Bachelor of Engineering & Master of Professional Engineering …€¦ · 2 FACULTY OF ENGINEERING...

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FACULTY OF ENGINEERING AND MATHEMATICAL SCIENCES

ENGINEERING AND MATHEMATICAL SCIENCES

Bachelor of Engineering & Master of Professional Engineering

GENG5511/GENG5512 Engineering Research Project Descriptions

Semester 1, 2018

To find a project description, search (Ctrl + F) using the Supervisors surname. The project title and description are listed below each Academic’s name. Please ensure that the project is

applicable to your discipline.

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Aman, Zachary, Dr Co-supervisors: May, Eric, Prof Johns, Michael, Prof Stanwix, Paul, Dr Graham, Brendan, Dr Metaxas, Peter, Dr Flow Assurance and Natural Gas Hydrates Disciplines: Chemical, Mechanical, and Oil & Gas Topic brief description: Natural gas hydrates are ice-like solids that form and can often suddenly stop the flow during oil and gas production. The cost of their prevention during design and production is high and the removal of hydrate plugs is expensive and dangerous. Today hydrates are still a major flow assurance concern especially as production moves to deeper water, and many of Australia’s major new gas field developments are considering innovative approaches to this long-standing problem. These projects aim to provide the knowledge needed for a risk-based approach to hydrate management by establishing quantitative model to assess plugging potential, optimize inhibitor doses, and develop methods to detect hydrate formation and location. The outcomes will help reduce chemical use by the industry, provide better methods to locate plugs and provide safer methods for their remediation, ultimately allowing for the reliable and economic development of marginal oil and gas fields. Students working on these projects will measure and/or model hydrate formation, agglomeration and dissociation processes. Naturally-occurring gas hydrates also represent a tremendous energy reserve: in 2013, first production was reported from a naturally occurring hydrate reserve located offshore the coast of Japan. Projects will also be available in which various properties of these natural hydrates are quantified, such that more informed decisions about exploiting natural hydrates can be made. An, Hongwei, Dr Hydrodynamic force on a inline cylinder group Disciplines: Civil, Environmental, Mechanical, Mining, and Oil & Gas Topic brief description: A group of inline cylinders is often seen in offshore strictures. The flow field around the cylinder group involves a wide range of interesting flow mechanics features. A series of physical model tests will be conducted using the O-tube facility to measure the hydrodynamic force and flow velocity on the cylinder. The force coefficients and vortex shedding frequency will be examined. This project gives students an opportunity to access to multi-awards winning research facility (the O-tube) and to gain experience on research about hydrodynamics of offshore structures.

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Aslani, Farhad, Dr

Co-supervisor: Chakrabortty, Anup, Dr

New types of self-compacting concrete (SCC) Disciplines: Materials Prerequisite skills: Interested students must also contact Dr Aslani before submitting preferences for this project. Topic brief description: Self-compacting concrete (SCC) can be placed and compacted under its own weight with little or no compaction. It is cohesive enough to be handled without segregation or bleeding. Modifications in the mix design of SCC may significantly influence the material’s mechanical properties. Therefore, it is vital to investigate whether all the assumed hypotheses about conventional concrete also hold true for SCC structures. This project is particularly examining the effect of fly ash, ground granulated blast-furnace slag and micro silica content on strength and the durability of the concrete.

Aslani, Farhad, Dr

Co-supervisors: Gunawardena, Yas, Mr

Hollow and geopolymer concrete-filled GFRP tubes columns Disciplines: Civil, Materials, and Mechanical Prerequisite skills: Interested students must also contact Dr Aslani before submitting preferences for this project. Topic brief description: Deterioration of the Australian’s infrastructure has been well documented and publicized. Glass fibre reinforced polymer (GFRP) composites have emerged as a potential solution to the problems associated with the infrastructure. An economic application of GFRP materials is in the form of composite construction with concrete, such that GFRP could act as load-carrying partner and protective measure for the structural members. And also the concrete industry is responsible for a significant proportion of world greenhouse gas emissions. Indeed, manufacture of Ordinary Portland Cement (OPC) is carbon intensive. An increase in research activities related to the development of low carbon concrete technologies, namely Geopolymer Concrete (GC), has occurred in recent years in Australia. GCs result from the reaction between fly ash and/or slag with an alkaline liquid. There is no Portland cement clinker in GC. GC exhibits many of the characteristics of traditional concretes, despite their vastly different chemical constituents and reactions. As the first experimental study reported in the literature on the axial compressive behaviour of normal and high-strength box and circular hollow and geopolymer concrete-filled GFRP tubes columns, this study will present the results of a test program that was aimed at investigating the influence of GC, GFRP Tubes, and critical confinement parameters on the

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performance of normal and high-strength box and circular hollow and geopolymer concrete-filled GFRP tubes columns. Aslani, Farhad, Dr Co-supervisor: Gunawardena, Yas, Mr

Hollow and concrete filled spiral welded steel tube columns Disciplines: Civil, Materials, Mechanical, and Oil & Gas Prerequisite skills: Interested students must also contact Dr Aslani before submitting preferences for this project. Topic brief description: Spiral welded tube (SWT) structures have found worldwide application in pipeline construction, wind turbine towers, foundation piles, and columns in tall buildings. Despite this, the understanding of SWT structures fundamental behaviour is still insufficient and efficient analysis and design methods have not been developed owing to the lack of experimental and numerical research on these types of structures. In this project, SWTs will be used in a new and innovative approach for both hollow and concrete filled steel columns, and the research will be conducted to characterise the engineering and manufacturing properties of SWTs. The goal of this project is “to provide insight into the ultimate strength and ductility of hollow and concrete filled SWT columns subjected to concentric axial loading, eccentric axial loading and pure bending loading through a comprehensive experimental study and theoretical model for adoption by engineers and Standards bodies”. Basarir, Hakan, A/Prof The prediction of powder factor using drilling machine operational parameters Disciplines: Civil, and Mining Topic brief description: Blasting is one of the main components of open pit mines. Powder factor (PF) defines the amount of necessary blasting agent to disturb a unit volume or per tons of rock. The prediction of powder factor is important as it may be used as an indicator of how hard the rock is, or for the prediction of the cost of the explosives needed. Different methods are available for the prediction of powder factor such as Blastability index (BI), a variable calculated from the rock mass properties. Researcher used seismic P wave velocity or some drilling related factors such as Rock Quality Index (RQI) for the prediction of PF. The purpose of this project is to derive new empirical equations based on drilling machine operational parameters such as Thrust (T), RPM and penetration rate (PR) as an alternative to existing measurement while drilling (MWD) methods. For this purpose data from open pit lignite mines will be used.

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Basarir, Hakan, A/Prof Co-supervisors: Wesseloo, Johan, Dr Construction of damage risk model for underground opening Disciplines: Mining Topic brief description: Most of drift support design focus on stability criteria and yields in a single number FOS. Whereas it is known that FOS based designs do not consider reliability. Therefore, new design methodologies including probability of failure and acceptability criteria are needed. Such approaches has been started to be used some civil engineering projects. Whereas, there are very limited number of researches using rick based design in mining engineering projects. The purpose of this project is to develop a risk based design approach that can be used at preliminary stages of design projects. Basarir, Hakan, A/Prof Co-supervisors: Karrech, Ali, A/Prof The prediction of the thickness of fractured zone around advancing longwall face: A parametric study Disciplines: Civil, and Mining Topic brief description: Longwall mining is a widely used method in underground coal mines. The assessment of the fractured zone above the advancing longwall face is very important regarding the caving process. Conventionally empirical and semi empirical methods are used for the prediction of the thickness of fractured zone. These methods are restricted by simplifying assumptions (Basarir et al., 2014). Therefore more realistic prediction tools are needed. The purpose of this project is to analyze the effect of different parameters such as rock properties, seam thickness, inclination, and production sequences. For this purpose 2D and/or 3D finite element (FE) method based software will be used. The results of numerical modeling will be analyzed in detail and guideline charts relating the parameters to the thickness will be proposed. Basarir, H., Oge, I. F., Aydin, O., 2015. Prediction of the stresses around main and tail gates during top coal caving by 3D numerical analysis. International Journal of Rock Mechanics and Mining Sciences, 76, 88-97. Bekki, Kenji, Prof Co-supervisor: Bennamoun, Mohammed, W/Prof

