85000 research outputs found
Sort by
Synthesis and Characterization of Thiol‐Ene Networks Derived from Levoglucosenone
No full textLevoglucosenone (LGO), a renewable compound obtained from cellulose biomass, has been utilized to prepare novel monomers bearing alkene functional groups. These monomer derivatives of LGO were subsequently cured via ultraviolet (UV)‐initiated radical thiol‐ene “click” chemistry with commercially available multifunctional thiols to obtain colourless, optically transparent cross‐linked thermosets. The monomers prepared in this work are unique due to utilising the internal double bond of the LGO ring during polymerization as part of the cross‐linked network. The thermal and mechanical properties along with the degradation of thermosets containing both ether and ester linkages within the LGO monomers were studied. These thermosets had tensile strengths of 1.3–3.3 MPa, glass transition temperatures between 23.2 and 27.2 °C, and good thermal stability of up to 300 °C.</p
DREAMING BIG: DEEP LISTENING IN DESIGN STUDIOS
No full textAn ever-increasing feature of architecture school design studio programs in Australia is to set project briefs grounded in real-world problem scenarios of Indigenous peoples. Mediated by the studio coordinator, students participate in project-based learning related to specific situational and contextual elements derived from the community setting. Little has been explored in how deep listening methods are employed within the context of design studio teaching in relation to visualising, valuing and informing the aspirational dreams of Indigenous communities. Employing critical reflective methods, this paper will explore relational approaches to project-based problem learning which employ ‘deep listening’ methods to meet, capture and elaborate three dreams of Indigenous communities, senior Elders, leaders and knowledge holders, explored within three Indigenous-led design studios by three built environment academics. Many Indigenous communities express aspirational dreams as part of their Story; these are often ‘big’ and ambitious and have remained unrealised due to a lack of resources, land title and/tenure and the ability to navigate regulatory or governmental barriers. The paper will focus not on how deep listening techniques are taught to students, but rather how the authors as design studio leaders engage in deep listening methods that are particular to
each studio context.</p
Triazine Based Materials: Design Strategy and Applications
No full textAbstract: This thesis presents the design of both hydrogen-bonded organic and
covalent systems from triazine-based monomers. The improved stability afforded by
charge-assisted hydrogen bonding between melaminium and dicarboxylate moieties in
the designed systems were beneficial in utilizing these systems as heterogeneous
bifunctional organocatalysts for antagonistic acid-base reactions exemplified from
cascade deacetalization-Knoevenagel condensation. The charge-assisted hydrogen
bonded systems were revealed as competent electrocatalysts for water splitting, with
low overpotential and high Faradaic efficiency. The introduction of the chirality in the
ionic hydrogen bonded system based on melamine, tartaric acid resulted in the
improvement of their overall electrocatalytic performance for OER, and HER owing to
the chirality induced spin selectivity (CISS) effect. The serendipitous discovery of the
planar polymorphic form of melamine (Form-II) with a greater extent of hydrogen
bonding was disclosed in presence of L-Glutamic acid as a structure-directing agent.
