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The Association Of Felis Catus Papillomavirus Type 2 Infection In Feline Cutaneous Squamous Cell Carcinomas And Its Premalignant Lesions (Bowenoid In Situ Carcinoma And Actinic Keratosis)
No full textFeline cutaneous squamous cell carcinomas (SCC) are the most common cutaneous malignant skin neoplasms of cats, comprising approximately 15% of feline skin neoplasms. Previous studies have demonstrated a potential causative role of infection with feline papillomaviruses, in particular Felis catus papillomavirus type-2 (FcaPV-2), in the development of cutaneous SCCs and its premalignant lesion Bowenoid in situ carcinoma (BISC). More recent studies in the human literature have also suggested a potential role of human papillomavirus (HPV) in the development of another premalignant skin lesion actinic keratosis (AK). The IHC study demonstrated that feline BISCs exhibited positive p16 labelling at higher rates compared to AKs (p = 0.0030) but there was no statistically significant difference in p16 labelling between UV-exposed and UV-protected SCCs (p = 0.0593). IHC for p53 was unsuccessful. The qPCR study demonstrated that UV-protected SCCs were more likely to contain FcaPV-2 DNA compared to UV-exposed SCCs (p = 0.0095) but there were no statistically significant differences in viral DNA detection between BISCs and AKs (p = 0.9512). When IHC and qPCR results were combined together, no statistically significant difference was observed in FcaPV-2 aetiology (positive for both FcaPV-2 DNA by PCR and p16 labelling by IHC) between feline BISCs and AKs (p = 0.1723). However, there was a statistically significant difference observed in FcaPV-2 aetiology between UV-protected and UV-exposed cutaneous SCCs (p = 0.0236). Therefore, FcaPV-2 infection appears to be associated with the development of BISCs, AKs, and UV-protected SCCs but not UV-exposed SCCs. This is suggestive that FcaPV-2 infection may be involved in the development of more cutaneous lesions in felines than what is currently expected
Home-based, tailored intervention to reduce rate of falls after stroke (FAST): a randomised trial. Data Set
No full textDATA SET for FAST trial. FAST was a two-armed, randomised trial which recruited ambulatory stroke survivors from three states in Australia who were within 5 years of stroke and had been discharged from formal rehabilitation to the community. Between August 2019 and December 2023, 370 people with stroke were enrolled. Primary outcome was rate of falls over 12 months. Secondary outcomes were: proportion of participants experiencing a fall, community participation, self-efficacy, balance, mobility, physical activity, ADL, depression and health-related quality of life.A prospective, multistate, Phase III randomised trial with concealed allocation, blinded measurement and intention-to-treat analysis. Primary outcome was rate of falls over 12 months. Secondary outcomes were: proportion of participants experiencing a fall
Internationalization through Co-Creating Institutions: the Case of Blockchain
No full textInstitutions are often treated as established variables in the International Business (IB) field. Despite
the important role of common institutions in cross-border activities, how firms participate in the
processes of developing institutions globally has received scant scholarly attention. This thesis
challenges a conventional assumption that institutions are pre-existing factors exogenous to firm
activities. It illuminates different pathways followed by firms to co-create common standards in a
nascent technological field.
The thesis comprises three articles that complement each other. The first article problematizes 101
studies published between 2014-2023. It uncovers a prevailing assumption in IB that takes
institutions as factors pre-existing to firm activities. It proposes alternative assumptions that treat
firms as co-creators of institutions in the context of digital innovations. The second article examines
challenges faced by firms while realizing blockchain’s potential as a general-purpose technology in IB
context. It proposes a framework for firms to develop valuable use cases, align stakeholder visions
and build viable blockchain-based solutions. The third article draws on the theory of institutional fields
to investigate how firms participate in common standard-making to enable the global adoption of
blockchain. It discusses how firms pursue different pathways to global standardization, as a central
actor, consortium members, and peripheral actors.
