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Investigation of intranuclear inclusion bodies in the hepatocytes of the koala and potential association with herpesvirus infection
No full textHepatocellular inclusion bodies are frequently observed in koalas during postmortem examinations, but their cause is unknown. Suspected origins include viral infection, glycogen or protein accumulation, or cytoplasmic invaginations. Koalas are susceptible to two gammaherpesviruses, Phascolarctid herpesvirus-1 (PhaHV-1) and Phascolarctid herpesvirus-2 (PhaHV-2). The clinical relevance of these viruses remains unclear. This study aimed to: (1) characterise the epidemiology of hepatocellular intranuclear inclusions of koalas; and determine whether these inclusions are associated with (2) other liver pathology or (3) PhaHV-1 or PhaHV-2 infection. A retrospective review and prospective, opportunistic, sample collection were undertaken. Epidemiologic data was investigated and liver histopathology analysed using a developed grading system. Liver and spleen samples from 34 koalas were tested by qPCR for PhaHV-1 and PhaHV-2. Koalas from the state of Queensland had a higher prevalence of inclusions than those from NSW, but no differences were found by age, sex, or captive/wild status. Inclusions were more common in koalas with chlamydiosis (OR 4.27) or neoplasia (OR 4.85) than in trauma cases. Affected koalas also showed increased hepatocellular anisokaryosis (OR 29.79). No association was found between inclusion presence and PhaHV-1 or PhaHV-2 infection. These findings suggest PhaHV-1 and PhaHV-2 are both unlikely to directly cause the inclusion bodies. Instead, the association with chronic disease and anisokaryosis points to increased hepatic metabolic demand and turnover as a potential contributing factor
Return to work for women with cognitive changes following breast cancer treatment: Implications for assessment and the role of occupational therapy
No full textWhile survival rates for women with breast cancer have improved, many experience persistent
cognitive challenges that hinder return to work. This thesis examines the impact of breast cancer on
workforce participation, focusing on cancer-related cognitive impairment and its implications for
employment outcomes. Despite growing recognition of these changes, structured assessment and
support remain limited in Australia’s healthcare and employment systems. Guided by the question,
“How do cognitive changes associated with breast cancer influence women’s work participation and
performance, and how can these effects be measured?”, the research explores four areas: evidence
of reduced work participation, the impact of cognitive changes on work performance, specific
cognitive domains affected, and the effectiveness of PRPP-A (PRPP@WORK) in assessing workrelated
cognition. Using a mixed-methods approach, the study combines a longitudinal analysis, a
scoping review, qualitative interviews, and pilot testing of PRPP@WORK. Findings confirm breast
cancer significantly reduces workforce participation, with many women moving to part-time roles or
leaving employment. Cognitive impairments, particularly in attention, planning, and executive
functioning, emerge as key contributors. PRPP@WORK demonstrates strong ecological validity and
predictive value, correlating with neuropsychological assessments and identifying women at risk of
not returning to pre-illness roles. The research highlights systemic gaps, including missed
opportunities for early cognitive screening, limited survivorship support, and fragmented referral
pathways. Occupational therapists are critical in bridging these divides yet remain underutilised. The
thesis advocates for integrated survivorship care, policy reform, and cancer-specific employment
support, introducing PRPP@WORK as a novel tool and underscoring work as both a meaningful
occupation and a form of cognitive rehabilitation
Optimization of Vancomycin Therapy in Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU)
No full textVancomycin is the first-line treatment for staphylococcal infections in neonates, yet safe and effective
dosing remains difficult because of limited clinical data and major developmental differences in
pharmacokinetics compared with adults. These challenges highlight the need for reliable therapeutic
drug monitoring (TDM) in neonatal intensive care units. This thesis focuses on improving vancomycin
dosing and TDM practices for neonates through four complementary studies.
A systematic review assessed current dosing strategies and showed that all existing algorithms
achieved less than 80% target attainment, revealing the limitations of conventional approaches. A
retrospective study at Westmead Hospital examined real-world practice in 69 neonates. When TDM
was performed appropriately, 75% reached the target trough after the first dose, rising to 84% after
TDM-guided adjustments, although many courses still required further dose optimization.
To support more precise dosing, a model-informed precision dosing (MIPD) evaluation was
conducted. Among 25 identified population pharmacokinetic models, nine were suitable for deeper
analysis, and the De Cock et al. (2014) model showed the most reliable predictive performance
across apriori, aposteriori, and Bayesian forecasting. These findings support the value of MIPD for
individualized and accurate dosing in neonates.
