Concurrent validity of accelerations measured using a tri-axial inertial measurement unit while walking on firm, compliant and uneven surfaces

Although accelerometers are extensively used for assessing gait, limited research has evaluated the concurrent validity of these devices on less predictable walking surfaces or the comparability of different methods used for gravitational acceleration compensation. This study evaluated the concurrent validity of trunk accelerations derived from a tri-axial inertial measurement unit while walking on firm, compliant and uneven surfaces and contrasted two methods used to remove gravitational accelerations: i) subtraction of the best linear fit from the data (detrending), and; ii) use of orientation information (quaternions) from the inertial measurement unit. Twelve older and twelve younger adults walked at their preferred speed along firm, compliant and uneven walkways. Accelerations were evaluated for the thoracic spine (T12) using a tri-axial inertial measurement unit and an eleven-camera Vicon system. The findings demonstrated excellent agreement between accelerations derived from the inertial measurement unit and motion analysis system, including while walking on uneven surfaces that better approximate a real-world setting (all differences <0.16 m.s−2). Detrending produced slightly better agreement between the inertial measurement unit and Vicon system on firm surfaces (delta range: −0.05 to 0.06 vs. 0.00 to 0.14 m.s−2), whereas the quaternion method performed better when walking on compliant and uneven walkways (delta range: −0.16 to −0.02 vs. −0.07 to 0.07 m.s−2). The technique used to compensate for gravitational accelerations requires consideration in future research, particularly when walking on compliant and uneven surfaces. These findings demonstrate trunk accelerations can be accurately measured using a wireless inertial measurement unit and are appropriate for research that evaluates healthy populations in complex environments.

Crossing Boundaries : Australian student teachers creating ‘The Global Teacher Exhibition’

This DVD describes a curriculum project embedded into the subject The Global Teacher (code: CLB049/LCB327, Faculty of Education, Queensland University of Technology). The Global Teacher is a subject within the undergraduate degree program for pre-service teachers and provides a global perspective on socio-political issues that shape education. The curriculum in The Global Teacher was designed around a collaborative partnership between Queensland University of Technology and State Library Queensland. Through this collaboration, State Library became not only a resource for information, but also helped to develop the pedagogical skills of the pre-service teaachers by guiding them in exhibiting and curating Global Teacher themes for a broader community-based audience. The collaboration became part of the assessment for The Global Teacher, requiring the pre-service teachers to visually translate their understandings of global educational issues into a public exhibition, which was held at State Library Queensland on 1st May, 2013. This DVD is a creative work explaining the stages of this collaborative project. It explores the learning outcomes achieved, using the voices of participants: the pre-service teachers, the QUT teacher educators and staff of State Library Queensland. A detailed description of this project is to be found at: http://libguides.library.qut.edu.au/content.php?pid=595206&sid=4908024&preview=1b455ed4f2c606d19702090f85d1f965

University of Glasgow at ImageCLEFPhoto 2009 : optimising similarity and diversity in image retrieval

In this paper we describe the approaches adopted to generate the runs submitted to ImageCLEFPhoto 2009 with an aim to promote document diversity in the rankings. Four of our runs are text based approaches that employ textual statistics extracted from the captions of images, i.e. MMR [1] as a state of the art method for result diversification, two approaches that combine relevance information and clustering techniques, and an instantiation of Quantum Probability Ranking Principle. The fifth run exploits visual features of the provided images to re-rank the initial results by means of Factor Analysis. The results reveal that our methods based on only text captions consistently improve the performance of the respective baselines, while the approach that combines visual features with textual statistics shows lower levels of improvements.

Of Forrests and acrosn : philanthropic gift may seed other university giving

A$65 million pledge by Nicola and Andrew Forrest to all five West Australian univerisities alters the philanthropy landscape in Australia. The Forrest' donation comes less than a year after Louise and Graham Tuckwell's A$50 million donation to Australian national University.

A preliminary decision model for shared services : insights from an Australian university context

Shared Services involves the convergence and streamlining of an organisation’s functions to ensure timely service delivery as effectively and efficiently as possible. This would result in lower cost, improved service delivery and economies of scale. The conventional wisdom of today is that the potential for Shared Services is increasing due to the increasing costs of changing systems and business requirements and also in implementing and running information systems (IS). However many organizations opt instead for an outsourcing arrangement as the alternative towards cost savings, due in essence to a lack of realization of this potential for Shared Services. This paper rationales turning from outsourcing (to looking within organisations) to leverage on Shared Services for similar cost savings and reaping other potential benefits. The paper’s objectives and contributions are three-fold: (1) distinguish between Shared Services and Outsourcing, (2) report on insights from a single Australian university case study through a transaction cost lens, and to demonstrate the potential for Shared Services and (3) develop a decision model to gauge the potential of implementing Shared Services across similar organisations.

