A policy case study of blood in Australia

In 2008 the Australian government decided to remove white blood cells from all blood products. This policy of universal leucodepletion was a change to the existing policy of supplying leucodepleted products to high risk patients only. The decision was made without strong information about the cost-effectiveness of universal leucodepletion. The aims for this policy analysis are to generate cost-effectiveness data about universal leucodepletion, and to add to our understanding of the role of evidence and the political reality of healthcare decision-making in Australia. The cost-effectiveness analysis revealed universal leucodepletion costs $398,943 to save one year of life. This exceeds the normal maximum threshold for Australia. We discuss this result within the context of how policy decisions are made about blood, and how it relates to the theory and process of policy making. We conclude that the absence of a strong voice for cost-effectiveness was an important omission in this decision.

Connecting people and resource consumption in real time

The authors currently engage in two projects to improve human-computer interaction (HCI) designs that can help conserve resources. The projects explore motivation and persuasion strategies relevant to ubiquitous computing systems that bring real-time consumption data into the homes and hands of residents in Brisbane, Australia. The first project seeks to increase understanding among university staff of the tangible and negative effects that excessive printing has on the workplace and local environment. The second project seeks to shift attitudes toward domestic energy conservation through software and hardware that monitor real-time, in situ electricity consumption in homes across Queensland. The insights drawn from these projects will help develop resource consumption user archetypes, providing a framework linking people to differing interface design requirements.

PIPP #2 : Pedestrian Interaction Patch Project

Presented as part of the Sampled Festival at Sadlers Wells UK in January 2009, PIPP #2 continues the exploration of the first installation (PIPP #1 Leeds) and asks audiences to connect with an interactive work presented in the foyer of a major dance festival. Literally choreographing their own dances on the walls of the venue, pedestrians re-connect with the architectural surrounds generating unique memories of self.

Rights versus reality : the difficulty of providing 'access to English' in Queensland Courts

This report was developed out of a Legal Practitioner on Trust Account Fund grant from the Department of Justice and Attorney-General in Queensland, to review the Aboriginal English in the Courts Handbook. Judges, Magistrates, barristers and court staff were interviewed about the Handbook. The findings extend beyond Aboriginal English into access to English in Queensland Courts. Recommendations are made about language difficulties faced by witnessed and the ability to the courts to respond to them.

Interaction of NPR1 with basic leucine zipper protein transcription factors that bind sequences required for salicylic acid induction of the PR–1 gene

The Arabidopsis thaliana NPR1 has been shown to be a key regulator of gene expression during the onset of a plant disease-resistance response known as systemic acquired resistance. The npr1 mutant plants fail to respond to systemic acquired resistance-inducing signals such as salicylic acid (SA), or express SA-induced pathogenesis-related (PR) genes. Using NPR1 as bait in a yeast two-hybrid screen, we identified a subclass of transcription factors in the basic leucine zipper protein family (AHBP-1b and TGA6) and showed that they interact specifically in yeast and in vitro with NPR1. Point mutations that abolish the NPR1 function in A. thaliana also impair the interactions between NPR1 and the transcription factors in the yeast two-hybrid assay. Furthermore, a gel mobility shift assay showed that the purified transcription factor protein, AHBP-1b, binds specifically to an SA-responsive promoter element of the A. thaliana PR-1 gene. These data suggest that NPR1 may regulate PR-1 gene expression by interacting with a subclass of basic leucine zipper protein transcription factors.

V2V/V2I augmented maps : state-of-the-art and contribution to real-time crash risk assessment

A number of advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) are currently being released on the market, providing safety functions to the drivers such as collision avoidance, adaptive cruise control or enhanced night-vision. These systems however are inherently limited by their sensory range: they cannot gather information from outside this range, also called their “perceptive horizon”. Cooperative systems are a developing research avenue that aims at providing extended safety and comfort functionalities by introducing vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) and vehicle-to-infrastructure (V2I) wireless communications to the road actors. This paper presents the problematic of cooperative systems, their advantages and contributions to road safety and exposes some limitations related to market penetration, sensors accuracy and communications scalability. It explains the issues of how to implement extended perception, a central contribution of cooperative systems. The initial steps of an evaluation of data fusion architectures for extended perception are exposed.

Urban informatics

The increasing ubiquity of digital technology, internet ser-vices and social media in our everyday lives allows for a seamless transitioning between the visible and the invisible infrastructure of cities: road systems, building complexes, information and communication technology, and people networks create a buzzing environment that is alive and exciting. Driven by curiosity, initiative and interdiscipli-nary exchange, the Urban Informatics Research Lab at Queensland University of Technology (QUT), Brisbane, Australia, is an emerging cluster of people interested in research and development at the intersection of people, place and technology with a focus on cities, locative media and mobile technology. This paper seeks to define, for the first time, what we mean by ‘urban informatics’ and outline its significance as a field of study today. It describes the relevant background and trends in each of the areas of peo-ple, place and technology, and highlights the relevance of urban informatics to the concerns and evolving challenges of CSCW. We then position our work in academia juxta-posed with related research concentrations and labels, fol-lowed by a discussion of disciplinary influences. The paper concludes with an exposé of the three current research themes of the lab around augmented urban spaces, urban narratives, and environmental sustainability in order to illustrate specific cases and methods, and to draw out distinctions that our affiliation with the Creative Industries Faculty affords.

