Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation

The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) is the national government body for scientific research in Australia. It was founded in 1916 originally as the Advisory Council of Science and Industry.

Research highlights include the invention of atomic absorption spectroscopy, development of the first polymer banknote, invention of the insect repellant in Aerogard, gene splicing technology and the introduction of a series of biological controls into Australia, such as the introduction of Myxomatosis and Rabbit calicivirus for the control of rabbit populations.

Recently, the CSIRO has been actively defending its patent for the use of wireless technologies which are a standard for many modern day laptops. A class action has been filed by US corporations Microsoft, Apple Computer and Dell to renege on paying royalties on the wireless patent filed by the CSIRO in 1996.

In October 2005 Nature magazine announced that CSIRO scientists had developed near-perfect rubber from resilin, the elastic protein which gives fleas their jumping ability and helps insects fly.

Research groups and initiatives

Employing over 6600 staff, the CSIRO maintains 55 sites across Australia and biological control research stations in France and Mexico. The primary roles of the CSIRO include contributing to meeting the objectives and responsibilities of the Australian Federal Government and providing new ways to benefit the Australian community and the economic and social performance of a number of industry sectors through research and development. The CSIRO includes the following research divisions: Agribusiness, Energy and Transport, Environment and Natural Resources, Information, Communication and Services, Manufacturing, Mineral Resources and Health.

"Flagship" initiative

The CSIRO "Flagship" initiative was designed to integrate, focus and direct national scientific resources. In May 2005, the government announced the launch of CSIRO's $97 million Flagship Collaboration Fund, which is intended to encourage cooperative research between universities, CSIRO and other research agencies.

As of May 2005, the CSIRO supported the following 6 "Flagships":

Energy Transformed
Food Futures
Light Metals
Preventative Health
Water for a Healthy Country
Wealth from Oceans

The Air Quality Modelling and Dispersion Team

CSIRO's Air Quality Modelling and Dispersion TeamAir Quality Modelling and Dispersion Team is a part of the Marine and Atmospheric Research division.

Some of the widely used air quality dispersion models developed by CSIRO are:

TAPM TAPM documentation (see description in Compilation of atmospheric dispersion models)
LADM LADM documentation (see description in Compilation of atmospheric dispersion models)
AUSPLUME AUSPLUME brief summary (scroll down beneath slide)
AUSPUFF AUSPUFF brief summary (scroll down beneath slide) (see description in Compilation of atmospheric dispersion models)
DISPMOD DISPMOD brief summary (scroll down beneath slide) (see description in Compilation of atmospheric dispersion models)

The "Australian Air Quality Forecasting System" is provided jointly by the Australian Bureau of Meteorology and CSIRO. The Bureau of Meteorology generates the high resolution weather forecasts and CSIRO has created computer models to calculate pollution levels.

History

A precursor to the CSIRO, the Advisory Council of Science and Industry, was established in 1916 at the intitiative of Prime Minister Billy Hughes. However, the Advisory Council struggled with insufficient funding during the First World War. In 1920 the Council was renamed the "Commonwealth Institute of Science and Industry", and was led by George Handley Knibbss (1921-26), but continued to struggle financially.

In 1926 The Science and Industry Research Act replaced the Institute with the 'Council for Scientific and Industrial Research' (CSIR). The CSIR was structured to represent the federal structure of Australian government, and had state-level committees and a central council. As well as this improved structure, the CSIR benefited from strong bureaucratic management under George Julius, Albert Rivett, and Arnold Richardson. CSIR research focussed on primary and secondary industries. Early in its existence, it established divisions studying animal health and animal nutrition. After the depression, the CSIR extended into secondary industries such as manufacturing.

The CSIRO today has expanded into a wider range of scientific inquiry. This expansion began with the establishment of the CSIRO in 1949 which, as well as a name change, reconstituted the organisation and its administrative structure. Under Ian Clunies Ross as chairman, the CSIRO pursued new areas such as radioastronomy and industrial chemistry.

Historic research

CSIR owned the first computer in Australia, CSIRAC, built as part of a project began in the Sydney Radiophysics Laboratory in 1947. The CSIR Mk 1 ran its first program in 1949, the fifth electronic computer in the world. It was over 1000 times faster than the mechanical calculators available at the time. It was decommissioned in 1955 and recommissioned in Melbourne as CSIRAC in 1956 as a general purpose computing machine used by over 700 projects until 1964.

Domain name

The CSIRO was the first Australian organisation to start using the internet, and as such was free to register the second level domain csiro.au (as opposed to csiro.org.au or csiro.com.au). Guidelines were introduced in 1996 to regulate the use of the .au domain.

Previous Chief Executives

Keith Boardman: 5 December 1986 - 4 March 1990
John Stocker: 5 March 1990 - 4 March 1995
Roy Green: 5 March 1995 - 4 February 1996
Malcolm McIntosh 3 January 1996 - 7 February 2000
Colin Adam: 7 February 2000 - 14 January 2001
Dr Geoff Garrett: January 2001 - present.

Recent controversies

In 2005 the organisation also gained worldwide attention (and criticism) for publishing and promoting the Total Wellbeing Diet book http://www.csiro.au/csiro/channel/pchaj,,.html Total Wellbeing Diet which features a high-protein, low-carbohydrate diet. The book has sold over half a million copies in Australia and over 100,000 overseas but was criticised in an editorial by Nature for giving scientific credence to a "fashionable" diet book sponsored by meat and dairy industries .

In 2006 CSIRO was again in the news, this time with reports that they were struggling with reduced funding and job cuts . It was reported that the organisation was increasingly affected by political processes as claims of gags on scientists on the topic of global warming emerged . The Labor Party attempted to open a Senate enquiry into the matter but it was rejected by the Government.

References

External Sources

Currie, George; Graham, John, The Origins of CSIRO: Science and the Commonwealth Government, 1901-1926, CSIRO, Melbourne, 1966

External links

Scientific institutions | Science and technology in Australia | Air dispersion modeling