Business planning in emerging firms : uses and effects

Business planning is at the core of entrepreneurship as it has implications for opportunity discovery and exploitation. This thesis' objectives are to disentangle the relationships between business planning and venture emergence to reconcile previous inconsistent findings. It reveals that the formalization of planning, the effort invested in the venture and the revision of the plan influence success for entrepreneurs in the process of launching their firm. This thesis provides generalizable results about the phenomenon of business planning by using a longitudinal random sample of emerging firms.

International virtual networking capabilities and firm performance: A study of international entrepreneurial Australian SMEs

The Internet is a critical resource for a new generation of small and medium sized enterprise. Specifically, the Internet is important for small entrepreneurial firms in pursuing international opportunities through increased digital integration. As such, the Internet has been identified as a key enabler of international entrepreneurship (Reuber & Fischer, 2011). By facilitating international business for many entrepreneurial SMEs, the Internet has the ability to increase the quality and speed of communications, lower transaction costs, and facilitate the development of international networks. Although the Internet has been found to play a pivotal role in the creation of international relationships and is a mechanism for the creation of international growth opportunities in SMEs (Mathews & Healy, 2008), the role of the international entrepreneurial decision-maker in the development of international virtual networks for leveraging opportunities in internationalisation remains unclear. The findings of this research indicate that developing an ‘international virtual network capability’ forms an important part of the firm’s resource and more specifically dynamic capability base, which is just one component of a firm’s resource bundle that builds towards successful internationalisation via an Internet platform.

The experience of learning in “The Cube” : Queensland University of Technology’s giant interactive multimedia environment

In this paper we report findings of the first phase of an investigation, which explored the experience of learning amongst high-level managers, project leaders and visitors in QUT’s “Cube”. “The Cube” is a giant, interactive, multi-media display; an award-winning configuration that hosts several interactive projects. The research team worked with three groups of participants to understand the relationship between a) the learning experiences that were intended in the establishment phase; b) the learning experiences that were enacted through the design and implementation of specific projects; and c) the lived experiences of learning of visitors interacting with the system. We adopted phenomenography as a research approach, to understand variation in people’s understandings and lived experiences of learning in this environment. The project was conducted within the first twelve months of The Cube being open to visitors.

Independent learning skills, self-determination theory and psychological well-being : strategies for supporting the first year university experience

The purpose of this article is to explain why the first year in higher education experience of Australian tertiary students can be improved through the explicit teaching of independent learning skills. Becoming an independent learner has many benefits, but the focus of this piece is upon the connection between independent learning and the improvement of student psychological well-being. High psychological distress levels appear to start in the first year of university education. We argue that explicitly teaching students independent learning skills is an important curriculum-based strategy that will contribute to the significant task of addressing this issue.

A QUM partnership approach to regulating biosimilars in Australia

Despite the realisation of the potential implications from biosimilars is relatively recent, much has already been written about raising the awareness of differences between biosimilars and originating/ reference listed (innovator) pharmaceuticals. The European Medicines Agency has led the global charge in regulating biosimilars. Regardless of sufficient similarities across international regulations, differences do exist across jurisdictions. The consideration of regulating biosimilars demands a congruent approach across all stages: pre-registration (Australian copyright protection, patent, international obligations), registration (confidential information, international regulators, safety and efficacy), post-registration (Pharmaceutical Benefit Scheme, prescriber and dispenser awareness). Our National Medicines Policy could provide the necessary congruent framework and function for national and international regulation of biosimilars. The Policy concedes that pharmaceuticals will be affected by financial policies and trade considerations, international treaty obligations, industrial policies, education policies and the need for public-private partnerships.

Firm-customer mobile digital connectedness : conceptualization, measurement and implications

Firm-customer digital connectedness for effective sensing and responding is a strategic imperative for contemporary competitive firms. This research-in-progress paper conceptualizes and operationalizes the firm-customer mobile digital connectedness of a smart-mobile customer. The empirical investigation focuses on mobile app users and the impact of mobile apps on customer expectations. Based on pilot data collected from 127 customers, we tested hypotheses pertaining to firm-customer mobile digital connectedness and customer expectations. Our test analysis using linear and non-linear postulations reveals those customers raise their expectations as they increase their digital interactions with a firm.

