Flow around a hemisphere-cylinder at high angle of attack and low Reynolds number. Part I: Experimental and numerical investigation

Three-dimensional Direct Numerical Simulations combined with Particle Image Velocimetry experiments have been performed on a hemisphere-cylinder at Reynolds number 1000 and angle of attack 20◦. At these flow conditions, a pair of vortices, so-called “horn” vortices, are found to be associated with flow separation. In order to understand the highly complex phenomena associated with this fully threedimensional massively separated flow, different structural analysis techniques have been employed: Proper Orthogonal and Dynamic Mode Decompositions, POD and DMD, respectively, as well as criticalpoint theory. A single dominant frequency associated with the von Karman vortex shedding has been identified in both the experimental and the numerical results. POD and DMD modes associated with this frequency were recovered in the analysis. Flow separation was also found to be intrinsically linked to the observed modes. On the other hand, critical-point theory has been applied in order to highlight possible links of the topology patterns over the surface of the body with the computed modes. Critical points and separation lines on the body surface show in detail the presence of different flow patterns in the base flow: a three-dimensional separation bubble and two pairs of unsteady vortices systems, the horn vortices, mentioned before, and the so-called “leeward” vortices. The horn vortices emerge perpendicularly from the body surface at the separation region. On the other hand, the leeward vortices are originated downstream of the separation bubble, as a result of the boundary layer separation. The frequencies associated with these vortical structures have been quantified.

Discovery of stable and variable differences in the Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis type I, II, and III genomes by pan-genome microarray analysis

Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis is an important animal pathogen widely disseminated in the environment that has also been associated with Crohn's disease in humans. Three M. avium subsp. paratuberculosis genomotypes are recognized, but genomic differences have not been fully described. To further investigate these potential differences, a 60-mer oligonucleotide microarray (designated the MAPAC array), based on the combined genomes of M. avium subsp. paratuberculosis (strain K-10) and Mycobacterium avium subsp. hominissuis (strain 104), was designed and validated. By use of a test panel of defined M. avium subsp. paratuberculosis strains, the MAPAC array was able to identify a set of large sequence polymorphisms (LSPs) diagnostic for each of the three major M. avium subsp. paratuberculosis types. M. avium subsp. paratuberculosis type II strains contained a smaller genomic complement than M. avium subsp. paratuberculosis type I and M. avium subsp. paratuberculosis type III genomotypes, which included a set of genomic regions also found in M. avium subsp. hominissuis 104. Specific PCRs for genes within LSPs that differentiated M. avium subsp. paratuberculosis types were devised and shown to accurately screen a panel (n = 78) of M. avium subsp. paratuberculosis strains. Analysis of insertion/deletion region INDEL12 showed deletion events causing a reduction in the complement of mycobacterial cell entry genes in M. avium subsp. paratuberculosis type II strains and significantly altering the coding of a major immunologic protein (MPT64) associated with persistence and granuloma formation. Analysis of MAPAC data also identified signal variations in several genomic regions, termed variable genomic islands (vGIs), suggestive of transient duplication/deletion events. vGIs contained significantly low GC% and were immediately flanked by insertion sequences, integrases, or short inverted repeat sequences. Quantitative PCR demonstrated that variation in vGI signals could be associated with colony growth rate and morphology.

Person, community, Tian: the emergence of order and harmony in Chinese philosophy

