The first two projects to commence with DTF funding are being undertaken by Nexus eWater and Sage Health Systems, while a further three projects will commence shortly through The Australian National University.

Grants Awarded

Nexus eWater has created an integrated process for domestic water treatment which uses the heat recovered from grey water to power hot water systems, while reducing potable water consumption by as much as 50%. The DTF funding will allow Nexus to build a pre-production prototype and demonstrator model to support its target market of new green building projects.

Sage Health Systems have developed SmartWard: a system which automates record keeping on hospital wards and provides decision-support to clinicians on robust, sterilisable and economic hardware. The DTF grant will fund Sage to obtain independent validation of the useability and required functionality of SmartWard with clinicians; and set performance benchmarks for clinician time and patient care for a subsequent hospital trial.

Funding has also been awarded for development projects to be undertaken at The Australian National University. The grants include an award for a project through the ANU College of Medicine, Biology and Environment’s Research School of Biology to determine the role of an ANU discovered plant root gene regulator in affecting nitrogen uptake and plant root architecture. An anticipated commercial outcome of the project, led by A/Professor Michael Djordjevic, will be methods of applying the regulators to optimise plant performance under varying environmental conditions, something keenly sought by the ag-biotech market to support sustainable crop production.

Offers of Award have also been made to support two development projects from the ANU College of Physical and Mathematical Sciences (CPMS). A Research School of Chemistry project led by Dr Yun Liu and Professor Ray Withers, will identify the potential of an ANU developed high-dielectric material for practical use in solid state super-capacitors for the energy storage market. An offer of award has been made to a second CPMS project, which will use DTF funding to further develop instrumentation for international research and commercial markets that use pulsed laser sources; such as chemical industries, commercial mass spectrometers, and manufacturing lines requiring very high laser powers.

The Discovery Translation Fund was established with the support of The Australian National University and the ACT Government.

Innovation ANU will be officially launched Tuesday May 3rd with an event to be held at the new offices – Level 6, 121 Marcus Clarke St. The new facility will house the ANU Office of Commercialisation, ANU Connect Ventures, and three incubator spaces to support emerging businesses.

The initiative is part of a broader strategy to share ANU’s wealth of ideas and expertise with partners in industry, government and not-for-profit organisations, by looking for new partners and new ways to connect. Innovation and entrepreneurship lies at the heart of this effort. We provide education and support in these key areas through courses, competitions and networks.

Innovation ANU and ANU Connect Ventures
As part of the new initiative, ANU, The ACT Government and ANU Connect Ventures have created the Discovery Translation Fund, which is designed to support emerging businesses bridge the critical funding gap between new ideas and attracting seed investment. Expressions of interest for grants between $25 and $100,000 can be submitted at any time and will be reviewed by a committee on a monthly basis.
expression of interest»

Digitalcore Services
Digitalcore offers a broad range of services including standard petrophysical analysis (porosity/permeability) on cuttings and sidewall cores through to complex sensitivity studies of multiphase flooding experiments. Methodology and results are transparent to the client and client consultation and feedback is sought and encouraged throughout the core analysis study.

Digitalcore offers a range of 3D imaging data at multiple resolutions allowing clients to capture an accurate static digital image of the pore space structure and the mineralogy of the matrix phase.

Once captured, this image data can be archived for later use. For example, clients may wish to obtain porosity/permeability trends and later use the archival data to predict residuals and relative permeabilities. The data can be further used to undertake history matching exercises in future years – the effect of saturation history and wettability can be probed. All data is generated to be readily integrated into existing reservoir models.

Digitalcore currently provide services to major organisations in the oil and gas industry and are actively pursuing business development activities in global markets. For more information, visit www.digitalcore.com.au»

The portable reader allows for easy in-situ dose measurement and features:

• Compact, low cost design with high accuracy suitable for definitive dose measurement.
• Suitable for use in medical radiotheraphy applications and on site personnel monitoring – military or civilian.
• Wide dynamic range and sensitivity.
• Cumulative dose measurements.
• Multi read without loss of data.
• Rapid, portable reading on site.
• Readily adapted to military use.

Dosimetry & Imaging’s technology is based on proprietary OEL technology, which consists of a radiation sensitive compound and an analyser. This technology is used for the detection and measurement of ionizing radiation such as X-Rays and gamma radiation from radioactive material.

Several more product applications incorporating OEL technology are envisioned. These Include:

• Expanded range of innovative dosimetry products – badges and readers for on site radiation detection.
• Very sensitive medical imaging system – potentially resulting in a significant reduction in patient radiation exposure, especially in breast cancer screening for women and brain scans in young children.
• In situ, potentially real time monitoring of radiation used for medical radiotherapy.

More details are available from Dosimetry and Imaging www.dosimetryimaging.com»

Enhancing traditional ‘build and price’ websites by providing a direct conduit for sales and financing, the implementation is based on the DOST system, which is linked to  Synergy – a self-service loan origination system developed by Synergetic. The system uses sophisticated identity checking, credit assessment and dynamic verification to grant customers conditional online loan pre-approval, provide customers with genuine choice, and fast track the lending process over the internet.

For more information regarding Synergetic, visit their website www.synserv.com.au»