The light of Gairdner

The Light of Gairdner is a key work of the author's exhibition Lightsite, which toured Western Australian galleries from February 2006 to November 2007. It is a five-minute-long exposure photographic image captured inside a purpose-built, room-sized pinhole camera which is demountable and does not have a floor. The Light of Gairdner depicts two brothers Allan and Harvey Lynch during their barley harvest. Allan is standing outside the pinhole camera-room in the barley field. The light from this exterior landscape is 'projected' inside the camera-room and illuminates the interior scene which includes that part of the barley field upon which the floorless room is erected, along with Harvey who is standing inside. The image evokes the temporality of light. Here, light itself is portrayed as the primary medium through which we both perceive and describe landscape. It is through the agency of light that we construct our connectivity to landscape. The exhibition/catalogue statement. "Harvey and Allan Lynch lost their father Frank, in a crop dusting crash five years ago. They now manage their dad's 6000 acre farm and are photographed here at the time of their barley harvest."

Full scale fire tests of a new light gauge steel floor-ceiling system

Cold-formed steel members can be assembled in various combinations to provide cost-efficient and safe light gauge floor systems for buildings. Such Light gauge Steel Framing (LSF) systems are widely accepted in industrial and commercial building construction. An example application is in floor-ceiling systems. Light gauge steel floor-ceiling systems must be designed to serve as fire compartment boundaries and provide adequate fire resistance. Fire-rated floor-ceiling assemblies formed with new materials and construction methodologies have been increasingly used in buildings. However, limited research has been undertaken in the past and hence a thorough understanding of their fire resistance behaviour is not available. Recently a new composite floor-ceiling system has been developed to provide higher fire rating under standard fire conditions. But its increased fire rating could not be determined using the currently available design methods. Therefore a research project was carried out to investigate its structural and fire resistance behaviour under standard fire conditions. In this research project full scale experimental tests of the new LSF floor system based on a composite ceiling unit were undertaken using a gas furnace at the Queensland University of Technology. Both the conventional and the new steel floor-ceiling systems were tested under structural and fire loads. Full scale fire tests provided a good understanding of the fire behaviour of the LSF floor-ceiling systems and confirmed the superior performance of the new composite system. This paper presents the details of this research into the structural and fire behaviour of light gauge steel floor systems protected by the new composite panel, and the results.

Grounded Light

A promenade performance. This research produced a unique combination of performance using electronically augmented costuming, site-specific discrete electronic lighting and video projection and sustained mountainside/top choreography. The work was examined and expanded in two subsequent peer reviewed papers which scoped out the emerging field of ‘Grounded Media’. Curator and writer Kevin Murray further accorded and enhanced these ideas in subsequent critical writing and the work was also featured in a two page major profile in RealtimeThe work was commissioned by the long established Floating Land Festival and involved extensive on-site work as well as a residency, production and artist talk series at the Noosa Art Gallery. A documentary film of the work was subsequently presented in the three-month exhibition ‘Lines of Sight’ for the Nishi Ogi Machi Media Festival, Nishiogikubo Station Platform 1, Tokyo, Japan, curated by Youkobo Art Space.

Axial shortening in reinforced concrete members using vibration characteristics - part 2 - Application

Controlling differential axial shortening in vertical load bearing concrete elements is a major concern for new generation tall buildings with complex geometries and mechanisms. Quantification of axial shortening using gauges to verify the pre-estimated numerical values used at the design stage is a well established method. This method makes adequate provision to mitigate the adverse effects during the construction. However, this method is becoming increasingly unusable due to its drawbacks. This highlights the need a novel method to quantify the axial shortening using ambient measurements. This paper will first brief introduce the method and then illustrate its application to a high-rise building with two outrigger and belt systems. Moreover, this procedure can be used as a health or performance monitoring tool of the building structure, both during and after construction.

Electron beam evaporation of tungsten oxide films for gas sensors

Pure and Iron incorporated nanostructured Tungsten Oxide (WO3) thin films were investigated for gas sensing applications using noise spectroscopy. The WO3 sensor was able to detect lower concentrations (1 ppm-10 ppm) of NH3, CO, CH4 and Acetaldehyde gases at operating temperatures between 100 degrees celcius to 250 degrees celcius. The iron doped Tungsten Oxide sensor (WO3:Fe) showed some response to Acetaldehyde gas at relatively higher operating temperature (250 degrees celcius) and gas concentration of 10 ppm. The sensitivity of the WO3 sensor towards NH3, CH4 and Acetaldehyde at lower operating temperatures (50 degrees celcius - 100 degrees celcius) was significant when the sensor was photo-activated using blue-light emitting diode (Blue-LED). From the results, photo-activated WO3 thin film that operates at room temperature appeared to be a promising gas sensor. The overall results indicated that the WO3 sensor exhibited reproducibility for the detection of various gases and the WO3:Fe indicated some response towards Acetaldehyde gas.