This thesis clarifies how the concept of tian functions in Chinese thought, and what tianren heyi (the continuity between tian and humans) means in the Chinese context. With a new interpretation about tianren heyi, I provide a new contribution for understanding these Chinese concepts for an English speaking audience. Tian is not a fixed concept like the idea of heaven, rather, it can be the principle for one’s immanent world. The meaning of the term changes depending on the context it is being used in, and can also be neutral when necessary. Continuity means that there is a resonance and reciprocity in the way these aspects of cosmology emerge together. Humans and tian are not being unified or connected—there is simply continuity between them. What happens is that a productive relationship between them produces depth, harmony, and enhanced significance. Through the interaction between humanity and tian, the human world gains order, and from the perspective of tian, gains harmony. This different understanding the continuity between humanity and tian leads to a new understanding of timing or the appropriateness in li. In the process of practice and self cultivation, it is seen that li is also an idea that is not fixed to one single interpretation as it is connected with timing and appropriateness. The Classical Chinese concept of “Person” (ren 人), as the concrete context of li, is the centre of this practice. Because of the unfixed natures of tian and li, one needs to be flexible in order to cater to their demands. This embodies the freedom of the subject in Chinese thought. As the outcome of li, the social and political structure is shaped in this process, the examples being the models of “great union” and “small tranquillity” (Chapter 3) in Chinese tradition.

Research Monograph: The role of community and lifestyle in the making of a knowledge city

Our brief is to investigate the role of community and lifestyle in the making of a globally successful knowledge city region. Our approach is essentially pragmatic. We start by broadly examining knowledge-based urban development from a number of different perspectives. The first view is historical. In this context knowledge work and knowledge workers are seen as vital parts of a new emergent mode of production reliant on the continual production of abstract knowledge. We briefly develop this perspective to encompass the work of Richard Florida who has, notedly, claimed: “Wherever talent goes, innovation, creativity, and economic growth are sure to follow.” Our next perspective examines concepts of knowledge and modes of its production to discover knowledge is not an unchanging object but a human activity that changes in form and content through history. The suggestion emerges that not only is the production of contemporary ‘knowledge’ organised in a specific (and new) manner but also the output of this networked production is a particular type of knowledge (i.e. techné). The third perspective locates knowledge production and its workers in the contemporary urban context. As such, it co-ordinates the knowledge city in the increasingly global structure of cities and develops a typology of different groups of knowledge workers in their preferred urban environment(s). We see emerging here a distinctive geography of knowledge production. It is an urban phenomenon. There is, in short, something about the nature of cities that knowledge workers find particularly attractive. In the next, essentially anthropological, perspective we start to explore the needs and desires of the individual knowledge worker. Beyond the needs basic to any modern human household an attempt is made to deduce, from a base understanding of knowledge work as mental labour, the compensatory cultural needs of the knowledge worker when not at work - and the expression of these needs in the urban fabric. Our final perspective consists of two case studies. In a review of the experiences of Austin, Texas and Singapore’s one-north precinct we collect empirical data on, respectively, a knowledge city that has sustained itself for over 50 years and an urban precinct newly launched into the global market for knowledge work and knowledge workers. Interwoven The Role of Community and Lifestyle in the Making of a Knowledge City Urban Research Program 8 through all perspectives, in the form of apposite citation, is that of ‘expert opinion’ gathered in a rudimentary poll of academic and industry sources. This opinion appears in text boxes while details of the survey can be found in Appendix A. In the conclusion of the report we interpret the wide range of evidence gathered above in a policy frame. It is our hope this report will leave the reader with a clearer picture of the decisive organisational, infrastructural, aesthetic and social dimensions of a knowledge precinct.

"Well, now I'm upset": Moral and social orders in the playground

There is much still to learn about how young children’s membership with peers shapes their constructions of moral and social obligations within everyday activities in the school playground. This paper investigates how a small group of girls, aged four to six years, account for their everyday social interactions in the playground. They were video-recorded as they participated in a pretend game of school. Several days later, a video-recorded excerpt of the interaction was shown to them and invited to comment on what was happening in the video. This conversation was audio-recorded. Drawing on a conversation analysis approach, this chapter shows that, despite their discontent and complaining about playing the game of school, the girls’ actions showed their continued orientation to the particular codes of the game, of ‘no going away’ and ‘no telling’. By making relevant these codes, jointly constructed by the girls during the interview, they managed each other’s continued participation within two arenas of action: the pretend, as a player in a pretend game of school; and the real, as a classroom member of a peer group. Through inferences to explicit and implicit codes of conduct, moral obligations were invoked as the girls attempted to socially exclude or build alliances with others, and enforce their own social position. As well, a shared history that the girls re-constructed has moral implications for present and future relationships. The girls oriented to the history as an interactional resource for accounting for their actions in the pretend game. This paper uncovers how children both participate in, and shape, their everyday social worlds through talk and interaction and the consequences a taken-for-granted activity such as playing school has for their moral and social positions in the peer group.

