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The New Service Offence of Cyberbullying: Defining the Scope of Section 48A of the Defence Force Discipline Act 1982 (Cth)
No full textThe University of Western Australia Law Review supports a policy of open access to legal scholarship.Two years have passed since the new service offence of ‘cyberbullying’ was enacted. Interestingly, not a single case has been tried by a superior military tribunal. In the absence of precedent, this article provides detailed commentary on the characteristics of s 48A of the Defence Force Discipline Act 1982 (Cth) and offers guidance on existing uncertainties surrounding its application. The analysis presented may aid the development of internal Australian Defence Force (‘ADF’) policy in this area of military discipline law to ensure ADF members, those authorised to lay charges, and those who will hear cyberbullying matters in the future are confident in the application of the new offence in promoting good order and discipline within the Defence Force.Colette Lango
Unraveling the electrolyte-free interface in membrane CO2 electrolysers
No full textFirst published 07 Jul 2025Zero-gap membrane electrode assembly electrolysers represent the benchmark architecture for scalable CO2 electrolysis and beyond. However, their device-level performance, particularly regarding energy efficiency and long-term stability, remains inadequate for practical deployment. Here, we argue that a key constraint of membrane electrolysers lies in the absence of catholytes, which creates a local reaction environment fundamentally distinct from that of aqueous H-type or flow cell systems, thereby reshaping electrocatalytic behaviour at the device level. We highlight the profound impacts of this catholyte-free interface, including altered proton availability, carbonate issues, mass transport limitations, product crossover, and re-oxidation—each representing a forefront challenge for CO2 electrolysis. By examining these emerging interfacial phenomena, we propose key strategies for advancing membrane CO2 electrolysers, including membrane-anolyte integration, ionomer engineering, and in situ device diagnostics. Collectively, these insights aim to bridge the interfacial gap between traditional half-cell studies (catalyst–electrolyte interfaces) and modern full-cell devices (catalyst–membrane interfaces).Wenhao Ren, Yao Zheng and Shi-Zhang Qia
Experiences of Loneliness Among Gay Men: A Systematic Review and Meta-Synthesis
No full textOnlinePublLoneliness is a significant social and public health issue, particularly among gay men who often face unique challenges shaped by their social identities and minority status. These challenges often exacerbate feelings of isolation and exclusion, yet the specific ways in which gay men experience loneliness remain underexplored. This study aimed to offer insights for health professionals and policymakers via a systematic review and meta-synthesis. A comprehensive literature search was conducted in May 2024 across five major databases and gray literature to identify appropriate qualitative studies (i.e. if they focused on the experiences of loneliness among gay men, were qualitatively designed, and included participants over the age of 18). 72 studies, encompassing approximately 1335 participants were analyzed. Guided by Intersectionality Theory and the Minority Stress Model, data analysis generated three categories that impacted gay men’s experiences of loneliness. (1) external influences of discrimination (lack of support systems, cultural standards, geographic location), (2) internal conflicts (internalized homophobia, concealment, fear of rejection), and (3) coping mechanisms (sex, substance use, social life and connections, embracing solitude). The findings highlight the complex interplay between external pressures and internal struggles, as well as how intersecting identities shape the diverse experience of loneliness among gay men.Eric W. Brumfield and Sophie C. Dahlenbur
Indirect evidence of sex-selective abortion practices to the imbalanced sex ratio at birth in Australian migrant populations
No full textA skewed sex ratio at birth (SRB), commonly observed in countries with high son preference can be attributed to prenatal sex-selective abortion. However, the possibility of sex selection among migrants in high-income countries has received little attention. Our study aims to identify the indirect evidence of sex-selective abortion practices to the SRB imbalance in a large Australian cohort. Our study aims to identify the indirect evidence of sex-selective abortion practices to the SRB imbalance in a large Australian cohort. In this population-based study, perinatal data were obtained from all registered births in Western Australia (WA) and New South Wales (NSW) for the period 1994 – 2015 (N = 2,175,252 births). We estimated the male-tofemale sex ratio at birth (SRB) and 95% CI by mothers’ country of birth stratified by sex of previous child and parity. The SRB exceeded expectations for children born to Indian, Chinese and Vietnamese mothers. For mothers from China, the SRB was 1.09 at second birth, slightly varying by sex of previous child (1.07 for male, 1.11 for a female) and markedly higher (1.34) at the third birth when the first two were female. A similar pattern was observed for Indian-born mothers. Indian and Chinese mothers had much higher induced abortion rates in early pregnancy than their Australian counterparts, which coincided with the introduction of non-invasive prenatal testing. Our study provides observational evidence that linked the male-biased SRB with prenatal sex determination followed by selective female-biased abortion practices. The findings of this study can inform public health policy decisions to address imbalanced SRB and sex-selective practices among migrants in high-income countries.Amanuel Tesfay Gebremedhin, Gizachew A. Tessema, Ravisha Srinivasjois, Judith A. Daire, Kevin A. Chai, Bereket Duko, Kalayu Brhane Mruts, Gavin Pereir
