Welcome to the Curtin Engineering Faculty Newsletter

Welcome to the Curtin Engineering Faculty Newsletter

Faculty Newsletter

Issue 19

4th July 2007

This Issue:

A Message from the Dean

Whats New in the Faculty?

Miscellaneous

Quote of the monthReminders

A Message from the Dean

We are now more than half way through what seems to be the busiest academic year yet. This feeling is not misplaced because we have more students now than we have ever had. Thus, I thank all staff of the Faculty for their monumental efforts that got us through the first semester and wish all those taking a spot of leave during the inter-semester period (and school holidays) a restful and well-deserved break. In addition to our teaching and research, new initiatives and achievements have continued to spring up some of which are outlined below.

Civil Engineering ARC Research Grant

In the most recent announcement of ARC-Linkage grants, Dr Sathaa Saravisan of the Department of Civil Engineering was successful. The title of his collaborative grant is "Novel Technology for Improving Disinfection Outcomes in Regional and Remote Drinking Water Distribution Systems". The total budget of the project is 1.8 million. Partners in this project are the Water Corporation, Curtin (Civil Engineering and Curtin Water Quality Research Centre) and CSIRO. The major aim of the project is to develop technology that will improve the effectiveness and reliability of drinking water disinfection, particularly in the Goldfield and Agricultural Water Supply System (G&AWSS) drinking water system. The project will tackle the problem using an integrated three-pronged approach: quantitative, microbiological and chemical. The outcomes of the project, scheduled to start in June 2007, will be applicable across the world.

Chemical Engineering Journal Launched

Professor Moses Tad (Editor-in-Chief) and Associate Professor Martyn Ray (Senior Editor) have launched the Asia-Pacific Journal of Chemical Engineering; Volume 1 appeared in December 2006. The journal is published by John Wiley and is issued six times per year. This journal has its origins in the journal Developments in Chemical Engineering and Mineral Processing, published by the Department of Chemical Engineering that was founded by Moses and Martyn some fourteen years ago. The re-naming of the journal and its adoption by John Wiley heralds a greater readership and status for the journal that has now really come of age. Moses and Martyn are to be congratulated for increasing the research profile of Curtin University on the world stage.

Australias Most Influential Engineers

All Staff from the Engineering Faculty congratulate Professor Tony Lucey who has been recognised by Engineers Australia as being in the top 100 of Australias Most Influential Engineers. To read the full details of the article Leaders in engineering and beyond please go to the Engineers Australia web site at www.engineersmedia.com.au

Second Research Student Colloquium Held

June 6th marked the second of Curtin Engineering Facultys Research Student Colloquia. The organising committee for the event comprised a team HDR of students, ably guided by Andrew King and Mark Pitman of the Faculty, who planned and managed the one-day series of some 30 papers in parallel sessions. As with the inaugural December 2006 event, the papers delivered were of a very high quality and did credit to out students. The book of abstracts will soon be published on the Faculty website following the link to CEFRC (Curtin Engineering Faculty Research Colloquium) at:

http://fac.eng.curtin.edu.au/home/id5_Current_Students/zid9_Postgraduate_Students/

My thanks go to the organising committee (who learned a lot about motivating fellow students!), Andrew and Mark, and Jenny Thurling for getting all of the important practical elements (eg. lunch!) in place on the day. The next colloquium will be held in December.

New HDR-student Centre

Curtin Engineering Faculty is converting Building 001 (the most exclusive designation on campus?) into a second HDR-student centre, adding to Building 120 which is a stones throw away. The new centre will provide shared office accommodation approximately 20 students to meet the needs of ever-growing research-student population, now numbering over 110. Students in Building 001 will be encouraged to share the conference/meeting-room facility in Building 120 while in return they can invite their colleagues for summer barbeques in the vine-covered courtyard of 001!

Whats New in the Faculty?

Please welcome the following staff members:

Dr Fu-Jun Tian has joined Chemical Engineering Department as a Research Fellow for 3 years commencing 23 April 2007.