At-risk students and classroom engagement : listening to “voices of possibility and hope"

In my work with secondary school students who have disengaged from mainstream classrooms, I have often been surprised at the ways they enthusiastically engage with the projects on offer. They have demonstrated that, in apparent contradiction of their classroom behaviour, they still maintain hope in achieving a positive outcome from education. In a long-running schools-university project employing a “students-as-researchers” approach to investigating educational disadvantage, “at-risk” students have produced high quality results. Naturally, I wanted to know what it was about this sort of pedagogy that seemed to work for them. In this chapter, then, I outline the project and discuss some reasons for disengagement. I then address the features of the project that the participants themselves have identified as being instrumental in their re-engagement with formal education. Finally, I consider how these features may be transposed to maintaining the educational engagement of at-risk students in mainstream classrooms.

Ceramic membranes for separation of proteins and DNA by in situ growth of alumina nanofibres with a nanomesh of metal oxide nanofibres

Ceramic membranes were fabricated by in situ synthesis of alumina nanofibres in the pores of an alumina support as a separation layer, and exhibited a high permeation selectivity for bovine serum albumin relative to bovine hemoglobin (over 60 times) and can effectively retain DNA molecules at high fluxes.

The influence of instructions and body-scaling as constraints on decision-making processes in team sports

Team games conceptualized as dynamical systems engender a view of emergent decision-making behaviour under constraints, although specific effects of instructional and body-scaling constraints have yet to be verified empirically. For this purpose, we studied the effects of task and individual constraints on decision-making processes in basketball. Eleven experienced female players performed 350 trials in 1 vs. 1 sub-phases of basketball in which an attacker tried to perturb the stable state of a dyad formed with a defender (i.e. break the symmetry). In Experiment 1, specific instructions (neutral, risk taking or conservative) were manipulated to observe effects on emergent behaviour of the dyadic system. When attacking players were given conservative instructions, time to cross court mid-line and variability of the attacker's trajectory were significantly greater. In Experiment 2, body-scaling of participants was manipulated by creating dyads with different height relations. When attackers were considerably taller than defenders, there were fewer occurrences of symmetry-breaking. When attackers were considerably shorter than defenders, time to cross court mid-line was significantly shorter than when dyads were composed of athletes of similar height or when attackers were considerably taller than defenders. The data exemplify how interacting task and individual constraints can influence emergent decision-making processes in team ball games.

Fluorescence spectrometric study on the interactions of isoprocarb and sodium 2-isopropylphenate with bovine serum albumin

The binding interaction of the pesticide Isoprocarb and its degradation product, sodium 2-isopropylphenate, with bovine serum albumin (BSA) was studied by spectrofluorimetry under simulated physiological conditions. Both Isoprocarb and sodium 2-isopropylphenate quenched the intrinsic fluorescence of BSA. This quenching proceeded via a static mechanism. The thermodynamic parameters (ΔH°, ΔS° and ΔG°) obtained from the fluorescence data measured at two different temperatures showed that the binding of Isoprocarb to BSA involved hydrogen bonds and that of sodium 2-isopropylphenate to BSA involved hydrophobic and electrostatic interactions. Synchronous fluorescence spectroscopy of the interaction of BSA with either Isoprocarb or sodium 2-isopropylphenate showed that the molecular structure of the BSA was changed significantly, which is consistent with the known toxicity of the pesticide, i.e., the protein is denatured. The sodium 2-isopropylphenate, was estimated to be about 4–5 times more toxic than its parent, Isoprocarb. Synchronous fluorescence spectroscopy and the resolution of the three-way excitation–emission fluorescence spectra by the PARAFAC method extracted the relative concentration profiles of BSA, Isoprocab and sodium 2-isopropylphenate as a function of the added sodium 2-isopropylphenate. These profiles showed that the degradation product, sodium 2-isopropylphenate, displaced the pesticide in a competitive reaction with the BSA protein.

