uwa news...uwa news 21 september 2009 volume 28 number 14in this issue p3 spring graduations p5 free...

UWA NEWS21 September 2009 Volume 28 Number 14

In this issue P3 SPRING GRADUATIONS P5 FREE ENERGY UNDER OUR NOSES P10 CENTENARY DISCOVERY

more on pages 8 and 9

The Premier, Colin Barnett, has put the case for the world’s biggest science project to be built in WA.

Launching the International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research (ICRAR), Mr Barnett told more than 350 guests, including international scientists, politicians and some of the world’s best

astronomers, that science, not sentiment, should determine the home of the Square Kilometre Array (SKA).

“We understand and respect the sentiment that, on humanitarian grounds, it would be a great thing for Africa if the SKA was built there,” the Premier said. “But this project is up there with putting man on the moon or the cyclotron project inurope. It is very important science and we make the case for UWA on purely scientific grounds.”

The State Government has put $20 million into the new centre and, with funding from the two partners, UWA and Curtin University of Technology, ICRAR will start with $100 million.

Opening the skies to the past and the future

by Lindy Brophy

The Pathfinder will generate

more information in one

week than is currently

contained on the whole

World Wide Web.

In one month it will generate

more information than is

contained in the world’s

academic libraries.

PHOTO: John Goldsmith

2

A much-loved UWA employee celebrated his retirement with a pizza lunch for 50 people last month – but he wasn’t allowed to eat any.

Pollock, the guide dog of Greg Madson, the receptionist for the Centre for Legumes in Mediterranean Agriculture and the Future Farm Industries CRC, is 12 ½ years old and has retired after eight years working with Greg on campus.

He became a favourite of staff in the Centres and visitors to UWA, sitting quietly under Greg’s desk or patrolling the corridors, as Greg says, “making sure that no crumbs or fragments of food became a trip hazard.”

Pollock will enjoy his retirement relaxing on the new bed that staff presented to him, and, after a five-week holiday in Europe, Greg will return to train a new guide dog.

Professor Kadambot Siddique described choosing Greg for the job eight years ago.

“I interviewed three applicants, one of them Greg, and of course Pollock came to the interview,” Professor Siddique said. “But I was a bit nervous about having a dog in the Faculty. “I tossed and turned that night and finally my wife asked me what I was worried about. I told her and she asked: ‘Will Greg do the job well?’ When I said yes, she said: ‘Well, employ him. Now shut up and go to sleep’.”

Pollock became such a valued member of the agriculture community that he was taken to Canberra several years ago when a team from UWA accepted the Prime Minister’s Employment Award.

During his working life at UWA, Pollock became a canine mentor to Ronnie, the guide dog of Arts student Eric McGlew, then Frankie, the guide dog puppy, trained by Staff Development Officer Claire Webb.

Greg has offered Pollock’s collar and registration tags to the Centenary Committee to put in the UWA time capsule.

Guide dogs have had a special place at UWA, since Economics lecturer Arnold Cook returned from England with Australia’s first guide dog in 1950.

He had spent two years at the London School of Economics on a Hackett Scholarship and brought his UK-trained dog, Dreena, back with him. The following year, Dr Cook established Australia’s first Guide Dog Association and in 1952, the first Australian-trained guide dog, Beau, was given to its owner.

Retirement – it’s a dog’s life

The Albany campus is about to get a $6 million facelift.

A new 1,000 square-metre building will provide additional classrooms, a science/medical library and 12 academic offices.

It will also provide a boost for the Centre of Excellence in Natural Resource Management, expand the Rural Clinical School, give research staff and postgraduate students more space, and supply more teaching and laboratory space for existing programs and future growth.

The State Government has contributed $3 million towards the expansion to boost higher education in the Great Southern region.

The Government’s commitment to the project is $1.5million over three years through the Royalties for Regions program and $1.5million from the Department of Education Services.

Equity and Diversity’s Bev Hill

Owner Greg Madson and Pro Vice-Chancellor Alistar Robertson

Pollock gets a tasty farewell gift

Staff say their goodbyes …

Albany campus expanding

UWA NEWS 21 September 2009 The University of Western Australia2

When Kylie Forth walked across Winthrop Hall to receive her Bachelor of Arts degree last week, she couldn’t see where she was going.

But after four years of navigating the campus with her white stick, Kylie is used to challenges like this one.

The short journey across the stage was the highlight of a remarkable triumph over disability.

Kylie is blind and has only one leg, after losing her eyes and her right leg to cancer when she was three years old. She took the courageous decision in 2005 to leave her wheatbelt home of Kununoppin to live at St Catherine’s College and study at UWA.

She enrolled in Psychology, then found it was not to her liking. So she completed her Arts degree with a double major in Anthropology and Linguistics accruing top marks along the way.

One degree, however, is not enough. Kylie is now studying law, after finishing her Arts degree last year. She missed the autumn graduation ceremony because she was representing Western Australia in a sailing competition in Sydney that week.

Sailing is another challenge this gutsy young woman has met head-on. She

Inspirational

first sailed on the STS Leeuwin and, just like all the able-bodied sighted young people who go on the Leeuwin, Kylie climbed the mast. She then took on blind match-racing and she and her partner Paul Borg won the International Blind Match Race Championships in Italy in 2006.

This year, she moved out of college and is living with a friend in Joondana. “It’s an experiment,” she said. “It’s going OK so far. We share the cooking and other chores but I’m the one who does most of the washing up. I can’t stand mess.”

Kylie has used a Braille notepad and a computer with a screen reader to enable her to complete her studies. As for Law, “it’s another experiment. I’m not sure where it will take me,” she said. “But for now, it’s all about Arts. I’m graduating with an Arts degree!”

Kylie’s is just one of 1,374 stories from the spring graduations. This number of students graduated from all faculties, most with undergraduate degrees, 99 with PhDs.

The first cohort of the new Master of Infectious Diseases graduated, with six students ready to tackle the spread of disease in our region. The course has already attracted more than 50 students from all over the world to train under Professor Geoff Shellam in the Marshall

Centre for Infectious Diseases.

As usual, the highest number of graduates from one course came from the Business School, with 277 graduands being awarded a Bachelor of Commerce.

There were 209 Bachelors of Arts, 193 Bachelors of Science and 105 Bachelors of Engineering conferred. The graduation also conferred degrees on 13 doctors and 59 lawyers.

graduationHaylee Gibbs from the graduations office runs through the graduation ceremony with Kylie Forth, to ensure smooth sailing on the night

Kylie climbs the mast of the Leeuwin

The University of Western Australia UWA NEWS 21 September 2009 3

4

Free clean energyright under our feet

Alan Robson Vice-Chancellor

The words of mathematician and philosopher Alfred North Whitehead reflect our University’s vision.

Soon to celebrate 100 years of service to our local, national and international communities, this University can afford to look back with pride. But our role in the future is even more crucial, particularly as we operate in an era of globalisation with hitherto unrivalled challenges and opportunities.

Two people highlighted in this issue of UWA News and attending our spring graduations highlight diverse ways in which our University helps to create the future.

One is 23 year-old Kylie Forth, from the wheatbelt town of Kununoppin. Kylie is blind and has only one leg. She graduated with an Arts degree in this current round of graduations because she was too busy in a world sailing competition to get to one of our autumn graduations. She is now studying Law. She is a fantastic role-model for all of us. Courage such as hers is rare and inspirational.

