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Operasi Cassava 5.0
No full textResearch Background
This research project builds upon the themes of digital existence, self-consciousness, and self-identity in the digital realm, intersecting the fields of interactive media, digital aesthetics, and artificial intelligence. It extends the inquiries of my 2008 solo exhibition When You Are Not Your Body (WYANYB), which explored disembodied digital existence, by engaging critically with artificial intelligence and its impact on self-identity. The project examines: How can AI-driven processes, particularly Generative Adversarial Networks (GANs), reshape our understanding of relational self-concepts as described by the assimilation-contrast model in social cognition (Bless & Schwarz, 2010).
Research Contribution
The project contributes to the field of media arts and digital humanities by integrating GANs to explore dynamic constructions of self-identity. Using a dataset of 2,000 photos collected during WYANYB, GANs are deployed to generate AI-driven portraits that visualize relational self-concepts through assimilation (integration) and contrast (differentiation). These portraits, presented as animated morphologies on E-ink displays, offer a novel method of exploring self-representation in the digital age. The work not only advances the creative application of AI in media arts but also deepens our theoretical understanding of identity formation mediated by technology.
Research Significance
Funded by CENDANA through its highly competitive evaluation process, the project aligns with its mission to nurture cultural vibrancy and sustainability through public art initiatives. By presenting Unstable Portraiture in public spaces in Malaysia, the project fosters discourse on the interplay of technology, identity, and art, making a critical intervention in the fields of digital media and cultural sustainability. It serves as a meaningful model for how AI-driven art can enhance public engagement, while simultaneously contributing to theoretical and artistic advancements in the study of digital selfhood.</p
Experimental study and multi-objective optimisation of CNC turning parameters of AL6061 materials
No full textThis paper investigates the effectiveness of feed rate, depth of cut, and cutting speed on material removal rate (MRR) and surface roughness (SR) of CNC lathe machines on AL6061 Materials. A combined use of Taguchi, Response Surface Methodology (RSM), and Genetic Algorithms (GA) is proposed to study and optimise turning processes. Firstly, the RSM with a fractional factorial design is implemented to indicate the significance and influence of process parameters on RSM and MRR. With the achieved data, regression models are formulated to present the relationship between control factors and the responses and are proven reliable in predicting through statistical analysis and validating experiment results. Further, a multi-objective genetic algorithm (GA) was used to obtain a Pareto solution set with multiple combinations of factors for optimal MRR and SR. Then, the best trade-off between process parameters is analysed to achieve desired quality outcomes. The results indicate that the proposed approach provides an effective solution for CNC Turning machines and can extend to similar problems in various fields.</p
Musical Automation in the Australian Games Industry: Current Perspectives
No full textThis report summarises stakeholder and industry research undertaken as part of a broader research project titled ‘Musical Automation in the Australian Games Industry’, the outputs, publications and documentation of which are available at https://metamiditoolkit.com/. This project was funded by Creative Australia and APRA AMCOS through the Digital Futures initiative, and allowed the research team to not only pursue the industry research discussed within this report, but to produce the following project outcomes:• Open-source Toolkit – The MetaMIDI Toolkit has been released as open source (under the MIT license), and so it can be used and extended further in your own projects.• Life (Re)Sounding – Demonstrating the capabilities of our MetaMIDI Toolkit, using Unreal Engine’s ‘MetaSounds’ real-time synthesis technologies, this narrative game has multiple levels and plays like an interactive 5-track album.• Video Documentary – Including background, interviews, and ‘behind-the-scenes’ footage of the project’s development.Alongside these outcomes, this research report was produced in collaboration and with the input of industry research participants to provide insights into how games professionals are engaging with these new technologies.This involved interviewing key workers and stakeholders within the Australian games audio sector regarding their perceptions, understandings and experiences of generative artificial intelligence–driven programs and software (GenAI), as well as non-AI forms of automation, and the impact of these on their workflows and processes. This report introduces the topic of musical automation in the Australian games industry, provides an overview of the project’s research design and methodology, and discusses the findings of our research, which are presented in themed findings chapters. The report concludes with a discussion of the project’s limitations and suggestions for further areas of research.</p
Who Writes a Generative Text? An Investigation into the Mechanisms of Projecting a Distinct Authorial Voice when using Generative Text Processes
No full textThis PhD project investigates the opportunities and limitations facing authors in trying to convey real world narratives in a distinct authorial voice when using generative text processes such as large language models (LLMs). Borrowing ideas from speculative creative nonfiction, computational creativity, and digital ethnography, I use creative practice research to examine how different stages in the production of a generative text can act as proxies for authorial identity.
