Research in the Faculty of Engineering & Information Technologies
The Faculty of Engineering and Information Technologies at the University of Sydney is one of the leading engineering research faculties in Australia with the greatest grant income per academic staff of any university in Australia. It is the third-strongest research faculty in the University of Sydney after Science and Medicine.
The Faculties Leading Researchers...
Professor Hugh Durrant-Whyte
Research Director, Australian Centre for Field Robotics (ACFR) and ARC Federation Fellow, School of Aerospace, Mechanical and Mechatronic Engineering
The ACFR undertakes research and development in all areas of robotics and intelligent systems. The ACFR incorporates the ARC Centre of Excellence for Autonomous Systems, The Rio Tinto Centre for Mine Automation (RTCMA) and the BAE Systems centre for Intelligent Mobile Systems (CIMS). The ACFR currently comprises over 150 researchers and is one of the largest and most successful robotics research groups in the world.
“Our vision is to become the world leader and national focus for research, development and commercial application of intelligent autonomous systems.”
Dr Andrew Harris
Director, Laboratory for Sustainable Technology
The Laboratory for Sustainable Technology at the University of Sydney is a multidisciplinary research group and is set up to undertake research to develop sustainable products and processes that maximise resource and energy efficiency and minimise environmental impact.
Dr Harris believes that the scientific breakthroughs of the future will come about because of multidisciplinary research – chemists, physicists, biologists and engineers working together to solve problems.
“I am interested in developing processes for the future that are inherently sustainable, not ‘end-of-pipe’ solutions simply to be implemented in the near term.”
Professor John Patterson
Fluid Mechanics, School of Civil Engineering
John’s research career has focussed primarily on areas of hydraulics, fluid mechanics and water quality engineering. The emphasis has been on modelling of lakes and reservoirs and the reservoir modelling work has led to extensive industry contacts, with projects across Australia and internationally. He was one the primary architects of the widely used reservoir simulation model DYRESM, and its water quality derivatives.
“My work spans experimental, numerical and analytical approaches and I strongly believe that a combination of approaches to an investigation is the most productive avenue to understanding.”
Professor Vassillios G. Agelidis
EnergyAustralia Chair of Power Engineering, School of Electrical and Information Engineering
With a continuously growing demand for power and power infrastructure, Australia is an exciting place for power engineers.
Professor Agelidis is the Chair of Australia’s largest and most internationally recognised power engineering research group.
Professor Agelidis and the Centre plan to:
- support and enable leading research and teaching in power engineering.
- attract support from industry leaders towards a sustainable and viable future.
- enhance national and international activities to increase its impact and exchange expertise.
Professor Tony Vassallo
Delta Electricity Chair in Sustainable Energy Development, The School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering
Professor Vassallo’s research spans sustainable and distributed energy technologies, including how energy storage can lead to greater use of renewable energy systems.
“I believe the widespread use of energy storage will transform the way we produce, deliver and use electricity, and will be the key technology linking transport with renewable energy systems.”
Professor Albert Zomaya
Chair Professor of High Performance Computing & Networking; Director, Centre for Distributed and High Performance Computing, School of Information Technologies
A major theme for the Centre of Distributed and High Performance Computing is Green Computing. Researchers in the Centre pioneered the development of several algorithms that help in the reduction of energy consumption in distributed systems and data centres. Green computing issues will be with us for many years and they will become more serious as our dependence on very large ICT facilities grows.
“In my work I investigate the development of efficient algorithms, models and software to produce more energy efficient high performance computer systems. This in turn reduces the carbon footprint of these systems and lead to greener ICT infrastructure.”