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Fabrication of titanium coatings for medical device applications
Full text linkAbstract
Titanium is widely used for medical purposes It related to bone repair because of its favorable mechanical properties
and biocompatible ability to osseointegrate in host bone tissue A good and lasting connection of the implant with the bone tissue is possible when there are sufficient conditions for the bone to grow into the pores of the material, therefore the use of a porous titanium coating may be helpful in solving this problem In this paper, shrouded plasma spray is used to produce low oxide containing titanium coatings and lower the cost as titanium is a very reactive metal at high temperatures A solid conical shroud
was designed for plasma spray The titanium coatings were assessed by scanning electron microscopy and energy dispersive Xray spectroscopy An analysis in microstructure had been carried out The results showed that the shroud attachment played an important role in protecting the titanium particles in flight during the process of plasma spraying An enhanced microstructure with moderate porosity in the titanium coatings plasma sprayed with the shroud was observed The reduction in air entrainment with the shroud resulted in a good heating of the particles The plasma sprayed titanium coating was mainly composed of α Ti
with a low quantity of Ti
Mum’s Kitchen: Scoring Loss in a Contemporary New Zealand Musical. Paper presented at Creative Practice at/and the In-Betweens Research Symposium, Wintec, 1 July 2021
Full text linkThis paper functions in part as an exegesis of a recently premiered New Zealand musical, Mum’s Kitchen, which was collaboratively written and composed by a team of four creatives. The show centres around three brothers who return to their family farm after their Mum passes away, and they must settle the estate, while processing their various states of grief for their childhood home and family. Mum’s Kitchen treads relatively familiar New Zealand theatrical ground, then, in terms of exploring themes of masculinity, emotional performance, and familial communication.
The question of a distinct New Zealand musical language is one that has occupied writers for many years, and
this becomes even more pressing in an idiom (musical theatre) that has such a limited tradition in this country (di Somma, 2016) – in other words, how to write musical theatre songs to tell a distinctly New Zealand story when such a musical language (arguably) does not exist? While the musical was not created to answer this question, the creative responses of the two primary composers provides some answers to this question, which, in turn, is revealing of how style and compositional choices are perceived to function in a musical.
Taking its cue from Murphy (2014), this paper analyses the songs in Mum’s Kitchen that directly addresses themes of loss and nostalgia. I suggest that despite the different composers on the project, there is a unified set of strategies as to how loss is “scored” into the songs: use of “anachronistic” styles (such as the country waltz) to evoke a past era, and a collection of contemporary harmonic devices (open chord voicings, harmonic ambiguity) that evoke emptiness and uncertainty
Family finds a way: Experiences of multigenerational transnational new Chinese immigrant families in New Zealand
Full text linkThe Immigration Act 1987 fundamentally transformed New Zealand’s immigration policy from one that was race-based to one based on economic needs of New Zealand society. It opened the borders to immigrants from much wider regions. As a result of this “open-door” immigration policy, a substantial new Chinese immigrant community from the People’s Republic of China (PRC) was established in New Zealand. Building a closely-tied multigenerational family is an important feature of family life for this immigrant group. Often, multiple generations live together or within close proximity with one another in highly interdependent relationships. However, a growing number have also started to maintain their family lives transnationally, with different family members across generations living apart but maintaining close ties, with frequent interactions across national borders. Given this transnational family arrangement is very different from Chinese traditional practices of family maintenance, the impact of this change on the wellbeing and functioning of these families and their individual family members is an issue of increasing academic interest.
This thesis responds to these concerns and explores the relationship between people’s experiences of transnational migration and their multigenerational family dynamics. Through engaging with individual life stories and perspectives of 45 participants across generations from new PRC immigrant families living in New Zealand, this thesis seeks to understand how those families with closely-tied multiple generations cope with dislocation and relocation during the process of transnational migration. It also investigates how transnational migration experiences contribute to new emergent domestic dynamics, including the development of new strategies and practices to maintain family traditions, interests and coherence across national borders, as well as shifting intergenerational relationships.