The planarity in melamine Form-II resulted in a lower hardness and elastic modulus,
while it proved to be a better adsorbent for dyes owing to an extensive hydrogen bonded
network. The last chapter discusses the template-free synthesis of a triazine-porphyrin
polymer, which has been used for the electrocatalytic reduction of dinitrogen to
ammonia</p
Wild Country
No full textBackground: This project utilised performative fieldwork, narrative non-fiction writing, participatory arts practice and State Library archival images to research the tension between visual and settler-community representation of the Ovens River and its watershed and settler-colonial histories of ecological devastation coursed by alluvial mining, sluicing and dredging, agricultural runoff, introduced species and climate change. It is believed that the water flowing through the Ovens River is the same water that has always been on Earth, arriving four and a half billion years ago as the solar system formed. Therefore, the water of the Ovens has moved through the capillaries of plants, nurtured new life in wombs, leisurely advanced through underground aquifers and lapped against tall ships, canoes and bulk carriers. In its molecular architecture, water records pasts we may not be able to see or that have been actively erased through settler-Australian visual culture. Therefore, this project utilised creative practice to think with the river, creating a critical discourse about the River’s hidden past and possible futures. Contribution: The history and ecological history of the Ovens River appears across many different texts. This research brought these distributed histories and research together for the first time in conversation with contributions from the local community, including Traditional Custodians, to paint a dynamic and detailed portrait of the river. Significance: This project was reviewed by the local press and included on the Print Council of Australia’s Imprint Blog. It was peer-reviewed and included in Project Anywhere: Art at the Outmost Limits of Location Specificity Global Exhibition Program in 2022. It was exhibited at Wangaratta Regional Gallery in 2024 and The Dock Gallery in the Docklands in 2025. The 2024 exhibition at Wangaratta Gallery included public programming, including a Seniors Week event and a public talk attended by the community and Dr Helen Haines MP.</p
An Intelligent Framework For Distributed Satellite Operations Advancing Autonomy for Space Traffic Management
No full textThe increasing complexity of space operations, driven by the proliferation of satellites and growing risks of orbital congestion, necessitates advancements in Distributed Satellite Systems (DSS) and Space Traffic Management (STM). This thesis presents a comprehensive framework that integrates next generation autonomy methods using distributed coordination and supervisory control to ensure mission assurance, resilience, and adaptability in DSS Space-Based Space Surveillance (SBSS) missions in support of STM.Key Contributions:Holistic Framework for Intelligent DSS in STM:This research develops a unified framework for DSS operations, emphasizing distributed mission planning, task coordination, and real-time adaptability. It highlights the critical architectural elements and autonomy features required to optimize satellite collaboration in surveillance and STM tasks.Distributed Mission Planning and Resource Optimization:The thesis introduces a distributed, multi-agent mission planning strategy leveraging advanced optimization techniques to coordinate observation tasks effectively across satellite networks. These strategies, maximize global utility, and adapt dynamically to changing operational requirements.Real-Time Adaptive Trajectory and Attitude Optimization:A robust onboard optimization framework is designed to manage satellite manoeuvres and resource constraints. The algorithms enable satellites to autonomously adapt to evolving mission scenarios, ensuring timely and efficient execution of SBSS operations and collision avoidance.Supervisory Control and Mission Assurance:The research proposes an integrated approach of providing supervisory control mechanisms based on dynamic system reliability assessment. This ensures robust oversight of autonomous DSS operations through intelligent plan selection enhancing mission resilience under uncertainty and operational disruptions.Uncertainty Management and Probabilistic Modelling:The thesis addresses the challenges of uncertainty in RSO tracking and collision prediction by developing unified methods for quantifying and resident space object uncertainties to support collision avoidance activitiesImpact and Applications:The proposed frameworks and methodologies significantly enhance DSS capabilities in autonomous decision-making, distributed task coordination, and uncertainty management. These contributions support critical STM goals, including collision avoidance, resource optimization, and mission resilience. The research has broad applications in managing the increasing demands of DSS operations, ensuring safe and sustainable use of space for future generations</p
Surface Levels