Nazanin Mohammadi has joined Electrical and Computer Engineering Department as an IT Specialist. Nazanin is one of our graduate students.

Dr Chensong (Jonathan) Dong has joined Mechanical Engineering Department as a Curtin Research Fellow. He is originally from Tianjin University in China having then studied at the University of Florida USAand then worked at Rakon Ltd in NZ.

Dr Ilyas Mazhar has joined Mechanical Engineering Department as a Lecturer.

Dr Ilyas office is located in building 204:525 and can be contacted on x2685.

Miscellaneous

Curtin Sailing Team

The Curtin Sailing Team (CST) is a student-based competitive team that aims to use engineering modelling and design methods taught here to design, build and analyse competitive sailing craft. The spirit of the team is similar to that of the Curtin Motorsport Team, where students have the opportunity to apply the engineering skills they learn at Curtin to the funding, management, designing and building of a competitive craft. The designing and building of sailing craft puts into practice many complex engineering skills including Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD), structural modelling, control system design, stability analysis and aero/hydro-elasticity. These skills are fundamental to the engineering of many modern systems, including renewable energy systems, of which sailing is one of the most established and elegant means of harnessing renewable (wind) energy to create (kinetic) energy.

The sailing team was created in order to foster student research and its application particularly in the field of fluid dynamics, which encompasses hydro and aerodynamics. Fluid dynamics is a strong research field at Curtin University. The Fluid Dynamics Research Group (FDRG), the Centre for Marine Science Technology (CMST) and many post-graduates across a range of departments are involved in fluid dynamics research at a variety of levels. Pioneering research is performed at the fundamental level of fluid-dynamics, aero-elasticity and fluid-structure interaction. Also the application of this research through packaged (commercial or otherwise) CFD computer code and methods is used across a range of engineering and science departments, such as Chemical, Mechatronic and Mechanical engineering.

Currently the team is in its early stages and has four final-year project students and a much interest from students across all engineering year levels and a range of disciplines. The final year project students are involved in establishing fundamental research into sail (aerofoil) aero-dynamics, hydrofoil dynamics, planning hull dynamics, and overall boat stability, velocity prediction programs and simulation.

Once fundamentals have been established, the team looks forward to the purchase and/or construction of small craft for racing standard classes in a similar manner as the Motorsport Team.

Currently the team is in its early stages and has four final-year project

Fund-Raising for Cancer Research

A big thank you to all the Engineering Faculty staff who worked so hard to raise money for cancer research at The Biggest Morning Tea held on Thursday, 24th May. Staff got the chance to get together for a break, catch up with colleagues and friends and raise money for a great cause. Special thanks is extended to those who donated prizes and money, sold raffle tickets, baked delicious cakes and delectable goodies, and who supported the event by their attendance. It was a wonderful effort and a total of $770 was raised. Well done!

Photos taken at The Biggest Morning Tea on Thursday, 24th May 2007 see: http://www.cage.curtin.edu.au/cage/TheBiggestMorningTea.pdf

Members of the Curtin Viginti Club

Our congratulations go out to Margaret Brown, Ian Chandler and Michael Elliss who were recognised for their 20 years continuous service to the University in a ceremony that was held on Tuesday 26th June. Professor Jeanette Hacket and members of the Planning and Management Committee presented them with a certificate and lapel badge and all are now members of the Curtin Viginti Club.

Happy Nana

Congratulations to Diane Garth who is a "Nana" for the second time. Rayne Lee Elliot was born on the 10th April, 2007 weighing in at 8lb 10oz. Diane says that she is so cute and a very happy baby. Diane is looking forward to lots of babysitting duties.

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Quote of the month

If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader.

John Quincy Adams

If you would like to contribute to the next newsletter please contact Melat at M.Habtemariam@curtin.edu.au

The CEFRC Organising Committee: From left to right, standing, Andrew King (staff), Imran Khalid, Tahir Rafique, Mikail Fortuna, Andrew Foong, Agus Setiawan, Mark Pitman (staff), Jenny Thurling (staff) and Ana Yusman.

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