Information About

VISOR (Virtual and Interactive Simulations of Reality) Research Group

Current Members

VISOR Research Group Members

Members	Research Area(s) & Short Biographies	Department
A/Prof Manolya Kavakli email:manolya.kavakli@mq.edu.au	Virtual Reality Systems Design and Engineering, Human Computer Interaction, Interface Design, Human Information Processing, Cognitive Modelling, Motion Tracking and Gesture Recognition. Associate Professor Manolya Kavakli is the Head of VISOR and the Director of Postgraduate Coursework Program at the Department of Computing and the Director of Virtual Reality Lab at the Simulation Hub, Macquarie University. She is in charge of the Master of IT program and supervised 18 MIT students, 7 Honours students, 9 MEng (Exchange) scholars, 11 PhD students, 2 MSc students, and 7 Postdoctoral fellows so far. She is currently supervising 5 PhD students. A/Prof Manolya Kavakli is an architect with a strong commitment to Design Science which aims at designing an artefact and evaluating its performance based on “build & evaluate” approach. Design Science explores the need to address an existing problem, finding a solution using the theoretical knowledge in the problem domain, and proving that the new solution improves on existing solutions and attempts to solve the problem. This could be applied in any area of architecture and engineering including system design.	Department of Computing
Dr Len Hamey	Computer vision and Artificial neural networks Dr Hamey is a senior lecturer in the Department of Computing, Faculty of Science and Engineering, Macquarie University, Sydney, NSW, Australia. His research interests include computer vision and artificial neural networks. From 1995 to 2002, he worked closely with the Cooperative Research Centre for International Food Manufacture and Packaging Science and Arnott's Biscuits Ltd on bake quality inspection. More recent projects have involved collaboration with Timber Queensland on timber colour matching, Sigma Plus Consulting on automatic number plate recognition, Atlantek Vision, and BCS Electronic Design, all in conjunction with Access Macquarie Ltd. Dr Hamey teaches units in the Department of Computing including programming units, computer architecture and computer networks. He developed the security protocol game to teach students the key concepts of network security protocols. At the honours level he offers reading units in neural networks and machine vision areas.	Department of Computing
Dr Stephen Smith	Information Systems Management Dr Stephen Smith is a Lecturer in Information Systems (IS) in the Department of Computing at Macquarie University, Sydney Australia. He has published in IS and related areas of Strategy, IS Security, IT Innovation, Emergency Management, Collaboration and GreenIS (adaptation). Stephen has extensive industry experience in Wireless Data Communications, Emergency Management, ICT and collaboration at Government (Federal and State) sectors. Stephen, has gained 22 years industry/commercial experience as an IT/BIS Manager for NSW government and have in-depth experience across most NSW Government agencies and have a comprehensive knowledge of government business processes and ICT use. Projects within these agencies have required a significant amount of interaction with both business and information technology staff and management, and a unique practical insight into the functions of the government. The majority of the projects have involved the adoption of ICT and Business Process re-engineering of existing government business practices.	Department of Computing
Dr Rajan Shankaran	Cyber Security Dr Rajan Shankaran is a Senior Lecturer at Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia. He received the MBA (MIS) degree in Information Systems Maastricht School of Management in 1994; and MS, MSc (Honours) and PhD degrees in Computing from the University of Western Sydney in 1999 and 2005 respectively. Prior to Macquarie University, Dr Shankaran was employed, first as an associate lecturer and then as a lecturer, at the University of Western Sydney. In 2011, he was promoted to Senior Lecturer at Macquarie University. Dr Shankaran mainly works in the areas of network security and trust in mobile networks. He is a member of Advanced Cyber Security Research group in the department of Computing and WiMED research centre in the Faculty of Science and Engineering, at Macquarie University. He is also an external member of Asia-Pacific Ubiquitous Healthcare Research Centre (APuHC), School of Information Systems & Technology Management, University of New South Wales. Dr Shankaran has published over 40 research papers in journals and conferences and has coauthored, and edited 1 text in the area of network security. He has graduated 4 HDR students including 3 PhD students. He is currently supervising 1 PhD student and 1 Master by research student. Dr Shankaran currently serves as a member of Industry and External relations Committee in the department. He is also a program lead for Master Program in Information Technology- Internetworking and Cybersecurity stream. His efforts have resulted in the establishment of a major program in networks and security in the Master of IT program. In recent past, he has been the acting coordinator of post-graduate studies and had also served in the ACS Accreditation Committee twice, both in the Department of Computing. Dr Shankaran has also been a member of the technical sub-committee Network Stabilization Project at the University level. He has served as a Program Co-Chair and program committee member for a number of conferences in computer networking and security.	Department of Computing
Prof Mark Wiggins	Cue-based Processing Associate Professor Mark Wiggins is a Registered Organisational Psychologist. He is currently Program Director of the Master of Organisational Psychology, Deputy Director of the Centre of Elite Performance, Expertise, and Training (CEPET), and Associate Dean (Research) for the Faculty of Human Sciences at Macquarie University. His specialities include employee assessment and training, expert skill acquisition, selection and interviewing, and human factors analysis and intervention. He is the Research Lead for the EXPERT Intensive Skills Assessment (EXPERTise) Project. His research is oriented towards improving the relationship between humans and advanced technology. Prof Mark Wiggins's research is oriented towards improving the relationship between humans and advanced technology. His research in cue-based processing is designed to help us understand the bases on which humans interpret and form judgements in complex, time-constrained situations. His work in decision-support systems is designed to consider solutions that might bridge the gap between humans and advanced technology. Finally, he has an interest in how communication can impact performance, particularly in applied industrial environments.	Department of Psychology
