Monash Information Technology researchers secure $1.4M for AI innovations and clean energy

Dr Qiuhong Ke, Dr Teresa Wang and Dr Kari Dahlgren, from Monash University’s Faculty of Information Technology (IT) have been awarded Australian Research Council Discovery Early Career Researcher Awards (ARC DECRA) with a combined total funding of $1,417,437.

Over the next two years, these grants will support their respective projects: ‘Generative Models for Generalised Skeleton-based Human Action Recognition’, ‘Knowledge Enriched Approach for Effective Personalization’ and ‘Hydrogen Hub Futures’.

‘The Faculty is committed to driving IT discoveries that positively impact our world. The real-world innovations you see today are grounded in the foundational research supported by the ARC DECRAs,’ said Deputy Dean (Research), Professor Jesper Kjeldskov.

This ARC DECRA success follows the Faculty’s recent achievement in winning Monash its fourth Science in Australia Gender Equity Athena Swan Cygnet Award for its long-standing support of academic carers.

"To have three women researchers receive DECRAs is a fantastic outcome for us, especially given our strong focus on cultivating and maintaining the academic momentum of women researchers which is exemplified by initiatives like our Women's Research Accelerator Program," said Professor Kjeldskov.

The prestigious ARC DECRA program recognises and aids promising researchers in the early stages of their careers pursuing new knowledge in their chosen fields.

Dr Ke, Dr Wang and Dr Dahlgren's projects are among only 200 awarded projects nationwide –  and Monash leads the country with 20 successful initiatives in total.

About the awarded projects

Generative Models for Generalised Skeleton-based Human Action Recognition


$481,962.00

Dr Qiuhong Ke

Vision and Language, Department of Data Science and Artificial Intelligence

This project seeks to advance human action recognition using innovative techniques based on generative models and privacy-preserving skeleton sequences.

By exploring new frontiers in data-efficient learning, zero-shot learning and domain adaptation, it aims to develop methods that enable action recognition models to identify previously unseen actions, and adapt seamlessly to diverse environments with minimal training data.

The anticipated outcomes include breakthrough technologies in skeleton-based action recognition, which hold the potential to revolutionise industries such as autonomous vehicles and healthcare.

Knowledge Enriched Approach for Effective Personalization


$447,000.00

Dr Teresa Wang

Machine Learning, Department of Data Science and Artificial Intelligence

This project will enhance user modelling for personalisation across various industries, offering substantial benefits to public organisations by enabling more tailored services through a deeper understanding of individual users, such as in personalised learning and medicine.

It will seek to leverage a novel neural-symbolic machine learning method to address challenges inherent in pure data-driven approaches – including data sparsity, data bias and lack of transparency – while harnessing the simplicity of heuristic-based systems.

Hydrogen Hub Futures


$488,475.00

Dr Kari Dahlgren

Emerging Technologies Research Lab, Department of Human-Centred Computing

This project seeks to be the first ethnographic study of Australia’s emerging hydrogen industry, aimed at supporting the nation in realising its potential decarbonisation, economic and social benefits.

By critically examining the hydrogen hub model and its impact on regional communities, the project will generate valuable actionable insights and resources, such as:

  • a deeper understanding of the consequences of the hydrogen hub model for regional communities
  • theoretical advancements in the social sciences of industrial decarbonisation
  • the creation of a documentary film for research dissemination
  • policy recommendations for hydrogen development underpinned by community concerns and aspirations.