The interactive potential of Web 2.0

Following the position of Beer and Burrows (2007) this paper poses a re-conceptualization of Web 2.0 interaction in order to understand the properties of action possibilities in and of Web 2.0. The paper discusses the positioning of Web 2.0 social interaction in light of current descriptions, which point toward the capacities of technology in the production of social affordances within that domain (Bruns 2007; Jenkins 2006; O’Reilly 2005). While this diminishes the agency and reflexivity for users of Web 2.0 it also inadvertently positions tools as the central driver for the interactive potential available (Everitt and Mills 2009; van Dicjk 2009). In doing so it neglects the possibility that participants may be more involved in the production of Web 2.0 than the technology that underwrites it. It is this aspect of Web 2.0 that is questioned in the study with particular interest on how an analytical option may be made available to broaden the scope of investigations into Web 2.0 to include a study of the capacity for an interactive potential in light of how action possibilities are presented to users through communication with others (Bonderup Dohn 2009).

Marginalising the mainstream : a signed performance of The Miracle Worker places deaf issues centre-stage

William Gibson’s The Miracle Worker was staged at the Brisbane Powerhouse June 2009 by Crossbow Productions. In this adaption, people with hearing impairment were privileged through the use of shadow-signing, unscripted signing and the appropriation of signing as a theatrical language in itself. 250 people living with hearing impairment attended the production, 70 had never attended a theatrical event before. During the post-performance discussions hearing audience members expressed feelings of displacement through experiencing the culture of the deaf society and not grasping some of the ideas. This paper argues that this inversion enhanced meaning making for all and illustrates a way forward to encourage the signing of more theatrical events.

Undressing the actor : the erotic relationship with the audience

The intimacy and eroticism of the actor’s relationship with the audience is captured in the ecstatic revelation of the actor “being in the moment.” Drawing on the theories of Freud and Sartre and twenty years of performance praxis, this paper explores the exchange of erotic discourse between stage and spectator that not only heightens the experience of the liveness of theatre, but creates a symbiosis that is silently negotiated, agreed upon and sensuously performed during the suspended timeframe of the theatrical event. The actor draws the audience into the erotic transaction through various dramatic devices: the seduction of the soliloquy, the somatic and verbal discourses, the sensuality of light and costuming. The audience responds with its own paralingual and verbal foreplay: the playfulness of laughter, the slapping of hands and, most significantly, the gaze. While the gaze is often perceived as a form of voyeurism, this paper argues that the gaze of consensual agreement between audience and actor can work to unmask inhibitions enabling the actor to create the truth of the moment in complete abandon.

Greenhouse Gas Fluxes in Tropical and Temperae Agriculture: The Need for a Full-Cost Accounting of Global Warming Potentials

Agriculture's contribution to radiative forcing is principally through its historical release of carbon in soil and vegetation to the atmosphere and through its contemporary release of nitrous oxide (N2O) and methane (CHM4). The sequestration of soil carbon in soils now depleted in soil organic matter is a well-known strategy for mitigating the buildup of CO2 in the atmosphere. Less well-recognized are other mitigation potentials. A full-cost accounting of the effects of agriculture on greenhouse gas emissions is necessary to quantify the relative importance of all mitigation options. Such an analysis shows nitrogen fertilizer, agricultural liming, fuel use, N2O emissions, and CH4 fluxes to have additional significant potential for mitigation. By evaluating all sources in terms of their global warming potential it becomes possible to directly evaluate greenhouse policy options for agriculture. A comparison of temperate and tropical systems illustrates some of these options.

Quality of life after total laparoscopic hysterectomy versus total abdominal hysterectomy for stage I endometrial cancer (LACE) : a randomised trial