The concept of authorship used is broadly inclusive to encompass any part of the commissioning, design, creation, and execution of a set of rules with the deliberate aim of producing a text through generative processes. I present an authorial framework which assigns responsibility for a generative text to the distinct roles of system owner, system designer, system programmer, system (the program itself), corpus curator, corpus author, system user, and reader. This framework may be expanded to other generative processes beyond text.
To examine how collecting and labelling data can be considered an authorial action, the research describes real world scenes from three distinct perspectives: simple data collected at a specific time and place, templated text which ‘textifies’ the initial data converting it into basic English sentences, and finally, conventionally written prose descriptions of a scene told in the limited omniscient authorial voice.
The main research artefact is presented as an Agile business document summarising and describing the project. It uses epistolary techniques and a type of Socratic dialogue to present a narrative through realistic chat logs, project documentation, and wireframe descriptions of system architecture. The result of this research is a description of the external requirements necessary for the development of such a system, and a story describing the development the system itself.</p
Exploring the magnetic and supercapacitor characteristics of praseodymium-doped CoFe2O4 magnetic nanoparticles
No full textPure and Praseodymium (Pr)-doped CoFe2O4 magnetic nanoparticles (MNPs) were prepared by chemical oxidation method with optimized experimental parameters. The structural change with increasing doping concentration of Pr was observed from the X-ray diffraction analysis. The spherical morphology of the MNPs was confirmed from field emission scanning electron microscopy and transmission electron microscopy. Magnetic properties of the pure and Pr-doped CoFe2O4 are analyzed by vibrating sample magnetometer and thermomagnetic analysis measurements. The maximum saturation magnetization of 77 emu/g was observed for pure CoFe2O4 MNPs and decreasing with increasing Pr doping concentration. The curie temperature of CoFe2O4 MNPs is observed around 520 °C from TMA measurements. The increase in the current from the cyclic voltammetry results with increasing doping fraction of Pr is observed. The Galvanostatic charge/discharge results revealed that the higher specific capacitance of 121 F/g was achieved for the electrode prepared with 5% of Pr-doped CoFe2O4 MNPs. The cyclic stability test suggested that the 5% of Pr-doped CoFe2O4 MNPs electrode can show more than 97% of capacity retention even up to 5000 cycles. The observed electrochemical characteristics of the pure and Pr-doped CoFe2O4 MNPs suggested that the doping on CoFe2O4 MNPs could be adopted to tune the capacitance of the electrode for supercapacitor applications
Digital Cumbia: The Role of DJs/Producers in Creolization
No full textCumbia emerged on the Caribbean coast of Colombia from a tri-cultural African, Indigenous American and European mixture. It has become one of the most popular forms of music in the barrios (“ghettos”) throughout Latin America. In the 2000s, DJs/producers from outside the barrio produced a digital form of cumbia which was announced globally as Latin America’s first genre of electronic dance music. However, barrio-based DJs/producers working with local sonidero sound system operators had already applied electronic dance music techniques to produce digital cumbia. In order to confront the contested status of digital cumbia, I therefore consider cumbia as a process, by which I mean cumbia as a practice situated in DJ and sound system cultures. My analysis of cumbia as a process is based on Julian Henriques’ theory of sound system know-how as ‘sounding’ (2011), which he based on Christopher Small’s idea of music as ‘musicking’ (1998) rather than a fixed object or thing.
