Recipe for success : cooking up a storm in the technology classroom

Ingredients: - 1 cup Vision - 100ml ‘Real World’ Application - 100ml Unit Structure/Organisation - 100ml Student-centric Approach [optional: Add Social Media/Popular Culture for extra goodness] - Large Dollop of Passion + Enthusiasm - Sprinkle of Approachability Mix all ingredients well. Cover and leave to rise in a Lecture Theatre for 1.5 hours. Cook in a Classroom for 1.5 hours. Garnish with a dash of Humour before serving. Serves 170 Students

Characterisation of atmospheric deposited particles during a dust storm in urban areas of Eastern Australia

The characteristics of dust particles deposited during the 2009 dust storm in the Gold Coast and Brisbane regions of Australia are discussed in this paper. The study outcomes provide important knowledge in relation to the potential impacts of dust storm related pollution on ecosystem health in the context that the frequency of dust storms is predicted to increase due to anthropogenic desert surface modifications and climate change impacts. The investigated dust storm contributed a large fraction of fine particles to the environment with an increased amount of total suspended solids, compared to dry deposition under ambient conditions. Although the dust storm passed over forested areas, the organic carbon content in the dust was relatively low. The primary metals present in the dust storm deposition were aluminium, iron and manganese, which are common soil minerals in Australia. The dust storm deposition did not contain significant loads of nickel, cadmium, copper and lead, which are commonly present in the urban environment. Furthermore, the comparison between the ambient and dust storm chromium and zinc loads suggested that these metals were contributed to the dust storm by local anthropogenic sources. The potential ecosystem health impacts of the 2009 dust storm include, increased fine solids deposition on ground surfaces resulting in an enhanced capacity to adsorb toxic pollutants as well as increased aluminium, iron and manganese loads. In contrast, the ecosystem health impacts related to organic carbon and other metals from dust storm atmospheric deposition are not considered to be significant.

Trees along our travelling tracks

This creative non-fiction piece of writing speaks to the ‘tree’ themed edition of the About Place Journal. It begins with…“This tree stands steadfast along my inland travelling track, near the town of Mundubbera on the land of the Wakka Wakka people. It is in the region called North Burnett. When we travel, we follow the river systems and look out for distinct markers in the landscape. We acknowledge the lands of others as we move down to Booburrgan Ngmmunge (the language term used by many Aboriginal people to describe the Bunya Mountains) and beyond”. The piece includes photograph images also taken by the author.

Forrest v ASIC : a ‘perfect storm’

The policy objectives of the continuous disclosure regime augmented by the misleading or deceptive conduct provisions in the Corporations Act are to enhance the integrity and efficiency of Australian capital markets by ensuring equality of opportunity for all investors through public access to accurate and material company information to enable them to make well-informed investment decisions. This article argues that there were failures by the regulators in the performance of their roles to protect the interests of investors in Forrest v ASIC; FMG v ASIC (2012) 247 CLR 486: ASX failed to enforce timely compliance with the continuous disclosure regime and ensure that the market was properly informed by seeking immediate clarification from FMG as to the agreed fixed price and/or seeking production of a copy of the CREC agreement; and ASIC failed to succeed in the High Court because of the way it pleaded its case. The article also examines the reasoning of the High Court in Forrest v ASIC and whether it might have changed previous understandings of the Campomar test for determining whether representations directed to the public generally are misleading.

IEEE 802.11p empirical performance model from evaluations on test tracks

IEEE 802.11p is the new standard for intervehicular communications (IVC) using the 5.9 GHz frequency band; it is planned to be widely deployed to enable cooperative systems. 802.11p uses and performance have been studied theoretically and in simulations over the past years. Unfortunately, many of these results have not been confirmed by on-tracks experimentation. In this paper, we describe field trials of 802.11p technology with our test vehicles; metrics such as maximum range, latency and frame loss are examined. Then, we propose a detailed modelisation of 802.11p that can be used to accurately simulate its performance within Cooperative Systems (CS) applications.

Prior storm experience moderates water surge perception and risk

Background How accurately do people perceive extreme water speeds and how does their perception affect perceived risk? Prior research has focused on the characteristics of moving water that can reduce human stability or balance. The current research presents the first experiment on people's perceptions of risk and moving water at different speeds and depths. Methods Using a randomized within-person 2 (water depth: 0.45, 0.90 m) ×3 (water speed: 0.4, 0.8, 1.2 m/s) experiment, we immersed 76 people in moving water and asked them to estimate water speed and the risk they felt. Results Multilevel modeling showed that people increasingly overestimated water speeds as actual water speeds increased or as water depth increased. Water speed perceptions mediated the direct positive relationship between actual water speeds and perceptions of risk; the faster the moving water, the greater the perceived risk. Participants' prior experience with rip currents and tropical cyclones moderated the strength of the actual–perceived water speed relationship; consequently, mediation was stronger for people who had experienced no rip currents or fewer storms. Conclusions These findings provide a clearer understanding of water speed and risk perception, which may help communicate the risks associated with anticipated floods and tropical cyclones.