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A new video-based action recognition system for astrophysical simulations Disciplines: Electrical & Electronic, Mechatronic, and Software Prerequisite skills: Programming skills (Python etc). It is great if students are familiar with Keras or Tensorflow. Interview will be done before the project starts. Topic brief description: Galaxies are formed from various physical processes, such as galaxy merging and hydrodynamics of gas. Astronomers use high-resolution computer simulations of galaxy formation in order to identify these formation processes. However, it has been time-computing for them to do so by checking images one by one by their naked eyes. In this project, we will develop a new video-based `action recognition’ system by which astronomers can automatically identify key physical process of galaxies. The new system is now being developed through a new collaboration between scientists working on astronomy and computer vision. Bosveld, Joel, Dr Co-supervisor: Chu, Qi, Dr Wen, Linqing Gravitational wave detection Disciplines: Electrical & Electronic, Mechatronic, and Software Prerequisite skills: Programming; physics, mathematics or signal processing background is helpful but not required. Topic brief description: Detection of gravitational wave signals from coalescing binary compact stars (e.g. neutron stars, black holes) has been achieved through the matched filtering of data with a modelled template waveform. In order to allow rapid follow-up of events, a large number of template waveforms must be matched against the data with low latency. The SPIIR pipeline achieves these goals through approximating each waveform as a sum of exponentially damped sinusoids; the matched filtering is then be implemented as a parallel set of IIR filters using GPU acceleration. Various projects exist within this domain, relating to: the waveform approximation; optimising the implementation; significance estimation; localisation evaluation. Bourhill, Jeremy, Dr Co-supervisor: Tobar, Michael, Prof Design and testing of cryogenic vibration isolation system Disciplines: Mechanical, and Mechatronic Prerequisite skills: Familiarity with MATLAB, Labview or Python

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Topic brief description: The vibration caused by commercial dilution refrigerators can be very disruptive for extremely sensitive experiments. One such experiment aims to construct a quantum gravimeter capable of navigation in a GPS denied environment. The aim of this project will be to test an experimental platform capable of isolating such sensitive experiments from the noisy external environment. Bourhill, Jeremy, Dr Co-supervisor: Ivanov, Eugene, W/Prof Extremely high quality factor resonance search software Disciplines: Electrical & Electronic, and Software Prerequisite skills: Familiarity with a programming language Topic brief description: The world's best frequency standards are used in many applications from radar to tests of fundamental physics. They rely on spectrally narrow resonances within some media, such as crystals or a cloud of ultra-cold atoms. Locating these resonant features in frequency space can be a very time consuming task - trying to find a needle in a hay stack. This project will focus on creating software designed to automate this search. Bräunl, Thomas, Prof

Driverless Cars Disciplines: Software, Electrical & Electronic Prerequisite skills: Completion of ELEC4403 Digital and Embedded Sys. or CITS2200 Data Structures with 75+. Good programming skills in C or C++ are absolutely essential Topic brief description: We are currently operating two autonomous vehicles, a donated BMW X5 and a student-built Formula SAE-Electric vehicle. Both vehicles already have full drive-by-wire technology implemented and are equipped with several sensor systems, including GPS, camera, Ibeo Lux Lidar, Xsens IMU (inertial measurement unit) and wheel encoders. We are using the latest automotive control hardware with an Nvidia Jetson TX1 board that provides real-time sensor processing and deep learning capabilities. 2018 Goals:

Autonomous navigation on UWA-internal roads and on external race track Sensor fusion of GPS, Lidar, inertial measurement system, odometry Map building Path planning and collision avoidance Vision sub-system for road and vehicle detection using OpenCV

http://opencv.org

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Exploring of deep-learning systems such as Caffe http://caffe.berkeleyvision.org

Further Details: http://revproject.com/vehicles/bmw.php http://revproject.com/vehicles/sae2010.php Bräunl, Thomas, Professor

Robots and Virtual Reality Disciplines: Software, Electrical & Electronic, Mechatronic Prerequisite skills: Completion of ELEC4403 Digital and Embedded Sys. or CITS2200 Data Structures with 75+. Good programming skills in C, C++ or Python. Topic brief description: We are using advanced mobile robots: driving robots similar to the ones you know from "Embedded Systems" as well as underwater robots and autonomous boats for building practical intelligent applications systems. 2018 Goals: • Completion of autonomous boat that should sail around Rottnest • Autonomous navigation and path planning for driving robots • Visual Navigation • Robot Swarms (in real and in VR) • SLAM (Simultaneous Localization and Mapping) • Integration of robots and EyeSim-VR simulator on Oculus Rift and HTC Vive Further Details: http://robotics.ee.uwa.edu.au/eyebot7/EyeBot7-UserGuide.pdf http://robotics.ee.uwa.edu.au/eyesim/ http://robotics.ee.uwa.edu.au/auv/ Cardell-Oliver, Rachel, A/Prof Co-supervisors: Keating, Adrian, A/Prof

Energy Neutral Sensor Networks Disciplines: Electrical & Electronic, Mechatronic and Software Prerequisite skills: Applicants will require skills in one or more of the following areas: embedded programming skills (Raspberry-Pi, Arduino); electronics (bread boarding, controlling actuators, energy efficiency); machine learning algs; data analysis (data collection, analysis and visualisation of experiments) Topic brief description:

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This project is intended for a multidisciplinary team of up to 4 students. Applicants will require skills in one or more of the following areas: embedded programming skills (Raspberry-Pi, Arduino); electronics (bread boarding, controlling actuators, energy efficiency); machine learning algs; data analysis (data collection, analysis and visualisation of experiments) This project involves the development and testing of new hardware and software towards zero-energy, wireless sensing systems. Internet-of-things (IoT) technologies promise a new, lower cost and more flexible solution for asset monitoring in which self-powered, self-organising sensors wirelessly communicate. However, to realise this promise, the energy use of each sensor needs to be shrunk by an order of magnitude over current systems. This project will investigate four steps towards zero-energy sensing: 1) experimental investigation of Lora (long-range) low power radio for communication; 2) development of general-purpose data-aware lossless compression algorithms to minimise the amount of sensor data that must be transmitted; and 3) design of energy harvesting systems for sensor nodes. Recommended Reading: New Directions: The Future of Sensing is Batteryless, Intermittent and Awesome, Hester and Sorber, http://josiahhester.com/cv/files/newdirssensys2017.pdf Cardell-Oliver, Rachel, A/Prof Co-supervisors: Keating, Adrian, A/Prof

Smart Sensing with Low Resolution Thermal Arrays Disciplines: Electrical & Electronic, Mechatronic and Software Prerequisite skills: This project is intended for a multidisciplinary team of up to 4 students. Applicants will require skills in one or more of the following areas: embedded programming skills (Raspberry-Pi, Arduino); electronics (bread boarding, controlling actuators, energy efficiency); machine learning algs; data analysis (data collection, analysis and visualisation of experiments) Topic brief description: Occupancy detection is the problem of identifying the number of people in a given space with a sensor that is non-invasive, privacy-preserving, reliable, low-cost and energy efficient. Low pixel count sensor arrays satisfy these requirements. However, detector arrays can not directly sense occupancy, but must be coupled with intelligent software algorithms to infer occupancy counts. The goal of this project is to investigate: 1) the properties of newly available thermal detector arrays (e.g. FLiR Lepton 80 x 80); 2) machine learning classification algorithms for predicting occupancy from thermal data; 3) a proactive sensing system that works correctly under different building conditions (e.g. temperature range) and can communicate with actuators to adjust those conditions (e.g. turn on a fan or open a window); 4) energy efficient sensing to support long term unattended operation of the sensor. Recommended Reading: Occupancy Estimation Using a Low-Pixel Count Thermal Imager, Tyndall et al, IEEE Sensors, 16(10) 2016, doi: 10.1109/JSEN.2016.2530824 Cardell-Oliver, Rachel, A/Prof

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Understanding public transport travel patterns Disciplines: Civil, Environmental, and Software Prerequisite skills: Essential: Programming (eg R or Python or Java), knowledge of data mining algorithms. Desirable (one or more of): Databases, Web programming and visualization (e.g. Javascript, D3, visualization libraries), GIS programming. Topic brief description: This project is part of a group supported by the PATREC transport research centre. Students will build the results of 2016-17 projects to identify customer types based on their TransPerth smartRider log data. The project involves developing and testing data mining algorithms and visualization of the results. Summer research scholarships will be offered for this project subject to good performance during the first project semester. Recommended Reading: Mining Ticketing Logs for Usage Characterization with Nonnegative Matrix Factorization, Poussevin et al, 2016 https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007%2F978-3-319-29009-6_8 Chow, Shiahuey, Dr Co-supervisor: Bienen, Britta, Dr Rapid penetration of spudcan footing in sand Disciplines: Civil, and Oil & Gas Topic brief description: The motivation for this study emanates from the lack of understanding in rapid penetration of spudcan footing in sand for offshore renewable energy application. Offshore renewable energy devices are typically located in shallow water (< 30 m) that predominates with sandy sediments. The renewable energy devices, particularly wind farms are installed and serviced using mobile jack-up rigs. A jack-up rig may experience dynamic leg loading during the set down of its spudcan footing into sand. The current inability to predict the penetration resistance under dynamic or rapid penetration of spudcan footing in sand has introduced substantial risk. Inaccurate prediction of sand resistance at high penetration rates may cause premature refusal for the spudcan, or potential damage to the jack-up rack-and-pinion systems and legs due to high moments and vertical loading introduced by spudcan-seabed impact. Economic consequences are severe (loss in productivity, property or even life), which could amount to tens of millions of dollars. Hence this project aims to provide better understanding of rapid penetration of spudcan footing in sand using laboratory model tests. The laboratory model tests will involve pushing an instrumented model spudcan footing into sand covering a range of penetration velocities. This project will require a team of two students, one looking at rapid penetration of spudcan in dry sand and another in saturated sand. Interested students are encouraged to contact Dr Shiaohuey Chow ([email protected]) for more information. Chu, Qi, Dr Co-supervisor: Bosveld, Joel, Dr