The thesis triangulates between documentary, interview and observational data collected from firms
based in 12 jurisdictions between 2021-2024. It builds on multi-level analysis of how individuals, a
single firm and consortia of firms participate in global standard-making via bottom-up, top-down, and
bespoke pathways. It brings an IB dimension to the theory of institutional fields and highlights the
importance of global adoption as a key process to establish common standards in a nascent
technological field
Fetal Brain Ultrasound Analysis: Sub-Region Segmentation of the Cerebellum and Texture Variability in the Thalamus
No full textUltrasound (US) imaging is routinely used during pregnancy because it is affordable, non-invasive and non-ionizing. Different scans are taken during different gestation stages for various purposes. It is scientifically proven that during 18-22 weeks of gestation, the fetal brain undergoes significant structural growth. This provides an opportunity to extract rich information from fetal brain US images taken during this period. Existing studies on fetal US images solely focus on investigating the size/shape characteristics of brain structures to assess their clinical values. However, the possible clinical value of radiomics, which includes texture features, in relation to fetal growth has been failed to examine. Texture-based analysis is important as it can provide a more comprehensive aspect of growth and this cannot be captured by simple size or shape measurement.
The first study in this thesis applied radiomics-based, including deep learning-based and statistical methods, to extract the textures of the thalamus from the fetal brain US images, then investigated the relationship with gestational age. The results indicate that several texture feature characteristics show statistically significant variations across different gestational age groups at birth. Additionally, texture feature characteristics demonstrate a weak to moderate correlation with the gestational age. This study suggests the feasibility of using texture feature as a novel approach to investigate the fetal brain growth, which is beneficial to future investigation of fetal neurodevelopment or gestational age estimation. Another study of this thesis introduces a novel AMFA Network, incorporating a novel adaptive attention gate and multi-fusion mechanism to enhance segmentation accuracy. Results show that the proposed model outperformed other segmentation arts in segmenting the cerebellum from the fetal brain US images and the breast tumor from the external public BUSI dataset compared to other models
Neodesign: The Loss of Craft, Imagination and a Playful Attitude
No full textSince around the turn of the millennium, a “New Design” ethos gradually emerged. It is a reformulation of design entrenched enough to warrant a term of its own: Neodesign. Repackaged as a procedural, risk-averse, sandboxed version of the design process, aimed especially at non-designers, Neodesign has nevertheless come to be seen as the measure against which design practice is measured outside of design practice. In this paper, we argue that craft, imagination, and playfulness are crucial aspects of what makes design design and, arguably, one of the reasons why the discipline has been well-received in business circles. We further explore the paradox that, in dispensing with these components of design practice, the sandboxed version of design is threatening the pedagogical practices that make design unique and which inspired business organisations to adopt them in the first place. We take stock of the last three decades and discuss, sometimes polemically, what has been lost and added by this new design ethos and how the loss of craft, imagination and a playful attitude are affecting design education, as well as industry practice
4D-Flow MRI for cardiovascular evaluation - application in routine clinical practice and integration in standard clinical workflow
No full text4D-flow MRI is a relatively novel imaging modality with growing applications in cardiovascular clinical workflow and research. The wealth of information obtained by 4D-flow MRI is unparalleled by conventional cardiac imaging modalities and has the potential to support the development of novel clinical parameters to improve diagnosis, assessment, and risk stratification of cardiovascular diseases. The studies reported in this thesis sought to examine the feasibility and validity of incorporating 4D-flow MRI and its derived clinical parameters into routine cardiovascular diagnostic workflow. In addition, the potential of 4D-flow MRI to improve the accuracy of CFD modelling of the LV was also examined.
Systematic examinations of existing evidence found several 4D-flow MRI derived parameters to have the potential of becoming clinical markers to improve the quantification of LV function and the risk stratification of aortopathy associated with bicuspid aortic valve. However, the existing evidence were all supported by small-scale studies, and substantial further investigations are required to prove the validity of these parameters in clinical use.
The methodology and pilot analysis of a large-scale non-inferiority study was reported with the aim to demonstrate clinical non-inferiority of 4D-flow MRI compared with conventional cardiac MRI, and the feasibility of incorporating 4D-flow MRI into routine clinical workflow by leveraging standardised imaging analysis protocols to reduce the dependence on MRI specialists. A large cohort investigation of bulk flow measurements in the large vessels comparing 4D-flow and 2D-PC supported 4D-flow as a potentially valid tool for clinical diagnosis of cardiac pathologies.
