Research

Research themes and priority areas

Health

Prevention, detection and management of disease and injury

Research Priority Areas

• Exercise, nutrition, lifestyle and other interventions for optimal health across the lifespan
• Multidisciplinary biological approaches to personalised disease diagnosis, prognosis and management
• Neuroscience and neurorehabilitation
• Prevention, detection and management of cancer and other chronic diseases
• Safety and quality in health care

Society and Culture

Impacting and supporting social change through ensuring diversity, creativity, cultural identity, education, personal and organisational success and social justice

Research Priority Areas

• Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander society and culture
• Creativity, culture and artistic practice
• Diverse, equitable, informed and productive communities, schools and workplaces
• Human movement and performance
• Individual, economic, organisational, political and social transformation

Natural and Built Environments

Understanding, harnessing, building and protecting environments for sustaining people, place and planet

Research Priority Areas

• Engineering, technology and nanotechnology
• Environmental management, governance and policy
• Environmental science, ecology and ecosystems
• Human-environment interaction
• Sustainability of energy, water, materials and resources

Securing Digital Futures

Enabling a safe, secure, productive and enterprising digital environment

Research Priority Areas

• Artificial intelligence and autonomous systems
• Critical Infrastructure
• Cyber-enabled crime
• Digital citizenship and human behaviour
• Secure systems

ECU's research is characterised by its fundamental commitment to the pathway from basic research to translation to innovative implementation (including practice, service delivery, and industry adoption).

ECU's commitment to this research pathway is reflected in its cross-cutting approach to research across each of its research themes and priority areas. These cross-cutting approaches are:

• A strong research–practice interface, including research-led practice and practice-led research, that involves and engages the professions, service-delivery agencies and other end- users (patients, clients, consumers, industry).
• Strengthening the evidence base by responding to the needs of high-end practitioners, policy-makers, guideline developers, activists, companies and governments, thereby ensuring they have access to expert advice and robust data for decision-making.
• Assessment, evaluation, advocacy, policy-making throughout all stages of planning, measurement and monitoring as well as the early stages of innovation.
• Indigeneity and diversity to reach a fuller understanding of aboriginal knowledge, practice, and belief and the diversity of the cultures among which we live and research.