Prof Ken Cheng	Human and Animal Navigation Prof Ken Cheng's research crosses mechanistic, functional and evolutionary questions in the study of animal behaviour. A central theme of his research concerns how animals process information. Dealing with information is crucial for many important behaviours in an animal's life, including choosing a mate, avoiding predators, and finding food. The range of species I have studied include humans, rats, pigeons, chickadees, Clark's nutcrackers, desert ants, and honeybees. A large part of his research has concentrated on how animals deal with space and time. He has collaborations with a number of researchers around the world. Macquarie University funds postgraduate students from anywhere in the world with scholarships. He is currently looking for students to study the behaviour of ants in Australia. We ate studying one species of desert ant, the highly thermophilic the red honey ant Melophorus bagoti, that lives in cluttered semi-arid habitats. We are also launching into the study of bull ants found on campus here. The latest venture is to provide virtual reality for ants, replicas of their natural scenes so that we can better control and manipulate the cues. He welcomes enquiries from those interested.	Department of Biological Sciences
A/Prof Kenneth Sheedy	Archaeology and Ancient Numismatic Studies Associate Professor Kenneth Sheedy was appointed the founding director of the Australian Centre for Ancient Numismatic Studies in 2000. He is also a member of the teaching staff of the Department of Ancient History and a member of the Ancient Cultures Research Centre. He received his doctorate in Classical Archaeology from the University of Sydney in 1987. Between 1988 and 1991 he was a curator at the Powerhouse Museum in Sydney. He was appointed Deputy Director of the Australian Archaeological Institute at Athens in 1991. In 1997 he obtained the position of curator for the Sylloge Nummorum Graecorum (SNG) Project at the British Museum, London. He was elected a Fellow of the Australian Academy of the Humanities in 2010. He is the representative of the Academy for the SNG Australia Project at the International Union of Academies. His fields of research and teaching are Greek numismatics, and the art and archaeology of Greece with emphasis on the archaic period. He has a special interest in the archaeology and history of the Cycladic Islands. In addition to his on-going studies in the coinage of the Cyclades, South Italy and Athens, he is interested in Geometric pottery, Protoattic pottery, archaic sculpture and the early history of Delos.	Director, Australian Centre for Ancient Numismatic Studies
Dr Cat Kutay	Computer Games Design and Engineering Cat Kutay graduated from UNSW in 2006 with a PhD in group based learning support using rule-based agents. She has been working in developing eLearning systems, including python web services, mobile apps with games and Unity games. She is working with the encultured agents system FAtiMA developed at GAIPS in Portugal to create agents suitable for enacting Aboriginal culture in games. The games are simulations with some interaction based on community stories and are designed for embedding Aboriginal content into the curriculum. Previously she has worked on projects for teaching Aboriginal culture including the Office of Learning and Teaching projects "Indigenous online cultural teaching and sharing" and "Exploring Transformative Education in Indigenous Australian Studies". She is also working with Muurrbay Aboriginal Language and Culture Cooperative to develop online and mobile learning systems for NSW Aboriginal language reclamation.	Department of Computing
Dr Malcolm Ryan	Game design, Game interface technologies, Artificial intellgience Dr Malcolm Ryan is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Computing where he teaches in the Game Design and Development program. After completing a PhD in Artificial Intelligence at UNSW in 2002, he worked for four years as a Research Fellow at the Centre for Autonomous Systems before shifting research areas from robotics to video games. He has been teaching game design since 2006 and has conducted various projects with the UNSW School of Optometry designing and developing games for testing colour vision and eye convergence. Dr Ryan’s current research focuses on the design of games with meaningful ethical impact, to be used in ethical pedagogy, in collaboration with the Macquarie Centre for Agency, Values and Ethics (CAVE) and the Department of Psychology. He is also continuing to supervise projects in the design of games employing novel interface technologies. He also runs a small independent games studio, Words on Play.	Department of Computing
Dr James Hazelton	Dr James Hazelton is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Accounting and Corporate Governance at Macquarie University. Prior to joining academia, Dr Hazelton was with PriceWaterhouseCoopers, where he worked in audit and risk management consulting in Sydney, London and New York. Dr Hazelton consults, researches and teaches in the areas of sustainability and business ethics and he also has a longstanding interest technology. Whilst at PwC he was part of the team that developed risk management software to underpin the global Enterprise Risk Management practice. Whilst at Macquarie University he was the co-investigator of a team engaged by the NSW Office of Environment and Heritage to develop online energy efficiency training for the accounting profession. Dr Hazelton also developed a dedicated undergraduate accounting unit ‘Measuring Sustainability’ that has been fully online since 2013. In 2016, together with A/Prof Manolya Kavakli-Thorne and Dr Mauricio Marrone he was the recipient of a grant by Chartered Accountants Australia and New Zealand to investigate the impact of virtual and augmented reality technologies on the accounting profession.	Department of Accounting and Corporate Governance
Mauricio Marrone	Award-winning Lecturer of Business Information Systems at Macquarie University. He has a bachelor degree in Software Engineering, an MBA focused on Entrepreneurship and a PhD in Information Management and Standards. His research interest is in the intersection of technology, innovation and entrepreneurship and how through text mining (analysis of text) in journals, reports and articles by both practitioners and academics can predict the rise and fall of an idea, product, or a technological innovation. His research is relevant to all business sectors, and is applicable to brands, company reports, stock trends, product lifecycle. He aims to help CEOs, entrepreneurs and innovators in the area of technology to refine the language of their communication to increase the adoption of their products in the marketplace.	Department of Accounting and Corporate Governance

