MELBOURNE CONNECT Innovation Week

Canstruction Melbourne is a community-focused competition

Join us for the annual OPTIMA Debate, where leading optimisation researchers from fields such as mathematics, computer science, engineering, and economics explore whether hyper-efficiency is always the best solution. Panellists will discuss topics like overfitting life, the ethics of optimisation, and whether chaos and spontaneity still have a place in an increasingly optimised world. If life were 100% efficient, would we lose those unpredictable yet defining moments like a spontaneous 2am snack run?

As the climate emergency intensifies, Australia faces a critical opportunity to lead global efforts through its bid to host the 2026 Conference of the Parties (COP31). This panel discussion will feature prominent climate and sustainability experts and policymakers, offering a behind-the-scenes look at what really happens at a COP. Explore the complexities of climate negotiations, the economic, social, and environmental impacts of hosting this pivotal event, and Australia’s potential to drive the global transition to a low-carbon future.

Presented by the UEDLAB for the 19th International Architecture Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, curated by Carlo Ratti, Song of the Cricket offers an immersive ecological and sensory experience focused on the endangered Zeuneriana marmorata, or Marbled Adriatic Bush Cricket.

Join editors from The Conversation for an engaging lunchtime event as they share their editorial priorities and plans for the year ahead. This is a unique opportunity to hear directly from the editorial team about the stories they’re looking to tell and how they’re shaping coverage across key topics and sectors.

What if your organs could talk—and you could listen in? QRious Bodies is an interactive, walk-through experience that reimagines how we learn about health. Scan a QR code and hear your organs speak — sharing bite-sized stories about what’s really happening inside your body.

The Faculty of Engineering and Information Technology at Melbourne Connect showcases displays across seven floors, offering a fascinating journey through the history of the engineering school and its groundbreaking research. These displays combine objects, stories, and multimedia, providing unique insight into 170 years of teaching, learning, and innovation.

The Faculty of Engineering and Information Technology at Melbourne Connect showcases displays across seven floors, offering a fascinating journey through the history of the engineering school and its groundbreaking research. These displays combine objects, stories, and multimedia, providing unique insight into 170 years of teaching, learning, and innovation.

Celebrate a year of innovation at the Melbourne Space Program’s Annual Showcase. Explore how student-led teams are advancing Australia’s space capabilities with projects like the ACRUX-2 satellite, set to work with Industry to develop Australia's space heritage, and initiatives such as Humanoid Robotics and Animatronics for Children’s Hospitals, where technology is making a real impact on both space exploration and community wellbeing.

Be part of The University of Melbourne's Three Minute Thesis (3MT) Grand Final and witness cutting-edge research distilled into dynamic presentations. 3MT is an internationally recognised competition that tasks participants with presenting their research to a non-specialist audience in just three minutes.

Australia’s offshore wind future is fast approaching, promising large-scale clean energy driven by digital innovation, policy alignment, and infrastructure planning. But delivering this vision demands cross-sector collaboration, smarter systems, and new ways of working.

In collaboration with The University of Melbourne’s Faculty of Engineering and Information Technology, Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry and Health Sciences, and Faculty of Science, this event showcases the most promising early to mid-career researchers as they pitch their collaborative biomedical engineering and medtech projects.