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Wen, Linging, Prof Robust real-time gravitational-wave detection Disciplines: Electrical & Electronic, Mechatronic, and Software Prerequisite skills: Programming; Paper reading Topic brief description: The summed parallel infinite impulse response (SPIIR) program is one of the four real-time gravitational wave search pipeline programs operated for aLIGO’s first and second science runs. It triggers a gravitational wave event in 30 seconds. However, when the detector noise is fluctuating, the pipeline is tempted to trigger on these noises. This project will simulate a real-time detection environment using realistic aLIGO data and investigate how to reduce glitch detections. Chu, Qi, Dr Co-supervisor: Bosveld, Joel, Dr Wen, Linging, Prof Deep neural network for gravitational wave search Disciplines: Software Prerequisite skills: Programming; paper reading Topic brief description: In gravitational wave search, we often use matched filtering technique to detect a signal from noise. The detection efficiency is limited by the linearity of this filtering. Deep neural network has the potential to detect weaker signals due to its inherent non-linear operations of elements. This project will investigate the detection efficiency of given gravitational wave signals using deep neural network techniques. Chua, Hui Tong, Prof High flux bright light synthesis of valuable nanomaterials Disciplines: Chemical Topic brief description: This project makes use of a first-of-its-kind high flux bright light facility to synthesise valuable nanomaterials. For example, we aim to synthesise MoS2 and WS2 nanoparticles from their naturally occuring MoS2 and WS2 materials. The former materials have phenomenal applications in engine and medical applications. They are mainly used as advanced lubricants in those applications, but are also very promising as materials for supercapacitors as well. We will also work on synthesising graphene from graphite particles, which has great applications in batteries, supercapacitors and membranes, as well as boron nitride nanoparticles from boron nitride.

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This project will be conducted in collaboration with colleagues at the Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Israel and the Taiyuan University of Technology, China. Chua, Hui Tong, Prof Geothermal energy applications Disciplines: Chemical, and Mechanical Topic brief description: 1. Modelling and Controlling geothermal swimming pool - this is an ongoing topic to work with the local councils and schools on managing geothermal swimming pools and specifically the Beatty Park Leisure Centre as well as Hale School. The student needs to physically visit the Beatty Park Leisure Centre and Hale School and even other swimming pools to collect pool data - 1 student. This project will inform the design/consulting sector in terms of the proper sizing of the heating capacity of swimming pools, which has a huge ramification in terms of the adoption of renewable energy. 2. The Cool Earth Project - this is an exciting project in partnership with LandCorp, Geoexchange, ABN builders, AIRAH, Carbonomics and other agencies to monitor the performance of two occupied properties at Craigie, with one being fitted with a ground source heat pump and another with a conventional air source heat pump. - 1 student. Chua, Hui Tong, Prof Catalytic cracking of methane for graphitic carbons and hydrogen Disciplines: Chemical Topic brief description: This is an ongoing project with the UWA ASX-listed spin-off company, Hazer Group, to focus on producing graphitic carbons by cracking methane. There will be two aspects to this project. One is to work on fine-tuning the catalytic process to get consistent and good yield, another is to work on purifying the as-cracked carbons in favour of graphene and other carbon morphologies. The Hazer technology has been spun off from UWA lab and is now worth more than $20mil. Chua, Hui Tong, Prof Industrial waste heat distillation, desalination, bauxite residue remediation

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Disciplines: Chemical, and Mechanical Topic brief description: This topic will have 2 sub-topics. 1. Reconcentrating spent liquor using waste heat from an alumina refinery - 4 students. Students will get to build and operate an actual pilot plant in collaboration with South32 and making use of actual spent liquor. Students need to travel to Worsley Alumina and Rockingham, Murdoch Uni campus for the actual test. Students will also get to be trained to the safety standard of South32 - a fantastic project to prepare for a career. Chemical engineering students are required. 2. Bauxite residue remediation - using centrifuge to dewater mining residue, an exciting technology - 1 student. This project is to be co-supervised by Prof. Andy Fourie of Civil Engineering. We are investigating the prospect of substituting the traditional impoundment method as practiced by the industry. A mechanical/civil engineering student is good for this project. Coggins, Liah, Dr Co-supervisor: Ghadouani, Anas, Prof Flow cytometry for the characterisation of water quality Disciplines: Environmental Topic brief description: Flow cytometry is rapid, high-resolution measurement technique, originally developed for medical applications. This project will involve the further development of this technique for the characterisation of algal and bacterial groups present in wastewater. Project perks: exclusive access to fancy equipment at the Harry Perkins Institute for Medical Research :) Datta, Amitava, Prof

Various projects in sociophysics and agent-based simulation of social phenomena Disciplines: Software Prerequisite skills: Some programming skills in C/Python/Fortran/Matlab are required Topic brief description: Sociophysics is an emerging discipline for studying social phenomena through agent-based simulation. There are many interesting results that have been already discovered through sociophysics simulations related to finance, opinion dynamics in human populations and evolution of languages. It is possible to frame questions in environmental and ecological studies as simulations in sociophysics. The programming skill required is not very demanding and these simulations can be written in C, Python, Fortran or even in Matlab. Any student

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interested in simulation and modeling should be able to grasp the basics very fast. Students from all disciplines with some programming background are welcome.

Doherty, James, Dr Strength and fatigue assessment of well conductors Discipline: Civil Prerequisite skills: Soil and structural mechanics, Matlab Topic brief description: The soil lateral stiffness (p-y response) has a strong influence on the overall strength and fatigue response of well conductors used for offshore oil and gas developments. Current API/ISO guidance is provided only for generic “sand” and “clay” soils and recent research by BP indicates that they are too soft for small amplitude well conductor motions. This project will involve the review of centrifuge tests conducted at UWA on a model conductor and the development of guide lines to better predict fatigue life of conductors in carbonate. Doherty, James, Dr Performance of infrastructure on soft soils Disciplines: Civil Prerequisite skills: Geotechnical engineering Topic brief description: During 2013 a full-scale embankment was constructed and instrumented at Australia’s first National Field Testing Facility (NFTF) for soft soils at Ballina NSW. The instrumentation of this embankment is extensive and includes the measurement of pore pressures, vertical deformations, horizontal deformations, vertical soil pressure, and horizontal soil pressure at a large number of key locations over time. In this project, numerical models will be calibrated using available laboratory and in-situ test data and applied to simulate the performance of the embankment with the aim of developing models to better predict settlement and consolidation. Doherty, James, Dr Improved foundation models for offshore wind turbines Disciplines: Civil Prerequisite skills: Geotechnics, structural analysis Topic brief description: Offshore wind energy is now cost competitive with some traditional forms of energy, thanks to the development of new design and construction technologies. The aim of this project is

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to develop improved foundation models for large diameter mono pile foundations for offshore wind turbines by combining m-theta springs with tradition p-y soils springs. Durham, Richard, Prof Industry topic (usually based on your vacation work) Disciplines: Mining Topic brief description: During your vacation work over the 2017-2018 summer break, you should ask your employer if they have any topic(s) suitable for your thesis. Ask them at the beginning, and then again towards the end. You need to write up the topic on

