Future postgraduate student scholarships

Physical science research projects

Development and characterisation of a high exposure UV dosimeter

To develop and characterise the properties of a suitable UV dosimeter for long term UV exposure measurements. The dosimeter will be based on the photodegradation of a suitable material. The properties to be characterised are: the dose response or how the material responds to UV radiation; the reproducibility to given UV exposures; the effect of temperature and relative humidity; the dark reaction or the manner in which the material continues to degrade upon removal from the source of UV radiation; the angular response or the manner in which the response to UV radiation obeys the cosine response law; the reciprocity of the material or the manner in which a given UV exposure produces the same response, regardless of the exposure time and irradiance and the spectral response or the wavelength response of the material. The dosimeter that will be developed will be tested in field measurement programs.

Supervisor

Alfio Parisi is an Associate Professor and physicist in the Faculty of Sciences at the University of Southern Queensland. His research focus is to provide an improved characterisation of the solar UV environment on the surface of the earth and he has published widely in this field with over 100 refereed publications. His research projects have developed techniques to quantify the ultraviolet radiation exposure to both humans and plants under different conditions.

Research modern methods and applications in modelling with dynamical systems theory

Modelling floods: floods are turbulent and flow over complex terrain. We use dynamical systems methods to seek models that account for the small scale turbulent structures while describing the large scale ebb and flow across the land.

Multiscale modelling: technologies for engineering systems at the micro and nano scales are rapidly emerging. Currently we are developing mathematical frameworks and software infrastructure for the integration of heterogeneous models and data over the wide range of scales present in most physical problems. Our fundamentally new mathematics is beginning to address the challenges of multiscale simulation.

Noisy PDEs: noise in real spatial systems is encoded mathematically as stochastic partial differential equations. Their numerical models are very delicate. Dynamical systems theory supports an holistic approach to generate discrete models of such stochastic systems. The resulting models will be much more faithful to the original physical system.

Detect fractal geometry: the world around and within us is best described as fractal. Yet the tools we have for detecting fractal nature are biased. Applications, such as detecting abnormalities in neuronal cells, desperately need new effective methods of analysis and characterisation. We pursue a program using the information in all the inter-point distances in the object under study.

Predict pattern formation: the classical explanation of the stripes on a tiger or the spread of a disease are based upon reaction diffusion equations. Yet births induce spatial correlations that also may generate patterns. he motion of so-called Brownian bugs is an introductory example. We need to learn how to model systems where such spatial correlations are maintained for significant times. Science needs to develop techniques to discriminate between whether reaction diffusion models are appropriate or whether long lasting correlations are the key mechanism.

Supervisor

Prof Tony Roberts was appointed by the Australian Research Council to the Mathematics, Information & Communication panel of the College of Experts in 2005.

He was appointed inaugural Electronic Editor of the Australian Mathematical Society in 1997, see http://anziamj.austms.org.au

In 1993 he was appointed Foundation Professor of Applied Mathematics at the University of Southern Queensland, after lecturing at the University of New South Wales and the University of Adelaide for 10 years.

Prof Roberts was elected a fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge; awarded a PhD for the dissertation Nonlinear buoyancy effects in fluids in 1982. In 1978 he was awarded a B.Sc.(Hons) 1st class in Applied Mathematics at the University of Adelaide, and the Amir Hasan Abdi Prize.

To date he has published: one book; 75 refereed journal articles; 9 refereed articles in collections; 26 refereed articles in conference proceedings; and 38 other technical reports. He has received external research grants: ten major and minor research grants awarded by the Australian Research Council. He is a regular reviewer for the ARC large grant program and assisted in the bid for the South Australian Parallel Supercomputer Centre in 1992, and the Queensland Parallel Supercomputer Facility in 1994.

Prof Roberts has supervised the successfully completed PhD programmes of six students; and the projects of eight honours students. His invitations include: Summer Study Program in Geophysical Fluid Dynamics (WHOI), ANZAAS '91, 30th Applied Mathematics Conference, Workshop on Symmetry and Bifurcation (University of Marburg), Mathematisches Forschunginstitut Oberwolfach in ‘97 and ‘98, plenary speaker at the ANU summer school in Computational Mathematics, and at the ANU Dynamic Summer.

Blood flow in human arteries as a self-sustained process

Modelling blood flow in human arterial system is a challenging problem with high significance for society. Arteries have muscles which support the blood flow by waves of twitching propagating down the arteries. Majority of existing models assume that the twitches are excited by some externally prescribed force. This project aims to develop a more consistent model where the blood waves constitute a self-sustained process.

Supervisor

Dr Dmitry Strunin is currently aSenior Lecturer in the Department of Mathematics and Computing, USQ. He earned his Bachelor of Engineering Physics (1983) from Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology, and his PhD (1989) in Applied Mathematics from the Russian Academy of Science, Institute of Oceanology.

His professional activities include Editorial Board Member, International Journal of Applied Mathematical Analysis and Applications, Assistant Editor, ANZIAM Journal (Electronic Supplement), Reviewer for international refereed journals: IMA Journal of Applied Mathematics, Foundations of Physics, European Journal of Mechanics-B/Fluids.

Dr Strunin has been awarded several research grants, including an Australian Research Council (ARC) Discovery Grant (2005-2007: AU$118,000) and a $10,000 grant from the USQ Discretionary Research Fund (2005). He is well published and currently supervising a PhD student, Dian Georgiev, who is working on the project "Modelling the large-scale complexity of turbulent floods and thin fluid films".