The thesis also highlights the important role of clinical pharmacists in leading TDM. Their expertise in
interpreting drug exposure and applying MIPD tools is essential for achieving safe and effective
therapy, yet often underutilized.
Overall, the results demonstrate substantial variability in current neonatal vancomycin practice and
the need for more consistent, model-informed, and pharmacist-supported TDM. Bayesian and MIPDguided
approaches offer a promising path toward safer and more individualized dosing in this
vulnerable population
Master of Health Policy & Planning Webinar 2025
No full textProfessor Andrew Wilson and Associate Professor Carmen Huckel Schneider will talk about what the program offers, as well as providing opportunities to ask any questions you have about the program
Submission to the Productivity Commission: Harnessing Data and Digital Technology & Building a Skilled and Adaptable Workforce
No full textThis submission responds to the Productivity Commission’s Interim Report on Harnessing Data and Digital Technology and Building a Skilled and Adaptable Workforce. These domains are not merely technical or economic in nature; they are deeply embedded within broader social, cultural, and institutional transformations that demand nuanced and contextually grounded policy responses
Towards controllable neural audio synthesis: An exploration of sound effects creation with generative models
No full textSound effects are crucial components in enhancing the auditory experience in media such as film, television, and video games. Traditionally, these effects are created using two primary methods: Foley recording, where sound is physically performed to match onscreen actions, and digital sound processing (DSP), which manipulates audio signals with algorithms to achieve desired sounds. While effective, these methods come with limitations in terms of scalability and the ability to rapidly prototype sounds.
Recent advancements in deep learning have introduced a new paradigm for sound effects generation through neural audio synthesis. This approach utilizes generative models to produce sound effects from learned audio features automatically. However, a significant drawback of this technology is the lack of fine-grained control over the sound output, as generative models typically provide fewer parameter adjustments compared to traditional DSP methods. This limitation poses challenges in achieving specific auditory outcomes necessary for creative sound design.
This thesis explores neural audio synthesis in sound effects generation. The data scarcity in the domain of sound effects has been a well-known issue, which makes it challenging for data-driven approaches towards learning and synthesizing. This thesis aims to study controllable and diverse sound effects generation under the setting of a limited audio dataset without requiring huge computation resources
Building readiness in community-based organisations to enable the implementation of public health interventions for adults and older adults: a scoping review
No full textData and supplementary file from: 'Building readiness in community-based organisations to enable the implementation of public health interventions for adults and older adults: a scoping review'
Background: A key challenge to implementing and scaling up evidence-based interventions (EBIs) into practice is organisational readiness; described as an organisation’s motivation, general capacities, and capabilities specific to the EBI. Building organisational readiness has been investigated in some health disciplines (e.g., mental health). However, the importance of building organisational readiness to effectively implement public health EBIs for adults and older adults in the community setting remains largely unexplored. Our aim was to examine how readiness was defined and measured, what strategies were used to build readiness, and the relationship between readiness-building strategies and implementation, service-level, and person-level outcomes.
Methods: In this scoping review, we searched seven databases and conducted forward and backward citation tracking. From a pool of eight reviewers, combinations of two reviewers independently screened references for eligibility. A single reviewer extracted data, and a second reviewer checked data. Results for each implementation, service-level and person-level outcome in each study were extracted and categorised as favourable, nonsignificant, or unfavourable.
Results: Twelve studies were included, which implemented a mix of different public health EBIs to almost 40,000 participants (n = 37,883; 54% women) across varied community settings. Only four studies defined readiness; all used different definitions. Five studies used five different instruments to assess readiness, all with poor psychometric properties. All studies used multiple strategies to build readiness (range 4–20 strategies per study), with all using strategies to assess, plan and monitor implementation of the EBI (i.e., ‘evaluative and iterative strategies’) and strategies to support collaboration between organisations delivering the EBI (i.e., ‘develop interest-holder interrelationships’). Three-quarters of the strategies focused on building the organisation’s capability to deliver the specific EBI (e.g., assessing readiness, conducting educational meetings) and were delivered by external support teams. Exploring the relationship between readiness-building strategies and study outcomes indicated more favourable than unfavourable outcomes, particularly for implementation and service-level outcomes (38/48; 79% favourable).
Conclusions: Within this limited sample, the use of readiness-building strategies improved the implementation of public health EBIs in community organisations. However, consistency of definitions and terminology and more sophisticated testing of readiness-building strategies will help confirm how best to do this.