VR PROGRAMMERS

Area(s)

Department

John Porte

Teaching and Research Technology Support

ScienceIT

Meredith Taylor

Virtual Reality, Knowledge Aquisition

Meredith Taylor graduated from Macquarie University with a Bachelor of Computer Science in 2007 then completed Honours in 2008 with her thesis ‘Finding and validating experts’, which explored methods of creating and regulating an expert recommender system. She is currently working on a joint MQU and USyd ARC Discovery grant on the use of "Multi-User Virtual Environments for Science inquiry in Australian secondary high schools”.

Previous projects she has worked on include creating a virtual doctor for an online medical advice system with The Children's Hospital at Westmead, an ARC 2007-2009 Discovery grant "Risk Management using Agent-Based Virtual Environments", and a 3D gesture-based interface using the PPT optical tracking system. Her main areas of interest are 3D graphics, computer games, knowledge systems, and agent based systems.

Christopher Walker

Wearable Computing, Game Design and Programming

Mr Christopher Walker has a BSc (Software Tech) Macquarie University and Diploma Computer Networking NSI TAFE 2009. He is a games and simulation programmer interested in customised control systems and Virtual Reality interfaces based on the Arduino hardware platform.

PhD Candidates	Area(s)	Department
David Walker	Cognitive Load in Strategic Decision Making	Department of Computing
Hasan Alyamani	Optimisation of Cognitive Load in Driving Simulators Hasan J. Alyamani is a PhD candidate in the Department of Computing and a member of VR lab, Macquarie University. Hasan recieved his Bsc (Computer Science) from Umm Al-Qura University, Saudi Arabia in 2006 and Ms (Computer Science) from The University of Waikato, New Zealand in 2012. His research interests lie in HCI, cognitive abilities and human behavior.	Department of Computing
Hessam (Sam) Jahani	Motion Tracking and Signal Processing in Gesture Recognition Hessam Jahani Fariman is the PhD candidate and researcher in department of Computing and VR lab, Macquarie University. He received his B.Sc. degree in Electrical and Electronic Engineering from Ferdowsi University of Mashhad, Iran in 2011 and M.Sc. in Control and Automation Engineering from University of Putra Malaysia, Malaysia, in 2014. His areas of interest include Pattern Recognition, Machine Learning, Biomedical Engineering and Rehabilitation.	Department of Computing
Zhenzhong (Charles) Liu	Motor Cognition and Agents using Cognitive Robotics in User Navigation	Department of Computing
Majed Alrowaily	Energy Monitoring in Smart Homes using mobile sensors Majed Abdullah Alrowaily is a PhD candidate in the Department of Computing and a member of VR lab, Macquarie University. Majed received his bachelor degree in Education,Major Computer from Aljouf University, Saudi Arabia in 2006 and MSc (Computer Science) from The University of Waikato, New Zealand in 2012. His research interests lie in HCI, smart meters, social networks and energy behaviour. Previous project: The Domestic Usage Monitoring Project http://idslm.cms.waikato.ac.nz/, known as DUMP, is about collecting and analysing a large dataset of household electricity consumption patterns. The data itself is varied; it ranges from whole-of-house right down to the level of individual appliances within a house.	Department of Computing