Estimating present day extreme water level exceedance probabilities around the coastline of Australia : tides, extra-tropical storm surges and mean sea level

The occurrence of extreme water levels along low-lying, highly populated and/or developed coastlines can lead to considerable loss of life and billions of dollars of damage to coastal infrastructure. Therefore it is vitally important that the exceedance probabilities of extreme water levels are accurately evaluated to inform risk-based flood management, engineering and future land-use planning. This ensures the risk of catastrophic structural failures due to under-design or expensive wastes due to over-design are minimised. This paper estimates for the first time present day extreme water level exceedence probabilities around the whole coastline of Australia. A high-resolution depth averaged hydrodynamic model has been configured for the Australian continental shelf region and has been forced with tidal levels from a global tidal model and meteorological fields from a global reanalysis to generate a 61-year hindcast of water levels. Output from this model has been successfully validated against measurements from 30 tide gauge sites. At each numeric coastal grid point, extreme value distributions have been fitted to the derived time series of annual maxima and the several largest water levels each year to estimate exceedence probabilities. This provides a reliable estimate of water level probabilities around southern Australia; a region mainly impacted by extra-tropical cyclones. However, as the meteorological forcing used only weakly includes the effects of tropical cyclones, extreme water level probabilities are underestimated around the western, northern and north-eastern Australian coastline. In a companion paper we build on the work presented here and more accurately include tropical cyclone-induced surges in the estimation of extreme water level. The multi-decadal hindcast generated here has been used primarily to estimate extreme water level exceedance probabilities but could be used more widely in the future for a variety of other research and practical applications.

Estimating present day extreme water level exceedance probabilities around the coastline of Australia : tropical cyclone-induced storm surges

The incidence of major storm surges in the last decade have dramatically emphasized the immense destructive capabilities of extreme water level events, particularly when driven by severe tropical cyclones. Given this risk, it is vitally important that the exceedance probabilities of extreme water levels are accurately evaluated to inform risk-based flood and erosion management, engineering and for future land-use planning and to ensure the risk of catastrophic structural failures due to under-design or expensive wastes due to over-design are minimised. Australia has a long history of coastal flooding from tropical cyclones. Using a novel integration of two modeling techniques, this paper provides the first estimates of present day extreme water level exceedance probabilities around the whole coastline of Australia, and the first estimates that combine the influence of astronomical tides, storm surges generated by both extra-tropical and tropical cyclones, and seasonal and inter-annual variations in mean sea level. Initially, an analysis of tide gauge records has been used to assess the characteristics of tropical cyclone-induced surges around Australia. However, given the dearth (temporal and spatial) of information around much of the coastline, and therefore the inability of these gauge records to adequately describe the regional climatology, an observationally based stochastic tropical cyclone model has been developed to synthetically extend the tropical cyclone record to 10,000 years. Wind and pressure fields derived for these synthetically generated events have then been used to drive a hydrodynamic model of the Australian continental shelf region with annual maximum water levels extracted to estimate exceedance probabilities around the coastline. To validate this methodology, selected historic storm surge events have been simulated and resultant storm surges compared with gauge records. Tropical cyclone induced exceedance probabilities have been combined with estimates derived from a 61-year water level hindcast described in a companion paper to give a single estimate of present day extreme water level probabilities around the whole coastline of Australia. Results of this work are freely available to coastal engineers, managers and researchers via a web-based tool (www.sealevelrise.info). The described methodology could be applied to other regions of the world, like the US east coast, that are subject to both extra-tropical and tropical cyclones.

