Over $1 million in ARC funding for our researchers
The Australian Research Council (ARC) have announced successful Discovery Project and Linkage Project recipients for 2021, including four research teams and academics from within the Sydney School of Architecture, Design and Planning. The total funding awarded for the School’s successful applicants is $1,054,806.
The Linkage projects scheme supports academics to work with government and industry partners to tackle complex problems and fast-track solutions. This program encourages the mutual exchange of skills, knowledge and ideas between higher education institutions and other parts of the innovation ecosystem.
The two successful Linkage projects from the School of Architecture, Design and Planning are:
- Sandra Löschke, ‘Co-Design Guide for Transforming Ageing Apartment Buildings’, awarded $320,184
This project aims to unlock the redevelopment potential of ageing apartment housing by developing a co-design process to enable transformative redesign to become a mainstream redevelopment option. The outcomes will be a conceptual framework and practical guide to realise sustainable housing futures beyond demolition - Cara Wrigley, Erez Nusem and Karla Straker, ‘Design guidelines for safety-critical controllers in high-risk environments’, awarded $274,933
This project aims to generate novel product design guidelines for developing safer controllers for use by potentially stressed individuals in high-risk situations, to improve interaction design. This project expects to generate new knowledge in design by establishing a new research topic around an under-examined user cohort.
The Discovery projects scheme provides grant funding to individual researchers or research teams within an academic research context. It seeks to expand the knowledge base and research capacity in Australia to stimulate economic, environmental and social benefits.
The two successful Discovery projects from the School of Architecture, Design and Planning are:
- Laurence Troy, ‘The precarious city: the suburban settlement in an age of uncertainty’, awarded $348,000
This project will investigate the disintegration of two interrelated pillars of Australia’s post-war ‘suburban settlement’ – home ownership and income security – and the consequences of this for patterns of urban change. The knowledge generated will inform policy makers and wider debates on the longer term implications of the break-down of home ownership on the Australian model of citizenship - Wendy Davis and Wenye Hu, ‘Reducing the energy consumed by lighting with gaze-dependent illumination’, awarded $111,689
This project aims to reduce the energy consumed by lighting by developing strategies for illuminating only the portions of architectural environments that are visible to occupants, thereby reducing unnecessary light. The project will explore the potential impacts of gaze-dependent lighting on energy consumption and the visual environment and generate design guidelines to facilitate the development of innovating lighting systems.
The Head of School and Dean, Professor Robyn Dowling, congratulated the recipients on their achievement. “These are highly competitive grants, and their award is a reflection of sustained high quality research over many years,” she said. “These projects enhance the School’s research partnerships with industry, policy makers and the professions to address intellectual and societal challenges in the built environment and design.”
The School’s selected research projects are among more than 50 successful projects from across the University. Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research) Professor Duncan Ivison congratulated the successful recipients and said this success was further recognition of the University of Sydney’s outstanding research record.
View a full list of Linkage project scheme recipients and Discovery project scheme recipients with complete project descriptions on the ARC website.