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Of protest, the commons, and customary public rights: an ancient tale of the lawful forest
No full textThis article explores an ancient tale of customary public rights that starts and ends with the landmark decision of Brown v Tasmania. In Brown, Australia’s highest court recognised a public right to protest in forests. Harking back 800 years to the limits of legal memory, and the Forest Charter of 1217, this right is viewed through the metaphor of the lawful forest, a relational notion of property at the margins of legal orthodoxy. Inherent to this tale is the tension that pits private enclosure against the commons, a contest that endures across time and place – from 13th century struggles against the Norman legal forest, through to modern claims of rights to the city
A robust control approach for high-speed nanopositioning applications
No full textIn this paper, a robust controller for the positioning of a piezoelectric tube scanner (PTS) used in an atomic force microscope (AFM) is proposed. A minimax linear quadratic Gaussian (LQG) controller is designed based on an uncertain system model which is constructed by measuring modeling error between the measured and model frequency response. This controller is robust against uncertainties introduced as a result of spillover dynamics of the scanner at frequencies higher than the first resonance frequency (900 Hz) of the scanner and the variation of plant transfer function due to temperature, humidity, and duration of operation. The proposed controller is applied to the PTS in the AFM used in the experiments to evaluate the performance of the proposed method. It is observed that the proposed scheme provides up to 12 dB closed-loop damping of the resonant mode to track the reference triangular signal. The robust performance of the proposed controller has been investigated for 0–1.96 g sample mass variation. A high positioning accuracy up to 125 Hz frequency is achieved by reducing scanner\u27s vibration and tracking error. Higher-quality imaging up to 125 Hz scanning frequency is achieved compared to the existing PI controller and some other existing methods. This control technique may be applied to control vibration for the systems with changing frequency response due to uncertainties, such as vibration control of disc-drive system
A comparative study of different texture features for document image retrieval
No full textDue to the rapid increase of different digitised documents, there has been significant attention dedicated to document image retrieval over the past two decades. Finding discriminative and effective features is a fundamental task for providing a fast and more accurate retrieval system. Texture features are generally fast to compute and are suitable for large volume data. Thus, in this study, the effectiveness of texture features widely used in the literature of content-based image retrieval is investigated on document images. Twenty-six different texture feature extraction methods from four main categories of texture features, statistical, transform, model, and structural-based approaches, are considered in this research work to compare their performance on the problem of document image retrieval. Three document image datasets, MTDB, ITESOFT, and CLEF_IP with various content and page layouts are used to evaluate the twenty-six texture-based features on document image retrieval systems. The retrieval results are computed in terms of precision, recall and F-score, and a comparative analysis of the results is also provided. Feature dimensions and time complexity of the texture-based feature methods are further compared. Finally, some conclusions are drawn and suggestions are made about future research directions
‘Support and Love and All That Stuff’: evidence of impact in the treatment and care for kids program
No full textCorrelation between fatty acid profile and anti-inflammatory activity in common Australian seafood by-products
No full textMarine organisms are a rich source of biologically active lipids with anti-inflammatory activities. These lipids may be enriched in visceral organs that are waste products from common seafood. Gas chromatography-mass spectrometry and fatty acid methyl ester (FAME) analyses were performed to compare the fatty acid compositions of lipid extracts from some common seafood organisms, including octopus (Octopus tetricus), squid (Sepioteuthis australis), Australian sardine (Sardinops sagax), salmon (Salmo salar) and school prawns (Penaeus plebejus). The lipid extracts were tested for anti-inflammatory activity by assessing their inhibition of nitric oxide (NO) and tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNFα) production in lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-stimulated RAW 264.7 mouse cells. The lipid extract from both the flesh and waste tissue all contained high amounts of polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) and significantly inhibited NO and TNFα production. Lipid extracts from the cephalopod mollusks S. australis and O. tetricus demonstrated the highest total PUFA content, the highest level of omega 3 (ω-3) PUFAs, and the highest anti-inflammatory activity. However, multivariate analysis indicates the complex mixture of saturated, monounsaturated, and polyunsaturated fatty acids may all influence the anti-inflammatory activity of marine lipid extracts. This study confirms that discarded parts of commonly consumed seafood species provide promising sources for the development of new potential anti-inflammatory nutraceuticals
Deconstructing embedded meaning within cyclists’ Instagram discourse: #fromwhereiride
No full textSocial media is now a central communication centre within social worlds bound by particular leisure interests. In the digital age, leisure participants are able to generate and share bespoke, archival content and thus project nuanced messages regarding leisure experiences to their social networks. Adopting an interpretive approach to analyzing multimodal components of cyclists’ Instagram posts tagged with the popular hashtag #fromwhereiride, this study sought to explore meaning embedded within cyclists’ social media discourse. Five overarching themes emerged which suggested through social media, cyclists seek to project nuanced constructions of the self through a range of cultural, embodied, and mobility-related practices. Our analysis shows that social media is a platform through which leisure serves as a late-modern backdrop for social class and gender power struggles. This research contributes original insights regarding the role of social media discourse in leisure whilst providing a foundation for future research
Storymaking belonging
No full textSometimes data invites more of us. To be physically held and touched, through hands creating and crafting with matter, cultivating a closer connection to the fibres, threads, textures and sinews of data. Through touching and shaping the materiality of data, other beings, places and times are aroused. Here, we share the story of data that invited more of us and how this has spurred the creation of an exhibition titled Stories of Belonging with Indigenous and non-Indigenous artist/scholars for an arts festival in Queensland, Australia. This work by the collective, SISTAS Holding Space, deeply interrogates our ontological positionality as researchers, in particular what this means in the Australian context – a colonised nation populated through waves of migration. The scars of colonization, migration and shame are held and heard through Black and White Australian women creating and interrogating belonging alongside each other – listening and holding space for each other. We air the pains of ontological destruction, silencing, disconnection and emptiness. Through experimental making research methodology, we argue the primacy of storying and making, and for provoking resonant and entangled understandings of belonging and displacement
Trade and growth in SACU countries: A panel data analysis
No full textRecent research from the IMF and the World Bank suggests that restrictive trade policies could lead to poor economic growth in many developing countries. This paper exploits over 30 years of panel data from five Southern African Customs Union (SACU) countries – Botswana, Lesotho, Namibia, South Africa, and Swaziland – to investigate the possible link between trade liberalization and economic growth. The paper contributes to the literature by introducing multiple indicators of liberalization to estimate the possible relationships between trade openness and economic growth. In particular, we use four different trade liberalization indicators: (i) tariffs, (ii) real effective exchange rates (REER), (iii) trade ratios, and (iv) adjusted trade ratios. The results from our fixed-effect regression models indicate that there is little, if any, compelling evidence that trade liberalization has had a positive impact on the economic growth on SACU countries over the last 30 years
Understanding the photochemistry of coastal hypoxic blackwater
No full textDeoxygenation is the major process behind generation of hypoxia and so-called blackwater in coastal waterways. This thesis investigated the potential for photochemical deoxygenation in the Richmond River system, northern NSW, through laboratory studies involving simulated solar irradiation of solutions containing standard dissolved humic substances and a field study on natural hypoxic blackwaters formed in the Richmond River system after a flood in 2017. Dissolved oxygen, optical properties, redox state of organic matter, pH and iron concentration were identified as key parameters. The results suggest photochemistry may significantly contribute to deoxygenation potential in shallow waters with high concentrations of organic matter