Five brilliant Australian ideas that changed the world

DESPITE our comparatively small population, Australia has exported some great inventions to the world including Sydney’s John O’Sullivan, who created Wi-Fi. Here are just a few.

Professor Graeme Clark shows Ryan, 2, how he was inspired by a shell to create the cochlear implant in 1977.

AUSTRALIA is a land of big ideas. Despite our comparatively small population and relatively new institutions of higher learning, we have exported some great ideas and inventions to the world — many with Sydney connections. Here are just a few.

BIONIC EAR

Professor Graeme Clark developed technology for the cochlear implant in 1978. Born in Camden, NSW in 1935, Clark studied medicine at the University of Sydney and became a specialist at London’s Royal National Throat, Nose and Ear Hospital.

He developed the technology for the bionic ear while head of otolaryngology (ear, nose, and
throat surgery) at the University of Melbourne.

A crucial breakthrough came while on holidays at Minnamurra Beach, NSW, in 1977, when he found a turban shell, structured like a human cochlea (in the inner ear). He poked a blade of grass into the shell, giving him an idea of how to insert wires into the cochlea.

In 1981 the company Cochlear Ltd was established in Sydney to promote Clark’s invention around the world, ahead of the first successful cochlear implant in 1982. The company is now based at Macquarie University.

WI-FI

In the 1970s and ’80s Sydney-born physicist and electrical engineer John O’Sullivan worked on ways to sift through the enormous amount of background noise that interferes with radio waves.

He was interested in helping astronomers find the radiation from black holes, theorised by Steven Hawking. But the work he did on sharpening signals also proved useful when he collaborated with a team at the CSIRO who were looking for ways to improve signals for wireless computer networks.

The CSIRO filed the first of many patents relating to Wi-Fi in 1992.

SURF LIFESAVING

THE original lifesavers patrolled pools but at the turn of the 20th century as beach bathing became popular, drownings in the sea increased prompting a need to patrol the surf.

The Surf Life Saving movement was born on the beaches of Sydney, training people to rescue swimmers in trouble in the ocean. Although there is some dispute about which lifesaving club came first — Bondi or Bronte — there is no dispute that Australia led the world in techniques and equipment used in surf rescue and exported their expertise to the world or inspired other nations to patrol their beaches.

PACEMAKER

In 1926 Dr Mark Lidwill, anaesthetist at RPA Hospital in Sydney and later director of the hospital, became the first person to use an electrical impulse to stimulate a heart and pace the beats.

He created a device with the help of Edgar Booth at the University of Sydney. It would lead to the creation of the implantable pacemaker.

MECHANICAL SHEARS

Shearers used manual clippers to shear sheep until Frederick Wolseley revolutionised the wool industry with his mechanical shears in 1884.

Born in Dublin in 1837 he came to Australia in 1854, settling in Euroka, near Walgett in 1876. After collaborating with others, he developed an “improved shearing apparatus” — the first practical mechanical shearing device — which he patented in 1884.

He set up a company to manufacture the machines in 1885, and in 1889, travelled to England to set up the Wolseley Sheep Shearing Machine Co. Pty Ltd in Birmingham.

MORE GREAT AUSSIE INVENTIONS

● Sydney inventors Peter Vogel and Kim Ryrie invented the first digital sampling synthesiser, the Fairlight Computer Musical Instrument in 1979. It had a major impact on popular music.

● Maria Ann “Granny” Smith of Eastwood created the Granny Smith apple in 1868, after she accidentally crossed a wild apple with a domestic variety.

● In 1969 Sydney chook farmer Norm Jennings wondered how to make chicken droppings into a marketable product. He invented a drinking system that kept the chicken poo dry and then worked out a way of compressing it into pellets that would break down in the soil. After extensive testing in the 1970s his product went on sale in the 80s as Dynamic Lifter and has since been sold around the world.

● Doug Waterhouse of the CSIRO developed an insect repellent dimethyl phthalate, which was used by troops in the Pacific in World War II. In 1963 it was used to help Queen Elizabeth cope with Australian bugs. Mortein rang CSIRO and secured the recipe to use as Aerogard.

● Extended wear contact lenses were developed by CSIRO scientists Gorden Meijs and Hans Griesser in collaboration with the University of New South Wales, and US ans Swiss teams.

What’s your big idea for a better Australia? Join the national #MyBigIdeaAU conversation and head to MyBigIdea.org.au to submit yours, vote on others and make the best become real.

Professor Graeme Clark with the world's first commercial multichannel Cochlear Implant.

CSIRO electrical engineer John O'Sullivan, inventor of key technology in Wi-Fi.

The oldest known picture of lifesavers at Bondi Beach in 1906.

Pioneer of the pacemaker, Dr Mark Lidwill, in 1903.

A very early version of the Wolseley mechanical shears in 1887.

Iva Davies (left) with Kim Ryrie (centre) and Peter Vogel, the two men who invented the world’s first digital keyboard, the Fairlight in 1979.

Maria Anne “Granny” Smith created the Granny Smith apple in 1868.

Originally published as Five brilliant Australian ideas that changed the world