The transformation of cumbia has been explored in ethnomusicology and popular music studies—where I situate this study—through various concepts used to describe cultural mixture, including mestizaje (“racial mixture”), transculturation, hybridity and more. I expand on these concepts by considering cumbia as creolization, which the Caribbean philosopher Édouard Glissant defined as cultures coming into relation with each other to produce something new and unpredictable, resulting in a process which is ongoing and never final. This leads to the research questions my study contemplates: How does cumbia function as a process of creolization? What is the role of the DJ/producer in this process? To answer these questions from a DJ’s perspective, this research is informed by my own professional practice spanning two decades as a DJ/producer. The methodology is based on participant observation and semi-constructed interviews with 24 DJs/producers. Fieldwork was both online and physical in the Mexican cities of Monterrey, Puebla and Mexico City; Bogotá, Colombia; Buenos Aires, Argentina and Berlin, Germany. My research reveals how cumbia has been socialized as belonging to the barrio and identifies distinct barrio-based ways of knowing which have been transferred to DJs/producers working with cumbia, irrespective of class or geographical location. These findings challenge essentialist definitions of culture and technology, contributing to the study of ways of knowing emerging from sound system and electronic dance music cultures, as well as cultural change, in complex and contested contexts marked by colonization and globalization.</p
The Role of Management Control Systems in Supply Chain Risk Management: A Case Study of Hospitals in Saudi Arabia
No full textAn effective supply chain risk management (SCRM) system has increasingly become a necessity for organisations to effectively address and navigate the inherent risks and disruptions in their supply chains. Management accounting research has highlighted how certain accounting technologies facilitate a proactive, data-driven, strategic SCRM system. For instance, the integration of business intelligence and analytics (BIA) technologies with management control systems (MCS) has resulted in the incorporation of risk management and control systems into business processes and supply chain activities.
However, the prior literature in accounting highlights the limitations of formal MCSs, such as legal contracts, in managing supply chain risks. Formal MCSs bring unintended outcomes and hinder flexibility and information access and processing, which in turn limit the ability of an organisation to make better strategic decisions and respond quickly to changes in the business environment. To date, the role of a BIA-enabled MCS to support the strategic focus of risk management in inter-organisational relationships of the supply chain has been conspicuously lacking.
SCRM systems are viewed as a dynamic capability shaped by organisational resources. Drawing on dynamic capability theory, this thesis posits that BIA-enabled MCS provides a dynamic capability by enabling processes and activities that foster sensing, seizing, and transforming capabilities.
This study employs an exploratory sequential mixed-method design in two phases. The first qualitative method phase uses interviews to investigate managers’ experience of risk management controls, culture, processes, and practices towards the factors supporting strategic SCRM systems. The second quantitative method phase uses surveys to (i) empirically test the factors; (ii) investigate the extent of BIA-enabled MCS in enabling a dynamic knowledge-creation risk culture capability; and (ii) investigate the consequential effect of SCRM on business processes, supply chain performance and hospital performance.
In order to deeply understand business processes and control systems, I conducted semi-structured interviews with 18 strategic and operational managers. Interviewees indicate that supply chain partners change organisational processes, procedures, and operations. The results reveal that BIA-enabled MCS facilitates knowledge development, learning processes, and activities that develop a dynamic capability. A deductive thematic analysis of the interview data reveals that top management, BIA and MCS are critical factors for supporting an effective SCRM system, which enhances performance. The findings validate the conceptual framework and provide a basis for a further examination of the relationships between the constructs.
My analysis of the survey data collected from 191 managers working in the healthcare industry in Saudi Arabia suggests that BIA-enabled MCS significantly supports a data-driven, strategic SCRM system. Higher quality BIA systems also develop higher levels of an organisation’s absorptive capacity to leverage joint knowledge and share information across the supply chain relationship. An organisational absorptive capacity significantly strengthens risk management and supply chain processes by leveraging and assimilating integrated BIA into an organisation’s decision-making and supply chain activity. Top management support is antecedent to and conditional on successfully implementing quality BIA systems in organisations.
