Monash University
Canvas Category Consultancy : Research : Academic
Monash University is Australia’s largest and most international university. Its extensive educational offering, delivered via our 10 faculties, includes undergraduate, postgraduate and research courses. Monash is a research-intensive university, known for some significant and lasting discoveries that have delivered impact beyond the academic community. The university is home to a range of world-leading facilities and technologies, giving it wide-ranging capabilities across many fields, sectors and industries. Monash works with a variety of industry, government and community groups, allowing its researchers to share their discoveries with the world. Monash is a truly global institution, with five Australian campuses, a campus in Malaysia, a joint graduate school in China, a learning centre in Italy, and a research centre in India. At Monash, cultural experiences are lived, not described.
Assembly Line
Artificial intelligence investments reduce risks to critical mineral supply
This paper employs insights from earth science on the financial risk of project developments to present an economic theory of critical minerals. Our theory posits that back-ended critical mineral projects that have unaddressed technical and non-technical barriers, such as those involving lithium and cobalt, exhibit an additional risk for investors which we term the “back-ended risk premium”. We show that the back-ended risk premium increases the cost of capital and, therefore, has the potential to reduce investment in the sector. We posit that the back-ended risk premium may also reduce the gains in productivity expected from artificial intelligence (AI) technologies in the mining sector. Progress in AI may, however, lessen the back-ended risk premium itself by shortening the duration of mining projects and the required rate of investment by reducing the associated risk. We conclude that the best way to reduce the costs associated with energy transition is for governments to invest heavily in AI mining technologies and research.
Optimizing waste handling with interactive AI: Prompt-guided segmentation of construction and demolition waste using computer vision
Optimized and automated methods for handling construction and demolition waste (CDW) are crucial for improving the resource recovery process in waste management. Automated waste recognition is a critical step in this process, and it relies on robust image segmentation techniques. Prompt-guided segmentation methods provide promising results for specific user needs in image recognition. However, the current state-of-the-art segmentation methods trained for generic images perform unsatisfactorily on CDW recognition tasks, indicating a domain gap. To address this gap, a user-guided segmentation pipeline is developed in this study that leverages prompts such as bounding boxes, points, and text to segment CDW in cluttered environments. The adopted approach achieves a class-wise performance of around 70 % in several waste categories, surpassing the state-of-the-art algorithms by 9 % on average. This method allows users to create accurate segmentations by drawing a bounding box, clicking, or providing a text prompt, minimizing the time spent on detailed annotations. Integrating this human–machine system as a user-friendly interface into material recovery facilities enhances the monitoring and processing of waste, leading to better resource recovery outcomes in waste management.
CSIRO achieves record efficiency for next-gen roll-to-roll printed solar cells
Scientists from Australia’s national science agency, CSIRO, have led an international team to a clean energy breakthrough by setting a new efficiency record for fully roll-to-roll printed solar cells. Printed onto thin plastic films, this lightweight and flexible solar technology will help meet the growing demand for renewable energy by expanding the boundaries of where solar cells can be used. The team demonstrated performances for solar cells of 15.5% efficiency on a small scale and 11% for a 50 cm2 module, which is a record for fully printed solar cells.
CSIRO is actively seeking industry partners to further develop and commercialise this technology.