The other is Dr George W. Taylor, who graduated from our University in 1957 with a Bachelor of Engineering. Dr Taylor received an Honorary Degree of Doctor of Letters this spring for his massive contribution to engineering and, indirectly, to the lives of many of us reading this.

Dr Taylor was a pioneer in the development and use of liquid crystal

Creating the future

displays. In 1970 he co-founded Princeton Materials Sciences Inc, where he designed one of the first LCD digital watches.

There is no doubt that this University has played a major part in setting Kylie Forth and George Taylor on their paths towards their own personal futures. What is most pleasing, however, is the ways in which these graduates are using, and will continue to use, many of the skills they acquire here to transform the lives of others – and to help create better futures for many in the community.

They join the more than 100,000 graduates who have left this University over the past near-century, many of them to contribute enormously to society.

Among our graduates we can count a former Prime Minister as well as other eminent Federal politicians and judges. We can name State Premiers and ministers. There are Nobel Laureates and numerous others who have served excellently in every field of human endeavour.

Our University’s graduates have helped make Western Australia what it is today. In many cases, their influence has spread much further afield. One of the true demonstrations of the strength of this University is the strength built on our graduates. For many of our spring graduation cohort, the future is a blank canvas. From what we have seen to date, I am sure they will do a brilliant job with it.

“The task of a university is the creation of the future.”


UWA is in the hot seat to take up the challenge of providing sustainable zero-emission energy.

The Geothermal research group is literally sitting on a valuable source of clean, virtually free energy, within the subsurface of the campus and, more generally, in Perth’s sedimentary basin.

Hot sedimentary aquifers such as ours offer a unique opportunity for the Australian geothermal industry, and the Western Australian Geothermal Centre of Excellence (WAGCOE) is working towards a new era of energy development.

Already exploratory drilling on campus has confirmed decent heat flow estimates which suggest good reserves of hot water right under our feet.

Sean Webb (pictured left), the business manager for WAGCOE, said that, all going well, drilling could begin as early as next year.

“It’s unusual for UWA research to be targeted so directly at benefits for the University,” Mr Webb said. “But the hot aquifers are just asking to be used for our Heating Ventilation and Air Conditioning (HVAC) project.

“It is a proof of concept project that will go ahead provided we obtain all necessary approvals from the relevant authorities. We already co-own the first geothermal permit issued in Western Australia – GP1.”

WAGCOE is a collaboration between UWA and CSIRO and Curtin University of Technology . It engages the expertise of the John de Laeter Centre and iVEC (interactive Virtual Environments Centre supercomputer), and works with geothermal institutes in New Zealand, Germany and France.

The Centre is led by Premier’s Fellow, Professor Klaus Regenauer-Lieb, with 20 staff, including 10 senior UWA professors and researchers in areas of structural geology (Winthrop Professor Peter Cawood), fracture and rock mechanics (Winthrop Professor Arcady Dyskin), thermodynamics (Professor Hui Tong Chua and Dr Xiaolin Wang), and applied mathematical geophysics (Research Professor Frank Horowitz), and other related fields.

It is part of UWA’s Energy and Minerals Initiative, directed by Tim Shanahan.

Harnessing geothermal energy is easier in volcanic settings, such as Reykjavik, where 95 per cent of the city is heated geothermally.

“It is more difficult in non-volcanic settings,” Mr Webb explained. “In low temperature hydrothermal systems, as we have here, the hot water forms convection cells in upwellings and

downwellings. The challenge is to get the hotter resource area properly identified so that when we drill, we hit the upwelling, and so drastically reduce the costs.”

He said that approximately 80 per cent of the cost of harvesting geothermal energy could be the drilling. “The costs rise exponentially with depth, so it is important to target the upwelling.”

There are two ways the heat from the aquifers can be used. The hot water can be extracted and used directly for heating, or the heat can be converted into energy by passing it through an absorption chiller.

“This latter method is what we would employ here at UWA,” Mr Webb said. “The thing you have to remember about geothermal energy is that it has a continuous capacity, 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

“Air-conditioning needs at UWA vary from a two megawatt thermal base to a 16 megawatt load at peak times. So it is likely that the geothermal energy we harness will be used for base-load air-conditioning only. But it is a really good reliable source of energy for uses such as supercomputers, which use the same (large) amount of energy continuously. You need to marry the technologies,” he said.

“We may even try to generate electricity.”

But first comes all the logistics of approvals, then getting an onshore drilling rig onto the campus (where the work site footprint could take up an area of about 100 metres by 50 metres), and ensuring the safety of people, buildings, and sensitive equipment.

“We have done a workshop on the risks involved and will be doing another one. Potential noise and vibration will be a crucial element in the management of the project. Facilities Management is already doing a great job in preparing for it,” Mr Webb said.

“Owing to the high natural permeability of the Perth sedimentary basin, there is no need for artificial hydraulic fracturing, so risks and dangers are reduced, as well as drilling costs.”

The HVAC project is just one aspect of WAGCOE’s research which is dedicated to providing desalinated water, heating and cooling for cities of the 21st century.

By exploring for low-grade heat in a permeable sedimentary environment, WAGCOE is addressing an overlooked opportunity for broadening the footprint of geothermal energy use, while reducing the carbon footprint of UWA and, hopefully, Perth and its surrounds.

Free clean energyright under our feet


6

A group of second year students have learnt research skills that put them on a par with postgraduate students.

The first cohort of the Undergraduate Learning and Teaching Research Internship Scheme (ULTRIS) has completed a semester of research and presented their findings to the WA Institute for Educational Research (WAIER).

Professor Sally Sandover who, with Dr Lee Partridge and Dr Wayne McGowan, conceived and ran the scheme, said the students were “absolutely outstanding” and she is keen to see the program embedded in the new course structure.

“At the WAIER conference, one of the students presented so well that she was mistaken for an academic staff member, and another was asked when she would finish her PhD,” Professor Sandover said.

“These students have learnt so much in one semester. The work they produced was equivalent to Honours. They are all considering post-graduate study, but in the meantime, they are using their newly-learned skills in their undergraduate degrees.

“They are as pleased with their new skills as we are excited about the success of the program,” she said.

ULTRIS: ultimate research tool

Sally Sandover and Lee Partridge (centre) and Wayne McGowan (far left) with the ULTRIS students: (back) Ying Yi Siow, Roz Hewitt, Lilly Brown, Isobel DaSilva, Anneli Strutt and (front) Pragnya Jagadish, Emma McIntyre, Jessica McColl, Rachel Dennis, Marzia Zamir

ULTRIS provides a one-semester internship for an undergraduate student from each faculty and the School of Indigenous Studies.

They spent most of February learning about research skills. They were then assigned a ‘faculty friend’ and a supervisor, and developed a proposal on the theme of students engaging with staff outside the classroom.

“We wanted the students to really make the most of this opportunity, so the Scholarship came with $3,000. The students had to consider the Scholarship as employment on campus and reduce any other outside work during the semester,” Professor Sandover said.

“We wanted the students to learn research skills but we also wanted them to become really engaged in the teaching process, to see what’s happening on campus beyond themselves and their friends. In the past this opportunity has really only been available to post graduate students, most of whom do not have a long term interest in teaching and learning.