No full textResearch Background Anthropologist Anna Tsing considers telling stories of “promise and ruin” which end in decay as abandoning hope in a time of climate crisis, where to maintain hope she calls for attention to be drawn to “what’s left” in “damaged landscape[s]” (2015, 18). This debate is reflected in documentary media scholarship as Alexandra Juhasz and Alisa Lebow (2018) argue in their Beyond Story manifesto that documentary needs forms beyond story to engage with destabilising forces such as climate. My research asks how can attending to what remains elicit hope in a time of climate crisis? Research Contribution Surface Levels is a five-minute experimental documentary smartphone film shot at Menindee Lakes; a region marked by cycles of drought and flood, culminating in mass fish deaths linked to climate change (Murray Darling Basin Authority 2023). The film juxtaposes fast-paced close-ups of unnoticed details with locked-off long shots of the landscape’s broader beauty. Utilising the smartphone’s intimate and mobile affordances, the film crafts an ecocinema experience that “models patience and mindfulness–qualities crucial for…an ongoing commitment to the natural environment” (MacDonald, 2013, p. 19). Surface Levels evolves as an ecocinema smartphone film which, through its appreciation of, elicits hope for the environment in the face of climate crisis. Research Significance Surface Levels was commissioned by Australian Environments on Screen in partnership with the Mobile Innovation Network Association (MINA). Was screened at ACMI as part of the MINA XII film festival in 2023 and will be screened at the Australian Screen Production Education Research Association (ASPERA) conference in November, 2024.</p
Mental Fatigue in Tennis: Coaching Practices, Training Tools, and Future Application
No full textThis thesis considers mental load and fatigue in applied settings, specifically elite Australian tennis. The aim was to gain an understanding of existing mental fatigue practises and to consider how tennis players can train to better withstand mental fatigue. Tennis as an individual sport requires an important focus of mental resilience and elite decision making across hours, weeks and often repeated efforts across months. Therefore, an athlete experiencing mental fatigue can have dire consequences in their emotional and cognitive processing but also their physical performance outcomes. Another uncontrollable hurdle tennis players experience is the year-long tournament schedule to gain ranking points in order to increase their world ranking. Therefore, a balancing act between training and world-wide travel is required of athletes and support staff, making adaptable training practises essential to success. Advances in sports technology allows for improved training practises and access to specialised sport science programs typically restricted to laboratories or national tennis academies. In this thesis, the current training practises and perceptions of mental load and fatigue on performance was investigated from the perspective of Australia’s elite tennis coaches. Subsequently, a potential training tool is considered in virtual reality tennis. Coaches were first interviewed on their opinions of virtual reality tennis. Secondly, a simulated match environment including brain endurance training (BET) was applied to junior tennis players. Elite coaches again, were interviewed to understand their experience and opinions of virtual reality tennis, with findings consistently showcasing that coaches did not believe the technology suited the requirements needed to be useful in elite tennis. Finally, based on the insights gained from coaches of what is required of technological equipment in tennis, an iphone application designed for brain endurance training in sport was used in an intervention study to assess the effects of simulated mental fatigue on tennis match performance in elite junior tennis players. Using simulated tennis matches as the testing environment, physical performance changes were assessed using a 3D-tracking system, subjective performance was assessed using questionnaires and mental performance changes were assessed using the BET software. Analysis was conducted using linear mixed models to examine physical performance and Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) followed by analysis of simple main effects to explore the subjective responses. Participants reported mental fatigue and a subjective decrease in physical performance during the mental fatiguing session compared to control. However, significant decrements in physical performance were shown only in ball spin, rally-ball landing location and serve in:out ratio. The findings of this thesis support the advancement of mental load and fatigue research and application in tennis. Players and coaches understand its importance and have a desire to improve training practises. Brain endurance training was shown to be an appropriate tool to simulate mental fatigue in tennis and affect match performance characteristics. This thesis also demonstrated that athletes, even at the junior level, can appropriately recognise sensations of mental fatigue and should therefore train to build resilience to the sensations. Future studies should focus on creating a protocol that allows for customisation in BET intensity to ensure all athletes are appropriately mentally fatigued before commencing sport-specific performance assessment. Coaches and sport scientists working with tennis players should look to incorporate BET sessions into their existing sessions as a way to test the mental capacities of their athletes as well as providing a new tool to build an athletes resilience to mental load and mental fatigue.</p
Liquid Metal Catalysts for Electrochemical Reduction of Carbon Dioxide
No full textRapidly deteriorating environment due to climate change has urged the development of technologies that can effectively address the factors affecting the climate. One such technology is the electrochemical reduction of carbon dioxide utilizing different catalysts.