Background: The two-stage Total Laparoscopic Hysterectomy (TLH) versus Total Abdominal Hysterectomy (TAH) for stage I endometrial cancer (LACE) randomised controlled trial was initiated in 2005. The primary objective of stage 1 was to assess whether TLH results in equivalent or improved QoL up to 6 months after surgery compared to TAH. The primary objective of stage 2 was to test the hypothesis that disease-free survival at 4.5 years is equivalent for TLH and TAH. Results addressing the primary objective of stage 1 of the LACE trial are presented here. Methods: The first 361 LACE participants (TAH n= 142, TLH n=190) were enrolled in the QoL substudy at 19 centres across Australia, New Zealand and Hong Kong, and 332 completed the QoL analysis. Randomisation was performed centrally and independently from other study procedures via a computer generated, web-based system (providing concealment of the next assigned treatment) using stratified permuted blocks of 3 and 6, and assigned patients with histologically confirmed stage 1 endometrioid endometrial adenocarcinoma and ECOG performance status <2 to TLH or TAH stratified by histological grade and study centre. No blinding of patients or study personnel was attempted. QoL was measured at baseline, 1 and 4 weeks (early), and 3 and 6 months (late) after surgery using the Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy-General (FACT-G) questionnaire. The primary endpoint was the difference between the groups in QoL change from baseline at early and late time points (a 5% difference was considered clinically significant). Analysis was performed according to the intention-to-treat principle using generalized estimating equations on differences from baseline for the early and late QoL recovery. The LACE trial is registered with clinicaltrials.gov (NCT00096408) and the Australian New Zealand Clinical Trials Registry (CTRN12606000261516). Patients for both stages of the trial have now been recruited and are being followed up for disease-specific outcomes. Findings: The proportion of missing values at the 5%, 10% 15% and 20% differences in the FACT-G scale was 6% (12/190) in the TLH and 14% (20/142) in the TAH group. There were 8/332 conversions (2.4%, 7 of which were from TLH to TAH). In the early phase of recovery, patients undergoing TLH reported significantly greater improvement of QoL from baseline compared to TAH in all subscales except the emotional and social well-being subscales. Improvements in QoL up to 6 months post-surgery continued to favour TLH except for the emotional and social well-being of the FACT and the visual analogue scale of the EuroQoL five dimensions (EuroQoL-VAS). Length of operating time was significantly longer in the TLH group (138±43 mins), than in the TAH group at (109±34 mins; p=0.001). While the proportion of intraoperative adverse events was similar between the treatment groups (TAH 8/142, 5.6%; TLH 14/190, 7.4%; p=0.55), postoperatively, twice as many patients in the TAH group experienced adverse events of CTC grade 3+ than in the TLH group (33/142, 23.2% and 22/190, 11.6%, respectively; p=0.004). Postoperative serious adverse events occurred more frequently in patients who had a TAH (27/142, 19.0%) than a TLH (15/190, 7.9%) (p=0.002). Interpretation: QoL improvements from baseline during early and later phases of recovery, and the adverse event profile significantly favour TLH compared to TAH for patients treated for Stage I endometrial cancer.

Real estate 2.0 : towards a value ecology?

This paper anatomises emerging developments in online community engagement in a major global industry: real estate. Economists argue that we are entering a ‘social network economy’ in which ‘complex social networks’ govern consumer choice and product value. In the light of this, organisations are shifting from thinking and behaving in the conventional ‘value chain’ model--in which exchanges between firms and customers are one-way only, from the firm to the consumer--to the ‘value ecology’ model, in which consumers and their networks become co-creators of the value of the product. This paper studies the way in which the global real estate industry is responding to this environment. This paper identifies three key areas in which online real estate ‘value ecology’ work is occurring: real estate social networks, games, and locative media / augmented reality applications. Uptake of real estate applications is, of course, user-driven: the paper not only highlights emerging innovations; it also identifies which of these innovations are actually being taken up by users, and the content contributed as a result. The paper thus provides a case study of one major industry’s shift into a web 2.0 communication model, focusing on emerging trends and issues.

A Two-stage information filtering based on rough decision rule and pattern mining

Information Overload and Mismatch are two fundamental problems affecting the effectiveness of information filtering systems. Even though both term-based and patternbased approaches have been proposed to address the problems of overload and mismatch, neither of these approaches alone can provide a satisfactory solution to address these problems. This paper presents a novel two-stage information filtering model which combines the merits of term-based and pattern-based approaches to effectively filter sheer volume of information. In particular, the first filtering stage is supported by a novel rough analysis model which efficiently removes a large number of irrelevant documents, thereby addressing the overload problem. The second filtering stage is empowered by a semantically rich pattern taxonomy mining model which effectively fetches incoming documents according to the specific information needs of a user, thereby addressing the mismatch problem. The experimental results based on the RCV1 corpus show that the proposed twostage filtering model significantly outperforms the both termbased and pattern-based information filtering models.

