WELL DONE RAIDERUP New grants strengthen links with industry 16...

WELL DONE RAIDERUP

New grants strengthen links with industry

16 February 2017


(L-R): Dr Daniel Heibert (NDPL), Dr Jerome Maller (MAPrc), Dr Caroline Gurvich (MAPrc),
Mr Charles Hider (NDPL), Prof Jayashri Kulkarni (Director, MAPrc),
Dr Roger Edwards (NDPL), Adjunct Prof Brian Lithgow (MAPrc) - Inventor and lead researcher,
Mr Anthony de Castella (MAPrc)
Monash, along with its respective industry partners, has been awarded two Cooperative Research Centre Project (CRC-P) grants.
They include a $2.2 million grant to the Monash Alfred Psychiatry research centre (MAPrc) for head trauma care and a grant for a joint venture that could revolutionise water and wastewater filtration using the latest advances in nanotechnology.
The funding received by MAPrc will go towards further developing the EVestG chair project, which is MAPrc's diagnostic tool using the vestibular system as a "window" to the limbic system, in effect an "ECG for the Mind".
The innovative diagnostic device was invented by Monash University engineer Brian Lithgow in research collaboration with MAPrc Director Professor Jayashri Kulkarni and her team.
The MAPrc team won the ABC show "New Inventors" award for best invention in 2010 with the early prototype of this device, and was a Eureka Award Finalist in 2015.
The team will be conducting clinical trials in depression and traumatic brain injury to validate the diagnostic capacity of EVestG, as well as using some of the funding to further develop the device.
Dollar-for-dollar funding will also be provided by MAPrc's commercial partners General Electrics (GE) and the company "Neural Diagnostics" who lease the intellectual property (IP) for the device.
Meanwhile, a team led by Associate Professor Mainak Majumder from Monash’s Nanoscale Science and Engineering Laboratory has been awarded a CRC-P grant to further develop exciting new next-generation water and wastewater filtration technology.
Led by Associate Professor Majumder, Monash has teamed up with Australian SMEs Clean TeQ and Ionic Industries to develop wastewater filtration products based on the latest advances in nanotechnology, using graphene oxide to dramatically improve performance and reduce current energy use.
Associate Professor Majumder has a strong track record of breakthroughs in graphene technology. In 2016 his team was the first to perfect a technique that could create graphene filters on an industrial scale.
Other Monash researchers on this CRC-P are Dr Rico Tabor, Professor Ana Deletic and Associate Professor David McCarthy.

“Graphene has special properties which could disrupt current commercial filtration techniques and significantly reduce the energy required to filter wastewater,” Associate Professor Majumder said.