Vanessa Lam
2 December 2015: University of Canberra student Joseph McHugh recently took out the top prize at the Information, Telecommunications, Electronic and Electrical Student Presentation and Awards Night (ITEESPAN).
ITEESPAN is a competition organised by Engineers Australia and open to final year students at universities in Canberra. Students showcase their final year design projects in the information, telecommunications, electronic and electrical engineering fields and give a presentation highlighting the project.
The Bachelor of Engineering in Network and Software Engineering student said he was thrilled to take out the award.
"It's fantastic to get this kind of recognition because the team and I have put so much work into this project," Mr McHugh said.
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Joseph McHugh, winner of the ITEESPAN 2015 prize in the Network Research Laboratory. Photo: Michelle McAulay
He presented his honours project, Mine safety and rescue using a heterogeneous wireless mesh network-guided unmanned aerial vehicle.
"As resilient communications platforms play crucial roles when the safety of the miners is concerned, I designed a robust, self-organising underground wireless mesh network capable of going through the rubble in the event of an incident," he said.
After receiving funding from the Health and Safety Trust of Coal Services Private Ltd., Mr McHugh said he decided to pursue the project, as it was an opportunity to do some valuable work in mining safety.
Working as a full time electrician, Mr McHugh said he chose to study at the University because the degree was valuable and he wanted to gain further skills.
"I choose to study at UC because the degree was a little bit different to what a lot of other places were offering.
"It has been a great experience; there are some really good lecturers here who put a lot of effort into everything they teach and I've made some good friends out of the whole process," he said.
Mr McHugh is also a member of the Network Research Laboratory lead by assistant professor in network engineering Kumudu Munasinghe. Together the group is involved in researching wireless communications and networking, and collaborating with government and industry bodies, including the Australian Army, Coal Services Private Ltd., Veolia Environmental Services and XTEK Ltd.