Enhancing Infrastructure for Disaster Resilience: Insights from Microlevel Assessments in Australia
No full textClimate change is intensifying natural disasters, making regional disaster resilience increasingly vital. This study utilizes the disaster resilience of place (DROP) model to examine disaster resilience across numerous statistical areas in Australia, focusing on microlevel evaluations often overlooked in large-scale studies. By analyzing Australian exposure information infrastructure data, this study’s findings reveal stark regional disparities in disaster resilience. The most vulnerable regions exhibit limited resilience due to inadequate infrastructure, while areas with the largest populations demonstrate effective resilience capabilities. Exceptional resilience is found in urban centers with diverse economies and advanced infrastructure, despite covering minimal land. These results underscore the urgent need for targeted interventions to bolster disaster preparedness in vulnerable regions and aid strategic planning to effectively enhance regional resilience.Xin Li, Ruidong Chang, Navodana Rodrigo, Jian Zuo, and Meng She
Nanoconfinement in ordered mesopores materials for catalytic wastewater purification
No full textCatalytic advanced oxidation processes (AOPs) have been challenged by low utilization efficiency of the reactive oxygen species, non-selective oxidation, hindered mass transfer, and reduced stability and activity of catalysts. Catalysis under nanoconfinement shows distinctive physicochemical properties and phase behavior that address the technical bottlenecks of AOPs; however, the confinement efficiency is highly dependent on substrate pore size. In this regard, ordered mesoporous materials (OMMs), functioning as nanoreactors, are particularly promising for providing uniformly nanoconfined channels and microenvironments, effectively boosting catalytic oxidation performance during wastewater purification. In this critical review, we first systematically elucidate the fundamentals of nanoconfinement in AOPs, focusing on its effects on chemical reactivity of reactants and intermediates, the stability and activity of catalysts, and the spatial nanoconfinement among different dimensional structures. Subsequently, the synthesis of OMMs with on-demand porous structure to facilitate nanoconfined reactions are reviewed. Afterwards, we discuss the applications of nanoconfined OMMs in catalytic wastewater purification from three aspects: redox agent-driven AOPs, electricity-driven AOPs, and light-driven AOPs. In conclusion, we summarize the fundamentals and application challenges of OMMs and their nanoconfined features in AOPs for wastewater purification, proposing strategies to drive advancements in this field.Yuwei Li, Minbo Zhao, Wanli Ma, Tianyi Ma, Shaobin Wang, Xiaoguang Dua
An immunocompetent rat model of Mycobacterium abscessus multinodular granulomatous lung infection
No full textAnimal models that can mimic progressive granulomatous pulmonary disease (PD) due to non-tuberculous mycobacteria (NTM) have not been established in rats to date. These models could assist with the study of the pathophysiology of NTM-PD as well as the preclinical development of new therapies. In the present study, an immunocompetent rat model of progressive Mycobacterium abscessus (MABs)- PD was developed using MABs originating from a patient with cystic fibrosis. MABs was embedded in agarose beads and delivered intratracheally to the lungs of Sprague Dawley rats two times at a one-week time interval. The bacterial burden of lysed lungs, spleen and liver was assessed by calculating colony forming units (CFUs) on day 28. Lung CFUs indicated a ~1.2–2 log10 total CFU increase compared to the initial total bacterial load instilled into the lungs. In all infected rats, multinodular granulomatous inflammatory lesions containing MABs were found in the lung. These findings support the establishment of an immunocompetent MABs PD rat model, characterised by an increase in mycobacterial burden over time and a chronic granulomatous inflammatory response to the MABs infection.Sholeh Feizi, Clare M. Cooksley, Nicole Reyne, Bernadette Boog, John Finnie, Gohar Shaghayegh, Karen Hon, Mahnaz Ramezanpour, Alkis J. Psaltis, Peter-John Wormald, Patricia Cmielewski, Alexandra McCarron, Martin Donnelley, David Parsons, Sarah Vreugd
The Effects of Rainfall and Drought on Southern Hairy-nosed Wombat (Lasiorhinus latifrons) Ecology and Fitness
No full textClimate change is projected to increase the duration and severity of drought events across much of the Australian continent, potentially threatening many unique and endemic mammal species. However, due to limited data, how these species respond to dry times is largely unknown. We established a long-term 32-year dataset of over 2,600 capture records of the semi-arid southern hairy-nosed wombat (SHW; Lasiorhinus latifrons) to investigate the effects of rainfall and drought on this species across environmental extremes. To aid in further analysis, we first identified a method to separate sexually mature and immature wombats and described the basic morphology of juvenile, subadult, and adult age cohorts. In doing so, we found adult males to have significantly wider and longer heads, longer pes lengths, and girthier necks than adult females. We then determined that rainfall, vegetation greenness, and drought severity significantly affect the body condition of these cohorts and found body condition of subadult and adult wombats to follow a seasonal pattern matching resource abundance. We identified body condition, and by proxy rainfall and drought, to significantly affect the probability of adult females having pouch young in the breeding season. Adult body condition declined significantly, by 