This page provides outline descriptions of honours and graduate (M.E./MPhil/PhD) research topics that I currently have available. If you are interested in one of these topics please contact me. I am willing to reserve a topic for a reasonable period while enrollment arrangements are made. Because enrollments do not always go ahead as planned, you should not regard a topic as unavailable simply because it is tentatively assigned.
Please note: As of 2011 I am reaching full capacity. I will not accept students who cannot show strong ability and affinity to a topic.
Energy scavenging is a popular concept for powering low power systems, for example sensing and monitoring functions in remotely mounted or inaccessible locations and in security applications (prox cards). Energy to power such systems can be supplied by a variety of sources. Many of these have the common feature that the available voltage can sometimes be very low, and needs to be transformed to a supply of typically more than 2V to run the function in question. Voltage multipliers in monolithic form have been around for many years. Dickson's classic paper (JSSC 1976) has shown the way for almost all subsequent designs and variants.
Silicon-on-Sapphire (SOS) CMOS technology offers various advantages over plain CMOS on silicon substrate. The differences give SOS advantages in a variety of niche applications such as RF switches. We believe certain of the advantages of SOS may provide for a more efficient dc-dc converter, especially when the power supply is very low, well below 1V.
A key component of the approach will be the development of an oscillator that starts reliably at as low a voltage as possible. Other challenges include design of a charge pump with very low parasitic capacitance and optimising threshold modulation through body effect.
This project is a collaboration between Silanna in Sydney and Bill Redman-White at Southhampton in the UK. The project aims to capitalise on Silanna's fab capability, Professor Redman-White's CMOS analog experience, and Professor Scott's oscillator experience. Familiarity with Microwave Office, analog design experience, and wafer-level test and measurement would all be advantages.
This is a Masters-level project.
Water is fast becoming an important commodity. The metering of its usage is increasing world-wide, and it may be the central commodity of concern in the twenty-first century, replacing fossil fuels. Governments, such as those of California and Australia, are considering legislation that would require irrigation systems to be intelligent, with the aim of optimising water usage.
Since the 1940s work by Penman and others has given us equations that will estimate crop water requirements as a function of temperature, insolation, rain, humidity and wind speed. Many commercial systems, using these and soil moisture, have been available to control irrigation on farms for some time. These systems are generally expensive and require maintenance.
There is a need for intelligent (actually heuristic) irrigation controllers that are robust (meaning that they require no skilled installation and little maintenance) and cheap enough to displace simple timers. Some work has been done to demonstrate "tap timers" that adjust their operating times in response to temperature and insolation. Work has started on a robust rain sensor, and two technologies are available that could sense rain in a robust fashion, one of which promises to be feasible for battery-powered devices.
This project aims to develop both a battery-powered and a mains-powered smart controller. The research question is to determine the incremental saving for each additional environmental factor that is taken into account, particularly in the domestic (non-commercial) situation. In each case the proof of the value will consist of a comparison between the water saved by some combination of factors with what would have been saved with all or none. This requires the development of controllers, at least for research purposes, that can sense all the factors.
There is considerable grounds for extending metrology science in the development of robust or low-power sensors for this project.
Applications where power and data are transmitted down the same wires have been discussed periodically in the literature for many years. Control and monitoring of power and lighting in homes to reduce power wastage and improve convenience is desirable, for instance, but has not become widespread. One implementation of control over power distribution, Digital Command Control or simply DCC, invented by Lenz Elektronik and later accepted as a standard for use in model railways, has been routinely and successfully used for decades. In principle, the use of such a system brings the opportunity for greatly-simplified wiring and straightforward control of multiple devices on the one data bus. Unfortunately these simplifications bring with them a daunting burden for non-technical users. The need to specify equipment, assign addresses, differentiate actuators, implement control, and debug minor problems represents a barrier to adoption.
A study has shown that in practice only technical users adopt DCC. The use of commercial controllers is reminiscent of programming a VCR: Unintuitive interfaces and the need to understand details of the workings counter the appeal of its advantages. The user must address too many options, remember too many details.
This project is about the design of a different DCC implementation, hardware and user interface. It aims to produce "iDCC", something that is to DCC what a Mac is to a PC, or TiVo to the VCR. The project will require analysis of user needs, perhaps with formally-documented formative feedback from focus groups, the development and implementation of a complete system vision. This vision should take the complete standard into account, implementing as much as possible in a way that obviates need for the user to understand technical detail by means of intelligent algorithm design coupled with appropriate hardware. The project will involve human factors analysis, creative design, original electronics and intelligent embedded coding.
The DCC system is a suitable vehicle for this study for several reasons. Standards are well-controlled, easy for engineers to understand, and publically readily available. Widespread standardisation has lead to the availability of cheap hardware and highly-compatible products from numerous manufacturers. A significant level of acceptance in the user community means that users and would-be users are available for formative and summative evaluation of user perception, needs, and desires. The DCC system is a microcosmic model of bus-control systems, offering the usual levels of implementation from the physical through protocol to application layers, and is thus suitable as a model of any conceivable system of the future. Additionally "playing with trains" can be fun and should lighten what might otherwise be a long and heavy project.