Research and enterprise

ACU develops innovative solutions to issues impacting human dignity and the common good. Our interdisciplinary and collaborative research seeks to enable people to develop intellectually, spiritually, physically, socially, and emotionally, to enable flourishing lives, foster thriving communities and build an ethical future.

Research and enterprise

  • 1st

    in Australia for research quality.

  • 100%

    of ACU's research disciplines are ranked as world class or above.

  • 1st

    in Australia for scientific impact across all disciplines.

Our research

When the bubble turns yellow

In an underground coal mine in China, an environment that's among the most hazardous workplaces on earth, the methane gas that seeps naturally from coal seams can ignite with devastating consequences. Danger escalates quickly, decisions must be made fast, and the stakes of a missed warning could hardly be higher.
Professor Garth Green

Carrying forward a legacy

On a dark November evening in Montreal, where the temperature often drops below zero and the wind chill makes it feel even colder, Professor Garth Green sits in his home office, contemplating the warmer days ahead. Within weeks he would relocate to Melbourne – a city where January means summer, not the cold Canadian winter that he and his Italian wife have become accustomed to.

From stress to strength: A guide to building resilience

When the Covid pandemic disrupted the way we live and learn, nursing students found themselves at the sharp edge of stress and uncertainty.

Teasing out the threads of the past

There was a time in Kate Fullagar’s life, just after she graduated from Australian National University with an honours degree in history, that her exit from Canberra couldn’t come soon enough.

Improving the wellbeing of war widows

Put yourself in the shoes of a Vietnam war widow. Your husband was one of more than 60,000 Australians to serve in combat against the Vietcong between 1962 and 1973, returning home to a less than welcoming environment, as veterans were widely shunned and mistreated.

Exploring the role of emotions in learning

Picture an exam hall at a school or university somewhere in Australia, or indeed anywhere in the world. Some of the students present in the hall are showing the telltale signs of test anxiety: nervous fidgeting, excessive sweating, increased heart rate and even nausea.

Valuing the work of early childhood educators

At an early childhood learning centre somewhere in Australia, two children race their way around the playground, side-stepping through their self-styled obstacle course to see who can get through it fastest.

Why democratic decline matters to everyday people

In mid-2015, when the political philosopher Adam Lovett started his PhD dissertation looking at how democracies fail, the world was a vastly different place. Then based at the New York University, the British scholar was combining political philosophy with empirical political science to explore the ways that modern democracies fall short of democratic values.

Can media literacy make young people happier and healthier?

For some time now, the backlash against social media has been building, and warnings that platforms like Instagram and TikTok are responsible for a worrying decline in young people’s mental health have grown increasingly loud.

Eating right and sleeping tight

We all eat and we all sleep. When we get these two crucial lifestyle factors right, we’re more likely to be at our best – whether we’re an elite athlete on a mission to get faster, higher and stronger, or a regular person who wants to perform to their potential at work, at school, or in relationships.

Opening eyes and ears to inclusive education

In a previous life, Melissa Cain was a musicologist. She lived abroad in Singapore, teaching music at a prestigious international school and conducting research on various aspects of music education. Things changed when her son Mikhail was born with a rare vision impairment known as Peters anomaly, which affects just one in a million people.

Embracing neurodiversity in the workplace

“I’d like to have a job here, if that’s okay with you,” says Rohan in the first season of Employable Me, the documentary series that follows a group of neurodiverse Australians as they navigate the challenging task of finding a job. When he hands his resume to the sales assistant on the other side of the counter, she responds politely – but an interview invitation never eventuates.
Helping to fix Australia's reading problem

Helping to fix Australia's reading problem

When Rauno Parrila, Director of the Australian Centre for the Advancement of Literacy, was a four-year-old in Finland, his teenage aunt taught him how to read. Before he had even started school, he was sounding out words, building his vocabulary and making sense of simple stories. And yet, Professor Parrila is quick to point out that “with Finnish, that’s not such a big task”.

Seeing the law through an Indigenous lens

In the early 1970s, when Mick Dodson was on his way to becoming the first Aboriginal man to graduate with a law degree, Indigenous issues barely got a mention in the curriculum. This was a time of great activism and change, with Aboriginal legal services being established all over the country, and the powerful land rights movement gaining pace.

Call for calm on screen time concerns

The much-celebrated Swiss physician and naturalist, Conrad Gessner, was well known for his dramatic declaration that a ubiquitous new technology would be "confusing and harmful" to the human mind, thereby leading society into ruin. And Gessner wasn't the first to warn of the dangers posed by this innovation. Others, like the Italian writer Filippo de Strata, asserted it would "corrupt susceptible hearts". So, which harmful invention were these scholars railing against?

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Research vision 2033

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