The empirical data demonstrates that despite the increasing proportion of new PRC families living transnationally, their experiences of managing family lives vary. I argue that this diversification of transnational family experiences is largely attributed to the interaction of various impact factors associated with both the internal dynamics of immigrant families themselves and external contexts where those families are closely related. My research also attests that family members’ transnational migration experiences accelerate changes to the way they perform family life, particularly amplifying intergenerational differences and altering intergenerational dependency. Even though those changes introduce vital challenges towards multigenerational family maintenance and coherence, my research reveals that families are resilient and able to actively forge multistranded resources as well as engage various transnational activities in response to those challenges. While this thesis poses intriguing perspectives and culturally-specific scenarios to study immigrant families in New Zealand society, more importantly, it also contributes to the broad theorisation of transnational family formation and maintenance in the increasingly globalised world
Residential IEQ improvement using UVGI lights and carbon fibre filters: Mould and relative humidity assessments
Full text linkMany New Zealand residential homes suffer from poor indoor environmental quality (IEQ). Cold, damp, and mould-ridden homes can cause serious respiratory health problems. Poor IEQ can arise due to poor insulation and ventilation, and is compounded when residents cannot afford heating. Features of the residential building code mean many New Zealand houses built under old standards lack wall insulation, have single glazing on windows and are poorly ventilated. A major indicator of poor IEQ is mould growth, which can cause, or exacerbate, respiratory illness. This project assesses the results of modifying an existing dehumidifier to include ultraviolet germicidal (UVGI) lights and two different types of filters (CityPleat and 30/30). The original device altered IEQ by removing moisture. The modified device was designed to further improve IEQ by performing filtration and purification of the air, with the addition of the CityPleat, 30/30 filters with the UVGI lights. This project investigates the impact on various IEQ elements, such as room temperature, particulate matters (PM2.5), and relative humidity using an air imaging sensor (compatible with current WHO guidelines), with a focus on mould growth. We found the different filtration scenarios presented reduced the relative humidity effectively in the room compared to the baseline dehumidifier action only. The results show that adding the 30/30 filter with the UVGI lights increased the room temperature by 2.2oC, reduced the relative humidity by 10%, and reduced the PM2.5 values from 2.5 µg/m³ to 0.4 µg/m³ in the room after three hours of operation. Mould growth, as measured in agar plate coverage, was also reduced by the addition of the filtration and UVGI lights
The tasting table: Food as theme and instigator of creative and practical projects
Full text linkFood is a signifier of culture, generation, and social status. Each recipe is a narrative and each dish arising from a recipe an exploration of the word made flesh (or textured vegetable protein or aquafaba!).
Building on the centrality and redundancy of food in our lives, three panelists who are teachers and researchers discuss how we have chosen to use food themes, developing our own and our student's communication and creative practice.
Having shared our mahi with each other, we share techniques, synergies, reflections, and a tasting table of stimuli.
Elna Fourie is a Senior Academic Staff Member at the School of Media Arts, and a facilitator and coach at Design Factory New Zealand (DFNZ). Discussing recent student projects from DFNZ, she brings to the panel reflections on the potential of food-based projects to allow for multi-disciplinary engagement, for student-community collaboration, and for applying human-centred design approaches to solving societal challenges.
Gail Pittaway is a Principal Academic Staff Member in the School of Media Arts and a teacher of Writing, Storytelling and Creative Media. Currently a PhD candidate at the Central Queensland University in Creative Writing, she is writing a Creative Nonfictional food memoir. She will discuss the use of food as stimulus for students’ writing and how investigation into food writing and food practices have generated a portfolio of articles and chapters for her own research.
Cate Prestidge is a Principal Academic Staff Member in the School of Media Arts, teaching media, communication and professional practice. Her masters study included examining the value of applied learning and the ‘soft skills’ required for graduates to thrive in the creative industries. Cate will discuss the ways food has featured in recent student learning, including; breaking down barriers for diversity interviews and the challenges of managing a test kitchen
Low-cost residential air quality device using ultraviolet germicidal irradiation (UVGI) light
No full textMany New Zealand residential dwellings suffer from dampness and fungi during the winter, which can cause respiratory health problems. This can be due to poor insulation and ventilation, and the situation worsens when residents cannot afford to heat the dwelling. The main aim of this paper is to modify an existing dehumidifier so that it can remove moisture, heat the living space and reduce fungi growth and bacteria. To achieve that, we installed ultraviolet germicidal lights (UVGI) in an existing dehumidifier with a total cost of NZD 213.76. The UVGI lights are known to be efficient in destroying the DNA of fungi and bacteria. The results show that the device reduced the fungi growth and did increase the room temperature because the dehumidifier captured two litres of water over 24 hours of testing. Therefore, our proposed low-cost device does improve the indoor air quality (IAQ) in the living space.
The design files for the modified dehumidifier will be included here.
https://data.mendeley.com/datasets/bshhwy3czd/
Performing nature unnaturally: musique concrète and the performance of knowledge one seabird at a time
No full textMigratory seabirds are an unseen conduit between marine and terrestrial systems, carrying the nutrients they consume at sea into the forests where they breed. Acting as environmental sentinels, their health and reproductive success provide early warning signals of deteriorating marine eco-systems as the climate changes, and fish stocks decrease.
Aotearoa New Zealand is the seabird capital of the world, with ~25% of all species breeding here and ~10% exclusively so. They play a critical role in maintaining healthy ecosystems, with their long-term well-being is closely interconnected with our own prospects for a sustainable future.
Now predominantly restricted to off-shore islands due to predation and habitat destruction, seabirds and their familiar sounds have become less available in an age when the unprecedented global movement and planetary spread of the human population has culminated in unsustainable fishing, predators and habitat destruction. Inspiring mythology, song, poetry and stories, birds have been significant in shaping our understanding of how our natural environment has come to be known and understood.