“An additional outcome of the scheme is that the students complete research that is of significant value to the University. The students feel an enormous sense of ownership in the work they complete.”

Lilly Brown is studying English and History and won her internship through the School of Indigenous Studies. Her research looked at the relationship between educators and students within the context of Indigenous pedagogy.

“My project looked at why western ways of knowing are dominant,” Lilly said. “I do a history unit called Aboriginal Ways of Knowing, which focuses on land, communities and people.

“Non-Indigenous students do the unit too. You really get to know each other; it can become quite emotional and involved. It’s a great way of learning, involving the spiritual side. I really saw how good teaching and learning can be.”

Lilly said students felt very comfortable in the class expressing their spirituality.

“The students also felt the tension existing in the two spaces: they were taking an Indigenous course but they had to write a ‘western’ essay at the end.

“It was a productive way to increase cultural competence because that tension is what Aboriginal people deal with every day of our lives,” Lilly said.

Other topics included student and staff perceptions of email expectations; student interaction with culturally and linguistically-diverse staff; the dynamics of international student-staff interactions; and the impact of commodification (academic capitalism) on student-staff interaction outside the classroom.

“More engagement between staff and students points to improvements in learning outcomes,” Professor Sandover said.

Professor Sandover and Dr Partridge will run the scheme next year. Applications for 2010 ULTRIS close on October 2nd. Further information can be found at http://www.catl.uwa.edu.au/page/148514


A PhD student has impressed the judges of a publication prize by getting into print so early in her candidature.

Dani Barrington began her PhD in the School of Environment Systems Engineering in March last year and submitted a paper to the high impact journal, Environmental Science and Technology, in June.

“I’m working on using environmentally-benign methods of cleaning up waste water and I had already done some similar work during my Honours year,” Dani said.

“Then, just as I started my PhD, there was a huge breakout of toxic bacteria in waste water ponds in Burekup and Merredin, so I had plenty of material, quite early, for a paper.

“Traditionally graduate research students publish in the second half of their candidature, or perhaps even after they’ve completed,” said graduate education officer Dr Michael Azariadis. “So to see that Dani had not only published so early, but had submitted her work to a high impact journal was most impressive.” He and a panel of senior academic staff came across Dani’s work while judging the Graduate Research School’s Postgraduate Publication Awards last month. They hope to encourage more graduate students to publish early.

“Publication is important in establishing a track record in research, and for PhD students it is a real bonus, come examination time, if the papers that are

Dani Barrington (above and top left) is testing the use of hydrogen peroxide to kill cyanobacteria in waste water ponds

part of the final thesis have already been reviewed,” he said.

Dani completed Honours in Environmental Engineering and a Bachelor of Science with a double major in Chemistry and Environmental Chemistry before being funded by an Australian Research Council Linkage project with the Water Corporation to do her PhD under the supervision of Associate Professor Anas Ghadouani and Winthrop Professor Greg Ivey.

“Anas encouraged me and told me to find the most appropriate journal. I didn’t know anything about impact factors then – this journal just seemed like the right one, so I submitted my paper on removing cyanobacteria from waste water, using low concentrations of hydrogen peroxide, and it was accepted within three months.”

A/Professor Ghadouani is hugely enthusiastic about Dani and his current cohort of post-graduate students.

“These students are great: they achieve so much in so many areas. I just love coming to work, to supervise them. I hope that Dani will serve as a role model for all PhD students, some of whom finish without ever publishing,” he said.

Dani is putting the finishing touches to her second academic paper. “It’s good for me because I get feedback from each article I write. And when I get to the end of my research, if I keep publishing, it will mean I will already have written a lot of my thesis,” she said.

She was the only student to come to UWA from her final year at Rockingham Senior High School. “I have known that I wanted to work in environmental science

since I was six and went whale watching for the first time,” she said.

Dr Azariadis and A/Professor Ghadouani are both impressed with Dani’s extra-curricular activities, as well as her academic work. She is president of UWA Engineers without Borders, was the final year representative on both the University Engineers’ Club and the Student Environmental Engineers’ Club and was heavily involved with the UWA Pantomime Society during her undergraduate degrees.

And just for the record, Dani did not win her category in the Postgraduate Publication Prizes. It went to a student who was close to completion. But she was given a special commendation and a $250 prize.

Early start raises the bar for PhD students


8

Opening the skies to the past and the future

continued from page 1

PHOTO: John Goldsmith

PH

OTO

: Pau

l Ric

kett

s

The Centre will be a significant component in Australia’s contribution to the international SKA effort. ICRAR will provide opportunities to grow new skills and to develop new capabilities. Its core purpose is to understand and analyse the unprecedented amount of data from the new generation of radio telescopes.

Professor Peter Quinn, Director of ICRAR, noted that this year marks the 400th anniversary of Galileo’s invention of the telescope.

“When he put his telescope to his eye in 1609, Galileo could get 10 times more information than he could with the naked eye. The SKA has 10,000 times the ability to look at the universe. We are very privileged to be scientists at this time,” he said. “The school students at this launch today will be the ones to use the SKA to answer the tough questions.”

Professor Richard Schilizzi came from the SKA development office in Manchester, England, for the ICRAR launch. He confirmed that the decision

on siting the SKA in either southern Africa or Western Australia would

be made in 2012, followed by a ten-year building

program.

“It will be unlike anything we have ever done before,” he said. “The SKA is a global project with more than 50 institutions from 19 countries taking part.”

Professor Schilizzi said the SKA would be capable of capturing a billion megabytes of data every second.

ICRAR, which Professor Schilizzi welcomed “into the SKA family”, will eventually have the capacity to analyse that data, even though it will need supercomputer capacity 1,000 times greater than any computer in the world today.

(A week before the ICRAR launch, the Federal Science Minister, Kim Carr, announced an $80 million supercomputing centre in WA, to build

the capacity to process the enormous amounts of data

from the SKA.)

Federal MP Gary Gray, representing Mr Carr, said projects such as ICRAR and the new computing centre demonstrated to the international science community “how serious we are about the SKA.”

“It is an important milestone in the massive international efforts working towards the SKA,” he said.

Even before the SKA becomes operational, massive computer capacity will be needed to analyse data from the Australian SKA Pathfinder (ASKAP) telescope that will be located in WA’s mid-west, at the Murchison Radio-astronomy Observatory.

It will be a key demonstrator instrument for new technologies for the SKA, while being a world-class telescope in its own right. The ASKAP is a next-generation radio telescope that will have an array of 36 dish antennae. It will be operational in the spring of 2012. The project is led by the CSIRO, in collaboration with scientists and engineers around the world and

colleagues from Australian universities.


… on the threshold

of what will be the

greatest step we

have ever taken on

our cosmic journey

of discovery.

“

Professor Peter Quinn

The ASKAP will generate more information in one week than is currently contained on the whole World Wide Web; in one month it will generate more information than is contained in the world’s academic libraries.

As the ASKAP and, potentially, the SKA, will both be located in the State’s mid-west, UWA invited high school students from Geraldton to take part in the launch and an afternoon of science activities, together with Shenton College students, following it.

The students toured the new Science Library, then enjoyed an afternoon of hands-on Physics experiments with teaching technician Joe Coletti, and finished with more activities in the Edward de Courcy Clark Earth Science museum with Jenny Bevan.

