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Unfest ‘25, Cornea Cochlear Club Curated: Live-coding Party/Showcase
No full textResearch backgroundHaving done an earlier public experiment in integrating live coding and generation of video using LLMs on the RMIT Vietnam campus, the opening performance of the Beyond 1&0 exhibition for the 10th anniversary of the Digital Media program, the artists made significant refinements to that work and presented it at Unfest '25 in Bangkok. The festival focused on realtime technologies for media, and the festival chose local curators Cornea Cochlear Club to program an event on the closing day of the festival. Cornea Cochlear Club selected our performance for that event.Research contributionAs in the Beyond 1&0 Opening Performance, new systems are used for both the generation of music and graphics: the music was live coded in the latest version of Bell's system called Konduktiva, while the graphics were generated in realtime with an improved version of the Touch Designer patch used previously. The improvements made to both the live coding system and the visual system and their interaction provides a model which others may replicate for doing performances in a similar style or with a similar technical structure. Due to additional rehearsals in the intervening period, many aspects of the performance itself have been improved.Research significanceBy developing these interlocking systems further, the researchers have demonstrated the feasibility of using such a technological arrangement and have also pointed to some of the potentials which still exist to be explored. While the event was curated to include additional experiments with live coding and realtime visuals, to our knowledge there have not been performances by others in Southeast Asia that demonstrate the tight coupling of two such systems using the Open Sound Control protocol. The very high level of synchronization combined with improvisational performance technique has not yet been shown to live in-person audiences here previously.All material copyright Renick Bell and Giang Nguyen Hoang</p
Recent Trends in the Role of Digital Technologies in Fashion and Textile Manufacturing
No full textThe manufacturing of fashion and textiles is still labour intensive in many countries despite the advancements in technology. Unlike other sectors such as automotive and pharmaceutical, several operations in manufacturing of fashion and textiles follow manual methods of production. Availability of cheap labour, high investment cost for new technologies and low cost of the garments are some of the factors that hinder the use of technology in the manufacturing of fashion and textiles. There is a potential for various technologies to revolutionise the fashion and textile sector. This chapter has focused on various digital technologies and their potential applications/impacts in the fashion and textile manufacturing. A brief history of industrial revolution has been given in the beginning of the chapter. Subsequently, the use of various technologies is illustrated with major application areas. The benefits of using technologies are also highlighted. Further, the sustainable benefits of using the technologies are discussed in brief. The chapter has been prepared mainly from the secondary data and some primary data from the projects the authors have completed. This chapter will provide concise knowledge on the use of advanced technologies in the manufacturing of fashion and textiles.</p
Enhancing Service Recovery Performance Through Ethical Leadership: A Multilevel Curvilinear Investigation
No full textUnderstanding how to enhance service recovery performance is crucial for service-oriented organizations, as it contributes to resolving service failures and addressing customer complaints. This study aims to develop a multilevel curvilinear model that explores the relationship between ethical leadership and service recovery performance, as well as the mediating and moderating effects underlying this relationship. Results from both Study 1 (dyadic and two-waved data from hotels) and Study 2 (triadic data from IT service organizations) revealed that ethical leadership had a curvilinear (inverted U-shaped) effect on service recovery performance. There was a curvilinear mediating effect of ethical self-efficacy between ethical leadership and service recovery performance, such that ethical leadership enhanced ethical self-efficacy, and an intermediate degree of ethical self-efficacy predicted the highest degree of service recovery performance (Studies 1 and 2). Results from Study 1 showed that internal knowledge transfer moderated the curvilinear relationship between ethical leadership and service recovery performance. Both internal knowledge transfer and task interdependence moderate the curvilinear relationship between ethical self-efficacy and service recovery performance (Study 1). Results from Study 2 showed that both internal knowledge transfer and task interdependence moderate the curvilinear relationship between ethical leadership and service recovery performance.</p
The king's laws yield to village customs: An exploratory study of relational contracting in sustainable forestry