Results further show that an effective SCRM system provides managers with information about current and anticipated obstacles, threats, or opportunities, determines how to use resources wisely and justifies the most appropriate decisions. Its consequential effect is improvement in the efficiency and effectiveness of business processes. Consequently, when an organisation effectively controls risks, mitigates volatility and disruptions, and uses resources efficiently, supply chain performance and overall hospital performance is improved.
The results further indicate that an effective SCRM system provides managers with valuable information about current and anticipated obstacles, threats, or opportunities. This information can help in making wise resource allocation decisions and justifying appropriate actions. The positive impact of effective SCRM can be seen in improved flexibility, internal and external coordination, and responsiveness in business processes. Consequently, when an organisation strategically chooses the right controls for managing risks and disruptions and using resources efficiently, it can enhance supply chain performance and overall hospital performance. The study suggests that the relationship between SCRM and supply chain performance and overall hospital performance is contingent on improvements in business processes and activities.
The study findings enrich and extend the findings of prior studies to provide a comprehensive understanding of the factors that contribute to effective risk management in inter-organisational relationships of the supply chain. The study also provides new insight and reinterpretation about the potential impact and recent changes that BIA technology has brought to management, individuals, organisational structure, control mechanisms and decision-making. The study enriches the understanding of BIA's role in enabling both formal and informal risk controls within inter-organisational relationships.
The findings are valuable to various stakeholders, including management accountants, organisations, and regulators, by providing timely perspectives on the increasing contemporary responsibilities for management accountants, which now include risk management and supply chain. The most straightforward message is that future management accountants should increase their ability to leverage and gain deep insights from data, as well as effectively visualise and communicate data with both internal and external stakeholders.</p
Advanced Corrosion Modelling: An Atomistic Approach to Describe the Corrosion Inhibition Process
No full textToxic inorganic compounds, usually used as corrosion inhibitors within paint films, are being replaced by more environmentally friendly compounds in coatings across aerospace, automotive, and infrastructure industries. However, the corrosion inhibition mechanism behind these compounds must be better understood. Molecular modelling can provide insights by analyzing the metal-inhibitor-water interface, but a realistic representation of the electrochemical processes is crucial. In this thesis, six critical aspects must be considered to realistically describe the corrosion inhibition process in modelling: the electronic properties of isolated inhibitors, the interaction of the inhibitor with the surface, the surface model, the effect of the anodic and cathodic zones on the surface, the solvent effects, and the electrodes’ potential effects. While the first three aspects are usually considered in the literature, the latter three and some more complex surface models are not. Here, two main ones will be the focus: the applied electrode potential and solvent effects.
The system chosen to showcase these two aspects is the adsorption of 2-mercaptobenzimidazole (MBI) on Cu(111) surfaces. First, molecular modelling based on Density Functional Theory (DFT) combined with the Non-Equilibrium Green’s Functions (NEGF) formalism was used to address the effect of the applied electrode potential in the MBI adsorption under different coverage and voltages. Both coverage and voltage play crucial roles in the adsorption of the inhibitor. The coverage determines the extent of the surface area protected from corrosion by the inhibitor. On the other hand, the voltage is essential to describe the cathodic and anodic zones within the material. It induces the system’s polarization, potentially influencing the inhibitor’s orientation towards adsorption and its charge distribution. Our results show that the system becomes more stable as the coverage of molecules increases, forming a self-assembled monolayer (SAM). The electronic structure, characterized through the analysis of the charge density difference and density of states, is sensitive to the applied voltage, inducing a charge redistribution in the system, where the MBI is acting as a metal and accumulates the induced charge at the molecule’s edge.
The final step addressed the solvent effects in the MBI adsorption, where the methodology combining the NEGF formalism and the Quantum Mechanics/Molecular Mechanics (QM/MM) method was used in a (5×6) Cu surface slab under varying coverage conditions: bare surface, a low-coverage with one MBI adsorbed, and a high-coverage case with six MBI adsorbed, and under different applied voltages (-1, 0 and +1 V). The dynamics explicitly included water molecules, with their quantity adjusted to match the density of liquid water under standard pressure and temperature conditions (1 g/cm³). Classical molecular dynamics were performed for the isothermal-isobaric ensemble and canonical ensemble to calibrate the system’s pressure and temperature. The reference temperature and pressure were 300 K and 1 bar, respectively.
