In a single semester, four Charles Darwin University (CDU) students developed an Artificial Intelligence (AI) model which can revolutionise road safety and infrastructure maintenance.
As part of their Master of Data Science, CDU students Cong Do Le, Khai Quang Thang, Van Phuc Vinh Ho and Buu Dang Phan developed technology that accurately detects and classifies road signs.
The model needed to be able to identify these road signs in varying and challenging conditions such as low light, adverse weather and local urban landscapes.
To do this, the students worked alongside national civil engineering provider Civiltech Solutions, which shared videos of Darwin streets recorded by a camera mounted on a bike.
The team extracted 60,000 images from these videos and then narrowed this dataset to about 8000 images, which they fed into the model.
At the end of the project, the students reported the model had a more than 90 per cent accuracy rate for identifying road signs.
Students Khai Quang Thang and Van Phuc Vinh Ho, who are both international students from Vietnam, said the project offered valuable experience.
"The highlights of this project were working in a team, how we managed and overcame problems, learning about this technology but also how to deal with industry professionals," Mr Ho said.
"At first, we had a lot of trouble, we had little knowledge about sign recognition.
"We improved the model step by step to make it more accurate and faster, and we got expert advice from our lecturers and Civiltech which improved our approach to monitoring and better understanding the real-world applications.
"I have a background in IT and I'm passionate about data science. I was able to learn about data and Artificial Intelligence, and this project has opened my eyes to new experiences."
Mr Thang, who comes from a business background hopes to pursue a career as a data analyst, said the project was challenging but the opportunity to blend academia and industry was a personal highlight.
"I've met a lot of talented people from our professors, my teammates and other talented people at CDU," Mr Thang said.
"We had to submit our project to the CDU IT Code Fair Research Competition, and this gave me a chance to speak in public. This is important to become a data analyst, because you must work with technology but also communicate with clients."
At the end of the project, the students reported the model had a more than 90 per cent accuracy rate for identifying road signs.
The legacy of this project will go beyond these four students. Future students who undertake this course will be able to use the technology to develop it for new applications which contribute to the community.
"Projects like this are a foundation for other students in the university to adapt and develop this technology," Mr Ho said.
"Our project has applications to make self-driving systems, recognise road signs in real-time, and help civil companies map roads."
CDU Lecturer in Information Technology Dr Thuseethan Selvarajah, who was one of the project's supervisors, said giving students opportunities to combine academia with industry collaboration was a priority.
"Normally students are used to theoretical studies," Dr Selvarajah said.
"But they don't know where and
