We are thrilled to announce that we have awarded nine Security & Defence PLuS (S&D+) seed grants during our inaugural S&D+ Seed Grant round. The panel reviewed 19 applications and have notified project teams of selection decisions. The seed grants will fund collaborations aligned to security and defence, with funded areas including, but not limited to, AUKUS stated priorities.
The objective of the seed grant is to support the development or expansion of research collaborations across our partner universities: Arizona State University (ASU), King’s College London (KCL), and the University of New South Wales (UNSW). Of the selected applications, four will be co-led by researchers from all three of the PLuS Alliance universities, while the remaining five are bilateral collaborations.
The seed grant funding will facilitate in-person meeting(s), development of a white paper proposing a solution to a security and defence need, article submission and a timelined plan outlining steps towards a collaborative proposal for an external sponsor.
The selected projects encompass a diverse range of research areas, including emerging norms in space governance, ethical training for military personnel, cybersecurity strategies in the Indo-Pacific, material science advancements for defence applications, and the integration of climate change considerations into defence industrial strategies.
We thank all applicants for their interest and are grateful for the review panel members for their time. More information on the selected projects to follow.
Trilateral Projects
- Emerging Norms in the Space Domain – Online Database
- Hacking Defence Training Simulation Architecture for Military Ethics Learning
- ‘Would you buy data or 500g of rice?’: Cyber Security as Statecraft in the Indo-Pacific
- Understanding Integrated Deterrence: A Framework for the AUKUS Context
Bilateral Projects
- A Machine Learning-Assisted Approach for the Design of Damage-Tolerant Multi-Component Alloys (ASU, UNSW)
- Fundamental Understanding of the Disruptive Dynamics Caused by Artificial Intelligence and Swarm Systems on the Intelligence Community and Global Security (ASU, UNSW)
- Seawater and Sea Sand Concrete for Navy Military-use Offshore Infrastructure (ASU, UNSW)
- A Systems’ Perspective for the Defence Asset Portfolio Management under Uncertainty: An Artificial Intelligence and Behaviour-driven Decision Support (KCL, UNSW)
- In Defence of the Climate: Locating Climate Change in the Australian and United Kingdom Defence Industrial Strategies (KCL, UNSW)