The importance of science fiction and other STEM-related mass media in young people’s decisions to enrol in university STEM courses

This paper presents Australian results from the Interests and Recruitment in Science (IRIS) study with respect to the influence of STEM-related mass media, including science fiction, on students’ decisions to enrol in university STEM courses. The study found that across the full cohort (N=2999), students tended to attribute far greater influence to science-related documentaries/channels such as Life on Earth and the Discovery Channel, etc. than to science-fiction movies or STEM-related TV dramas. Males were more inclined than females to consider science fiction/fantasy books and films and popular science books/magazines as having been important in their decisions. Students taking physics/astronomy tended to rate the importance of science fiction/fantasy books and films higher than students in other courses. The implications of these results for our understanding of influences on STEM enrolments are discussed.

Doctoral research training : encouraging timely completion – case study reflections of one university on how it supports a vibrant research training culture

This is a case study of a young university striving to generate and sustain a vibrant Research Training culture. The university’s research training framework is informed by a belief in a project management approach to achieving successful research candidature. This has led to the definition and reporting of key milestones during candidature. In turn, these milestones have generated a range of training programs to support Higher Degree Research (HDR) students to meet these milestones in a timely fashion. Each milestone focuses on a specific set of skills blended with supporting the development of different parts of the doctoral thesis. Data on student progress and completion has provided evidence in highlighting the role that the milestones and training are playing in supporting timely completion. A university-wide reporting cycle generated data on the range of workshops and training provided to Higher Degree Research students and supervisors. The report provided details of thesis topic and format, as well as participation in research training events and participant evaluation of those events. Analysis of the data led to recommendations and comments on the strengths and weaknesses of the current research training program. Discussion considered strategies and drivers for enhancements into the future. In particular, the paper reflects on the significant potential role of centrally curated knowledge systems to support HDR student and supervisor access, and engagement and success. The research training program was developed using blended learning as a model. It covered face-to-face workshops as well as online modules. These were supplemented by web portals that offered a range of services to inform and educate students and supervisors and included opportunities for students to interact with each other. Topics ranged from the research life cycle, writing and publication, ethics, managing research data, managing copyright, and project management to use of software and the University’s Code of Conduct for Research. The challenges discussed included: How to reach off campus students and those studying in external modes? How best to promote events to potential participants? How long and what format is best for face-to-face sessions? What online resources best supplement face-to-face offerings? Is there a place for peer-based learning and what form should this take? These questions are raised by a relatively young university seeking to build and sustain a vibrant research culture. The rapid growth in enrolments in recent years has challenged previous one-to-one models of support. This review of research training is timely in seeking strategies to address changing research training support capacity and student needs. Part of the discussion will focus on supervisory training, noting that good supervision is the one remaining place where one-to-one support is provided. Ensuring that supervisors are appropriately equipped to address student expectations is considered in the context of the research training provisions. The paper concludes with reflection on the challenges faced, and recommended ways forward as the number of research students grows into the future.

Indigenous epistemology : creating an international Indigenous higher education space in the wake of the western “university of excellence”

Interest in the participation of Indigenous peoples in higher education has, in recent times, gained momentum with an increasing number of advocates challenging the global history of culturally inept policies and practices imposed within the western higher education system. To address the challenges being presented by Indigenous communities and other groups (often relegated under the banner of disadvantaged or equity) Western Universities are promoting a shift toward inclusive policies and practices. Frustrated with the offerings of the Western Higher Education system, a global movement of Indigenous academics, Elders and knowledge holders are developing strategies to meet the educational needs of their own communities, in order to find a way forward. The mobilization of Elders and Indigenous academics has resulted in the development of a global higher education network which is proving to be a significant force in changing the position of Indigenous participation in higher education. The World Indigenous Network Higher Education Consortium (WINHEC) has presented a significant challenge to those barriers within the western higher education system that has historically demonstrated an inability to develop culturally inclusive practices within their institutions. This paper examines the development of a world Indigenous higher education movement and its contribution to the history of the “university” within the context of western higher education institutions. Outlined in this examination will be a synopsis of the development of the “University of Excellence” and the creation of an international Indigenous space within higher education.

The Researcher Librarian Partnership : building a culture of research

Increasingly, the library and information science (LIS) practitioner is being challenged to incorporate research into the context of their professional work. This paper reports on the Researcher-Librarian Partnership, a research-mentoring program that was initiated by the International Federation of the Library Association and Institutions. Six new LIS practitioners within their first seven years of professional practice took part in the program. Each was partnered with an experienced LIS researcher who provided mentoring and support. During the 12-month program the new professionals designed and implemented a research project on a topic of interest. This paper outlines the details of the program providing observations on how research mentoring can be a powerful way to ensure all stakeholders – practitioners, educators and professional associations – can plan an active role in supporting the development of a research culture within the profession.