This paper speculates upon how we learn to communicate and cooperate with these precious taonga, and what might be learned from such an exchange through creative practice. Reflecting upon what birds might tell us, musician Matthew Bannister and I, a visual artist, have taken our cue from seabirds sharing our local environment on the west coast of Aotearoa - from the petrel (peera) through to the gannet (tākapu). Working on the premise that bird vocalisation is a performed negotiation that includes defence of territory and mate attraction, a bird’s call is a form of communication that effectively says “Come here” or “Go away”, which arguably is true of music – marking a social space and time to invite or repel.
Rather than limiting bird calls to functionalist categories of explanation, we ask whether seabirds can communicate and exchange information about environmental changes using a malleable vocabulary, comprised of unique acoustic units arranged and re-arranged sequentially for greater communicative depth. Granting a high level of agency and creativity to birds as opposed to believing a bird only avails itself of stereotyped ‘speech’ to survive an accident-rich environment, places greater importance on responses that are improvised directly upon environmental stimuli as irritant rather than as a signal.
Matthew explores bird calls via musique concrète, sampling recordings of seabirds to abstract the musical values of bird song conventions – a human response to the ‘other’ in jointly formed compositions, reflecting a living evolving relationship between composer and bird.
In further developing our research into a multimedia artwork, I shall extend a technique used for electroacoustic composition (granular synthesis) to video portraits of composer/performer and bird. In applying granular synthesis techniques to video, tiny units of image and sampled sound are reassembled within the frames. Through the mixing of existing synthesised sequences, performer/composer and bird become active participants in the making and remaking of a shared environment, articulating the limits of space/territory to find new ways to be heard within it
Using data science techniques to create and maintain a globally diversified ETF-based investment portfolio
Full text linkInvesting has been recognised as one way to generate wealth. Investors are particularly interested in chasing short-term top performance while they, in fact, should be concerned with selecting proper financial assets of different asset classes and allocate them to optimize long-term returns. This article explores the use of data science tools and techniques for creating and maintaining (via rebalancing) an investment portfolio that is statistically capable to provide the expect returns while being consistent to the investor profile.
In the article, we quantitatively analysed some of the exchange traded funds (ETFs) from the New Zealand Exchange (NZX) aiming of determining their historical performance and how it can predict future returns. After, we created a portfolio with the selected ETFs as well as an investing approach that would meet the expected performance while maintaining the risks relatively low. Back testing, machine learning, simulation and other data sciences techniques were used to analyse historical and forecasted performance of the portfolio and the potential outcomes of the associate investing strategy
The development of personal growth, self-awareness & graduate attributes in engineering & design factory students – Part 1
Full text linkCONTEXT
Engineering, like many workforces, is adapting to the technological advances the world is experiencing which is creating new engineering roles as well as requiring more links between roles. This, therefore, is putting pressure on undergraduate students to enter a workforce that is constantly evolving and to quickly feel comfortable to contribute meaningfully. Currently, engineering education tends to focus heavily on technical teaching and practical experiments with little emphasis on work-ready skills. The use of student-centered teaching & learning pedagogies is essential engineering disciplines though are still assessed heavily on outcomes rather than process; with repetition of a skill seen as growth. This paper is an investigation into how a Level 7 engineering project and Design Factory Module can develop and enhance student’s growth which in turn, can create students who can assimilate faster into the workforce.
PURPOSE
The purpose of this study is to understand the engineering educational approach to prepare students for industry and to record the progression of student’s personal growth, self-awareness, and graduate attributes, which are measured against our observations.
APPROACH OR METHODOLOGY/METHODS
The Engineering project and Design Factory courses have industry connections and are believed to create the most change in personal growth of students. This study involves ongoing collection of student data from semi-structured interviews at the beginning, middle and end of year. The interviews collect data about the learners’ profile, learners’ progress, and employability skills self-assessment to analyse their competency throughout the course. As well as this, part of the Design Factory course assessment includes a personal development plan which measures the soft skill development of the students during their study.
ACTUAL OUTCOMES
Early indications show students want involvement in industry projects, participate in hands on exercises and practical learnings to gain work-ready skills. Students tend to rate themselves highly on their employability skills, until placed in a situation that is new to them. As more data is received (over a long term study) this study will help identify graduate attribute areas which require development and aid in identifying activities that work the best for student growth.
CONCLUSIONS
Reid and Ferguson state, “To develop and enhance student’s growth, it is necessary to praise a student’s professional learning – not just a student’s intelligence”. This study is a first step to building on this statement, by creating an understanding of engineering students needs in relation to future engineering employability
“Forced” family separation and intergenerational dynamics: Multi-generational new Chinese immigrant families in New Zealand
Full text linkIn New Zealand (NZ), due to the immigration policy change against family reunifications, many ‘forced’ transnational immigrant families emerged between NZ and other immigration sending countries. Closely tied family members across generations now have limited choice but to live across different national, cultural, and linguistic localities. By taking the new Chinese immigrant families from the People’s Republic of China (PRC) as the case in point, and based on 45 in-depth interviews with their multi-generational family members, this paper examines how immigrant families adapt to the NZ immigration regime which does not easily accommodate their cultural preference to live as multi-generational families. It also demonstrates the importance of family reunification for immigrant families in NZ, and the changing inter-generational power relations caused by the evolving process of migration and settlement of these families