Estimating present day extreme total water level exceedance probabilities around the Australian coastline

The occurrence of extreme water level events along low-lying, highly populated and/or developed coastlines can lead to devastating impacts on coastal infrastructure. Therefore it is very important that the probabilities of extreme water levels are accurately evaluated to inform flood and coastal management and for future planning. The aim of this study was to provide estimates of present day extreme total water level exceedance probabilities around the whole coastline of Australia, arising from combinations of mean sea level, astronomical tide and storm surges generated by both extra-tropical and tropical storms, but exclusive of surface gravity waves. The study has been undertaken in two main stages. In the first stage, a high-resolution (~10 km along the coast) hydrodynamic depth averaged model has been configured for the whole coastline of Australia using the Danish Hydraulics Institute’s Mike21 modelling suite of tools. The model has been forced with astronomical tidal levels, derived from the TPX07.2 global tidal model, and meteorological fields, from the US National Center for Environmental Prediction’s global reanalysis, to generate a 61-year (1949 to 2009) hindcast of water levels. This model output has been validated against measurements from 30 tide gauge sites around Australia with long records. At each of the model grid points located around the coast, time series of annual maxima and the several highest water levels for each year were derived from the multi-decadal water level hindcast and have been fitted to extreme value distributions to estimate exceedance probabilities. Stage 1 provided a reliable estimate of the present day total water level exceedance probabilities around southern Australia, which is mainly impacted by extra-tropical storms. However, as the meteorological fields used to force the hydrodynamic model only weakly include the effects of tropical cyclones the resultant water levels exceedance probabilities were underestimated around western, northern and north-eastern Australia at higher return periods. Even if the resolution of the meteorological forcing was adequate to represent tropical cyclone-induced surges, multi-decadal periods yielded insufficient instances of tropical cyclones to enable the use of traditional extreme value extrapolation techniques. Therefore, in the second stage of the study, a statistical model of tropical cyclone tracks and central pressures was developed using histroic observations. This model was then used to generate synthetic events that represented 10,000 years of cyclone activity for the Australia region, with characteristics based on the observed tropical cyclones over the last ~40 years. Wind and pressure fields, derived from these synthetic events using analytical profile models, were used to drive the hydrodynamic model to predict the associated storm surge response. A random time period was chosen, during the tropical cyclone season, and astronomical tidal forcing for this period was included to account for non-linear interactions between the tidal and surge components. For each model grid point around the coast, annual maximum total levels for these synthetic events were calculated and these were used to estimate exceedance probabilities. The exceedance probabilities from stages 1 and 2 were then combined to provide a single estimate of present day extreme water level probabilities around the whole coastline of Australia.

RNASeqBrowser: A genome browser for simultaneous visualization of raw strand specific RNAseq reads and UCSC genome browser custom tracks

Background Strand specific RNAseq data is now more common in RNAseq projects. Visualizing RNAseq data has become an important matter in Analysis of sequencing data. The most widely used visualization tool is the UCSC genome browser that introduced the custom track concept that enabled researchers to simultaneously visualize gene expression at a particular locus from multiple experiments. Our objective of the software tool is to provide friendly interface for visualization of RNAseq datasets. Results This paper introduces a visualization tool (RNASeqBrowser) that incorporates and extends the functionality of the UCSC genome browser. For example, RNASeqBrowser simultaneously displays read coverage, SNPs, InDels and raw read tracks with other BED and wiggle tracks -- all being dynamically built from the BAM file. Paired reads are also connected in the browser to enable easier identification of novel exon/intron borders and chimaeric transcripts. Strand specific RNAseq data is also supported by RNASeqBrowser that displays reads above (positive strand transcript) or below (negative strand transcripts) a central line. Finally, RNASeqBrowser was designed for ease of use for users with few bioinformatic skills, and incorporates the features of many genome browsers into one platform. Conclusions The features of RNASeqBrowser: (1) RNASeqBrowser integrates UCSC genome browser and NGS visualization tools such as IGV. It extends the functionality of the UCSC genome browser by adding several new types of tracks to show NGS data such as individual raw reads, SNPs and InDels. (2) RNASeqBrowser can dynamically generate RNA secondary structure. It is useful for identifying non-coding RNA such as miRNA. (3) Overlaying NGS wiggle data is helpful in displaying differential expression and is simple to implement in RNASeqBrowser. (4) NGS data accumulates a lot of raw reads. Thus, RNASeqBrowser collapses exact duplicate reads to reduce visualization space. Normal PC’s can show many windows of NGS individual raw reads without much delay. (5) Multiple popup windows of individual raw reads provide users with more viewing space. This avoids existing approaches (such as IGV) which squeeze all raw reads into one window. This will be helpful for visualizing multiple datasets simultaneously. RNASeqBrowser and its manual are freely available at http://www.australianprostatecentre.org/research/software/rnaseqbrowser webcite or http://sourceforge.net/projects/rnaseqbrowser/ webcite

Cyclone-induced mixing does not cool SST in the post-monsoon north Bay of Bengal

High-resolution data from the TRMM satellite shows that sea surface temperature (SST) cools by 3 degrees C under the tracks of pre-monsoon tropical cyclones in the north Indian Ocean. However, even the strongest post-monsoon cyclones do not cool the open north Bay of Bengal. In this region, a shallow layer of freshwater from river runoff and monsoon rain caps a deep warm layer. Therefore, storm-induced mixing is not deep, and it entrains warm subsurface water. It is possible that the hydrography of the post-monsoon north Bay favours intense cyclones.