No full textVietnam's forestry sector faces unique governance challenges due to a landscape characterized by highly dispersed smallholder ownership, contrasting with concession-based models. As international markets increasingly demand sustainability certifications (e.g. FSC or PEFC), cost and complexity deter most smallholders, prompting wood processing firms to finance certification themselves. Such investments of processing firms can be at risk of opportunistic behaviour by smallholders who may side-sell at harvest. The risk can be compounded by weak legal enforcement. Drawing on transaction-cost economics and network theory, we employ a relational contracting lens to examine how such agreements persist. We analyse 15 key stakeholder interviews and six documents. We find evidence that contract stability rests less on legal stipulations and more on relational mechanisms: flexible contingent terms, co-investment in technical capacity, and embedded governance via local authorities and social networks. These informal institutions and networked enforcement substitute for formal mechanisms, enabling sustainable long-term contracting in emerging markets.</p
QQSUM: A Novel Task and Model of Quantitative Query-Focused Summarization for Review-based Product Question Answering
No full textReview-based Product Question Answering (PQA) allows e-commerce platforms to automatically address customer queries by leveraging insights from user reviews. However, existing PQA systems generate answers with only a single perspective, failing to capture the diversity of customer opinions. In this paper we introduce a novel task Quantitative Query-Focused Summarization (QQSUM), which aims to summarize diverse customer opinions into representative Key Points (KPs) and quantify their prevalence to effectively answer user queries. While Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) shows promise for PQA, its generated answers still fall short of capturing the full diversity of viewpoints. To tackle this challenge, our model QQSUM-RAG, which extends RAG, employs few-shot learning to jointly train a KP-oriented retriever and a KP summary generator, enabling KP-based summaries that capture diverse and representative opinions. Experimental results demonstrate that QQSUM-RAG achieves superior performance compared to state-of-the-art RAG baselines in both textual quality and quantification accuracy of opinions. Our source code is available at: https://github.com/antangrocket1312/QQSUMM.</p
Questionnaires for Translators in Public Health Communications
No full textThe COVID-19 pandemic, while tragic and disruptive, served as a valuable diagnostic tool for evaluating multilingual communications during public health crises, exposing critical gaps, particularly in relation to culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) communities. In Australia, the role of translation in public service communications attracted attention. RMIT conducted a research project that assessed the multilingual production and effectiveness of 4 translated government health communications on COVID-19 vaccination from both ‘upstream’ and ‘downstream’ perspectives. These categories of analysis are focused on the processes involved in translation, with the upstream perspective assessing the reception of translations and traces their production origins back to the translator, and the downstream perspective assessing the translations from the origins and their dissemination ‘downstream’ to the readership, including their reception and uptake of the intended actions contained in them. On the basis of this analysis, the dataset includes questionnaires completed by the translators involved in the production of the four methods and by the community checkers who assessed the final translated versions in Arabic, Greek, Spanish, Serbian, Vietnamese and Croatian.</p
Development and Validation of a Custom Stochastic Microscale Wind Model for Urban Air Mobility Applications
No full textUrban air mobility operations, such as flying Uncrewed Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) and small passenger aircraft in and around cities, will be inherently susceptible to the turbulent wind conditions in urban environments. Therefore, understanding UAM aircraft performance under microscale wind disturbances is critical. Gaining such insight is non-trivial due to the lack of sufficient UAM aircraft operational data and the complexities involved in flight testing UAM aircraft. A viable solution to overcome this hindrance is through simulation-based flight testing, data collection, and performance assessment. To support this effort, the present paper establishes a custom Stochastic microscale Wind Model (SWM) capable of efficiently generating high-resolution, spatio-temporally varying urban wind fields. The SWM is validated against wind tunnel test data, and subsequently, the findings are employed to guide targeted refinements of urban wake simulation. Furthermore, to incorporate realistic atmospheric conditions and demonstrate the ability to generate location-specific wind fields, the SWM is coupled with the mesoscale Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) model. This integrated approach is demonstrated through a case study focused on a potential vertiport site in Milan, Italy, illustrating its utility for assessing operational area-specific UAM aircraft performance and vertiport emplacement.</p
Reinforcement Learning based Online Estimation of the Inductances of the Permanent Magnet Synchronous Machines