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Dyskin, Arcady, Prof Co-supervisors: Pasternak, Elena, Prof Geo- and Mechanical Lasers Disciplines: Civil, Mechanical, Mining, Oil & Gas, Petroleum, and Software Prerequisite skills: GENG4405 Topic brief description: Modelling of the mechanism of wave amplification in geomaterials produced by grain rotations. Numerical modelling will involve solving large systems of differential equations using the functions provided by Matlab. Sound programming skills or strong interest to acquire them are expected. Dyskin, Arcady, Prof Co-supervisors: Pasternak, Elena, Prof MacNish, Cara, Prof Hassan, Ghulam Mubashar, Dr Deformation measurements using 2D or 3D photogrammetry Disciplines: Civil, Mechanical, Mechatronic, Mining, Oil & Gas, Petroleum, and Software Prerequisite skills: GENG4405 or an equivalent course on programming and numerical methods Topic brief description: Deformation in solids may be very small hence highly accurate measuring techniques are required. The measurements are complicated by surface features, discontinuities (such as cracks) and environmental noise (such as dust or occlusion). This project will characterise the problems and find robust solutions. There is also a scope to assess viability issues in real-world deployment and collection and analysis of in-situ data. Elchalakani, Mohamed, Dr Co-supervisor: Meek, Alexandra, Ms

Corrosion of steel in geopolymer-stabilised rammed earth Disciplines: Civil, and Materials Topic brief description: Students will investigate the corrosion behaviour of steel reinforcement in newly developed geopolymer-stabilised rammed earth. The project will involve a comprehensive programme

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of testing in the Structures Laboratory to correlate material properties with corrosion susceptibility. Specimens are manufactured using a jackhammer - students will need to be comfortable with physical work. Contact: [email protected] with any queries. Elchalakani, Mohamed, Dr Co-supervisor: Meek, Alexandra, Ms

Mechanical properties of geopolymer-stabilised rammed earth Disciplines: Civil and Materials Topic brief description: This project will study the mechanical properties of newly developed geopolymer-stabilised rammed earth. Students will determine properties such as compressive, tensile and bond strengths in various environments. Mixes will largely be composed of industrial waste products and there will also be the opportunity to investigate materials used to construct Egyptian pyramids. Specimens are manufactured using a jackhammer - students should be comfortable with physical work. Contact: [email protected] with any queries. Elchalakani, Mohamed, Dr Co-supervisor: Karrech, Ali, A/Prof

Development of ultra High Strength Fibre Reinforced Concrete Disciplines: Chemical & Process, Civil, Materials, Mechanical, and Oil & Gas Topic brief description: Ultra-high performance concrete (UHPC) which is characterised by high strength and, when reinforced with steel fibres, high ductility, has the potential to revolutionise the construction industry. The application of UHPC is currently mainly limited to landmark projects due to the high cost of manufacture, which often involve specialist materials such as specially graded sands and the need for complex mixing and curing regimes. Moreover, mix designs are commonly proprietary information or incompletely reported. As a result of the complexity of material requirements and the restricted nature of complete mix design details it can be difficult to reproduce reported results. This project aims to address these issues by investigating the potential for producing UHPC using widely available fine and coarse aggregates. It is expected that UHPC of compressive strengths in the range of 100–160 MPa can be produced using commonly graded aggregates without the requirement for complex

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mixing or curing regimes. It is expected that the fineness modulus of aggregates as well as the superplasticiser content strongly influences the compressive strength. An investigation of the axial and lateral stress–strain relationship of the mixes may shed some light on the residual stress plateau post softening. Elchalakani, Mohamed, Dr Co-supervisor: Karrech, Ali, A/Prof

Geopolymer Concrete Structures reinforced with GFRP Disciplines: Civil, Environmental, Materials, and Mechanical

Topic brief description: Geopolymer concrete is a new concrete which does not have any cement. It is more envinrementally friendly than traditional cement concrete and more durable. The use of Glass Fibre-Reinforced Polymer (GFRP) reinforcement as an alternative to steel for use in Reinforced Concrete (RC) structures has developed significantly in recent years. GFRP’s excellent corrosion resistance, high tensile-strength-to-weight ratio, nonmagnetic, nonconductive make it an excellent solution for projects requiring improved corrosion resistance or reduced maintenance costs. Despite a number of recent studies illustrating the effective use of GFRP bars as longitudinal reinforcement for concrete compression members, the current international design codes such as ACI 440.1R-15 (2015), CAN/CSA S806 (2012), TR55 (2012), ISO 10406-1 (2015), and FIB (2007) do not recommend including GFRP reinforcement in the compression member capacity calculations. Recent Experimental research at UWA showed that GFRP RC columns are more ductile under their steel RC column counterparts. This project is a further step to compare the behaviour and design of circular columns under dynamic loading. In this research project, laboratory tests will be conducted on RC columns reinforced under concentric and eccentric loading. Elchalakani, Mohamed, Dr Co-supervisor: Karrech, Ali, A/Prof

Analytical and Numerical modeling of steel structures with and without strengthening using CFRP Disciplines: Civil, Environmental, Materials, Mechanical, Mechatronic, Mining, Oil & Gas, and Petroleum Topic brief description: In this project, analytical and numerical models will be developed for design presupposes for steel structures reinforced with CFRP. Steel structures all around the world including bridges, offshore platforms and mining infrastructure require retrofitting. Conventional methods for repairing and strengthening steel structures has generally always been to cut out

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and replace plating, or to attach additional external steel plates that are bulky, heavy, difficult to install and prone to corrosion and fatigue. In addition, welding or bolted connection repair works are not a favourable solution due to further fatigue issues, and extensive installation time respectively. The superior mechanical, fatigue, high strength to density ratio and in-service properties of Carbon Fibre Reinforced Polymer (CFRP) composites make them excellent candidates for strengthening and retrofitting of steel structures. Elchalakani, Mohamed, Dr Co-supervisor: Karrech, Ali, A/Prof Reinforced Concrete Circular Columns reinforced with GFRP Disciplines: Civil, Environmental, Materials, Mechanical, and Oil & Gas Topic brief description: The use of Glass Fibre-Reinforced Polymer (GFRP) reinforcement as an alternative to steel for use in Reinforced Concrete (RC) structures has developed significantly in recent years. GFRP’s excellent corrosion resistance, high tensile-strength-to-weight ratio, nonmagnetic, nonconductive make it an excellent solution for projects requiring improved corrosion resistance or reduced maintenance costs. Despite a number of recent studies illustrating the effective use of GFRP bars as longitudinal reinforcement for concrete compression members, the current international design codes such as ACI 440.1R-15 (2015), CAN/CSA S806 (2012), TR55 (2012), ISO 10406-1 (2015), and FIB (2007) do not recommend including GFRP reinforcement in the compression member capacity calculations. Recent Experimental research at UWA showed that GFRP RC columns are more ductile under their steel RC column counterparts. This project is a further step to compare the behaviour and design of circular columns under dynamic loading. In this research project, laboratory tests will be conducted on RC columns reinforced under concentric and eccentric loading. Faiello, Cosimo, Associate

Sustainability applied to project management & engineering practice Disciplines: Chemical, Civil, Electrical & Electronic, Environmental, Materials, Mechanical, Mechatronic, Mining, Oil & Gas, Petroleum Prerequisite skills: N/A Topic brief description: This topic will introduce students to the field of project management and engineering practice with a focus on achieving sustainable results based on a “triple bottom line” (TBL) approach: That is, achieving project objectives, while taking into account the societal and environmental implications of a project. A sustainable approach to project management and engineering practice is recognised globally by many organizations, as being vital to achieving

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their strategic objectives. By researching this topic students will learn how to apply theoretical concepts and frameworks to ‘real world projects’ in order to achieve sustainable outcomes using a TBL strategy. Fernando, Tyrone, Prof Co-supervisors: Iu, Herbert, Prof

Stability Analysis of a DFIG Wind Turbine System Disciplines: Electrical & Electronic Prerequisite skills: MatLab programming Topic brief description: Presently there is a global concern about the economic downturn and a green earth which in turn is related to a better and efficient method to generate and transmit electric power. Wind energy systems are becoming popular. Doubly fed induction generator (DFIG) is a popular wind turbine system due to its high energy efficiency, reduced mechanical stress on the wind turbine, and relatively low power rating of the connected power electronics converter. The DFIG is also complex involving aerodynamical, electrical, and mechanical systems. With increasing penetration level of DFIG‐type wind turbines into the grid, the stability issue of DFIG is of great importance to be properly investigated. The aim of this project is to study the small signal stability of the DFIG wind turbine system. Fernando, Tyrone, Prof Co-supervisors: Iu, Herbert, Prof

Control Strategy of DFIG Wind Turbines for Power System Fault Ride Through Disciplines: Electrical & Electronic Topic brief description: Doubly fed induction generator (DFIG) is a popular wind turbine (WT) system due to its high energy efficiency, reduced mechanical stress on the WT, and relatively low power rating of the connected power electronics converter of low costs. With increasing penetration level of WTs into the grid, the wind power grid connection codes in most countries require that WTs should remain connected to the grid to maintain the reliability during and after a short‐term fault. The ability of WT to stay connected to the grid during voltage dips is termed as the low‐voltage ride‐through (LVRT) capability. The aim of this project is to develop a control strategy for both the rotor and grid side converters to enhance the LVRT capacity of the DFIG WT. Fernando, Tyrone, Prof Co-supervisors: Iu, Herbert, Prof