Calm or storm? : Wind power actors perceptions of Finnish wind power and its future

Wind power has grown fast internationally. It can reduce the environmental impact of energy production and increase energy security. Finland has turbine industry but wind electricity production has been slow, and nationally set capacity targets have not been met. I explored social factors that have affected the slow development of wind power in Finland by studying the perceptions of Finnish national level wind power actors. By that I refer to people who affect the development of wind power sector, such as officials, politicians, and representatives of wind industries and various organisations. The material consisted of interviews, a questionnaire, and written sources. The perceptions of wind power, its future, and methods to promote it were divided. They were studied through discourse analysis, content analysis, and scenario construction. Definition struggles affect views of the significance and potential of wind power in Finland, and also affect investments in wind power and wind power policy choices. Views of the future were demonstrated through scenarios. The views included scenarios of fast growth, but in the most pessimistic views, wind power was not thought to be competitive without support measures even in 2025, and the wind power capacity was correspondingly low. In such a scenario, policy tool choices were expected to remain similar to ones in use at the time of the interviews. So far, the development in Finland has followed closely this pessimistic scenario. Despite the scepticism about wind electricity production, wind turbine industry was seen as a credible industry. For many wind power actors as well as for the Finnish wind power policy, the turbine industry is a significant motive to promote wind power. Domestic electricity production and the export turbine industry are linked in discourse through so-called home market argumentation. Finnish policy tools have included subsidies, research and development funding, and information policies. The criteria used to evaluate policy measures were both process-oriented and value-based. Feed-in tariffs and green certificates that are common elsewhere have not been taken to use in Finland. Some interviewees considered such tools unsuitable for free electricity markets and for the Finnish policy style, dictatorial, and being against western values. Other interviewees supported their use because of their effectiveness. The current Finnish policy tools are not sufficiently effective to increase wind power production significantly. Marginalisation of wind power in discourses, pessimistic views of the future, and the view that the small consumer demand for wind electricity represents the political views of citizens towards promoting wind power, make it more difficult to take stronger policy measures to use. Wind power has not yet significantly contributed to the ecological modernisation of the energy sector in Finland, but the situation may change as the need to reduce emissions from energy production continues.

Alignment of the ALICE Inner Tracking System with cosmic-ray tracks

ALICE (A Large Ion Collider Experiment) is the LHC (Large Hadron Collider) experiment devoted to investigating the strongly interacting matter created in nucleus-nucleus collisions at the LHC energies. The ALICE ITS, Inner Tracking System, consists of six cylindrical layers of silicon detectors with three different technologies; in the outward direction: two layers of pixel detectors, two layers each of drift, and strip detectors. The number of parameters to be determined in the spatial alignment of the 2198 sensor modules of the ITS is about 13,000. The target alignment precision is well below 10 micron in some cases (pixels). The sources of alignment information include survey measurements, and the reconstructed tracks from cosmic rays and from proton-proton collisions. The main track-based alignment method uses the Millepede global approach. An iterative local method was developed and used as well. We present the results obtained for the ITS alignment using about 10^5 charged tracks from cosmic rays that have been collected during summer 2008, with the ALICE solenoidal magnet switched off.

The Merger Storm Recognizes No Borders: An Analysis of Media Rhetoric on a Business Manoeuvre

Despite the central role of the media in contemporary society, studies examining the rhetorical practices of journalists are rare in organization and management research. We know little of the textual micro strategies and techniques through which journalists convey specific messages to their readers. Partially to fill the gap, this paper outlines a methodological framework that combines three perspectives of text analysis and interpretation: critical discourse analysis, systemic functional grammar and rhetorical structure theory. Using this framework, we engage in a close reading of a single media text (a press article) on a recent case of industrial restructuring in the financial services. In our empirical analysis, we focus on key arguments put forward by the journalists’ rhetorical constructions. We maintain that these arguments—which are not frame-breaking but rather tend to confirm existing presuppositions held by the audience—are an essential part of the legitimization and naturalization of specific management ideas and ideologies.