In CFD modelling of the LV, data derived from 4D-flow MRI was able to improve boundary condition modelling and overall model accuracy in a small-scale investigation. A clinically pragmatic and accurate model remains a challenging topic
Understandings of empathy held by Australian engineering leadership
No full textEmpathy is emerging as a vital engineering skill in light of the growing complexity of engineering work and necessity of human-centred solutions. While there is emerging research on empathy in engineering, there is a lack of specific
focus on Australian leaders in this field. Considering the criticality of this demographic to realising systemic change in engineering organisations and the profession, this thesis examines how Australian engineering leaders understand
empathy. To achieve this, thematic analysis of semi-structured interviews with seven Australian engineering leaders has been conducted. From this, it is clear that a collective uplift in empathetic skills within engineering is essential,
particularly for engineering leaders. However, this necessity varies depending on an individual engineer’s work, which reflects their personal abilities, and is completely natural and acceptable. It is inherently empathetic to recognise and
champion the diversity of skills in engineering. Developing empathy as an engineering skill requires holistic and nuanced integration into engineering education as well as whole-of-career development. Self-selecting engineers
should be empowered to deepen their empathy skills and a baseline awareness requirement should be established for all graduates. These findings are significant as they challenge the all-or-nothing approach to people skills in
engineering while reinforcing their criticality to the future of the profession. This thesis recommends that systemic change should be reflected through a tiered approach to empathy in Engineers Australia’s competency standards
involving a Stage 1 awareness and a Stage 2 knowledge. This approach sidesteps the issue of congested undergraduate education programs to deliver a collective uplift in empathetic capability. Ultimately, this thesis provides rich insights
from Australian engineering leaders in how empathy might be better integrated into engineering education and the profession
Pure high-order dispersion dissipative Kerr solitons in optical cavities
No full textThrough numerical simulations we demonstrate the existence of an infinite family of temporal cavity solitons which balance arbitrary negative pure, even-order dispersion and self-phase moduation, as well as loss and parametric gain. These correspond to frequency combs with increasingly flatter spectra as increases. We determine the analytic forms of these solitons in the limit of high pump power and detuning, and derive their scaling properties. In particular, we show that their energy is related to the pulse duration as
Advancing Contrastive Learning for Visual Representation: From Unsupervised to Supervised Paradigms
No full textContrastive Visual Representation Learning has emerged as a cornerstone in computer vision research, celebrated for its simplicity and exceptional performance. At its core, this approach leverages instance discrimination, contrasting positive and negative samples from the same or different instances, to learn effective representations. These representations have demonstrated remarkable efficacy across diverse visual tasks. This thesis delves deeper into the potential of contrastive-based visual representation learning, addressing key research questions: How can contrastive learning be optimized for various learning paradigms, including unsupervised/self-supervised, semi-supervised, and fully supervised settings? What novel algorithms and techniques can mitigate the typical challenges of contrastive learning?
To answer these questions, we design and propose innovative methods to overcome challenges such as mitigating class collision problems in self-supervised settings, optimizing label efficiency in semi-supervised scenarios, and addressing intra-class disparities in fully supervised contexts. Comprehensive experiments and analyses are conducted on diverse visual datasets to validate the effectiveness and versatility of our approaches. Furthermore, this thesis explores the practical applications of fine-tuning contrastive pre-trained models, highlighting their potential in low-shot image classification, object detection, semantic segmentation, and other real-world tasks requiring robust visual representations.
By advancing the theoretical and practical foundations of contrastive learning, this thesis contributes significantly to making visual representation learning more robust, versatile, and applicable to a broader spectrum of challenges in computer vision
Developing systems and capacities to protect animals in catastrophic fires.
No full textThis report details the findings and recommendations from the Australian Government funded project "Developing systems and capacities to protect animals in catastrophic fires." The project interviewed over sixty people in the Shoalhaven region of NSW regarding their experiences trying to care for and protect wild, domesticated and farmed animals during the 2019/2020 bushfires