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Power Management and Control Incorporating Renewable Energy Sources, Micro-grids and Batteries Disciplines: Electrical & Electronic Topic brief description: An investigation to power management and control incorporating renewable energy sources, micro grids and batteries. It is likely and desirable for homes, companies and suburbs to incorporate battery storage for power generated by renewable sources, such as solar panels. A control system designed to optimize energy contributions to local storage, selling to the grid and micro-grid batteries is desired. Fourie, Andy, Prof Co-supervisor: Reid, David, Dr Investigation of the effects of consolidated state on triaxial extension results for loose sand Disciplines: Civil, Environmental, Mechanical, Mechatronic, Mining, and Ocean Systems Prerequisite skills: Bachelor of Science (Engineering Science) Topic brief description: The undrained triaxial extension test, while less frequently used than triaxial compression, represents an important loading condition. As triaxial extension testing often shows the lowest undrained strength, it is theorised to be important in the triggering process of static liquefaction. However, all available triaxial extension test data is for samples that were either consolidated isotropically or in anisotropic conditions in compression. However, in a liquefiable soils deposit with material under triaxial extension loading, it is far more likely that anisotropic consolidation will have resulted in extension loading already occurring under a drained condition prior to subsequent failure. Such drained loading prior to failure is likely to increase the strength of the material in undrained shearing, and potentially reduce the actual strength anisotropy relevant in the field. To investigate this possibility, this project will comprise carrying out and interpreting a comprehensive set of to investigate the effects of drained shearing in the extension direction prior to subsequent undrained shearing. Fourie, Andy, Prof CPT correlations to infer consolidation characteristics Disciplines: Civil, Environmental, Mechanical, Mechatronic, Mining, and Ocean Systems Prerequisite skills: Bachelor of Science (Engineering Science)

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Topic brief description: The cone penetration test (CPT) represents the leading method to investigate the strength and in situ conditions of tailings. However, correlations for the CPT typically assume either “drained” or “undrained” cone penetration, whereas for many tailings materials it is likely the penetration will be partially drained. The potential for partial drainage can be inferred through dissipations tests, however these are time consuming and are only carried out intermittently in a CPT sounding. To develop better correlations between the CPT and drainage conditions, this project will involve review and analysis of a large amount of CPT data provided by Perth-based tailings consultants and mining companies. This data will be used to develop correlations between dissipation test behaviour and the “soil behaviour type” indicated by the CPT for the tailings at that location. Depending on the outcome of this review and analysis, updated correlations on when partial drainage is occurring may be proposed. Fourie, Andy, Prof Using electric fields to extract minerals from mine waste Disciplines: Chemical, Civil, Environmental, Materials, Mechanical, Mechatronic, Mining, and Ocean Systems Prerequisite skills: Bachelor of Science (Engineering Science) Topic brief description: There are many mine waste deposits (tailings) that still contain high grades of unrecovered minerals, e.g. the tailings storage facility of a mine in Queensland is now the world's tenth largest zinc resource. The objective of the project will be to recover minerals without needing to excavate and process the waste; rather, the process will be in-situ treatment, which is environmentally far more favourable. A recent final year project at UWA demonstrated excellent recovery of zinc from tailings from the Qld mine. This project will continue this work, using previously designed equipment, and evaluate the recovery potential of valuable minerals from tailings that will be sourced from a range of sites in WA. It will also focus on optimising the process, e.g. using pulsed voltages, polarity reversal, etc. Fridjonsson, Einar, Dr Co-supervisors: May, Eric, Prof Johns, Michael, Prof Industrial and Oilfield Water Management Disciplines: Chemical, Mechanical, and Oil & Gas Topic brief description: Projects are available across a range of industrial and oilfield water management topics.

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(i) Natural gas and oil extraction results in the production of substantial quantities of (formation) water which needs to be discharged back into the sea. We are currently developing technologies to both monitor ppm oil contamination of this discharge water such that it is compliant with environmental legislation, as well as the use of novel NMR-based multi-phase flow metering methods for oil/gas/water production flow quantification. (ii) Desalination and waste water treatment are areas of growing global importance (47% of Perth’s water now comes from desalination!). Membranes are important for the separation of contaminants from liquids across a range of industrial processes. A critical issue with membrane separation is fouling, projects are available on membrane fouling, forward osmosis and the development of NMR based clamp-on monitoring technology, as well as associated process modelling and optimisation. (iii) 80-95% of all crude oils existing at some stage in an unwanted emulsified state. Typically these form water-in-oil emulsions which increase corrosion, transportation costs and hydrate formation risk. We are currently developing various chemical treatment options to break these emulsions into their constituent parts. (iv) Projects are also available on Nanofluids which have the potential to substantially reduce both the OPEX and CAPEX and water usage of heat exchange processes for LNG production facilities. Ghadouani, Anas, Prof Co-supervisor: Coggins, Liah, Dr Decentralised water and wastewater treatment systems Disciplines: Chemical, Civil, Environmental, Mechanical, and Mining Prerequisite skills: Hydraulics Topic brief description: As we move into the future, increasing population requires innovation of flexible solutions for the treatment of water and wastewater in both small towns and large cities. This is a multidisciplinary topic which would be suitable Environmental, Civil, Mechanical, Mining and Chemical engineering students. This topic could include design, social innovation, planning and management strategies. Ghadouani, Anas, Prof Co-supervisor: Coggins, Liah, Dr Greenhouse gas emissions from wastewater ponds Disciplines: Chemical, Civil, Environmental, Mechanical, Mining, and Software Topic brief description:

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This topic is around the development of tools for the measurement and assessment of Greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and fluxes from waste stabilisation ponds. This could include the development of accounting frameworks and policy considerations. Ghadouani, Anas, Prof Co-supervisor: Coggins, Liah, Dr Microplastics in the water cycle Disciplines: Chemical, Civil, Environmental, Mechanical, and Mining Prerequisite skills: Hydraulics Topic brief description: Microplastics are growing area of concern in the water cycle. This project could involve the characterisation, fate and transport of microplastics through wastewater, stormwater, and environmental flows. Ghadouani, Anas, Prof Ecological engineering solutions for urban water Disciplines: Chemical, Civil, Environmental, Mechanical, and Mining Topic brief description: This project revolves around the integration of ecological engineering principles in the design and management of water infrastructure in urban settings. Graham, Brendan, Dr Surface Active Agents for Flow Assurance Mitigation Disciplines: Chemical, Mechanical, and Oil & Gas Topic brief description: Water in oil emulsions and hydrate formation/plugging are two major flow assurance issues being investigated at UWA. This project is looking at naturally occurring surface active components in crude oil that interact with the droplet/hydrate surface thereby affecting their agglomeration behaviour and reducing the severity of the resultant flow assurance problems. Work by previous FYP and PhD students have shown very promising results and the desire of this project is to complete the research with the aim of writing a paper for journal publication. The project is mainly experimental with successful students being trained in all relevant techniques so prior experimental background is not required. The project is suitable for both chemical and mechanical engineering students.

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Grime, Andrew, Dr Co-supervisor: Chen, Lifen, Dr Testing of an innovative concept design for self-installing spar structure Disciplines: Civil, and Mechanical, and Oil & Gas Prerequisite skills: Hydrodynamics, wave-structure interaction, experimental methods Topic brief description: Arup is a leading independent consulting organisation providing strategic, commercial and technical services for offshore oil and gas projects. Arup is developing a self-installing spar “ACE” structure which will fill the gap between subsea tie-backs and full facility floaters. The hydrodynamic response of the as-installed spar structure will be investigated in this project through scale model experimental testing using the Riverlab facility. This will be complemented by performing hydrodynamic and mooring system analyses of the spar using state of the art software. Grime, Andrew, Dr Co-supervisor: Pinna, Rod, Dr – Aker Solutions Post-yield behavior of bolted end plate connections Disciplines: Civil Prerequisite skills: Structural analysis, Finite element analysis Topic brief description: Bolted end plate connections are regularly used in onshore structures. As clients seek to extend the life of existing structures there is a need to critically reassess connection behaviour in both the elastic and post-yield regimes, stepping outside of the usual codified methods. In this project students will establish the codified approach to connection assessment and compare their findings to results of finite element modelling. One of the potential outputs of this parametric study will be an update to the ASI prying action factor. Grime, Andrew, Dr Co-supervisor: Pinna, Rod, Dr – Aker Solutions Use of directional metocean data in offshore platform design Disciplines: Civil, and Oil & Gas Prerequisite skills: Structural analysis, Hydrodynamics, Structural design Topic brief description: New-build offshore structures typically use omni-directional metocean data as it represents a conservative basis for design. The use of directional wave data is permitted by ISO 19902, but the wave data is required to be adjusted so as to result in a design with the same probability of failure as one designed to omni-directional waves. There is no agreed upon method for