Web searching interaction model based on user cognitive styles

As more and more information is available on the Web finding quality and reliable information is becoming harder. To help solve this problem, Web search models need to incorporate users’ cognitive styles. This paper reports the preliminary results from a user study exploring the relationships between Web users’ searching behavior and their cognitive style. The data was collected using a questionnaire, Web search logs and think-aloud strategy. The preliminary findings reveal a number of cognitive factors, such as information searching processes, results evaluations and cognitive style, having an influence on users’ Web searching behavior. Among these factors, the cognitive style of the user was observed to have a greater impact. Based on the key findings, a conceptual model of Web searching and cognitive styles is presented.

Closing the gap : the next steps for the interaction of corporate reputation and psychological contract development

With an increasing body of literature linking the human resource management and marketing fields, one area receiving increased academic attention is how an organisation’s corporate reputation can be managed to attract potential recruits and shape their employment expectations through their psychological contracts. This paper seeks to enhance current models which focus on the interrelationship of corporate reputation and psychological contract theory. It is argued that a number of factors need to be considered in order the build a firmer foundation for such a theory. Firstly, a common understanding of the psychological contract needs to be established such that the focus on either expectations or promises is clarified. Secondly, the included components of the psychological contract need to be considered in light of their empirical founding and their relationship with one another. Thirdly, the interrelationship of corporate reputation, employer branding, identity and image needs to be explicated within the context of how they both influence and interrelate with the psychological contract. The final consideration surrounds the opportunity for potential employees to be considered within the corporate reputation literature as a significant stakeholder group.

A chimeric vitronectin : IGF-I protein supports feeder-cell-free and serum-free culture of human embryonic stem cells

This paper was retracted by the Journal of Stem Cells and Development on February 15, 2013.

Using economic data to reduce healthcare-acquired infection

In this issue Burns et al. report an estimate of the economic loss to Auckland City Hospital from cases of healthcare-associated bloodstream infection. They show that patients with infection stay longer in hospital and this must impose an opportunity cost because beds are blocked. Harder to measure costs fall on patients, their families and non-acute health services. Patients face some risk of dying from the infection.

Interaction, privacy and profiling considerations in local mobile social software : a prototype agile ride share system

Agile ridesharing aims to utilise the capability of social networks and mobile phones to facilitate people to share vehicles and travel in real time. However the application of social networking technologies in local communities to address issues of personal transport faces significant design challenges. In this paper we describe an iterative design-based approach to exploring this problem and discuss findings from the use of an early prototype. The findings focus upon interaction, privacy and profiling. Our early results suggest that explicitly entering information such as ride data and personal profile data into formal fields for explicit computation of matches, as is done in many systems, may not be the best strategy. It might be preferable to support informal communication and negotiation with text search techniques.

Sapporo World Window : urban interaction through public and private screens

This paper introduces Sapporo World Window, a screen-based application that is currently under development for the new underway passage at the centre of Sapporo City. There are ten large public screens installed in the space, displaying user-generated videos about various aspects of the city and a real-time map that visualises users’ interaction with the city. The application aims to engage the general public by functioning as a unique ‘point of connection’ for socio-cultural and technological interactions, making the space a lively social place where people can have meaningful experiences of interacting with people and places of Sapporo through mobile phones (keitai) and the public screens in the space. This paper first outlines the contextual background and key concept for the application’s design. Then the paper discusses the user interaction processes, technical specifications, and interface design, followed by the conclusions and outlook.

Three primary school students’ cognition about 3D rotation in a virtual reality learning environment

This paper reports on three primary school students’ explorations of 3D rotation in a virtual reality learning environment (VRLE) named VRMath. When asked to investigate if you would face the same direction when you turn right 45 degrees first then roll up 45 degrees, or when you roll up 45 degrees first then turn right 45 degrees, the students found that the different order of the two turns ended up with different directions in the VRLE. This was contrary to the students’ prior predictions based on using pen, paper and body movements. The findings of this study showed the difficulty young children have in perceiving and understanding the non-commutative nature of 3D rotation and the power of the computational VRLE in giving students experiences that they rarely have in real life with 3D manipulations and 3D mental movements.

Rethinking public service media and citizenship: digital strategies for news and current affairs at Australia’s Special Broadcasting Service

This article considers the concept of media citizenship in relation to the digital strategies of the Special Broadcasting Service (SBS). At SBS, Australia’s multicultural public broadcaster, there is a critical appraisal of its strategies to harness user-created content (UCC) and social media to promote greater audience participation through its news and current affairs Web sites. The article looks at the opportunities and challenges that user-created content presents for public service media organizations as they consolidate multiplatform service delivery. Also analyzed are the implications of radio and television broadcasters’ moves to develop online services. It is proposed that case study methodologies enable an understanding of media citizenship to be developed that maintains a focus on the interaction between delivery technologies, organizational structures and cultures, and program content that is essential for understanding the changing focus of 21st-century public service media.