Tim Rawling – AuScope, our vision and the National Research Infrastructure investment landscape Steven Micklethwaite – Opportunity for application of drones in the Earth Sciences, technology and issues

1. AN ORGANISATION FOR A NATIONAL EARTH SCIENCE INFRASTRUCTURE PROGRAM
Drones in the Earth Sciences –
Opportunities and issues
June 2017 Tim Rawling – AuScope
Steven Micklethwaite – Monash University

2. AN ORGANISATION FOR A NATIONAL EARTH SCIENCE INFRASTRUCTURE PROGRAM
Outline
• Tim Rawling – AuScope, our vision and
the National Research Infrastructure
investment landscape
• Steven Micklethwaite – Opportunity for
application of drones in the Earth
Sciences, technology and issues

3. What is AuScope
• AuScope was established to implement an Earth
and Geospatial science infrastructure program
– National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy (NCRIS)
Program – “Structure and Evolution of the Australian Continent”
– Education Investment Fund (EIF) Program –”Australian
Geophysical Observing System”
• AuScope’s purpose is
– To create widely available access to earth and geospatial
science research infrastructure (equipment, data and analytics)
to drive front edge Australian scientific research and support
scientific investigations in government and industry
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4. National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy
– NCRIS
• $542million over 7 years allocated in 2004
• 15 Strategic Research Capabilities identified for infrastructure
funding (13 funded)
• Structure and Evolution of Australian Continent $43.3million 2007-
2011 managed by AuScope Ltd
• Since 1997 the investment in “major geoscience research
infrastructure programs” (including MNRF’s) has been
– Commonwealth Cash $77.8 million
– Partner Cash $42.2 million
– Partner in-kind $152.0 million
And more recently
– AuScope AGOS 2011-2014 $23 million
– AuScope CRIS for Operations & Maintenance 2013-2014 $4 million
– AuScope NCRIS 2013 for Operations & Maintenance 2013-2015 $9 million
– AuScope NCRIS 2015 for Operations & Maintenance 2015-2016 $7.2 million
– $1.5B NCRIS funding announced for next 10 years in Innovation Statement
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5. AuScope Infrastructure System for National
Data and Integration
Physical
equipment and
datasets
Grid computing
infrastructure to
access data
Software for
analysis and
modelling
National
spatial
framework
Models and
concepts for the
Australian
Continent
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a combination of research infrastructure
and applied science infrastructure
a combination of research infrastructure
and applied science infrastructure

6. The AuScope AEOS Strategy is to link field and laboratory
infrastructure across Australia to form a sensor array focusing on
the Solid Earth
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“The AEOS will be our communities SQA – a distributed telescope that looks
into the earth rather than away from it – a 10 million square kilometer array”
Providing unprecedented imaging
fidelity of our crust to fundamental and
applied researchers in the earth,
environmental and geospatial sciences
Imaging and observing the earth across
all length and time scales
Strongly aligned with other community
strategic initiatives including the
UNCOVER research program
Interdisciplinary collaboration platform
for the earth and environmental
sciences

7. National Innovation and Science Agenda
• Inward focused Earth monitoring and exploration
• Explore establishment of next generation Earth monitoring
and potential development of inward looking “telescopes”
• Enhanced capability in AuScope to:
• include new Earth monitoring data
• utilise new remotely sensed data and visualise
findings
• A key requirement is a generational shift in technology
resources and interconnectivity of all facilities…including
the establishment of a virtual laboratory network to enable
sharing of large data (including digitised collections) and
improved real time communication.
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• $1.5B commitment over 10 years
• Highlighted 9 research infrastructure focus areas
that will enable Australia to pursue
transformational research while delivering returns
for the community and industry partners

8. National Innovation and Science Agenda
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• Only one explicit mention of drones in the
Roadmap
– Increasing automation of sensors and imaging
capability needs to be a priority. Autonomous,
intelligent sensors are able to record biological and
chemical measurements of marine biodiversity. Pairing
satellites with remotely operated aircraft and drones for
high resolution observation, mapping, environmental
and biodiversity analysis should also be explored.
• Multiple mentions of Autonomous Systems,
Remote Sensing and The Internet of Things
– Australia needs to develop an integrated distributed
network of geophysical and remote sensing and
geochemical sampling and analysis that will form a
geological telescope to support research.

9. National Innovation and Science Agenda
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10. AN ORGANISATION FOR A NATIONAL EARTH SCIENCE INFRASTRUCTURE PROGRAM
tim.rawling@unimelb.edu.au