WA’s Chief Scientist, UWA Professor Lyn Beasley was master of ceremonies for the launch. “Remember,” she said to the students, “the telescopes we build now are for your generation.”

She said the ICRAR initiative was “a wonderful example of co-operation, collaboration and cohesiveness, between the State Government, Curtin University of Technology and UWA.”

The Vice-Chancellor of Curtin University, Professor Jeanette Hacket, said the robust collaboration between the two universities and the State Government helped to make Western Australia a strong competitor for the SKA.

Also invited to the launch were members of the Indigenous people of the mid-west, the Simpson family representing the Yamatji people. Troy Buswell, the State Minister for Science and Innovation, pointed out that the skies which their ancestors had gazed at for centuries, which had guided them with its stars, would be the same skies that would reveal the mysteries of the universe, through the SKA.

This most powerful and sensitive radio telescope will revolutionise our understanding of the universe by providing answers to questions about its complexity and the fundamental laws of physics. The name Square Kilometre Array comes from the collecting area, up to one square kilometre of dish antennae. It will have up to 50 times the sensitivity and 10,000 times the survey speed of current radio telescopes. The sensitivity is needed to detect the very weak signals coming from the edge of the cosmos.

A telescope such as the SKA will be able to ‘see’ distant objects from the early days of the universe and provide answers to questions about the emergence of the first stars, galaxies and other structures.

Because the speed of light is finite and the size of the universe is so enormous, telescopes are effectively time machines that enable astronomers to look into the past and study the universe as it was billions of years ago.

As it pioneers and tests new technologies for the design and development of the SKA, ICRAR will attract some of the world’s leading researchers in radio astronomy.

Professor Quinn describes it as being on the threshold of what will be the greatest step we have ever taken on our cosmic journey of discovery.


10

Student pranks and shenanigans are among campus stories being dug up for the centenary.

One gold nugget is the hoax staged by a St George’s College student in 1949, who pretended to be a famous Alsatian-American sculptor. ‘Monsieur Jean Leps’, as he called himself, gave a talk at Winthrop Hall to more than 450 art enthusiasts.

The speech, ironically entitled Modern Sculpture: Is it a Hoax? lasted about fifteen minutes and received wild applause, after which ‘Leps’ then hurriedly left, saying he could not answer any questions.

‘Leps’ apparently had ‘trouble speaking English’, despite having talked at length about the significance of simple everyday things in the culture of art.

“There is nothing so beautiful as a tall, proud factory chimney, strong and uncompromising against the soft sky,” spouted the ‘sculptor’. The lecture was reported in newspapers around Australia.

The true identity of ‘M. Leps’ was eventually revealed, much to his supporters’ embarrassment. Many students at the time agreed that there should be “far more sheer nonsense” around the University.

Researchers are wondering if ‘Jean Leps’ may have been inspired by a similar hoax performed five years earlier.

‘Ern Malley’ was a fictitious poet created by two writers, James McAuley and Harold Stewart.

Their ludicrous poetry was then sent to the editor of a modernist magazine, Angry Penguins, who thought he had discovered Australia’s next best thing.

He was consequently humiliated when McAuley and Stewart later revealed the poetry was random words and phrases chaotically strung into sentences.

The story of ‘Jean Leps’ may feature in a Centenary publication.

Virginia Rowland, Senior Project Officer, Centenary Planning, is working on many other centenary celebrations, events and publications.

Projects include a time capsule; an online time line; a UWA Centenary History book; a list of University Treasures; a Centenary website with further updates on new events; an Alumni Food and Wine Festival; and an Alumni and Friends Weekend.

“The Alumni and Friends Weekend will be lots of fun, because they will be able to return to the residential colleges to stay,” Virginia said.

“The weekend will also coincide with PIAF in 2011, so they will have plenty of entertainment over the few days.”

Ideas and suggestions for the time capsule, timeline and University Treasures are welcome. Contact Virginia Rowland at [email protected] or on 6488 4214

Hoax is part of our historyby Jacqui Wong

St George’s journal, The Dragon, reports on Jean Leps’ lecture

Bid for a conferenceTwo professional development scholarships are again available for UWA academic staff for 2010.

The scholarships, sponsored by the Perth Convention Bureau, will enable the winning academics to attend a conference of their choice, and fund a bid for a conference in Perth. They are each worth $5,000.

Last year, the two winners were Professor Anya Waite from the School of Environmental Engineering and Dr Paul Maginn, from Urban Planning in the School of Earth and Environment.

For more information and to enrol for the launch of the scholarships, go to http://www.uwa.edu.au/page/151476 before October 23 or email Elaine Barnes from Organisation and Staff Development Services at Elaine. Barnes@ uwa.edu.au

The launch, on October 29, includes a lunch, sponsored by Perth Convention Bureay at Currie Hall. Applications close on March 31 next year.


Pets – and dogs in particular – can help to strengthen the social fabric of communities, the benefits extending even to those who don’t own one.

Dr Lisa Wood from the Centre for the Built Environment and Health has translated some of the research from her PhD into a guide for local councils, Living Well Together, to highlight ways in which communities can accommodate pets and pet owners, to the benefit of all.

The Living well Together guide has been, distributed to every local government council in Australia, and highlights the role of pets in building social capital and sense of community.

Social capital can be defined as the connections, trust and shared behaviours that bind people in communities together.

“It’s often seen as an easier option for councils to say no dogs in public places such as parks or beaches, or for residential building owners to say no pets in apartments or retirement villages. Yet with around two thirds of Australians having a pet, it makes sense to work out how pets can be accommodated,” Dr Wood said.

“There is both anecdotal and academic evidence that dogs play a role in

A dog can be anybody’s best friend

motivating their owners to be more physically active, which in turn has a flow-on benefit to health, both physical and mental.

“But I found the benefit of having dogs or other pets extends to the rest of the community.

“Dogs are something that people who otherwise would have no connection with each other, have in common. They can be the social lubricant between people of different ages, backgrounds, cultures and education.

“Pets can be a focal point for a conversation between strangers, which fosters trust and friendship in a community.

“ People out walking their dogs are also helping to keep their neighbourhoods safe,” Dr Wood said. “If you took dog walking away from our streets and parks, there would be safety implications, with fewer people around. Having ‘eyes on the street’ and more people out and about enhances perceptions of safety and deters theft and vandalism and personal attacks.

“If the parks were deserted – instead of full of dogs and their owners – they could became unsafe places for people to walk.

“It’s not just dogs, but all pets, which can provide a point of contact between neighbours.

“I’m really interested in the notion of social capital,” she said.

“One of the most prolific areas of social capital research and interest is in the health field, with lower mortality rates, higher self-rated health, better general health and decreased mental illness all positively associated with social capital,” Dr Wood wrote in her introduction to Living Well Together.

“Other research indicates that higher levels of social capital are associated with a lessening in violent crime, positive child development and good community governance.

“Social capital is a marker of individual and community wellbeing.”

Dr Wood’s PhD looked at three differently planned Perth suburbs to determine the extent to which neighbourhood design influenced social capital. When she analysed the data, she found pet owners scored more highly for social capital.

“While not everyone has the desire or capacity to have a pet of their own, communities that embrace pets for their positive and tangible contribution to human health and wellbeing have much to gain,” she said.

Living Well Together is published by Petcare Information and Advisory Service. More than 500 copies have been sent to CEOs, mayors and community development officers in local government around Australia.