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doing this, though typically it is done by increasing the return period of the directional wave. For this project it is proposed to design a number of simplified example fixed jacket structures using both omni-directional and scaled directional wave data. The return period of failure of the structure will be found for the various structures. Comparisons of the reliability of the structures will then be made. The reliability will be assessed through push-over analysis. Grime, Andrew, Dr Co-supervisor: Pinna, Rod, Dr – Aker Solutions Accurate modelling of the response of gravity based structures Disciplines: Civil Prerequisite skills: Structural analysis, Geotechnical background Topic brief description: Determining the natural frequency response of gravity based structures is a key factor in their design. In particular, the frequency response of offshore wind turbines is of concern in their design. Current practice generally relies on fairly crude models, with the soil represented by discrete springs. This is generally driven by the requirements of typical offshore design packages. Little work has been done to demonstrate the accuracy of these simplified methods. More accurate modelling, such as modelling the soil as a 3D continuum is possible, but not generally performed. The aim of this project is to compare the accuracy of simplified models to more complex models. Preliminary work has suggested that typical simplified models may not accurately represent the true response. This project will extend this work. Guzzomi, Andrew, Dr Co-supervisor: Peressini, Carlo, Dr Agricultural engineering (1): novel machinery development for cropping systems Disciplines: Mechanical, and Mechatronic Topic brief description: Engineering must contribute to agriculture if we are to increase global food production. UWA's AgEng group's $1.5M Targeted Tillage GRDC project has developed commercial mechanical weeding technology for the grain's industry which is considered state-of-the-art. This R&D project offers exciting prospects for machine design, mechanism dynamic analysis, Discrete Element Modelling (DEM) of tool-soil-plant impact phenomena and multi-physics models. Guzzomi, Andrew, Dr

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Co-supervisor: Erickson, Todd, Dr (School of Biological Sciences) Merritt, David, Dr (Kings Park and Botanic Gardens) Restoration engineering: rendering lab science practical at scale Disciplines: Civil, Environmental, Mechanical, Mechatronic, and Mining Topic brief description: In 2016 the Restoration Engineering team won the WA Innovator of the Year and 2017 a $1.3M Global Innovation Linkage Project "Eco-engineering solutions to improve mine-site rehabilitation outcomes". This project will improve our ability to restore sites using native seed. Research topics include: the development of seed coating/pelleting technologies, large-scale/broadacre precision sowing, robotics and automation/mechanisation. The outcomes will be applicable to the agricultural sector (i.e. farming) and areas suffering from desertification as well as mine site restoration. Guzzomi, Andrew, Dr Co-supervisor: Silva, Dilusha, Dr Peressini, Carlo, Dr Agricultural Engineering(2): Engineering innovations for food production Disciplines: Civil, Electrical & Electronic, Environmental, Mechanical, and Mechatronic Topic brief description: Recognising the need to provide engineering solutions to agriculture for sustainable growth of net farm-yield, reduction of wastage, and minimisation of environmental impact the UWA Institute of Agriculture (IOA) has recently added an Agricultural Engineering 'Engineering innovations for food production' research theme. This project will develop and research topics from 'sensors' to 'effectors' for cropping, horticulture and livestock. Hassan, Ghulam, Dr Co-supervisors: French, Tim, Dr, Reynolds, Mark, A/Prof

Tabletop model for vehicle protocol simulations Disciplines: Electrical & Electronic, Environmental, Mech, Mechatronic, Mining, and Software Prerequisite skills: Strong programming skills essential Topic brief description:

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The aim of this project is to utilize and improve a recently developed table top traffic testbed for investigations of autonomous vehicle networks. The model consists of Bluetooth controlled vehicles, raspberry pi microcomputers, a data projector and a machine vision camera. This is a part of complex large scale project, where the first phase focused on building a basic control loop that can detect the location of different vehicles, and based on this pass driving instructions onto those vehicles. In this project, students will be modelling observability and implementing traffic routing algorithms. Hodkiewicz, Melinda, Prof Co-supervisors: Liu, Wei, Dr French, Tim, Dr

Cognitive Computing of Maintenance Records Disciplines: Electrical & Electronic, and Software Prerequisite skills: Requires >75% in any of CITS2200, CITS3001, CITS3002 or CITS4404 Topic brief description: There is a huge interest from major manufacturing and resource companies in being able to automate the processing of manually completed maintainer work orders. These work orders capture information about the state of the equipment and work done by the maintainer. This information is vital in assessing the reliability of the equipment. We have been working with a major resource company for a number of years on this exciting area. This project is for CSSE students or computing literate EE’s with the right experience (see below) who are doing MPE. We are looking for someone interested in ontology development, text mining, and other cognitive computing methods and their application to an important industry problem. Hodkiewicz, Melinda, Prof Co-supervisors: Travaglione, Ben, Adjunct Defence Science Design and Build MEMS Test Units Disciplines: Electrical & Electronic, Mechanical, and Mechatronic Prerequisite skills: ELEC4403 or GENG5508 with >70%. Coding (experience with python, or a willingness to learn), Scientific computing (eg Matlab, Mathematica, SciPy, R), electronics , CAD, microcontroller/arduino experience, general workshop skills. Topic brief description: The Internet-of-Things has arrived. Our world is becoming filled with vast numbers of small sensors, capable of collecting and processing data in real time, and streaming data to the cloud. The sensors are becoming smaller and cheaper. The wifi-enabled microcontrollers attached to these sensors are becoming faster and more powerful. In order to explore this new and rapidly changing landscape, the System Health Lab has developed an IoT device called the "Blue Box". This device uses a small COTS MEMs accelerometer and a cheap wifi-

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enabled microcontroller to stream data to the cloud. The student(s) undertaking this project will design and build a series of test apparatus to compare the Blue Box performance to a number of (more expensive) commercial/scientific alternatives. Interested students must have a strong background in the open-source software used in programming modern single-board microcontrollers. A familiarity with electronics will also be helpful. There will also be a requirement to manipulate the collected data and build appropriate models of the underlying physics. Hodkiewicz, Melinda, Prof Optimising maintenance for Mobile units Disciplines: Software Prerequisite skills: Java, Python, Good Stats Topic brief description: All the iron ore in WA is moved with heavy haulage trains. As we look at autonomous trains the reliability of locos is crucial. The aim of this project is to incorporate real life considerations into an existing simulation and optimization model for maintenance of locomotives on a heavy haulage rail. It is an extension of a FY17 project. Students need a strong understanding of reliability analysis concepts (Distinction or above in Geng5507 or similar stats unit), and an ability to program in Java. Ideally you would have done a number of CSSE units. Hodkiewicz, Melinda, Prof Co-supervisors: Sercombe, Tim, Prof Travaglione, Ben, Adjunct Defence Science Experimental work – UV degradation of 3D printed parts Disciplines: Materials, and Mechanical Prerequisite skills: There is a large test component in this project so the students will need to have a strong practical and time management skills. You will need to do laser, Instron, and possibly microscopy training. You will learn a lot of skills and work with a good team but will need to dedicate at least one day a week to this project throughout both semesters. We suggest you only consider this if you have >70% in core Materials units as there is a strong technical component. There was a previous project on this if you need more information. See Poster outside System health Lab 1.53 in Mech Eng. Topic brief description: In 2017 System Health Lab developed testing facilities for comparing the UV degradation of 3D printed vs machined nylon. The 2018 project will involve experimental design, procurement, test execution, tensile testing and microscopy of samples degraded using facilities on the roof and an accelerated test facility.

