UWA awarded $31m in research grants

The University of Western Australia has again dominated the state's portion of the latest round of federal government research grants, receiving $31 million of WA’s total allocation.

Education Minister Christopher Pyne today announced $522 million in funding for 1,177 new research projects through the Australian Research Council.

This represents a substantial increase from the $360 million in grants awarded by the ARC last year.

WA universities were awarded a total of $40 million across 87 projects, a figure significantly underweight relative to the state’s population when compared with the $152 million awarded to New South Wales and $135 million to Victoria.

Queensland and the Australian Capital Territory also received more funding than WA, securing $92 million and $58 million respectively.

Of the $40 million allocated to WA universities, Curtin University won $8.4 million in funding while Edith Cowan University secured $383,000.

Murdoch University was not allocated any funding, despite receiving just more than $1 million in last year's grant allocations.

A UWA-led consortium will install data analysis pipelines on its Pawsey Centre supercomputer, while a Curtin-led group will establish a digital mineralogy and materials characterisation hub for reservoir exploration research.

A research team at ECU will meanwhile investigate the impact of internet usage on primary school students.