One of the most important setbacks for the conventional solid catalysts is the blocking of their active sites (where reactions take place) as the process proceeds, known widely as coking. This phenomenon decreases the prospects of catalyst utilization in the long term as the reaction efficiency declines with time. The expensive catalysts either need to be replaced or regenerated at regular intervals through energy intensive processes. Thus, there is a constant demand to develop novel catalysts for electrochemical carbon dioxide reduction process.
Liquid metal catalysts have recently been explored as a new class of catalysts because of their high melting points, high thermal and electrical conductivity, and versatility to alloy with different metal additives. This thesis deals with the use liquid metals to synthesize liquid metal alloy catalysts to be utilized for carbon dioxide reduction through electrochemical processes. The additives used to synthesize liquid metal alloys were selected based on their ability to carry forward multi-electron reactions and solubility in the liquid metal mixture (EGaIn). Out of the five different additives, 3% vanadium in EGaIn (V-EGaIn) showed the best reducing performance in a simple electrochemical cell with dimethyl formamide electrolyte, based on current density that was double to the one reported in the past. Also, different electrolytes have been studied to reveal their effects on the controllability of products
The last portion of the research consists of the formation of liquid metal droplets from the V-EGaIn and their immobilization of conductive surfaces to make electrodes for the reduction of carbon dioxide. The electrochemical activity increased due to the increased surface area of the catalyst thus providing more active sites for the electrochemical reaction to take place.</p
Applying Human-Centred Design Tools in Social Work Research: A Desire-Centred Approach
No full textThis article describes an exploration of the application of human-centred design (HCD) tools in social work research. Drawing on Tuck’s [2009. Suspending damage: A letter to communities. Harvard Educational Review,79(3), 409–428] definition of “desire-centered” research (DCR), we describe the development of a set of HCD research tools based on DCR principles in a community support setting, focused on participants with experience of marginalisation and vulnerability. We present the design tools including “Show and Tell”, a “Card Sort”, a mapping tool called “The Circle of Support”, Aspiration Trees and a Generative Toolkit activity using, and demonstrate how the application of these design tools enabled participant-led recommendations regarding their support experiences and needs to be foregrounded in research. We conclude that desire-centred research and human-centred design tools may provide beneficial methodological pathways to account for the complexity of human experience of individuals experiencing marginalisation and vulnerability.</p
Ecological Urban Networks. “More-than-Human” Urban Rehabilitation
No full textThis article delves into the innovative convergence of landscape, urban design, and architecture to rejuvenate cities amid biodiversity and climate crises. It highlights two academic projects arising from collaborative studios and practice-based research, demonstrating how urban renewal can embrace more-than-human perspectives and foster human connection with the living world. These blueprints reimagine underutilised spaces, creating cooling blue-green networks that weave through metropolitan landscapes, seamlessly integrating ecosystems within the city. By blending urban and natural realms, these projects encourage the spontaneous co-evolution of ecosystems and cities, integrating native species into urban environments while responding to unique site conditions and topography. They propose an inventive alternative to traditional climate- and water-sensitive designs that often rely on a narrow palette of plant species and an utilitarian view of nature.
The featured urban design-research projects strategise ecosystems at the metropolitan scale and tailor designs to specific precincts, with practice research prototyping their real-world viability. Together, these studies offer a multi-layered approach, viewing ecosystems as intricate networks involving plants, animals, humans, and urban contexts. By challenging conventional ideas of controlling and separating urban and natural systems, this comprehensive approach envisions transforming and revegetating urban areas in ways that reveal the full dynamism of spontaneous ecosystems: changing along the seasons, adapting to surrounding conditions and enriching over time, while providing habitats for other living beings. Providing experiences and opportunity for discovery, renewed urban spaces improve liveability and environmental health for both humans and non-human life across the urban tapestry, all the while improving climate resilience and biodiversity.</p