His research interests include Modelling of a wide range of processes in fluid mechanics, particularly floods and other turbulent flows; Combustion; Thermal processes in solid mechanics; and attracting regimes in dissipative systems, structures, self-similarity. He has been an invited speaker and chairman at several international conferences.

Universal dynamics in nonlinear diffusion with application to turbulence modelling

Many physical processes are driven by nonlinear diffusion and interaction between diffusing agents. Because of the crucial role of the diffusion, often there exist universal regimes toward which such processes evolve. Self-similar regimes give an example of such regimes. However, there can be different forms of universal dynamics. This project is aimed at searching for the universal dynamics with particular attention given to modelling turbulent jets.

Supervisor

Hydrodynamic stability

Strongly non-linear partial differential equations describing fluid flows can and usually do have a multitude of different mathematical solutions such as seen in Figure 1. But which ones are physically relevant and can be observed in real life? What triggers the transition from one type of solution and the corresponding physical flow to another? How does it happen and why? My state-of-the-art field of research called spatio-temporal instability theory answer these questions in qualitative and quantitative ways. This study area is at the leading edge of both applied and computational mathematics and fluid physics and offers challenging yet extremely exciting and fulfilling opportunities for research.

Supervisor

Dr Sergey A Suslov is the Senior Lecturer in Applied Mathematics in the Department of Mathematics and Computing at the University of Southern Queensland. His research is focused on Hydrodynamic Stability Theory and Scientific Computations Explain Industrial Fluid Flows.
In 1991 Dr Sergey was awarded a degree with High Distinction for a Master of Science in Applied Mathematics and Physics for the thesis "Variational Adaptive Grid Generation for Problems with Boundary Layers and Shock Waves''. He was awarded his PhD in Aerospace Engineering in 1997 for the dissertation "Nonlinear Stability Analysis of non-Boussinesq Convection", University of Notre Dame, Indiana, U.S.A.

Dr Sergey was appointed a Design Engineer at the Center for Aviational Science and Technology, Antonov Design Bureau, Kiev, Ukraine in 1992 and worked on wing optimisation of a new passenger aircraft.

His awards include the:

Eli J. and Helen Shaheen Graduate School Prize in Engineering; and
Owen M. Griffin Memorial Prize for Excellence in Fluid Mechanics, University of Notre Dame, Indiana, U.S.A.

Dr Sergey is a member of the American Society of Mechanical Engineering, the Australian Mathematical Society, the Australian and New Zealand Industrial and Applied Mathematics Society, and the USQ Computational Engineering and Science Research Centre. He has produced 32 refereed journal and conference articles; and 14 other technical reports. Publications include articles in the top international journals such as Journal of Fluid Mechanics, Fluid Dynamics Research, Analytical Chemistry and Journal of Computational Physics. He was appointed Referee for more than 10 international research journals and conferences as well as the Australian Research Council.

Dr Sergey has been invited to talk at the International Conference Advanced Problems in Thermal Convection, Perm, Russia, and the World Congress of Nonlinear Analysts, Orlando, U.S.A. He has presented at several University seminars in the USA and Australia and has been awarded research grants from The Australian Academy of Sciences, International Union for Theoretical and Applied Mechanics, Australian Partnership for Advanced Computing.

High temperature (non-Boussinesq) convection

Fluid motion caused by non-uniform heating of a fluid is known as thermal convection. This type of fluid flows is one of the most common found in nature as well as in various technical applications ranging from heaters and boilers to heat exchangers, to thermal insulation systems and refrigerators. In some applications the temperature difference in the flow domain becomes large enough that fluid properties such as density and viscosity cannot be assumed constant anymore and appropriate constitutive equations describing such variations with temperature have to be introduced. In turn they cause the equations governing such flows to become strongly non-linear. See from Figure 3 how complicated the resulting unsteady flow fields become. Their comprehensive study remains an open task.

Supervisor

His awards include the:

Eli J. and Helen Shaheen Graduate School Prize in Engineering; and
Owen M. Griffin Memorial Prize for Excellence in Fluid Mechanics, University of Notre Dame, Indiana, U.S.A.

CVD flow modeling

The major industrial process used today for the manufacturing of electronic components for computers and other hi-tech devices is Chemical Vapour Deposition (CVD). The essence of this process is the high-temperature flow of chemicals dissolved in a gas over a substrate on the surface of which the products of chemical reactions are deposited to form the base of future computer chips. Experimental investigation of flows in CVD reactors such as the one shown in Figure 4 is virtually impossible because of the extremely high temperatures and chemical activity of the materials. Therefore theoretical and numerical modelling is the major way of understanding the physics of CVD flows which is extremely important for achieving two major goals: the high uniformity of deposited films and the speed-up of the process. My research showed that all three research fields mentioned above (spectral numerical simulations, studies of non-Boussinesq convection and further development of hydrodynamic stability theory) are essential components of CVD flow investigations. Therefore this field offers an exciting opportunity for research where fundamental theory is capable of contributing directly to a multi-billion dollar major world industry.

Supervisor

His awards include the:

Eli J. and Helen Shaheen Graduate School Prize in Engineering; and
Owen M. Griffin Memorial Prize for Excellence in Fluid Mechanics, University of Notre Dame, Indiana, U.S.A.