceae and to understand the evolutionary mechanisms responsible for these adaptations.Methods and ResourcesThe project will …
- Study level
- PhD
- Faculty
- Faculty of Health
- School
- School of Biomedical Sciences
- Research centre(s)
-
Centre for Microbiome Research
Structural application of green concrete
The need for sustainable construction has prompted researching alternative concrete technologies around the world. In QUT, a project has been developed to investigate structural applications of environmentally friendly (Green) concrete.Project activities can be undertaken by students at various levels, including VRES, final-year undergraduates, and PhD researchers.
- Study level
- PhD, Honours
- Faculty
- Faculty of Engineering
- School
- School of Civil and Environmental Engineering
- Research centre(s)
- Centre for Materials Science
Centre for the Environment
Development composite electrode for next generation Li-ion batteries
Australia is rich in lithium battery materials and is poised to be the world leader in sustainable energy storage. The rapid growth in the automobile and energy sector created greater demand for high-performance Li-ion batteries with high energy density. Conventional Li-ion batteries utilise a graphite anode with a limited theoretical capacity. Therefore, we need to develop alternative electrode materials with high energy density and a longer lifespan.Silicon (Si) has received attention owing to its high specific capacity at ambient temperature. …
- Study level
- PhD
- Faculty
- Faculty of Engineering
- School
- School of Mechanical, Medical and Process Engineering
- Research centre(s)
- Centre for Materials Science
Bio-inspired design to create strong and toughness composites
A fundamental challenge to materials design for mechanical capability is to attain both strength and toughness at the same time in one body. Conventional metallic materials generally have relatively large plasticity due to having massive population of microstructural defects and effective plastic deformation mechanism, which have long been exploited for fabricating flaw tolerant (toughness) materials for structural applications. By the same token theseStructural defects render the materials relatively low strength, thus low load-bearing capability. In contrast, ceramics and intermetallic compounds …
- Study level
- PhD, Master of Philosophy
- Faculty
- Faculty of Engineering
- School
- School of Mechanical, Medical and Process Engineering
- Research centre(s)
- Centre for Materials Science
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