No full textThis article proposes a novel method to estimate the d- and q-axis inductances of the permanent magnet synchronous machine (PMSM) based on reinforcement learning (RL) algorithms. The main challenges in online inductance estimation are the nonlinearity of the inverter and the complex dependence of machine inductances on the operating d- and q-axis currents. A feedforward neural network (FNN) was developed and trained to compensate for the nonlinearity of the inverter in the measured d- and q-axis voltages. The twin-delayed deep deterministic (TD3) policy gradient RL-based estimator was developed and trained to identify the machine inductances in real time using the compensated d- and q-axis voltages, the measured d- and q-axis currents, and the rotor speed, allowing high flexibility to adapt to variations in the system during operation by retraining with updated data. The proposed technique was experimentally validated and demonstrated high estimation accuracy under critical operating conditions, including full load variation, field weakening, and speed changes. The simulation and experimental results also showed that the proposed approach outperforms the conventional recursive least squares (RLS) and Adaline neural network (ANN) methods, achieving over 10% improvement in estimation accuracy and enhanced robustness against the inverter’s nonlinearity.</p
Global Stakeholder Perceptions of Circular Building Adaptability, Open Building Methodology and Mass Timber Construction: A Qualitative Study
No full textTo meet global carbon emissions reduction targets we need to adopt sustainable construction practices
and transition toward a Circular Economy (CE). The present paper proposes a combination of CEfocused technologies, Circular Building Adaptability (CBA), Open Building (OB) and Mass Timber
Construction (MTC) working in concert to support emissions reduction objectives. A total of 158
participants aged between 18 and 65+, from Europe (20%), North America/Canada (32%), South
America (3%), Africa/South Africa (3%), Middles East (3%), Asia Pacific (36%) and Southeast Asia
& Asia (45) provided open text-based reponses to survey items as part of a larger project. The sample
predominately consisted of those who identified as male (87%) and worked as Engineers primarily
from the Asia Pacific region and North America/Canada. The paper aimed to assess international
construction industry stakeholders’ perceptions of CBA, OB and MTC in delivering a more sustainable
construction solution for our built environments. Using a Braun and Clarke (2006) Thematic
Analaysis, applying a pragmatist lens, themes interpreted from the data coalesce toward the primary
objective of achieving carbon reduction and mitigating the negative environmental impacts of
construction activities in the built environment. Themes included, Cost, Economic Barriers, and
Market Dynamics Perceptions, Knowledge Gaps, and Education Sustainability, Carbon Reduction,
and Environmental Impact, Regulatory and Safety Concerns, Adaptability and the Circular Economy,
Open Building Approach and Social Implications. Evidence from the study indicates support for the
concepts with participants articulating concerns regarding the adoption of novel construction solutions.
The outcomes are discussed, and future research recommendations are offered.</p
Medicine affordability and access in India: lessons from generic–branded price variation under the Jan Aushadhi Scheme
No full textHigh out-of-pocket expenditure (OOPE) on medicines continues to be a major driver of health-related financial hardship in India. The Jan Aushadhi Scheme (JAS), launched by the Government of India, seeks to improve affordability and access to essential medicines through generic substitution. However, systematic evidence on its pricing dynamics, affordability, and equity implications remains limited. We conducted an observational analysis of 696 branded formulations for Eye and Ear, Nose, and Throat (ENT) conditions, comparing their prices with Jan Aushadhi generics listed in the Pharmaceuticals and Medical Devices Bureau of India (PMBI). Data were drawn from the Current Index of Medical Specialties (CIMS, 2021) and PMBI catalogs. Cost ratios and price variation percentages were calculated, alongside affordability assessment using the WHO/HAI one-day wage benchmark. Correlation and regression models assessed the relationship between brand proliferation and price dispersion. Supplementary analyses included chronic disease medicines (diabetes, hypertension, and insulin), distribution trends of Jan Aushadhi Kendras (2018–2022), and global benchmarking using WHO indicators. Branded formulations exhibited wide cost variation, with correlation analysis showing that greater brand numbers were associated with higher—not lower—price dispersion. While most JAS medicines met the WHO affordability threshold, chronic therapies such as glaucoma drugs remained financially burdensome for low-income households. Supplementary analyses demonstrated that dosage form, packaging, and storage requirements contribute to persistent price gaps. Geographic analysis revealed strong growth in Kendras (3,200 in 2018 to 9,000 in 2022), but significant inequities persisted, with large states such as Uttar Pradesh and Bihar showing low per-capita availability. Global benchmarking highlighted India’s paradox: despite being a global leader in generic production, domestic uptake of generics remains far below comparator countries. The Jan Aushadhi Scheme has made measurable progress in improving medicine affordability, but inequities in access, persistent price variation, and limited uptake constrain its full potential. Strengthening regulatory oversight, improving geographic distribution, and addressing physician and patient perceptions of generics are essential to maximize policy impact. Future research should apply quasi-experimental methods and integrate patient perception data to better capture the affordability–access–adherence pathway.</p