Advanced Sensing and Quantum Technologies

Delivering innovative sensor and monitoring systems for remote operations

The ability to sense is fundamental to engineering operations, scientific exploration and society wellbeing. Modern intelligent systems often integrate a range of sensors, distributed over a wide area, to enable control of operational tasks. As such, there is a great need for innovative sensing techniques as well as innovative application of sensors.

The Advanced Sensing Technology group’s goal is to enable the next generation of sensing technologies needed to solve remote operational challenges, with a focus on agriculture, environment, infrastructure and asset health monitoring, mining resource exploration, offshore drilling, and airborne remote sensing.

Research opportunities are available for prospective students in this cluster. You can learn more by emailing the Pre-candidature team at the Graduate Research School.

Our work is central to the worldwide microtechnology revolution. We work to develop reliable, economical sensing technologies, with sufficient spatial and temporal resolution, appropriate for the operational environment. We are also creating sensor technologies that are as thin as a human hair, can withstand strong shocks and vibrations, consume almost no power, and are capable of being deployed in harsh environments.

Some of the current projects our group is working on include:

Infrastructure and Operations
Novel Sensor Materials
Infrared MEMS Sensors
Sensor Applications
The Science of Discovery

Our Research Projects

Infrastructure and Operations

Australian Nanofabrication Facility, WA Node
ARC Centre of Excellence for Engineered Quantum Systems
Atomic Layer Deposition Facility for IR and MEMS Technologies

Novel Sensor Materials

Band engineered heterostructures for next generation HgCdTe infrared photodetectors
Carrier Mobility Distributions: New Insights into Fundamental Electronic Transport in Advanced Semiconductor Structures
Plasmon mode lasers; smaller, faster, better
HgCdSe: A novel II-VI semiconductor material for next generation infrared technologies
Unravelling complex electronic transport phenomena in type-II superlattices
Defect engineering in MBE- grown HgCdTe materials on CdZnTe substrates
Study of Magnetic and Electronic Properties of Isotopically Pure Materials at Low Temperatures with Application to Quantum Physics
Transformation Dual Phase Synergy for Unprecedented Superelasticity

Infrared MEMS Sensors

MEMS metamaterials for spectroscopic imaging from infrared to terahertz

Sensor Applications

Transistor-based sensor technology for fast, reliable and accurate in situ monitoring of recycled wastewater
A new technology platform for high speed, high sensitivity thermal imaging
Bio-Inspired Sniffer Chips
Portable methane sensors
Airbone imaging and spectroscopy for detection of improvised threats
Concept Feasibility Study
Towards Zero-Energy Sensing Systems for Building Monitoring

The Science of Discovery

Precision tests of fundamental physics at the electroweak unification scale
Precision Low Energy Experiments to Search for New Physics
Magnonic solutions for future logic and sensors of Internet of Things ARC Discovery (Application): Magneto-electronic hydrogen gas sensor
Magneto-electronic hydrogen gas sensor

Our Research Areas

Quantum Technologies and Dark Matter

Research in this area aims to build instruments with world-class precision and performance that can be used to make measurements of high value and interest in both fundamental physics and more practical applications.

Many modern developments in today's society are based on high-quality clocks and oscillators: the Global Positioning System (GPS) satellite system, radar, optical fibre communications, even mobile phones. The group's goal is to develop new frequency standards and technologies with two endpoints in mind: to improve systems that are based on high-quality clocks and oscillators (such as those listed above), and to use these as precision tools to test the foundations of physics.

We are dedicated to commercialising our inventions and thus hold patents in conjunction with industry. Our research programs include strong international and industrial collaborations.

Research projects within Quantum Technologies and Dark Matter cover a broad spectrum of interests, ranging from engineering to fundamental physics. Projects include:

Precision measurement, quantum metrology and quantum sensing within the ARC Centre of Excellence for Engineered Quantum Systems (EQuS).
Axion dark matter detection with ORGAN, and as members of the ARC Centre of Excellence for Dark Matter Particle Physics, and the ADMX Collaboration.
Advancing the Cryogenic Sapphire Oscillator one of the world's most stable frequency sources.
Member of the European Space Agency's ACES mission.
Low noise frequency and phase synthesis and measurement techniques.
Testing Lorentz invariance by measuring speed of light isotropy, in collaboration with Humboldt University of Berlin.
Measurement of electronic and magnetic properties of materials.
Hybrid quantum systems, spin-photon coupling, ESR.
Novel high-Q microwave and millimetre wave resonators, including 3D printed superconducting resonators.
Applied physics and electronics: development of opto-mechanical gravity sensors.