15 %, over 32 years, strongly influenced by long-term declines in rainfall and increasing drought frequency and severity since 2010. Declining body condition also drove a long-term decline (25 years) in the probability of females having pouch young. Breeding season duration shortened as breeding cessation occurred earlier over the study period, likely due to the long-term decline in rainfall, increasing drought severity, and declining body condition. We then conducted a pilot study investigating how soil type influences burrow use and microclimate, which is vital for energy and moisture conservation. We found warrens under sheet calcrete to be significantly larger than those in other soil types. Burrows under sheet calcrete tended to be deeper, resulting in a cooler and more stable burrow temperature, particularly in summer-autumn. This resulted in significantly higher wombat activity in calcrete burrows than other soil types during summer-autumn, but not in winter-spring when shallower burrows are beneficial for energy conservation. Wombat activity occurred earlier during a severe spring drought than in average conditions, likely to maintain body temperature as the ability to thermoregulate can be compromised by severe drought. Finally, we investigated temporal and spatial variation in the faecal microbiome of SHWs to assess its potential as a conservation tool in assisting wombats to adapt to a drying climate. Microbial composition varied significantly across the rainfall range of the SHW distribution (170 – 320 mm), and microbial composition and diversity varied seasonally at each site, likely driven by rainfall dependent changes in diet. The results of this thesis indicate that climate change poses a significant threat to SHWs, with our study population already experiencing detrimental effects. Future research on this species should focus on the effects of drought on pouch young and juvenile survival and recruitment, the compounding effects of drought and habitat degradation on wombat survival, and on mitigating the effects of drought.Thesis (Ph.D.) -- University of Adelaide, School of Biological Sciences : Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, 202
Optimizing image capture for low-light widefield quantitative fluorescence microscopy
No full textLow-light optical imaging refers to the use of cameras to capture images with minimal photon flux. This area has broad application to diverse fields, including optical microscopy for biological studies. In such studies, it is important to reduce the intensity of illumination to reduce adverse effects such as photobleaching and phototoxicity that may perturb the biological system under study. The challenge when minimizing illumination is to maintain image quality that reflects the underlying biology and can be used for quantitative measurements. An example is the optical redox ratio, which is computed from autofluorescence intensity to measure metabolism. In all such cases, it is critical for researchers to optimize the selection and application of scientific cameras to their microscopes, but few resources discuss performance in the low-light regime. In this tutorial, we address the challenges in optical fluorescence imaging at low-light levels for quantitative microscopy, with an emphasis on live biological samples. We analyze the performance of low-light scientific cameras including electron-multiplying charge-coupled device, scientific complementary metal oxide semiconductor (sCMOS), and the photon-counting sCMOS architecture, termed quantitative CMOS, while considering the differences in platform architecture and the contribution of various sources of noise. The tutorial covers a detailed discussion of user-controllable parameters, as well as the application of post-processing algorithms for denoising. We illustrate these concepts using autofluorescence images of live mammalian embryos captured with a two-photon light sheet fluorescence microscope.Zane Peterkovic, Avinash Upadhya, Christopher Perrella, Admir Bajraktarevic, Ramses E. Bautista Gonzalez, Megan Lim, Kylie R. Dunning, Kishan Dholaki
Age-related mesenchymal stromal cell senescence is associated with progression from MGUS to multiple myeloma.
No full textThe risk of progression of monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined significance (MGUS) to multiple myeloma (MM) increases with advancing age, suggesting that progression may be influenced by age-related changes within the bone marrow (BM) microenvironment. We hypothesise that senescent mesenchymal stromal cells (MSCs), which accumulate in the BM with age, may contribute to MGUS progression to MM. Here, we show that, like BM MSCs from aged non-cancer controls, BM MSCs from both MM and MGUS patients exhibit a senescent phenotype characterised by enlarged, flattened morphology, increased β-galactosidase activity and CDKN2A expression, and decreased proliferation rate compared with BM MSCs from healthy young individuals. While coculture with BM MSCs suppresses the proliferative capacity of MM cell lines in vitro, induction of senescence via irradiation or replicative exhaustion in healthy MSCs relieves this suppression, compared with non-senescent MSCs. This may, in part, be attributable to upregulated expression of the BMP antagonist Gremlin1 in senescent MSCs, which facillitates MM cell proliferation. Notably, the risk of progression to MM was significantly elevated in MGUS patients with increased MSC senescence. Collectively, our data provide evidence that age-related accumulation of senescent MSCs may be a driver of MGUS to MM progression.Natalya Plakhova, Vasilios Panagopoulos, Melissa D. Cantley, Laura J. Trainor, Duncan R. Hewett, Kimberley C. Clark, Jo Gardiner, Angelina Yong, Cindy Lee, Noemi Horvath, Peter I. Croucher, Dimitrios Cakouros, Sheila A. Stewart, Stan Gronthos, Andrew C. W. Zannettino, Krzysztof M. Mrozik, and Kate Vandyk