Past Members (Once Upon a Time in VISOR)

Previous VISOR Research Group Members
Past Member	Area(S)	Department
Darren Burke	Psychology, Human Vision and perception, Cognitive Modeling	Department of Psychology
Julian Lesley	Statistics, Forensic Sciences	Department of Statistics
Scott McCallum	Computer Graphics, Maths	Department of Computing
Debbie Richards	Knowledge based systems, cognitive modeling, machine learning/data mining, Human Computer Interaction	Department of Computing
Michael Hitchens	Networks and Security, Computer Role Playing Games	Department of Computing
Chris Anderson	Forensic Sciences	Department of Statistics
Kathryn Millard	Story Telling	Department of Media
Lee Flax	Cognitive Modelling, Information Systems
Mark Dras	Language Technology	Department of Computing

Postdoctoral Fellows
Past Member	Area(s)	Duration
Dr Iwan Kelaiah	Gesture Recognition	January 2012-2013
Dr Ali Boyali	Motion Tracking	May-2010-July-2012
Dr Tauseef Gulrez	Computer Assisted Robotics	January-June2013 April 2008-2009
Dr Nicolas Szilas	Interactive Drama, Computer Games	Feb 2005-Feb 2006 July-August 2004
Miriam Lloyd	Tele-presence, Projection Cubes, Caves	July –October 2005

Completed PhD
Past Member	Area(s)	Duration
Jing Liu	Analysis of Gender Differences in Speech and Hand Gesture Coordination for the design of Multimodal Interface Systems E-IPRS (Endeavor-IPRS) Scholar, Macquarie University Research Excellence Scholarship (MQRES) Schola	2009-26.6.2014
Maximillian Wittmann	Understanding Computer Graphics Student Problem Solving through Source-Code Analysis	2008-2013
Yi Fan Gao	Facial Expression Classification Using Optical Tracking, Wavelet Filters and Subspace Learning Method	21.2.2005-4.6.2013
Eric Malbos	Psychological Rehabilitation using VR	2008-2012 Department of Psychology
Susan Bruck	Simulator Sickness	2006-2012
Eric Fassbender	Collaborative Learning Environments	2006-2009 Department of Computing
Anders Tychsen	Play Story, Communication, Character, and Cross-platform Gaming Experiences in Multi Player Role Playing Games IMURS1, IPRS, HDRSCHOL Scholar	1.1.2005-31.12.2008 Department of Computing
Rudra Tarashankar	Emotion classification and Analysis in the Design and Implementation of a Game Pidgin Language APAI - ARC Scholar	2002-2008 Department of Computing
Tauseef Gulrez	Body Machine Interface – Remapping Residual Mobility of Spinal Cord Injured patients to Control Assistive Robotic Devices RAACE Scholar	27.7.2006-2008 Department of Computing


Iwan Kelaiah (Kartiko)	The Visual Complexity of Instructional Animations in Training Simulations to Promote Learning: Guidelines for Virtual Reality Designers ARC Scholar	30.3.2007-24.12.2011 Department of Computing
Zheng Zhou	Biometric facial recognition	2005-2007 Department of Computing
Antonio Lafusa	The Emergent Behaviour of Self Replicating Machines	2005-2009 Department of Computing

Research Fellows
Past Member	Area(s)	Department
Dilshan Jayarathna	Virtual Reality, Hand Gesture Recognition	Department of Computing
Mine Cicek	Gesture Recognition	Department of Computing
Nolwenn Bigoin	Virtual Reality, Motion Sickness, 3D Modeling	Universite De La Mediterranee

Honours and ITEC Students
Past Member	Area(s)	Department
Dilmi Pallayuruge	Motion Capture	Department of Computing
Andrew Hills	Virtual Reality, Biometrics, Emotion Recognition	Department of Computing

Research Programmers
Past Member	Area(s)
Jason Barles	Training simulations, UnrealEngine Mods, Programming, CAVE building
Tom Fellman	Virtual Reality Engine, programming, CAVE building

Macquarie University Faculty of Science