After the classical molecular dynamics calibration, the QM/MM-NEGF molecular dynamics were performed on the systems under varying coverage and voltages from the equilibrated geometries. Structural descriptors such as the water’s density profiles, water dipole moment and angular distributions were evaluated for the different concentrations and applied voltages. The electronic structure was analyzed through the evolution of the net Hirshfeld charges along the dynamics.
The results suggest that a stable SAM is formed in the high-coverage case. It prevails along the dynamics and acts as a physical barrier between the water molecules and the surface, preventing their interaction with the metallic surface. The results in the bare surface and with one MBI adsorbed showed a water layer directly in contact with the Cu surface, contrary to the case with a SAM adsorbed, where the first water layer is located at the end of the SAM structure. The results also indicated an induced polarization in the system due to the applied voltage on the system, which is reflected in the electronic structure and the structural descriptions evaluated. In this sense, the net Hirshfeld charges of the left and right Cu surface change according to the voltage, besides the charges in the MBI. The dipole moments and angular distribution revealed the water molecules’ polarization, primarily with the ones located at the inhibitor-surface interface. The water molecules aligned according to the voltage sign, and in the case of positive voltages, their hydrogen atoms pointed out towards the left Cu surface. Negative potentials induced the opposite effect. Even at 0 V, the simulations with the SAM adsorption showed a polarization, which is evident in the angular distributions and indicates the outstanding charge redistribution caused by the SAM upon adsorption on the surface.
Finally, a collaboration with experimental partners in RMIT University was performed to investigate the adsorption of 2-mercaptobenzothiazole (2-MBT) and 2-aminobenzothiazole (2-ABT) on galvanized steel, using a Zn(0001) model surface. Two concentrations at the surface were investigated: a low (1 molecule/nm²) and high (3 molecules/nm²) concentration cases, identifying the most stable adsorption modes. The findings aligned with experimental data using X-ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy (XPS), which revealed the bonding between 2-ABT and the Zn through the endo S and the 2-MBT through the endo N and exo S. Electronic structure analysis revealed the inhibitor’s charge density donation to the Zn surface. The experimental data also highlighted the strong interaction between 2-MBT and the surface, potentially forming complexes with Zn²⁺ ions.
Therefore, this thesis highlighted the importance of the six critical aspects of corrosion inhibition modelling and demonstrated that the proposed QM/MM-NEGF approach significantly advances modelling electrochemistry and can be successfully applied in corrosion inhibition studies. From these critical aspects, this thesis focused on two fundamental ones: the solvent and electrode potential effects and how the inclusion of these effects allows us to understand the role of the inhibitor in the protection of the materials, in this case by the formation of stable films with the applied voltages, and the charge redistribution at the inhibitor structure.