Dr Wood has been invited to present her findings to a conference on Human Animal Interactions social capital in Sweden next year.

Lisa Wood with her dog Bella


12

A dawn chorus with a difference greeted the first day of Spring at UWA.

Usually sunrise is greeted on campus by a cacophony of birdsong. But on September 1 this year the birds were hushed by the brave voices of the Winthrop Singers, performing at the top of Winthrop Tower.

About 100 equally brave people gathered to listen to a half-hour performance of religious songs (mostly relating to the theme of ascension), madrigals and some pieces from the group’s regular St George’s College chapel repertoire.

It is the third year in which Assistant Professor in Music Education and Winthrop Singers director Nicholas Bannan has coaxed his choir to climb the stairs to the top of the tower to pay homage to Spring.

They started singing just after 6am, while it was still dark. “A bank of fog or cloud delayed the appearance of the sun,” said Dr Bannan. “But when it appeared, it was beautifully reflected.”

St George’s piper Tim McNamara played a solo on his bagpipes as the sun broke through.

The 23 singers and many of their audience shared breakfast at the University Club, which opened half an hour early especially to accommodate them.

“It was cold and windy at the top of the tower, but the atmosphere in the Club afterwards was well worth it,” Dr Bannan said.

“My thanks to the Office of Development, the School of Music and the University Club for making this special occasion work.”

The Winthrop Singers perform every Thursday at Evensong in St George’s College Chapel, at 6pm.

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Spring songThis year’s Save the Children book sale smashed their record by thousands of dollars.

More than 100,000 books, CDs, and sheet music were sold over the six days and a whopping $220,000 was raised, surpassing their previous record by $40,000.

When the doors closed on the final day of the 45th annual event, there were no books left over – a triumphant close to the sale.

“The paperback fiction was probably the most popular,” said Keren McCullagh from the University Branch of Save the Children.

There were 40 categories of books to choose from, including cooking, history, fiction, non-fiction and children’s books.

Over 45 years, more than $2million has been raised from the book sales, which have become a highlight of the year for book lovers, keen readers and collectors.

About 30 percent of the raised funds will go towards projects in the Kimberley. The rest will go to projects in Lao People’s Democratic Republic and Bangladesh.

Book sale ever popular

Jacqui Drage (right) came down from Northampton to see her daughter, St George’s College resident and science student Arianne (left), and to go to the book sale.

Does a community or government fund a salinity program or help to save a threatened species? Which is the better use of limited resources?

A national group including UWA scientists can help with the decision.

The Investment Framework for Environmental Resources – INFFER – is a project which recently won its team a $10,000 Eureka Prize. INFEER helps governments and environmental groups to spend their ‘green’ money most effectively.

The Australian Research Council Eureka Prize for Excellence in Research by an Interdisciplinary Team was awarded to Professor David Pannell and Research Assistant Professor Sally Marsh from the Centre for Environmental Economics and Policy. The Australian Museum Eureka

Financial advice with a green tingePrizes are the most prestigious awards in Australian science.

INFFER focuses on environmental problems in rural areas, including protection of biodiversity and native vegetation; soil erosion; water quality in rivers, lakes and wetlands; environmental pests; threatened species; and salinity.

It is already in use in environmental assets of national importance, such as native forests threatened by dieback, the Gippsland Lakes, and the Hamersley Ranges.

The other team-members are Dr Anna Roberts and Jennifer (Department of Primary Industries, Victoria) and Geoff Park (North Central Catchment Management Authority, Victoria).

INFFER is a project of the Future Farm Industries CRC, which is headquartered at UWA.


UWA NEWS classified

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CeNTRe FoR INTegRATeD HUmAN STUDIeS PUBlIC SemINARWednesday 7 October 5.30 – 7 pmCaring for an ageing populationSeminar Room 1.81 School of Anatomy and Human BiologyWith Professor Leon Flicker, physiotherapist Faye Bastow, and actor Jenny Davis

IAN CoNSTABle leCTURe 2009Monday, 5th October 2009, 7.15pm for 7.30pm start, Octagon Theatre, The 21st century pandemic by Professor Anne Kelso, Director of the World Health Organisation (WHO) Collaborating Centre for Reference and Research on InfluenzaEnquiries to the Institute of Advanced Studies Tel: (08) 6488 1340 or [email protected] are welcome to this free event. Tickets are essential to gain entry and are available from the Octagon Theatre Box Office. Tel: (08) 6488 2440, Monday - Friday, 12.00 - 4.15pm

PUBlIC leCTUReNative Title for Sale? by David Ritter, Institute of Advanced Studies 1 October 2009 at 6pm, Webb Lecture Theatre, Ground Floor Geography Building, UWA Fifteen years since the Mabo decision, agreements over resource development with Aboriginal people are entirely commonplace. Why and what does this mean? David Ritter will argue that the native title legislation has given rise to a de facto market place within which procedural rights are effectively being traded.

2010 RAINe ReSeARCH PRIzeClosing Date: Monday, 19 October 2009 Applications for the 2010 Raine Research Prize are invited from researchers in Western Australia in the field of medical/health science who have been awarded their

doctoral degree or professional qualification within the past five years.The Prize, consisting of a travel allowance up to the value of $5,000 and medallion, shall be awarded by the Raine Research Committee for the best published paper arising from research undertaken primarily at The University of Western Australia or affiliated institution.The prize will be announced in November 2009.Application Form and ConditionsThe Application Form and the Conditions governing the Raine Research Prize are available to download from the Raine website: http://www.raine.u wa.edu.au/prizesCandidates are invited to submit applications to: The Executive Officer, Raine Medical Research Foundation, Suite 24, The Hollywood Specialists Centre, 95 Monash Avenue, Nedlands WA 6009h

PROMOTION BRIEFS

Provided by Elizabeth Hutchinson, Executive Officer, Academics Promotion Committee, Human Resources

PRoFeSSoRDr Simon Young (Law School)Dr Young’s principal areas of research are Administrative law and Indigenous law and policy (particularly native title), in which he has an international reputation. His substantial monograph The Trouble with Tradition: Native Title and Cultural Change (based on his doctoral thesis which won UWA’s Robert Street Prize in 2005) was published by the Federation Press in 2008.Last year he was awarded the Faculty of Law Excellence in Individual Teaching Award (Postgraduate and Undergraduate Teaching) and the Blackstone law students’ society award for Teacher of the Year. Dr Young is involved in co-ordination of the WA contribution to a national land council student placement program and the UWA Aboriginal Pre-Law Program. He is a member of the WA Chapter of the Australian

Institute of Administrative Lawyers, an active member of the Law Faculty Research Committee and has been a member of the University Human Research Ethics Committee.