Trial registration: Open Science Framework, May 5, 2024.Scoping revie
INTRODUCTION The Holocaust and Human Rights: Transnational Perspectives on Contemporary Memorial Museums
No full textInterrogates the global, and often controversial, phenomenon of Holocaust and human rights museums
Spanning six continents—Europe, Australia, Africa, Asia, North America, and South America—this edited collection offers a comparative, transnational study of Holocaust and human rights museums that foregrounds the overlapping and often contested work these institutions do in narrating and memorializing histories of genocide and human rights abuses for a public audience. Museums that link the Holocaust with social justice, human rights, and genocide prevention have been founded in many countries—for example, the Kazerne Dossin Memorial Museum in Belgium, the Anne Frank House in the Netherlands, and the Johannesburg Holocaust and Genocide Centre in South Africa—making Holocaust and human rights museums a global phenomenon. It is not uncommon for these institutions to court controversy by linking the Holocaust to human rights issues in their locales and abroad. Some begin from a “Holocaust core” and extrapolate from this history to address broader concerns, while others integrate the Holocaust as “a” or, at times, “the” case study par excellence of human rights abuses. Other institutions that may not explicitly focus on the Holocaust continue to engage these representational practices to highlight other instances of genocide and human rights abuses.
The case studies in this book illuminate the convergences between Holocaust and human rights museums in their demands for social justice and reparation, educational and activist purpose, design principles, and curatorial choices. But it also shows how these museums can also be sites of contestation around how stories of suffering, courage, and survival are told; whose stories are prioritized; and who is consulted. Although Holocaust museums were once the most influential form of representation of human rights issues in the international museum and heritage fields, they are now in dialogue—visually, spatially, methodologically—with museums and memorial sites concerned with human rights more broadly. Interrogating debates in both museology and Holocaust memory studies, this volume reveals how institutions dedicated to these concerns have become active and influential contributors to local, national, and transnational dialogues about human rights
The Pleasures of War
No full textWar is often studied through its horrors: death, injury, violence, trauma, barbarity, and destruction. Unsurprisingly, when scholars in International Relations (IR) and related disciplines examine human experiences in war, it is usually in relation to these forms of suffering. However, personal accounts from soldiers, humanitarians, and journalists reveal that war also generates a range of pleasurable experiences. This thesis investigates the overlooked dimension of pleasure in war and the implications of its exclusion from IR. Drawing on interviews with 32 noncombatants who worked in Afghanistan during the most recent war, as well as memoirs and poetry by war workers across various conflicts, this study identifies a wide array of pleasures that are largely absent from IR discourse, including job satisfaction, emotional connection, meaning, purpose, excitement, pride and more. These accounts reveal that pleasure, far from being an anomaly, permeates daily life in war. By centring the experiences of war workers who report feeling good in war, this thesis challenges dominant narratives that reduce war to fighting and trauma. It seeks to expand what counts as legitimate knowledge about war and highlights the moralism embedded in war studies. Excluding pleasure from the study of war allows war to be framed as something that only sadists or sociopaths could enjoy. This thesis proposes that to truly understand war, we must take its pleasures as seriously as its horrors. Pleasure is as intrinsic to war as pain and death and ignoring it purifies war in a way that helps make it more palatable. War is easier to comprehend when it is exclusively awful. I argue that by focusing only on its terrible aspects, vast as they are, we offer ourselves a comfortable, sanitised version of war that may even contribute to its endurance
Saviourhood, Liberation, and Unity in the Royal Image of King Henry VII of England
No full textWhen Henry Tudor seized the throne of England in August 1485, becoming King Henry VII of
England (r.1485-1509), he portrayed himself not as a usurper or rival, but as a saviour. According to
Henry, he claimed the throne to free England from tyranny, and to unite the kingdom under the rule of
a new, just king – himself. Throughout Henry’s nearly two-year campaign for the throne and later as
king, Henry regularly highlighted the stark differences between himself and his predecessor Richard
III, portraying himself as the antithesis to Richard’s villainy, and as the figure who would unite
England by ending the civil conflict later known as the Wars of the Roses. Henry maintained that his
purpose in seeking the throne was neither for greed nor personal glory; rather, he asserted his claim
in the name of saviourhood. The idea of saviourhood played a crucial role in the creation of Henry’s
royal image, and was expressed by Henry via two main characterisations: that of himself as a
liberator, and of himself as a unifier