Facilities
We support our Electrical Engineering community to deliver impactful research by providing accessible, world-class learning and teaching spaces.
We support our Electrical Engineering community to deliver impactful research by providing accessible, world-class learning and teaching spaces.
Our dedicated computer laboratories at the School of Electrical Engineering and Telecommunications provide researchers with extended hour access, and our building is furnished to provide general group and individual study spaces. Our modern, course-specific teaching laboratories and specialised research laboratories house some of the most unique facilities in the country.
Energy systems
High voltage laboratory
Our high voltage laboratory supports research in high voltage power engineering through specialised facilities including:
- High voltage testing (AC, DC and Impulse voltages)
- Partial discharge detection equipment
- Transformer ratio arm bridges
- Recover voltage testing equipment
- Thermal testing equipment
- Variable frequency testing of insulation equipment
Power electronics and drives laboratory
This laboratory supports power electronics research through the following sophisticated systems and software:
- Extensive power electronic invert/conductor systems for operation with a range of motor drives and other applications such as superconducting fault limiting devices
- Data acquisition systems used for fast online parameter determination of rotating machines
- Finite element analysis software for magnetic, thermal and electric field modeling and analysis
ACRE Laboratory
The Australian Centre for Renewable Energy laboratory provides power quality assessment equipment for monitoring the characteristics of power electronic inverters supplied by renewable sources such as photovoltaic systems.
Telecommunications
Mobile communication laboratories
Our mobile communication laboratories contain some of the most advanced measurement and simulation equipment for communications systems in the country. These include facilities for testing GSM, IS-95, 3G, PCS RF and antenna design.
Audio anechoic chamber
EE&T now hosts a large audio and radio frequency anechoic chambers for future mobile telecommunications and acoustic systems development
Communication network laboratories
We provide a state-of-the-art experiential environment that enables researchers to carry out traffic analysis, design and test protocols at all levels and conduct performance analysis of end terminals and servers. Our laboratories also provide a large-scale simulation of networked systems. This network includes:
- Commercial low and high-end routers
- LAN switches
- Experimental NetFPGA routers
- Linux and FreeBSD based PC routers
- Wireless LAN and Infrared access points
- Specialist measurement devices that allow real-time and non-real-time analysis of network traffic and protocol performance
Signal processing
Signals, Information & Machine Intelligence Lab (SIMI)
The Signals, Information and Machine Intelligence (SIMI) Lab brings together a wealth of expertise in speech, image and signal processing, machine learning, system identification and modelling, telecommunications, networking, control theory and high-performance computing.
Speech and Behavioural Processing Research Laboratory
The Speech and Behavioural Signal Processing Laboratory is known internationally for its research into automatic emotion and mental state inference from speech and behavioural signals, pronunciation detection and speaker and language identification.
Interactive Visual Media Processing Lab (IVMP)
The Interactive Visual Media Processing (IVMP) lab is a world leader in developing coding, estimation and post-processing technologies for visual media, including images, video and higher dimensional media such as volumetric and plenoptic content.
Systems laboratories
We designed this laboratory for signal processing, microelectronics and systems and control education. It includes PCs equipped with the latest Texas Instruments signal processing hardware and equipment for analysing speech and video signals.
Photonics
We are proud to offer a comprehensive range of phototonic facilities to support research in this area, including:
- A solid-state laser system capable of tuning from 200nm to 2000nm
- Conventional laser sources like YAG, Argon, HeNe and diode lasers
- Amplified spontaneous emission and fibre laser sources
- An optical autocorrelator for measuring femtosecond pulses
- A low coherence reflectometer for micron resolution device characterisation
- A fibre tpering facility for coupler manufacture
- A Carl-Zeiss Yena interference microscope for phase measurement
Silica optical fibre fabrication facility
Our optical fibre facility is for fabricating special silica-based optical fibres and fibre devices. The facility includes:
- MCVD preform fabrication system
- A fibre drawing system
- Capacity to produce rare-earth doped fibres for fibre amplifiers and lasers, photosensitive fibres, single polarization fibres, multi-core fibres, D-shaped fibres and custom fibres for specific applications
- Facilities for characterisation and measurement of fibre preforms and optical fibres
Polymer optical fibre fabrication facility
We support extensive research in novel optical fibre technology through a range of facilities that equip researchers for the following:
- Material processing
- Preform fabrication
- Fibre drawing
- Electro-optic fibres for optical switches and modulators
- Laster-dye doped and rare-earth-doped fibres for fibre amplifiers and lasers
- Single-mode polymer optical fibres for fibrebragg grating and sensing
Optical waveguide fabrication facility
This facility support research in phototonic waveguide circuitry technology and includes:
- A Hollow Cathode Plasma Enhanced Chemical Vapour Deposition (HC-PECVD)
- A Hollow Cathode Plasma Enhanced Reactive Ion Etch (HC-RIE)
Microelectronics discipline
Australian National Fabrication Facility (ANFF)
We provide Australian researchers from both the public and private sectors with access to micro- and nano-fabrication tools and services through the ANFF. Our facility is one of eight within the national network under the National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy (NCRIS) and offers advanced nanofabrication capability supported by:
- Cleanrooms and laboratory spaces spanning 750 square metres
- Three electron beam lithography systems, capable of producing sub-20nm device features
- A full Si-MOS process line (high temperature furnaces for oxidation, diffusion and annealing; photolithography; a ranger of deposition and etching tools; and dicing, packaging and bonding capability)
- A suite of molecular beam epitaxy systems producing ultra-low-disorder III-V heterostructure material
- A wide range of high-quality complex oxide layers and nanocomposites
More details about the ANFF-NSW facility can be found here.
CAD facilities
These include a network of SUN workstations supporting software for computer aided design of integrated circuits, VHDL design, MEMS devices. CAD packages include Mentor Graphics, H-Spice, ANSYS.
Systems and control discipline
Our Systems and Control Research Group facilities span several areas in engineering into the biological and medical sciences, with three groups of laboratories available.
Industrial and process control
We enable problem-based learning and research using pilot plants in these laboratories. These pilot plants utilise computer-based workstations equipped with data acquisition equipment and may be motor sets simulation electromechanical systems, interacting tanks whose levels are to be controlled or air heater processes representing process control plants. The laboratories are also equipped with:
- Standard software packages such as Matlab and Simnon for control design and analysis
- Boeing’s EASY5 nonlinear simulation package
- A modular simulation shell SSIM allowing the user to build up complex simulation from component modules
- A real time kernel for adaptive tuning and control
Systems Neuroscience and Biomedical Engineering
This laboratory has numerous medical workstations equipped to study human movement control systems including:
- Electrical activity from muscles, nerves and the brain
- Measurements of joint angles and forces
- Response characteristics of reflex and voluntary muscle control systems
- Cardiovascular control systems
Vision and control laboratory
The laboratory is under development. Activities underway include visual serving experiments and autonomous vehicle control of a model hovercraft.