The effects of sensing and seizing of market opportunities and reconfiguring activities on the organisational resource base

This study has important implications for marketing theory and practice. In an era of turbulent market environments, the organisational ability to sense and seize market opportunities and to reconfigure the resource base accordingly, has significant effects on performance. This paper uses a dynamic capability framework to explain more explicitly the intricacies of the relationship between sensing and seizing of market opportunities and reconfiguring the resource base (i.e. dynamic capabilities) and the resource base. We investigate how the attributes of dynamic capability deployment, timing, frequency and speed, influence the resource base. We test the proposed framework using survey data from 228 large organisations. Findings show that the timing and frequency of dynamic capability deployment have significant effects on the resource base.

The relationship between subjective appetite sensations, markers of inflammation and appetite in dialysis patients

Background: Poor appetite is a marker of morbidity and mortality in hemodialysis patients, making it an important area for research. Visual analog scales (VAS) can capture a range of subjective sensations related to appetite (such as hunger, desire to eat or fullness), but have not been commonly used to measure appetite in dialysis patients. The aim of this study was to explore the association between retrospective ratings of appetite using VAS and a range of clinical variables as well as biomarkers of appetite in hemodialysis patients.----- Methods: 28 hemodialysis patients (mean age 61±17y, 50% male, median dialysis vintage 19.5(4-101) months) rated their appetite using VAS for hunger, fullness and desire to eat and a 5-point categorical scale measuring general appetite. Blood levels of the appetite peptides leptin, ghrelin and peptide YY were also measured.----- Results: Hunger ratings measured by VAS were significantly (p<0.05) correlated with a range of clinical, nutritional and inflammatory markers: age (r=-0.376), co-morbidities, (r=-0.380) PG-SGA score (r=-0.451), weight (r=-0.375), fat-free mass (r=-0.435), C-Reactive Protein (CRP) (r=-0.383) and Intercellular adhesion molecule (sICAM-1) (r=-0.387). There was a consistent relationship between VAS and appetite on a 5-point categorical scale for questions of hunger, and a similar trend for desire to eat, but not for fullness. Neither method of measuring subjective appetite correlated with appetite peptides.----- Conclusions: Retrospective ratings of hunger on a VAS are associated with a range of clinical variables and further studies are warranted to support their use as a method of measuring appetite in dialysis patients.

Open content creation : the issues of voice and the challenges of listening

This paper examines the proposition that increased ability to have a voice and be listened to, through ‘open ICT4D’ and ‘open content creation’ can be an effective mechanism for development. The paper discusses empirical work that strongly indicates that this only happens when voice is appropriately valued in the development process. Having a voice in development processes are less effective when participation is limited. Open ICT allows for more and more voices to be heard, but it is open ICT4D that has the obligation to ensure voices are listened to. In the paper I first explore participatory development and the idea of open ICT4D before elaborating on issues of voice and thinking about voice as process, and voice as value. Research findings are presented from research that experimented with participatory (or open) content creation, discussed in relation to notions of openness and voice. I then consider the challenges of listening, before drawing some conclusions about opening up ICT4D research.

