Timeline of Australian inventions
[1] Perhaps due to its status as an island continent connected to the rest of the world only via air and sea, Australians have been leaders in inventions relating to both maritime and aeronautical matters, including powered flight, the black box flight recorder, the inflatable escape slide, the surf ski and the wave-piercing catamaran winged keel.
Australians also developed a number of useful household items, including Vegemite, and the process for producing permanently creased fabric.
CSIRO scientists lead Australian research across a number of different fields, and work with industry and government to solve problems such as using insects to tackle weeds, growing more sustainable crops and improving transportation.
These create wedge-shaped regions of oil inside the bearing between the pads and a rotating disk, which support the applied thrust and eliminate metal-on-metal contact.
The board was propelled in a sitting position with two small hand blades, which was probably not a highly efficient method to negotiate the surf.
The deck is flat with a bung plug at the rear and a nose ring with a leash, possibly originally required for mooring.
[26] 1912 – Tank – South Australian Lance de Mole submitted a proposal to the British War Office, for a 'chain-rail vehicle which could be easily steered and carry heavy loads over rough ground and trenches,' complete with extensive drawings.
The British Royal Commission on Awards to Inventors eventually made a payment of £987 to De Mole to cover his expenses and promoted him to an honorary corporal.
The apparatus was used at Crown Street Women's Hospital, Sydney to revive a potentially stillborn infant whose heart continued 'to beat on its own accord', 'at the end of 10 minutes' of stimulation.
Flynn & Hudson Fysh, (a founder of QANTAS) signed an agreement to operate an aerial ambulance from Cloncurry, Queensland in 1927, with the first service beginning on the 5th of May 1928.
The blocks also enable the sprinters to adopt a more efficient starting posture and isometrically preload their muscles in an enhanced manner.
1930 – Clapperboard – The wooden marker used to synchronise sound and film was invented by Frank Thring Sr of Efftee Studios in Melbourne.
The idea came from a Geelong farmer's wife who wrote to Ford in 1933 advising the need for a new sort of vehicle to take her 'to church on Sundays and pigs to market on Mondays.
[54] 1943 – Splayd – The combination of knife, fork and spoon was invented by William McArthur after seeing ladies struggle to eat at barbecues with standard cutlery from plates on their laps.
Distance measuring equipment is a radio navigation technology that measures the slant range (distance) between an aircraft and a ground station by timing the propagation delay of radio signals[61] 1956 – Pneumatic broadacre air seeder – lightweight air seeder uses a spinning distributor, blew the seeds through a pipe into the plating tynes.
The instrument, which can measure one part in 10 million, has been used in chemical analysis in the petrochemical industry, medical and biochemical research, and in the monitoring of the environment.
[70] 1961 – Medical ultrasound – David Robinson and George Kossoff's work at the Australian Department of Health, resulted in the first commercially practical water path ultrasonic scanner in 1961.
An aircraft that enters the scanned volume uses a special receiver that calculates its position by measuring the arrival times of the beams.
The project was called INTERSCAN and was developed by the Radio Physics Division of the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO).
This computerised system allowed continuous analysis of key metals and meant greater productivity for the mineral industry worldwide.
So-called hammerhead ribozymes are bits of genetic material that interrupt a DNA code at a particular point, and can be used to cut out genes that cause disease or harmful proteins.
Rofin Australia Pty Ltd, developed this product into the portable Polilight which shows up invisible clues such as fingerprints and writing that has been scribbled over, as well as reworked sections on paintings.
[112] 1991 – Buffalo fly trap – In 1991 the CSIRO developed a low-tech translucent plastic tent with a dark inner tunnel lined with brushes.
[115] 1992 – Spray-on skin – Developed by Dr Fiona Wood at Royal Perth Hospital[116] 1992 – Product Activation – Patented by Ric Richardson of Sydney's northern beaches initially to allow digital distribution of his own software.
[128] 1996 – Anti-flu Medication – Relenza was developed by a team of scientists at the Victorian College of Pharmacy at Monash University in Melbourne.
Relenza was discovered as a part of the Australian biotechnology company Biota's project to develop antiviral agents via rational drug design.
[130] 2003 – UltraBattery – A hybrid energy storage device invented by the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO).
[133] 2010 – Robotic Visual Horizon – An automated system that allows unmanned aeroplanes to perform complex manoeuvres was adapted from the way a bee's brain processes visual information during flight by researchers and engineers at the Vision Centre, the Queensland Brain Institute and the School of Information Technology and Electrical Engineering at the University of Queensland.
[134] 2010 – Scrubba Wash Bag – flexible, lightweight washboard inside a waterproof bag, for hiking and offgrid clothes washing[135] 2011 – Anti-Hacking Software Kernel – National ICT Australia (NICTA), and Open Kernel Labs (OK Labs) released the seL4 microkernel, a small operating system kernel which regulates access to a computer's hardware and is able to distinguish between trusted and untrusted software, allowing secure financial or secret data to be used on the same platform as everyday applications, protecting the secure data from hackers.
[142] 2016-2018 – Concentric artificial surf generator pool – Aaron Trevis and the team he assembled as "Surf Lakes Holdings" created a plunger designed artificial wave maker, that sends out sets of waves, 360 degrees from the plunger, with the ability to vary the wave type[143] 2018 – Modular self-fit hearing aid – Collaboration between Government of Victoria, RMIT University, Swinburne University of Technology and Professor Peter Blamey and Professor Elaine Saunders release the first hearing aid with a modular design allowing users with severe dexterity issues to self-manage their own hearing aids.
