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Research Opportunities for Students

Why do research in CSSE?


“The excitement of exploring the cutting edge of knowledge, and the thrill of your first research result, something you have discovered that no one else in the world knows, are worth savouring.”

Dianne Pros O’Leary, Computer Science, University of Maryland

A research project provides a unique opportunity to follow your interest in an area of computer science research. The focus is on your capacity for creative, independent research, critical thinking, time and project management and problem-solving, and you will also need to have, or to develop, excellent skills of organisation and communication of information. CSSE researchers are encouraged to travel and present their work at leading international conferences. Graduates with research experience are in high demand by employers for their generic or transferable skills, as well as their advanced knowledge of computer science and software engineering.

Who can do research projects?

Research projects are available for CSSE students at any stage of their studies at UWA.

Undergraduate: vacation research projects and the professional practicum are 8 to 12 week projects working with a member of academic staff, and sometimes an industry partner, on a specified research project. Talk to your lecturers about projects currently on offer.

Honours and Masters by Coursework: A 24 point or 12 point research project is part of all Honours or Masters by Coursework degrees in CSSE.

Postgraduates: PhD (or Masters research degree) is a 3.5 (or 2 year) full time research degree for students who have a 1st class or 2A Honours or equivalent. The degree of PhD (Doctor of Philosophy) is a supervised research degree, in which a student undertakes a research project, and presents the results in a thesis. A PhD thesis will demonstrate, in the context of a substantial and original contribution, mastery of the subject of concern as well as a furthering of understanding in that field of knowledge, through the discovery of knowledge, the formulation of theories, or the innovative re-interpretation of known data and established ideas.

What projects are available ?

CSSE offers projects in the many areas of expertise of its academic staff. Research strengths in the School include computer vision, wireless and sensor networks, adaptive systems, logic and formal methods, software engineering and bioinformatics.

Some current project suggestions include:

Adaptive Approaches to Object Tracking in AIBO Robotic Dogs (Cara MacNish and Wei Liu)

Temporal-spatial reasoning with incomplete information, in this case weather radar images, to predict time of rain front hitting a certain point within the metro area (Mark Reynolds and Du Hunyh)

SENSID on SunSPOTs: a Java implementation for the SunSPOT of a middleware framework for classifying sensor network observations (Rachel Cardell-Oliver and Mark Kranz)

Saraswati: A lightweight system for bioinformatics information retrieval (Michael Wise)

What will I be paid?

In some cases, for practicum and honours, projects there are small scholarships available. Speak to the prospective project supervisor about this.

PhD scholarships meet the cost of fees (for international students) and a tax free living allowance. The basic scholarship living allowance is around $20,000 per year, but top-ups are available for certain projects and scholarships to a total of around $30,000 pa. Remember it is tax free! PhD students often undertake some tutoring and teaching duties in the School which is paid at an hourly rate.

What do I do next ?

Firstly, you should speak to your CSSE lecturers about projects on offer and your interests.

Then make an application for research. For PhD scholarships see the deadlines below and visit http://www.scholarships.uwa.edu.au/
For undergraduate and honours projects the process is less formal: just speak to a staff member.

For Australian and New Zealand applicants, scholarship applications close: Wednesday 31st October 2007
home/postgrad/general/australian_postgraduate_awards

See http://www.scholarships.uwa.edu.au/home/postgrad/engineering or a member of CSSE staff about the various top up scholarships available.

A second round of applications for International Research Fee Scholarships for China (IRFSC) will open on Monday 15 October 2007 and close on Tuesday 15 January 2008.

The 2008 first round of applications for Scholarships for International Research Fees (SIRF) will open on Tuesday 15 January 2008 and close on Friday 14 March 2008

See http://www.scholarships.uwa.edu.au/home/postgrad/international for information about scholarships for international applicants.

Useful Web Links

Projects of Current and Recently completed Research Students in CSSE

http://www.csse.uwa.edu.au/research/profiles

Resaerch Project Suggestions

http://www.csse.uwa.edu.au/research/research_project_suggestions

How to apply for research study in CSSE

http://www.csse.uwa.edu.au/postgraduate/research_degrees

Information about Research Scholarships

http://www.scholarships.uwa.edu.au/

Travel scholarships for prospective research students to visit CSSE

http://www.scholarships.uwa.edu.au/home/postgrad/engineering/ecm_travel_scholarship

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