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Hu, Xiaozhi, W/Prof Co-supervisor: Yuan, Bingyan, Dr Impact resistant carbon fibre composites Disciplines: Civil, Materials, and Mechanical Topic brief description: Even low energy impact can induce delamination in laminar carbon fibre composites. This project involves design, manufacturing and testing of carbon fibre composites with interfacial toughening. Potentially, research papers can be published in international journals. Hu, Xiaozhi, W/Prof Co-supervisor: Yuan, Bingyan, Dr Repair of drilling damage in carbon fibre composite Disciplines: Civil, Materials, and Mechanical Prerequisite skills: Basic knowledge of materials, able to take initiative and work hard

Topic brief description: Drilling and machining can induce edge delamination in carbon fibre composites. The delamination crack tip opening is measured in sub-micron and hard to repair. We have developed a special technique, which can fill the crack tip with epoxy resin. Potentially, research papers can be published in international journals. Hu, Xiaozhi, W/Prof Co-supervisor: Yuan, Bingyan, Dr U n- bonded non-woven veils using Kevlar pulps Disciplines: Civil, Materials, and Mechanical Prerequisite skills: Basic knowledge of materials, able to take initiative and work hard Topic brief description: The ultra-thin veils will be used to manufacture impact resistant carbon fibre composites. We have successfully made the veils using short Kevlar fibres from 2 - 8 mm. The length of Kevlar fibre pulps is less than 1 mm. Mechanical testing will be required. Potentially, research papers can be published in international journals. Hu, Yuxia, Prof Co-supervisors: Geoff Cocks, Mr., Senior Principal (Industry Partner)

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Fred Verheyde, Dr., Manager/Principal (Industry Partner) Investigation of Perth sand characteristics and ground improvement using sand overlay Disciplines: Civil Prerequisite skills: This project involves lab testing and field testing. Hands-on works are essential.

Topic brief description: Perth sands include Tamala sand, Safety bay sand and Bassendean sand. Although sands are good foundation soils for construction, they may behave differently when fines are present in the soil. The soil characteristics, such as capillary rise, permeability and compressibility of Perth sand with different amount of fines need to be investigated for foundation design. With the population growth of Western Australia, the residential establishment expands to areas with soft ground for residential buildings and roads. A sand overlay method is normally used to improve the ground condition before construction. This project is to investigate the performance of soft ground soils with different sand layer laid on top.

Hu, Yuxia, Prof Co-supervisors: Hossain, M. Shazzad, A/Prof Offshore foundation design Disciplines: Civil, and Software Prerequisite skills: Numerical analysis experience and geomechanics knowledge Topic brief description: Jackup rigs are a popular offshore structure to support offshore platforms up to 150 m in water depth. The rigs are normally supported by three individual legs with a footing at the bottom called spudcan. The mobility of the rigs means that it will be installed at a location for oil/gas exploration and retrieved after the exploration, before it is moved to the next location. The common issues are: (a) spudcan retrieving process - using innovative spudcan to reduce pullout resistance; (b) sand overlay method to reduce spudcan penetration depth for wind turbine installation. This project will investigate different issues above. Finite Element analysis will be conducted to investigate different options.

Hu, Yuxia, Prof Co-supervisors: Reynolds, Mark, Prof Qindong Li, WAMR Optimisation of Road Maintenance and Scheduling Disciplines: Civil, and Software

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Prerequisite skills: Some programming experience (need to be confident with simple data structures, basic iteration, I/O, etc.) and some road construction/maintenance knowledge, working with WA MainRoad department (communication skills)

Topic brief description:

Road performance has been monitored after the road construction in the road network around Perth and WA. For existing road networks, roads are deteriorating with age. Road maintenance work needs to be scheduled based on the budget and optimum performance of the overall network. This project is to examine the road performance monitoring data and the current road deterioration models, with the constraint of annual road maintenance budget, to optimise the road maintenance scheduling. This project is to combine datamining with optimisation techniques based on genetic algorithms to determine the most effective ways to keep a maintenance schedule up to date. The decisions will be guided by a simple mechanical model of road deterioration along with data about failures and faults appearing. Huang, David, Prof

Mining plan based wireless network design for open-pit mines Disciplines: Electrical & Electronic, Mining, Prerequisite skills: N/A Topic brief description: Mine site wireless communications with seamless coverage and Quality of Service guarantees are a key element to improving operational efficiency and employee safety of contemporary open pit mines. The topography of a typical pit consists of benches and slopes with mineral-rich reflective surfaces, and its size and form can change quickly during the lifetime of the mine. This makes the radio propagation conditions of open pit mining very different from typical commercial wireless communication systems. Mining is a carefully planned activity. Mine planning determines the extent of the terrain profile that will be modified and provides estimates of materials to be moved and equipment to be deployed. From mine planning, it is possible to determine the communication requirements, e.g. the amount of data traffic (including when and where) required to be transmitted, and the radio propagation conditions. Geographic Information System (GIS) has been extensively used in the mining industry for development and production. Using the GIS and the mining plan, a quasi-deterministic communication traffic dimensioning can be determined. It is then possible to identify a proper combination of wireless technologies that are appropriate for the mining site. In this project, we will investigate how to select the optimal locations of key communication nodes (e.g. access points and base stations) and the optimal parameters associated with them, through the simulation and modeling of the radio propagation environment and data traffic, with the aid of GIS. This approach includes:

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• 3D radio propagation modeling for typical open pit mine structure such as benches and slopes. • Radio coverage analysis for different antennas over typical mining pits. • Data traffic modeling for typical devices employed in an open pit mine. • Developing analytical models for the deployment of various wireless networks. • Modeling and analysis of capital and operating expense of various wireless networks Huang, David, Prof Resource Optimization in Broadband Wireless Communications Disciplines: Electrical & Electronic Prerequisite skills: N/A Topic brief description: For future broadband wireless communications, we need not only to build a link with the capability of providing high data rate but also to divide the link wisely to accommodate the various requirements of different applications from different users. From this perspective, how to utilize a link is as important as how to build a link. In this project, you are going to investigate and propose ways to effectively and efficiently allocate resources to different users and different applications using the principle of “opportunistic communications”. The principle of opportunistic communications is actually simple: it always allocates the resources to the users or applications that can best utilize them. This is somehow similar to the fact that the school normally awards students with best performance. Huang, Yimiao, Dr Explosion Safety Assessment of Urban Underground Utility Tunnel Disciplines: Civil, Materials, and Oil & Gas Topic brief description: In order to fulfill the requirements of new-type urbanization and city modernization, the development of urban underground utility tunnels is required. Since pipes with hazardous materials such as natural gas and heating power are installed in the utility tunnel together with other pipes, high confinement and congestion conditions may be formed and significant consequences will occur if gas cloud from a leak pipe is ignited. This project aims at proposing risk analysis and evaluation methods which consider multiple explosion risk factors based on the specific characteristics of underground utility tunnels. Meanwhile, numerical modelling methods will be applied to model the complicated environments of underground utility tunnels and estimate explosion effects. Ivey, Greg Prof

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Co-supervisor: Branson, Paul, Mr Island wakes and downstream flows in shallow water Disciplines: Civil, and Environmental Prerequisite skills: Matlab, Fluid mechanics Topic brief description: In the topographically complex Kimberley Region there are over 1000 islands, which are subjected to strong tidal forcing due to the very large tidal range (up to 10m). The tidal flow around islands form wakes and secondary circulation regions that are thought to have an ecologically significant influence on the vertical and cross shelf mixing processes. A purpose built Shallow Tidal Flow Flume has been constructed in the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory at UWA to study this system. The wake form and vertical transport (upwelling) are functions of the relative tidal excursion to island size in conjunction with bed friction on the shallow shelf region. This project will utilise flow visualisation techniques to examine the secondary influence of the Reynolds number on two processes 1) the in water column wake form and 2) distribution of bed shear stress across the parameter range relevant to shallow islands. Semi-quantitative image analysis techniques will be applied examine the flow structure and spatial distribution. Ivey, Greg Prof Co-supervisor: Zulberti, Andrew Mr Near bottom flows in deep water and forces on bottom structures Disciplines: Civil, and Environmental Prerequisite skills: Matlab, Fluid mechanics Topic brief description: A variety of Engineering codes are used to guide the design of offshore structures. In this project, we will look at the relative performance of these codes with simple idealised near-bottom infrastructure. The key feature of the project is that we will use measured mean velocity data from a recent field experiment conducted offshore of Broome in 250 m of water offshore of Broome in April 2017. The data shows a complex and unsteady tidally-driven near-bottom velocity field, and the project would involve comparing this actual oceanic forcing with the idealised velocity fields that are assumed in design codes. Johns, Michael, Prof Co-supervisors: May, Eric, Prof Carbon Sequestration