The results from this QM/MM-NEGF approach differentiate from the usual corrosion inhibition modelling, which lacks a precise description of the atomistic process occurring at the metallic-inhibitor-aqueous interface. Instead, the QM/MM-NEGF approach provides an accurate and predictive way to simulate fundamental interactions that lead to corrosion inhibition properties. Furthermore, the results from this approach can potentially be used to feed artificial intelligence (AI) methods and multiscale models, which can bridge the gap between nanoscale corrosion inhibition modelling and the continuum scale of corrosion inhibition processes. This could enhance our understanding of corrosion inhibition and lead to more effective solutions.</p
Quality Green Space Supporting Health, Wellbeing and Biodiversity: A Literature Review
No full textThis literature review was prepared for a collaborative project between the Heart Foundation (South Australian Division), the South Australian Local Government Association, the South Australian Government Departments of Health and Ageing, Office for Recreation and Sport, and the Department of Environment, Water and Natural Resources. The literature reviews evidence on characteristics of POS and green space that benefits human health and wellbeing, biodiversity and ecosystem services. The review summarises findings from an emerging research field, which considers the relationships and benefits between POS and green space characteristics, and physical, mental and social wellbeing, biodiversity and ecosystem services. </p
Autonomy and Time
No full textThis thesis reimagines a question first posed by film philosopher Gilles Deleuze in Cinema 2: The Time-Image, a question Deleuze attributes to Martin Heidegger and Antonin Artaud: what is it about the moving image that forces us to think? Such a question arises when the sensory-motor schema breaks down and thought is confronted with its own void, what Deleuze refers to as ‘“the inpower [impouvoir] of thought”, the figure of nothingness, the inexistence of a whole which could be thought’ (1997b:168). Nearly half a century later, following the slow movement of recent decades (much like the Italian neorealism that preceded it), the urgency of this question has shifted. Today, cinema does not simply present us with a direct image of time in isolation, but does so within a media environment increasingly shaped by television, digital media, and audience-centric approaches. In this changed landscape, it is much more fitting to ask: how does time affect the audience of the moving image? And, further, how does time itself modulate our capacity to think—before, during, and after the image—as part of an ongoing, durational experience?
The relationship between the past, present, and future encapsulates the core uncertainty of this renewed question. Firstly, by reducing time to a causal link between affect and effect, both the social sciences and the humanities have constrained our ability to think about time in relation to cinematic experience. Secondly, the assumption that such an experience can be aggregated under the concept of ‘the audience’ has led to a number of generalisations about the majority of its viewers, often at the expense of minority perspectives, echoing concerns raised by the ethnographic turn of the mid-to-late 20th Century. Thirdly, there remains a lingering presumption that Deleuze (and, to a lesser extent, Félix Guattari) might still offer a definitive answer to these questions—without acknowledging that our capacity to think has also been shaped by Deleuze’s work since the publication of the Cinema books. This presumption runs counter to Deleuze’s own insistence in Difference and Repetition that philosophy generates more problems than it solves (2001:xix-xxii).
As the question of our capacity to think traverses multiple disciplines, it becomes increasingly difficult to situate this problem within the bounds of any single epistemological framework. Rather than a gap within any one particular theory, it emerges instead as an onto-epistemological tension: one that implicates both how knowledge is formed and how our own experience is structured around that knowledge. The difficulty of reconciling epistemology with lived experience poses a challenge for those seeking to move beyond Deleuze, since few existing modes of research consider the intersection of affect, temporality, and interpretation—despite the enduring influence of Deleuze’s work. In response, this thesis draws on both content and textual analysis to develop a new and original theoretical framework grounded in a process called microphilosophy. Where philosophical pluralism tends to treat theories as discrete, competing systems, microphilosophy allows for the fluid interplay of concepts from a variety of disciplines, woven together in ways that respect their differences while facilitating new modes of interpretation. Grounded in hermeneutic principles, this methodological approach also emphasises the importance of context in shaping how we, as academics, engage with our ideas.
Far from being static, theories themselves evolve through the same interplay of time, affect, and the audience’s own lived experience, which itself shapes the nature of the research problem while it unfolds. Consequently, microphilosophy approaches theory not as a fixed system, but as a dynamic, evolving process. By exploring how time, rather than affect, shapes our interpretation of a given film, and how that interpretation is, in turn, shaped by the affective residue of past encounters, this thesis identifies a recursive relationship that forms the interpretive horizon through which cinematic meaning gradually emerges as part of an ongoing experience. When theoretical approaches diverge across fields and disciplines, an autoethnographic perspective is adopted as a way of addressing the privilege that Deleuze, in conversation with Michel Foucault, once identified as the tendency for intellectuals to speak on the behalf of others while failing to acknowledge their own implication in the theoretical frameworks they construct (1977:209). Framed as a call to recognise one’s own role in theoretical production, the interpretive method developed here is not only recursive and interdisciplinary, but also self-reflexive—attuned to the situated nature of thought, and the contingent affective conditions through which meaning takes shape.</p