CSIRO gets High-Speed Broadband Ready 8 November 2011
CSIRO has been at the leading edge of information and communications technology research for a long time. They have been developing technologies to connect people and machines with high speed broadband and enable them to access the wireless internet anytime, anywhere.
The organisation responsible for several landmark technologies – including Australia’s first recordable computer and the high-speed wireless networking - WLAN - technology which lies at the heart of the most popular way to connect computers without wires.
CSIRO’s Sydney-based ICT Centre is working to develop broadband-enabled applications and services as well as technologies to ensure broadband access in parts of the country where fibre is impractical.
The Centre’s focus is on research to build and operate high speed and high capacity wireless and fibre networks to smoothly operate the demanding applications and services of tomorrow.
A special area of interest for CSIRO is in providing high performance wireless broadband network connectivity to people living in rural and remote Australia who are not connected by fibre.
Broadband-enabled technologies
CSIRO is working in three main areas: e-health, smart infrastructure and remote operation systems.
E-health
Expanding the use of technologies to improve healthcare services is a key focus.
CSIRO has already achieved success in using collaborative tools and immersive technologies which allow people at distant locations to work together as if they were in the same room.
For example, three NSW hospitals (Nepean, Lithgow and Blue Mountains) are benefiting from the virtual critical care unit - ViCCU - a real-time telepresence link which enables specialists in emergency medicine at one hospital to supervise a team treating a critically ill patient at another.
Smart infrastructure
Data monitoring and sharing is another major area of opportunity with the connectivity offered by high-speed broadband.
This is being applied in water quality and catchment health where CSIRO is using smart wireless sensors to monitor environmental conditions, providing real time data via an internet portal.
Remote operation systems
Developed for the mining industry, CSIRO’s telerobotic rockbreaker is an example of intelligent machines and systems which can be operated from a few metres away or from the other side of the world.
Remote operation systems in the mining sector can deliver significant benefits, removing people from hazardous and inhospitable working environments, and creating opportunities for increasing efficiency, productivity and profitability.
Broadband access technologies
CSIRO is focusing on the opportunity to provide high performance network connectivity to those Australians not served by fibre technologies.
CSIRO is developing two technologies aimed at bringing broadband Internet access to remote areas of Australia: wireless local access and wireless backhaul.
Wireless local access
Proof-of-concept trials are underway in NSW to test a wireless local access solution that aims to deliver two-way network connectivity at rates similar to fibre.
Broadband signals are sent from existing television broadcast towers in the form of focused beams. In the premises, the existing rooftop antenna is connected to a modem terminal which incorporates the CSIRO technology. Users can connect computers and other devices to this terminal as they would using a local area network.
Wireless backhaul
CSIRO is preparing to test a prototype of a wireless backhaul solution that could be a cost-effective alternative to fibre backhauls for regional centres.
The solution aims to provide Internet connectivity by joining together isolated sub-networks as well providing a path to the main fibre optic Internet spine.