Prospective, non-randomized phase 2 clinical trial of carboplatin plus paclitaxel with sequential radical pelvic radiotherapy for uterine papillary serous carcinoma

Objective Uterine Papillary Serous Carcinoma (UPSC) is uncommon and accounts for less than 5% of all uterine cancers. Therefore the majority of evidence about the benefits of adjuvant treatment comes from retrospective case series. We conducted a prospective multi-centre non-randomized phase 2 clinical trial using four cycles of adjuvant paclitaxel plus carboplatin chemotherapy followed by pelvic radiotherapy, in order to evaluate the tolerability and safety of this approach. Methods This trial enrolled patients with newly diagnosed, previously untreated patients with stage 1b-4 (FIGO-1988) UPSC with a papillary serous component of at least 30%. Paclitaxel (175 mg/m2) and carboplatin (AUC 6) were administered on day 1 of each 3-week cycle for 4 cycles. Chemotherapy was followed by external beam radiotherapy to the whole pelvis (50.4 Gy over 5.5 weeks). Completion and toxicity of treatment (Common Toxicity Criteria, CTC) and quality of life measures were the primary outcome indicators. Results Twenty-nine of 31 patients completed treatment as planned. Dose reduction was needed in 9 patients (29%), treatment delay in 7 (23%), and treatment cessation in 2 patients (6.5%). Hematologic toxicity, grade 3 or 4 occurred in 19% (6/31) of patients. Patients' self-reported quality of life remained stable throughout treatment. Thirteen of the 29 patients with stages 1–3 disease (44.8%) recurred (average follow up 28.1 months, range 8–60 months). Conclusion This multimodal treatment is feasible, safe and tolerated reasonably well and would be suitable for use in multi-institutional prospective randomized clinical trials incorporating novel therapies in patients with UPSC.

TaNF-YC11, one of the light-upregulated NF-YC members in Triticum aestivum, is co-regulated with photosynthesis-related genes

NF-Y is a heterotrimeric transcription factor complex. Each of the NF-Y subunits (NF-YA, NF-YB and NF-YC) in plants is encoded by multiple genes. Quantitative RT-PCR analysis revealed that five wheat NF-YC members (TaNF-YC5, 8, 9, 11 & 12) were upregulated by light in both the leaf and seedling shoot. Co-expression analysis of Affymetrix wheat genome array datasets revealed that transcript levels of a large number of genes were consistently correlated with those of the TaNF-YC11 and TaNF-YC8 genes in 3-4 separate Affymetrix array datasets. TaNF-YC11-correlated transcripts were significantly enriched with the Gene Ontology term photosynthesis. Sequence analysis in the promoters of TaNF-YC11-correlated genes revealed the presence of putative NF-Y complex binding sites (CCAAT motifs). Quantitative RT-PCR analysis of a subset of potential TaNF-YC11 target genes showed that ten out of the thirteen genes were also light-upregulated in both the leaf and seedling shoot and had significantly correlated expression profiles with TaNF-YC11. The potential target genes for TaNF-YC11 include subunit members from all four thylakoid membrane bound complexes required for the conversion of solar energy into chemical energy and rate limiting enzymes in the Calvin cycle. These data indicate that TaNF-YC11 is potentially involved in regulation of photosynthesis-related genes.

Aurora : an illustrated novella

Aurora, an illustrated novella, is a retelling of the classic fairytale Sleeping Beauty, set on the Australian coast around the grounds of the family lighthouse. Instead of following in the footsteps of tradition, this tale focuses on the long time Aurora is cursed to sleep by the malevolent Minerva; we follow Aurora as she voyages into the unconscious. Hunted by Minerva through the shifting landscape of her dreams, Aurora is dogged by a nagging pull towards the light—there is something she has left behind. Eventually, realising she must face Minerva to break the curse, they stage a battle of the minds in which Aurora triumphs, having grasped the power of her thoughts, her words. Aurora, an Australian fairytale, is a story of self-empowerment, the ability to shape destiny and the power of the mind. The exegesis examines a two-pronged question: is the illustrated book for young adults—graphic novel—relevant to a contemporary readership, and, is the graphic novel, where text and image intersect, a suitably specular genre in which to explore the unconscious? It establishes the language of the unconscious and the meaning of the term ‘graphic novel’, before investigating the place of the illustrated book for an older readership in a contemporary market, particularly exploring visual literacy and the way text and image—a hybrid narrative—work together. It then studies the aptitude of graphic literature to representing the unconscious and looks at two pioneers of the form: Audrey Niffenegger, specifically her visual novel The Three Incestuous Sisters, and Shaun Tan, and his graphic novel The Arrival. Finally, it reflects upon the creative work, Aurora, in light of three concerns: how best to develop a narrative able to relay the dreaming story; how to bestow a certain ‘Australianess’ upon the text and images; and the dilemma of designing an illustrated book for an older readership.