Contemporary dramaturgy in theatre for young people : the conceptual shape of displacement and installation

This thesis investigates Theatre for Young People (TYP) as a site of performance innovation. The inquiry is focused on contemporary dramaturgy and its fieldwork aims to identify new dramaturgical principles operating in the creation and presentation of TYP. The research then seeks to assess how these new principles contribute to Postdramatic Theatre theory. This research inquiry springs from an imperative based in practice: Young people under 25 years have a literacy based on online hypertextual experiences which take the reader outside the frames of a dramatic narrative and beyond principles such as linearity, dramatic unity, teleology and resolution. As a dramaturg and educator I wanted to understand the new ways that young people engage in cultural products, to identify and utilize the new principles of dramaturgy that are now in evidence. My research examines how two playwright/directors approach their work and the new principles that can be identified in their dramaturgy. The fieldwork is scoped into two case studies: the first on TJ Eckleberg working in Australian Theatre for Young People and the second on Kristo Šagor working in German Children’s and Young People’s Theatre (KJT). These case studies address both types of production dramaturgy - the dramaturgy emergent through process in devised performance making, and that emergent in a performance based on a written playscript. On Case Study One the researcher, as participant observer, worked as production dramaturg on a large scale, site specific performance, observing the dramaturgy in process of its director and chief devisor. On Case Study Two the researcher, as observer and analyst, undertook a performance analysis of three playscripts and productions by a contemporary German playwright and director. Utilizing participant observation, reflective practice and grounded analysis the case studies have identified two new principles animating the dramaturgy of these TYP practitioners, namely ‘displacement’ and ‘installation.’ Taking practice into theory, the thesis concludes by demonstrating how displacement and installation contribute to Postdramatic Theatre’s “arsenal of expressive gestures which serve as theatre’s response to changed social communication under the conditions of generalized communication technologies” (Lehmann, H.-T., 2006, p.23). This research makes an original contribution to knowledge by evidencing that the principles of Postdramatic Theory lie within the practice of contemporary Theatre for Young People. It also contributes valuable research to a specialized, often overlooked terrain, namely Dramaturgy in Theatre for Young People, presented here with a contemporary, international and intercultural perspective.

In Bed with Autobiography: Unravelling the Fabric of Gender and Genre in Women’s Bed(room) Confessions

This thesis consists of a confessional narrative, What My Mother Doesn’t Know, and an accompanying exegesis, And Why I Should (Maybe) Tell Her. The creative piece employs the confessional mode as a subversive device in three separate narratives, each of which situates the bed as a site of resistance. The exegesis investigates how this self-disclosure in a domestic space flouts the governing rules of self-representation, specifically: telling the truth, respecting privacy and displaying normalcy. The female confession, I argue, creates an alternative space in women’s autobiography where notions of truth-telling can be undermined, the political dimensions of personal experience can be uncovered and the discourse of normality can be negotiated. In particular, women’s confessions told in, on or about the bed, dismantle the genre’s illusion of self and confirm the representative aspects of women’s experience. Framed within these parameters of power and powerlessness, the exegesis includes textual analyses of Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s The Yellow Wallpaper (1892), Tracey Emin’s My Bed (1999) and Lauren Slater’s Lying (2000), each of which exposes in a bedroom space, the author’s most obscure, intimate and traumatic experiences. Situated firmly within and against the genre’s traditional masculine domain, the exegesis also includes mediations on the creative work that validate the bed as my fabric for confession.

Development of rapid and highly resolving combinatorial genotyping schemes for Campylobacter jejuni and Campylobacter coli