RESEARCH GRANTS AND CONTRACTS

Grants awarded between 24 August and 6 September

ANz PHIlANTHRoPY PARTNeRS HolSWoRTH WIlDlIFe Dr Natasha Lebas Animal Biology, ‘Population Dynamics Ecology and Viability of the Ornate Dragon Lizard Ctenophorus Ornatus’ — $6,000 (2009)

ARC DISCoVeRY PRoJeCTSProfessor Malcolm McCulloch, Assistant Professor Julie Trotter, Earth and Environment, ‘Ocean Acidification in a Rapidly Increasing CO2 World’ — $651,058 (2009-12)

ACCoUNTINg AND FINANCe ASSoCIATIoN oF AUSTRAlIA AND NeW zeAlAND (AFAANz)Assistant Professor Marvin Wee, Associate Professor Millicent Chang, UWA Business School, ‘Do Corporate Governance and Insider Trading Policy Affect the Information Content of Insider Trades’ — $8,080 (2009)Assistant Professor Victoria Clout, Professor Ann Tarca, UWA Business School, ‘An Evaluation of IFRS Impact Using the Earnings Return Relation’ — $6,335 (2009)

ADVANCeD geomeCHANICSResearch Associate Professor Christophe Gaudin, Professor David White, Offshore Foundations Systems (Centre for), ‘Advanced Geomechanics - Gorgon Stability - Centrifuge Modelling of Pipe Soil Interaction’ — $204,100 (2009)

AUSTRAlIAN ACADemY oF SCIeNCeDr Kioumars Ghamkhar, Legumes in Mediterranean Agriculture (Centre for), ‘Scientific Visits to Japan - Comparative Mapping in Subterranean and Red Clovers’ — $7,000 (2009)

AUSTRAlIAN INSTITUTe oF ABoRIgINAl AND ToRReS STRAIT ISlANDeR STUDIeSDr Christiane Keller, Social and Cultural Studies, ‘Visualising Sensory Experiences as Part of an Indigenous Aesthetic’ — $30,000 (2009)

CeNTRe D’eCologIe FoNCTIoNNelle eT eVolUTIVeDr Sandra (Sam) Saunders, Biomedical, Biomolecular and Chemical Sciences, ‘Chemical Profiling of Petrel Seabirds Volatiles Emissions’ — $6,194 (2009)

CHANNel 7 TeleTHoN TRUSTDr S Devadson, Paediatrics and Child Health, ‘Inhalation in Preterm Neonates - Evaluation of Optimal Particle Size and Inhalation Strategies Using in Vitro and ex Vivo Techniques’ — $122,316 (2009)Research Assistant Professor Janet Dunstan, Paediatrics and Child Health, ‘Epigenetic Effects of Folate in Pregnancy on the Epidetic increase of Asthma and Allergy’ — $61,158 (2009)

CHARleS DARWIN UNIVeRSITYProfessor Helen Wildy, Graduate School of Education, ‘Performance Indicators in Primary Schools PIPS’ — $179,695 (2009)

HeAlTH DePARTmeNT oF WAWinthrop Professor Christobel Saunders, Research Assistant Professor Claire Johnson, Research Assistant Professor Angela Ives, Surgery, ‘Literature Review for Cancer Care Pathway Development’ — $34,989 (2009)

IAN PoTTeR FoUNDATIoNResearch Assistant Professor Siobhan Reid, Sport Science, Exercise and Health, ‘Travel Grant - American Academy of Cerebral Palsy and Dev- elopmental Medicine’ — $2,000 (2009)

INSTITUTe oF TeCHNologY SlIgoResearch Associate Professor Christophe Gaudin, Offshore Foundations Systems (Centre for), ‘Institute of Technology Sligo - Dynamically Embedded Plate Anchors - DEPLA’ — $33,000 (2009)


UWA NEWS classified

14

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What’s more, we can also design it, create quality artwork and see the whole job through from start to finish.

See UniPrint too for all your copying and binding needs. UniPrint is your printer on campus.

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moNASH UNIVeRSITY eX ARC DISCoVeRY PRoJeCTSDr Jakob Madsen, Winthrop Professor Peter Robertson, UWA Business School, ‘Growth Trade and Economic Development in Asia’ — $102,000 (2009-11)

NHmRC SIR mACFARlANe BURNeT FelloWSHIPProfessor Barry Marshall, Biomedical, Biomolecular and Chemical Sciences, ‘Sir Macfarlane Burnet Fellowship - Marshall’ — (2009-13)

UWA ReSeARCH DeVeloPmeNT AWARD SCHemeMr Alexander Larcombe, UWA Centre for Child Health Research, ‘Rhinovirus Infection Results in Exacerbation of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) Symptoms in a Mouse Model of COPD’ — $14,805 (2010)Ms Anna Johansson, UWA Centre for Medical Research, ‘The Role of LIGHT in the Tumour Environment’ — $23,360 (2010)Dr Daniel Smale, Plant Biology, ‘Climate Change and Marine Biodiversity the Effects of Increased Temperature and Disturbance on Marine Biodiversity’ — $29,710 (2010)Associate Professor Mark Edele, Humanities, ‘Explaining the Instant Barbarization of Warfare at the German-Soviet Front in 1941’ — $32,000 (2010)Assistant Professor Joanne Sneddon, Office of the Registrar, ‘Predicting Ethical Consumers Intentions to Purchase Wool Apparel and their Willingness to Pay for Ethical Attributes’ — $4,537 (2010)Dr Megan Lloyd, Biomedical, Biomolecular and Chemical Sciences, ‘Assessment of Recent MCMV Isolates for Their Ability to Cross the Mouse Placenta and Infect Mice as a Model for HCMV Fetal Infection’ — $23,632 (2010)Dr Courtney Solheim, Plant Energy Biology (ARC Centre for), ‘Understanding Proteases in Plant Metabolic Function - the Targeted Isolation and Identification of Ion 1 Protease Interaction Partners in Arabidopsis’ — $23,243 (2010)Dr Veronica Poland, Plant Energy Biology (ARC Centre for), ‘Sexual Conflict in Honey Bees - The Molecular Response of Queens to Seminal Fluid’ — $23,741 (2010)Assistant Professor Elliot Wood, Psychology, ‘Using Blue Enriched White Light to Improve Alertness Performance and Sleep Quality of Shift Workers’ — $10,000 (2010)Mr Jason Fellman, Plant Biology, ‘Riverine Export of Organic Matter from Northwest Australia - Is Marine Carbon of Ancient Origin’ — $18,240 (2010)

Mr Peter Noble, Biomedical, Biomolecular and Chemical Sciences, ‘Relating Airway Hyper responsiveness in Vivo to Airway Narrowing in Vitro Using Precision Cut Lung Slices’ — $23,052 (2010)Mr Andrew Whitehouse, Psychology, ‘Is Foetal Testosterone Related to Autism Like Behaviours - A Study of Dizygotic Twins’ — $23,865 (2010)Dr Monika Murcha, Plant Energy Biology (ARC Centre for), ‘Characterisation of the Role of a Stress Inducible Transport Protein in the Mitochondrial Inner Membrane’ — $29,015 (2010)Dr Georgiana Kirkham, Humanities, ‘Virtue, Ethics Technology and the Environment: The Argument from Nature’ — $7,343 (2010)Assistant Professor Blaze Kwaymullina, Assistant Professor Ambelin Kwaymullina, Indigenous Studies, ‘Gathering the pieces: An Examination of records on the Palkyu people’ — $24,524 (2010)Dr Liam Brady, Social and Cultural Studies, ‘Rock-Art and social networks from the Inland Pilbara region (north-western Australia): collaborative investigations into Palyku visual heritage’ — $28,636 (2010)Dr David Barrie, Humanities, ‘Prosecution and punishment in the age of enlightenment: The Scottish experience, 1747-1787’ — $30,000 (2010)Dr Shayne Loft, Psychology, ‘The role of working memory in the execution of briefly delayed intentions’ — $16,000 (2010)Assistant Professor Martin Porr, Social and Cultural Studies, ‘North of the Southern Arc - Discovering the Pathways and Conditions for the Colonization of Australia’ — $35,982 (2010)Miss Estelle Giraud, Biomedical, Biomolecular and Chemical Sciences, ‘Characterisation of the Function and Regulation of the Stress Inducible Alternative Oxidase in Rice - a Monocot Plant Model Species’ — $20,387 (2010)Dr Vladimir Kapor, Humanities, ‘Archeofictions - Fiction and Archaeology in the Nineteenth Century - a Franco British Perspective’ — $14,000 (2010)Assistant Professor Steffen Wetzstein, Earth and Environment, ‘Brokers of Urban Transformations - Metropolitan Economic Governance and Business Elites in Australasia’ — $7,000 (2010)Dr Olivier Van Aken, Plant Energy Biology (ARC Centre for), ‘Characterisation of a Novel Palindromic DNA Motif Involved in Regulation of Mitochondrial Retrograde Signalling’ — $23,024 (2010)Assistant Professor Danijela Kambaskovic‑Sawers, Social and Cultural Studies, ‘Re Drawing the Literary Map 1250 to 1650 - The Sonnet Sequence as an Influence on the History of the Novel - Proof of Concept’ — $38,546 (2010)