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Disciplines: Chemical, Mechanical, and Oil & Gas Topic brief description: Western Australia has several major offshore gas assets containing significant quantities of carbon dioxide. Scenarios for dealing with this CO2 must be developed before these gas fields can be developed. One scenario involves the re-injection of carbon dioxide produced from one reservoir into the extremities of a different natural reservoir for the purpose of both CO2 disposal and enhanced gas recovery. However, such a strategy is only viable if the probability of breakthrough by the re-injected CO2 to the producing wells is small. Simulating reliably this novel reservoir production scenario requires an improvement in our fundamental understanding of the hydrodynamic behaviour of supercritical CO2 in heterogeneous gas and water-saturated rock. Research projects are available measuring this behaviour for its inclusion into relevant field simulations. Jones, Nicole, Dr Internal wave dynamics on the Australian Northwest Shelf Disciplines: Chemical, Civil, Environmental, and Mechanical Prerequisite skills: Desirable: Matlab skills (or equivalent); Strong interest in fluid mechanics Topic brief description: Internal waves are a ubiquitous feature of the Australia Northwest Shelf. They have a significant impact on the design of offshore infrastructure as they often provide the strongest near-bed currents. Furthermore, they cause vertical mixing and cross-shelf transport that delivers nutrients to support primary productivity. This project will examine 2.5 y of existing field observations to better characterize, understand and increase predictability of internal waves. Jones, Nicole, Dr Co-supervisor: Rayson, Matt, Dr Riverlab- Swan River physical dynamics project Disciplines: Chemical, Civil, Environmental, and Mechanical Prerequisite skills: Desirable: Matlab skills (or equivalent); Strong interest in fluid mechanics Topic brief description: The RiverLab – a collaboration between Woodside and The University of Western Australia – is a unique initiative aimed at developing innovations in offshore engineering via research, education and outreach. http://www.oceans.uwa.edu.au/collaborations/woodside-futurelab/riverlab This project will explore the physical dynamics of importance within the Swan River using existing and new field observations. For example:

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1) Salt fluxes in the Swan River- quantifying the movement of the fresh and marine water in the estuary using new observations. 2) Turbulent mixing in the Swan River- developing techniques to observe turbulence using new instrumentation. Karnowski, Karol, Research Associate Co-supervisors: Sampson, David, Prof

Untracht, Gavrielle, Ms (PhD Student)

Miniaturized, handled, fiber probes for optical coherence tomography Disciplines: Electrical & Electronic, Mechanical, Mechatronic Prerequisite skills: Electronics, Machatronics, 3D design. Topic brief description: Our microscope in a needle won The Australian newspaper’s Innovation Challenge in 2015. We are looking for passionate students who would like to participate in the prototyping of next generation needle microscopes. We are aiming for light, hand-held imaging probes that can be used with our existing OCT systems. Within this project, we can accommodate students with different background and interests, from 3D designing, electronics, and mechatronics; through designing, making and experimental testing. Come and talk to us about this project. Karnowski, Karol, Research Associate Co-supervisors: Sampson, David, Prof

Li, Qingyun, Mr (PhD Student)

Real time processing of biomedical measurements with GPU Disciplines: Software Prerequisite skills: Experience in GPU programming Topic brief description: We collect tens of GB of data during out OCT measurements. Multi-stage processing to get final image or quantitative information is crucial for many of clinical applications. In this project, we aim to develop GPU based processing that will allow real time preview of measured quantities during measurement. With this project, you can help us help clinicians to help people. Come and talk to us about this project. Keating, Adrian, A/Prof Sugar cube sized energy harvesting and wireless sensors for the internet of

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Disciplines: Mechanical, Mechatronic, and Software Prerequisite skills: Much of the work leverages electrical engineering, design skills, instrumentation and data collection and analysis. Mechanical design is also required – this is an interdisciplinary project Topic brief description: This project has significant industrial interest. Students will investigate novel energy harvesting technologies, extracting energy from unused heat, motion or electromagnetic radiation. We have a desire to create extremely small wireless sensors than can be used almost anywhere, but which require extremely low power technology to work with the energy being harvested. All students working on this project will focus on a sub-system of the overall system, as there is a high degree of interconnection. Keating, Adrian, A/Prof Co-supervisor: Parish, Gia, Prof Materials and sensors made from thin air - porous film properties Disciplines: Electrical & Electronic, Materials, Mechanical, and Mechatronic Prerequisite skills: Modeling and experimental design skills, instrumentation and data collection and analysis. Topic brief description: This project investigates how the addition of nanometer sized pores in a material can alter the mechanical, electrical, thermal and optical properties. Such "meta"-materials are useful in a range of applications, from sensors, to cloaking devices. This project offers opportunities for electrical, mechanical and/or material students to learn more about this technology and it's applications. Investigations of both electrical (noise) and thermal (conductivity, time constants) properties is required. Kimiaei, Mehrdad, A/Prof Effects of combined environmental loads on fatigue design of risers Disciplines: Civil, and Mechanical Prerequisite skills: Familiarity with offshore engineering concepts (enrolled in CIVL5505 or already passed it) and structural / mechanical engineering background are necessary. Topic brief description: Offshore platforms are always under randomly generated and combined wave, current and wind loads. Steel Catenary Risers (SCRs) are one of the main components for development of offshore fields in deep water areas and their structural response is strongly affected by time varying environmental loading and dynamic characteristics of the system.

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Leggoe, Jeremy, Dr Finite Element Modelling of Bolted Flanged Connections in LNG Processing Disciplines: Mechanical, and Materials Prerequisite skills: Strong Performance in Solid Mechanics, Materials & Manufacturing, Numerical Methods& Modelling; if not already taken, students should plan to enrol in Degradation of materials and Finite Element Modelling during the project. Topic brief description: The integrity of sealing in bolted flanged connections (BFC) can be compromised when large temperature differentials exist across the connection, as can be the case when cold liquid LNG partially fills a pipeline that is otherwise exposed to ambient conditions.This is a significant practical issue in LNG plants, as a loss of sealing integrity implies a loss of containment of hydrocarbons. Finite element analysis is being used to investigate BFC integrity under a range of conditions. Given the broad range of temperatures, even characterising the material properties for the flanges, bolts and gaskets accurately for use in FE models is challenging. Students in this project will focus on various aspects of modelling the connection: - The seating of the gasket, and the response of the gasket material when exposed to different temperatures (noting that gaskets are often composites themselves) - Modelling the individual bolts, and the effects of the sequence of bolt tightening - Understanding the effect of pipe layout (and thus boundary conditions) on the connection - Understanding the effects of flange dimensions on BFC performance This project is aligned with an ongoing investigation being undertaken by a PhD candidate. The PhD candidate will join weekly group meetings, and his previous work in this area will provide background for the project Leggoe, Jeremy, Dr Co-supervisor: Aman, Zach, A/Prof

Computational Fluid Dynamics Modelling of Jet break up for Oil & Gas Well Blow Outs and other jet spraying applications in the Oil & Gas industry Disciplines: Chemical, and Mechanical Prerequisite skills: Previous completion of ENSC3003 (and ideally strong performance in the unit) is essentialfor this project. Completion of CHPR 4407 would also be an advantage – if not already undertaken, students undertaking this project should plan to enroll in CHPR4407 in 2018. Topic brief description:

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In the event of jet releases such as a well blowout or MEG spray, the nature of the turbulent flow field in the feed pipe and the surrounding the resulting jet are significant but poorly understood factors in determining the ultimate dispersion of the released material. This project will develop and interpret CFD models of jet releases into a quiescent environment to explore the relation between jet dynamics and the distribution of droplet sizes produced by the process. Particular emphasis will be directed towards: - Characterising multi-scale processes of droplet formation - Characterising the effect of the presence of multiple immiscible phases on turbulence - Evaluating different turbulence modelling approaches, in particular scale resolving techniques such as SAS, DES, and LES Students should expect to work with the software ANSYS/Fluent - previous experience with the software is not essential, but would be a significant advantage. The students undertaking this project will join a group including PhD student, and significant progress was made by the students working on the project in 2016 and 2017. The PhD student has presented papers on this work at international conferences in 2016 and 2017 (and will again in 2018), and that work will provide background for the project. Lehane, Barry, Prof Co-supervisor: Vulpe, Cristina, Dr

Exploring the potential of hybrid gravity-suction caissons Disciplines: Civil, and Oil & Gas Topic brief description: Proposed developments in wind and wave energy as well as in new oil and gas fields have identified a need for more cost effect anchoring systems at soft clay sites. This project is a numerical study that explores the potential of combining the benefits of suction caisson anchors with gravity anchors. The students will employ existing techniques developed at UWA for this study. The final research output will be a series of design charts to assist Industry. Lehane, Barry, Prof Co-supervisor: Grime, Andrew, Dr

Reducing foundation costs using optimised construction sequencing Disciplines: Civil Topic brief description: Integration of the design of a building’s substructure and superstructure is not generally performed in a way that optimises the overall design, minimises the foundation costs and mitigates the risk of an ultimate limit state or serviceability limit state failure. This proposal

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uses a simple structural analysis package combined with finite element analysis for p

Bachelor of Engineering & Master of Professional Engineering …€¦ · 2 FACULTY OF ENGINEERING...

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Transcript of Bachelor of Engineering & Master of Professional Engineering …€¦ · 2 FACULTY OF ENGINEERING...