Campylobacter jejuni followed by Campylobacter coli contribute substantially to the economic and public health burden attributed to food-borne infections in Australia. Genotypic characterisation of isolates has provided new insights into the epidemiology and pathogenesis of C. jejuni and C. coli. However, currently available methods are not conducive to large scale epidemiological investigations that are necessary to elucidate the global epidemiology of these common food-borne pathogens. This research aims to develop high resolution C. jejuni and C. coli genotyping schemes that are convenient for high throughput applications. Real-time PCR and High Resolution Melt (HRM) analysis are fundamental to the genotyping schemes developed in this study and enable rapid, cost effective, interrogation of a range of different polymorphic sites within the Campylobacter genome. While the sources and routes of transmission of campylobacters are unclear, handling and consumption of poultry meat is frequently associated with human campylobacteriosis in Australia. Therefore, chicken derived C. jejuni and C. coli isolates were used to develop and verify the methods described in this study. The first aim of this study describes the application of MLST-SNP (Multi Locus Sequence Typing Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms) + binary typing to 87 chicken C. jejuni isolates using real-time PCR analysis. These typing schemes were developed previously by our research group using isolates from campylobacteriosis patients. This present study showed that SNP + binary typing alone or in combination are effective at detecting epidemiological linkage between chicken derived Campylobacter isolates and enable data comparisons with other MLST based investigations. SNP + binary types obtained from chicken isolates in this study were compared with a previously SNP + binary and MLST typed set of human isolates. Common genotypes between the two collections of isolates were identified and ST-524 represented a clone that could be worth monitoring in the chicken meat industry. In contrast, ST-48, mainly associated with bovine hosts, was abundant in the human isolates. This genotype was, however, absent in the chicken isolates, indicating the role of non-poultry sources in causing human Campylobacter infections. This demonstrates the potential application of SNP + binary typing for epidemiological investigations and source tracing. While MLST SNPs and binary genes comprise the more stable backbone of the Campylobacter genome and are indicative of long term epidemiological linkage of the isolates, the development of a High Resolution Melt (HRM) based curve analysis method to interrogate the hypervariable Campylobacter flagellin encoding gene (flaA) is described in Aim 2 of this study. The flaA gene product appears to be an important pathogenicity determinant of campylobacters and is therefore a popular target for genotyping, especially for short term epidemiological studies such as outbreak investigations. HRM curve analysis based flaA interrogation is a single-step closed-tube method that provides portable data that can be easily shared and accessed. Critical to the development of flaA HRM was the use of flaA specific primers that did not amplify the flaB gene. HRM curve analysis flaA interrogation was successful at discriminating the 47 sequence variants identified within the 87 C. jejuni and 15 C. coli isolates and correlated to the epidemiological background of the isolates. In the combinatorial format, the resolving power of flaA was additive to that of SNP + binary typing and CRISPR (Clustered regularly spaced short Palindromic repeats) HRM and fits the PHRANA (Progressive hierarchical resolving assays using nucleic acids) approach for genotyping. The use of statistical methods to analyse the HRM data enhanced sophistication of the method. Therefore, flaA HRM is a rapid and cost effective alternative to gel- or sequence-based flaA typing schemes. Aim 3 of this study describes the development of a novel bioinformatics driven method to interrogate Campylobacter MLST gene fragments using HRM, and is called ‘SNP Nucleated Minim MLST’ or ‘Minim typing’. The method involves HRM interrogation of MLST fragments that encompass highly informative “Nucleating SNPS” to ensure high resolution. Selection of fragments potentially suited to HRM analysis was conducted in silico using i) “Minimum SNPs” and ii) the new ’HRMtype’ software packages. Species specific sets of six “Nucleating SNPs” and six HRM fragments were identified for both C. jejuni and C. coli to ensure high typeability and resolution relevant to the MLST database. ‘Minim typing’ was tested empirically by typing 15 C. jejuni and five C. coli isolates. The association of clonal complexes (CC) to each isolate by ‘Minim typing’ and SNP + binary typing were used to compare the two MLST interrogation schemes. The CCs linked with each C. jejuni isolate were consistent for both methods. Thus, ‘Minim typing’ is an efficient and cost effective method to interrogate MLST genes. However, it is not expected to be independent, or meet the resolution of, sequence based MLST gene interrogation. ‘Minim typing’ in combination with flaA HRM is envisaged to comprise a highly resolving combinatorial typing scheme developed around the HRM platform and is amenable to automation and multiplexing. The genotyping techniques described in this thesis involve the combinatorial interrogation of differentially evolving genetic markers on the unified real-time PCR and HRM platform. They provide high resolution and are simple, cost effective and ideally suited to rapid and high throughput genotyping for these common food-borne pathogens.