In a campus emergency

dIal 2222Security staff will call the emergency services, direct them to you

and come to help you while waiting for their arrival.

It is more efficient and effective to dial 2222 than to call 000.

Ms Svetlana Baltic, CRC for Asthma and CAARR (Asthma, Allergy and Respiratory Rsrch), ‘Relevance of Different EP Receptor Subtypes to Airway Epithelial Cell Function’ — $15,000 (2010)Dr Daniela Baratieri, Humanities, ‘Mussolini’s Mad - Lunatic Asylums and the Confinement of Women in Fascist Italy’ — $20,000 (2010)Dr Adriano Scaffidi, Biomedical, Biomolecular and Chemical Sciences, ‘Investigations into the Mode of Action of Karrikin Germination Stimulants’ — $23,038 (2010)Assistant Professor Nada Eltaiba, Social and Cultural Studies, ‘Views of Muslim in Patients and Their Carers’ — $5,893 (2010)Dr Lisa Wood, Research Assistant Professor Hayley Christian, Population Health, ‘Childs Play - Exploration of the Factors that Encourage Play in Neighbourhood Parks and Playgrounds’ — $10,000 (2010)Dr Sandra Kahlau, Plant Energy Biology (ARC Centre for), ‘Characterisation of Chloroplast to Nucleus Signalling Pathways via the Chlorophyll Precurser ALA’ — $23,799 (2010)Dr Sam‑Ho Lee, UWA Business School, ‘Cross Country Differences in Redistribution Policy’ — $7,500 (2010)Ms Marianne Peters, Psychology, ‘Does Masculinity Signal Health during Adolescence - A Study of Health Testosterone and Masculinity in Adolescent Boys’ — $22,500 (2010)Associate Professor Daniel Franklin, Forensic Science (Centre for), ‘Excavation of Funerary

Monuments in Wadi Tifariti - Analysis and Interpretation of the Human Skeletal Remains’ — $12,048 (2010)Assistant Professor Wade Jarvis, UWA Business School, ‘Exploring the Impact of Different Alcohol Warning Statements on Young Consumers Choice Behaviour’ — $12,000 (2010)Dr Bahareh Badrian, Medicine and Pharmacology, ‘Micro RNA as a Diagnostic and Therapeutical Tool in Malignant Mesothelioma’ — $12,000 (2010)Dr Tak Sum Cheng, Surgery, ‘TNF Like Core Domain of RANKL Exhibit Therapeutic Potential for the Treatment of Osteoporosis’ — $24,500 (2010)Dr Keith Giles, Ms Priscilla Zhang, UWA Centre for Medical Research, ‘Modulation of Erlotinib Resistance in Pancreatic Cancer Cells with microRNA’ — $24,243 (2010)Dr Anna Kemp, Dr Jonathon Ng, Population Health, ‘Does Treatment of Age-Related Macular Degeneration with Intravitreal Injection of Vascular Endothelial Growth Factor Inhibitors Increase Arterial Thromboembolic Events’ — $29,579 (2010)Ms Nicole Patten, Environmental Systems Engineering, ‘Control of ocean productivity by marine viruses’ — $24,400 (2010)Dr Amanda Cleaver, Medicine and Pharmacology, ‘Examining the role of the inhibitory ligand PD-L2 in suppression of anti-tumour immune responses in mesothelioma’ — $27,420 (2010)Dr Gianina Ravenscroft, UWA Centre for Medical Research, ‘Preliminary Investigations into Viral Therapy for Skeletal Muscle a-actin Disease’ — $25,015 (2010)

RESEARCH GRANTS AND CONTRACTS

continued


UWA NEWS classified

Coordination Disorder’ — $25,456 (2010)Dr Britta Bienen, Offshore Foundations Systems (Centre for), ‘A Load Capacity Model for the Foundations of Mobile Offshore Platforms on Clay Relevant to the Offshore Industry’ — $29,355 (2010)Dr John Fitzpatrick, Animal Biology, ‘Inbreeding avoidance through sperm selection in guppies’ — $28,756 (2010)Dr Vera Biermann, Environmental Systems Engineering, ‘Impact of Contemporary Geochemical Processes in the Vadose Zone and in the Hyporheic Zone on Acidification in the Dalyup Catchment’ — $17,818 (2010)Dr Peter Peeling, Sport Science, Exercise and Health, ‘Effect of hyperoxic gas inhalation on post-exercise inflammatory and haemolytic responses’ — $16,350 (2010)Dr Noel Boylan, Offshore Foundations Systems (Centre for), ‘Penetrometer Based Design for Offshore Jack-Up Rig Foundations’ — $21,000 (2010)Dr Rachel Standish, Plant Biology, ‘Can belowground mutualisms influence competitive interactions among plant species?’ — $23,210 (2010)Assistant Professor Daniela Ciancio, Civil and Resource Engineering, ‘Characterisation of Stabilised Rammed Earth: Influence of Soil Grade, Cement Content and Water Content in the Material Strength and Durability’ — $27,999 (2010)Dr Edward Cripps, Mathematics and Statistics, ‘Understanding the Dynamics of Learning Behaviour in

the Presence of Spiralling Effects: A Bayesian Approach using Mixtures- of-Random-Effects’ — $10,500 (2010)Assistant Professor Ionat Zurr, Anatomy and Human Biology, ‘Animating semi-living: Muscle actuators as cultural evocative objects’ — $25,196 (2010)Dr James Doherty, Civil and Resource Engineering, ‘Fabrication of Centrifuge Scale Pressuremeter’ — $15,000 (2010)Dr Muhammad Hossain, Offshore Foundations Systems (Centre for), ‘Innovative Mechanism-Based Design Approach and Mitigative Perforation Drilling for Safe Installation of Jack-Up Spudcan Foundations in Complex Multi-Layered Soils’ — $29,949 (2010)Associate Professor Defeng Huang, Electrical, Electronic, Comp Engineering, ‘Building a Digital Signal Processing Platform for High-Speed Underwater Acoustic Communications’ — $30,916 (2010)Dr Ajmal Mian, Computer Science and Software Engineering, ‘Automatic Construction of 3D Deformable Fish Models for Biomass Measurement and Identification’ — $28,087 (2010)Dr Renaud Merle, Earth and Environment, ‘Combined U-Pb, O and Hf Isotope Study of Granites from New England Fold Belt (Eastern Australia): Implications to Growth of Continental Crust’ — $20,350 (2010)Assistant Professor Thomas Stemler, Mathematics and Statistics, ‘Toward Reliable Statistics from Climate Models’ — $24,000 (2010)Dr Jian Wu, Mechanical Engineering, ‘The Role of the Surface of Articular Cartilage in Maintaining Cartilage Matrix Integrity and Healthy Joints’ — $13,500 (2010)

UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY EX ARC LINKAGE PROJECTSDr Hala Zreiqat, Dr Peter Pivonka, Professor Kenneth Johnson, Computer Science and Software Engineering, ‘Scaffolds for Bone Tissue Regeneration and Use in Orthopaedic Applications’ — $25,564 (2010)UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN MADISON EX NIHProfessor Paul Attwood, Biomedical, Biomolecular and Chemical Sciences, ‘University of Wisconsin Madison ex NIH - The Structure and Function of Pyruvate Carboxylase’ — $83,039 (2009)WHEATBELT DEVELOPMENT COMMISSIONProfessor Matthew Tonts, Mrs Helen Pelusey, Earth and Environment, ‘ Industrial Workforce Attraction’ — $18,500 (2009)

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Friday 30 October 20096.00pm – 7.45pm

Cocktail reception from 7pmThe University Club AuditoriumUniversity of Western Australia

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When life is not plain sailing ...

The Employee Assistance Program offers free confi dential counselling to UWA staff & immediate family, for personal or work problems.

To arrange an appointment contact one of the following service providers

PPC Worldwide

Level 16, 251 Adelaide Tce, PerthTel 1300 361 008 (24hrs)Web www.au.ppcworldwide.com

UWA Counselling & Psychological Service

2nd Floor, South Wing, Guild Village Tel +61 8 6488 2423 (Offi ce Hours)Web www.counselling.uwa.edu.au

For further information on the UWA Employee Assistance Program seewww.safety.uwa.edu.au/policies/eap

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Ms Amy Samuels, UWA Centre for Child Health Research, ‘Metabolomic Analysis of Glucocorticoid Resistance in T-Cell Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia’ — $24,263 (2010)Dr Dirk Saarloos, Population Health, ‘Measuring the Impacts of the Built Environment on Health in Older Adults’ — $10,000 (2010)Dr Kris Waddington, Marine Futures (Centre for), ‘The role of bait in marine ecosystem processes in Western Australia’ — $16,014 (2010)Dr Katherine Thompson, UWA Centre for Child Health Research, ‘Transcriptome Sequencing to Identify Novel Gene Fusions in a Rare, Aggressive Carcinoma’ — $28,198 (2010)Research Assistant Professor Natalie Ward, Medicine and Pharmacology, ‘Development and Application of an LCMS Method to Analyse CYP450 Metabolites or Arachidonic Acid in Cell Culture and Biological Samples’ — $29,250 (2010)Dr Kim Carter, UWA Centre for Child Health Research, ‘The relationship between childhood infections and clinically significant atherosclerosis in adulthood: a retrospective study of hospital-based morbidity using linked data’ — $10,500 (2010)Mr Guicheng Zhang, Paediatrics and Child Health, ‘Investigating the Confounding Effects of Population Admixture on Gene by Environment Interactions with Asthmatic Phenotypes in Karelians’ — $15,000 (2010)Dr Melissa Licari, Sport Science, Exercise and Health, ‘The Neural Mechanisms of Motor overflow in children with Developmental


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UWA NEWS

Professor Peter QuinnDirector, International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research (ICRAR)

At the recent launch of ICRAR, Premier Colin Barnett described the Square Kilometre Array project as being “up there with putting man on the moon.”

And there are obvious comparisons to building a spacecraft – from the development of bright ideas to the final working observatory.

The launch of the International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research is, in the famous words associated with putting man on the Moon, ‘a giant leap for mankind’ in the direction of one of the world’s greatest science projects, the Square Kilometre Array.

With New Zealand now joining Australia in the international bid for the world’s largest radio telescope project, the centre will draw together astronomers from around the world to drive the research aims of the SKA.

The impact of this project and its potential cannot be over-estimated. But it will need the commitment of Governments, and scientists, for decades and perhaps generations, not just the next few years of the political cycle.

The design and construction of the SKA radio telescope will create a single scientific machine capable of studying the first objects to shine in the Universe, the very beginnings of the cosmic avalanche of growth that resulted in mankind some 13 billion years later.

The strengths of the Australia-NZ position are threefold. One, we have in Western Australia one of the world’s best radio astronomy sites – the ‘radio-quiet’ Midwest region. The agreement with New Zealand means the antennae and other devices could span from WA to New Zealand, substantially increasing the clarity of the radio images produced.

Two, the world’s best radio survey telescope (the Australian SKA pathfinder or ASKAP) will be built on that site by CSIRO utilising $110m in Federal funding. ASKAP will be operational in 2012.

Three, two major international centres will be built to support the project.

The $80 million federally-funded Pawsey Centre for High Performance Computing and SKA Science, launched this month by the Federal Minister Kim Carr, will handle the vast amounts of data to be generated by the Australian SKA Pathfinder and other telescopes on the Murchison Radioastronomy Observatory.

In its first six hours, the ASKAP (the Australian SKA Pathfinder) is expected to generate more data than all of the other radio telescopes in the world combined. The SKA produces more data per day than is produced by the entire population of planet Earth each year.

ICRAR will ensure Australia is leading international research efforts, will enhance our nation’s scientific reputation, enable the

A giant leap at the start of a long journey

development of leading technologies and have positive financial benefits for Australia.

The SKA is a project for the future. It will take more than 15 years to build and will be the leading edge of radio astronomy for the next 50 years, beyond the term of Governments and even the future of our children.

Federal Minister Kim Carr has been a champion of the project and State Premier Colin Barnett and West Australian Science and Innovation Minister Troy Buswell have been consistent supporters and advocates.

Minister Carr said that if our bid was successful, the SKA would significantly increase Australia’s and New Zealand’s scientific capabilities, and result in economic benefits in areas including supercomputing, data transmission, renewable energy, construction and manufacturing.

The SKA will have up to 4,000 antennae spread over a 5,000 kilometre baseline to create a single deep space listening device.

Most will be concentrated in outback Western Australia, along with a series of remote ‘array stations’ positioned in a spiral configuration radiating out over thousands of kilometres.

Array stations in New Zealand will see the baseline of the SKA extend from 3,000 to 5,000 kilometres. This will result in an almost doubling of the telescope’s resolution.

Astronomers world-wide are now working hard on the SKA project. We need to raise the funds, design the facility, perfect the radio technology and work with industry to build a new scale of computing and data resources.

2012 is not the end of the journey. It is the beginning.

ICRAR is a collaboration between Curtin University of Technology, UWA and the State Government.


uwa news...uwa news 21 september 2009 volume 28 number 14in this issue p3 spring graduations p5 free...

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