Digital Commons Network^™

Evaluation Of Renewable Energy Generation And Storage For Industrial Buildings, Craig Pickup

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

This research focuses on the financial aspects of the underutilised industrial renewable energy generation and storage market in Australia, where the developed methodology is applied to two distribution warehouses and a large energy consuming manufacturer. Throughout Australia the residential and utility scale renewable energy market is booming, however the industrial market has been lagging behind at a fraction of the residential generation capacity in 2020. This lack of uptake in the industrial market is attributed to perceived costs and lack of industry knowledge. This research simplifies the results of solar PV and energy storage design into key financial metrics that …

The Effect Of Type 2 Diabetes Risk Communication And Risk Perception On Health Behaviour Intentions In A Substance Dependence Population, Choon Wee Melvin Goh

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

Background: The risk and burden of diabetes is greatest among vulnerable populations such as people living with mental health and substance use disorders. However, there is a paucity of research examining Type 2 diabetes (T2D) risk in this population. There is a wealth of research in health risk communication which suggest the effectiveness of message framing and tailored risk feedback; however, little is known about their potential utility when used concurrently for T2D prevention in people with substance use problems.

Methods: Study 1 was a systematic review, comprised of 5 empirical studies, that examined health risk communication in people who …

Neural Architecture Search For Image Segmentation And Classification, Sui Paul Ang

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

Deep learning (DL) is a class of machine learning algorithms that relies on deep neural networks (DNNs) for computations. Unlike traditional machine learning algorithms, DL can learn from raw data directly and effectively. Hence, DL has been successfully applied to tackle many real-world problems. When applying DL to a given problem, the primary task is designing the optimum DNN. This task relies heavily on human expertise, is time-consuming, and requires many trial-and-error experiments.

This thesis aims to automate the laborious task of designing the optimum DNN by exploring the neural architecture search (NAS) approach. Here, we propose two new NAS …

Contributions To Lattice–Based Cryptography, Quoc Huy Le

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

Post–quantum cryptography (PQC) is a new and fast–growing part of Cryptography. It focuses on developing cryptographic algorithms and protocols that resist quantum adversaries (i.e., the adversaries who have access to quantum computers). To construct a new PQC primitive, a designer must use a mathematical problem intractable for the quantum adversary. Many intractability assumptions are being used in PQC. There seems to be a consensus in the research community that the most promising are intractable/hard problems in lattices. However, lattice–based cryptography still needs more research to make it more efficient and practical. The thesis contributes toward achieving either the novelty or …

Do As/Nzs Respiratory Protection Standards For Filter Penetration Ensure That Worker Health Is Protected Against Nanoparticle Sized Diesel Particulate Matter?, Kerrie Anne Burton

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

Australian workers are exposed to emissions from diesel engines in a variety of workplaces. Diesel particulate matter (DPM) has the potential to cause serious health impacts for exposed workers, including lung cancer, irritation, and adverse cardiovascular effects. Personal respiratory protective devices (RPD) are a common control measure to mitigate worker exposure from the damaging health impacts of DPM, and to protect against these adverse impacts they need to act as effective filters.

The filtering efficiency (FE) of RPD in current standards is determined by challenging the filter media with specified test aerosols, to calculate the penetration at designated flow rates. …

Knowledge Distillation And Continual Learning For Optimized Deep Neural Networks, Vu Minh Hieu Phan

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

Over the past few years, deep learning (DL) has been achieving state-of-theart performance on various human tasks such as speech generation, language translation, image segmentation, and object detection. While traditional machine learning models require hand-crafted features, deep learning algorithms can automatically extract discriminative features and learn complex knowledge from large datasets. This powerful learning ability makes deep learning models attractive to both academia and big corporations.

Despite their popularity, deep learning methods still have two main limitations: large memory consumption and catastrophic knowledge forgetting. First, DL algorithms use very deep neural networks (DNNs) with many billion parameters, which have a …

Investigating The Relationship Between Post-Injury Occupational Change And Persistent Occupational Identity: A Mixed Methodological Study Combining Quantitative Analysis Of A Survey Of Adult Australians With Qualitative Analysis Of Interviews With Truck Drivers Who Have Experienced Occupational Change, Ross Girdler

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

The literature regarding occupational change indicates that identification with one occupation can present a barrier to making the change to another. Rehabilitation Counsellors are often given the responsibility of assisting individuals to make that change, usually through vocational counselling. The principles which underpin the conduct of vocational counselling commonly do not include consideration of the effect of persistent occupational identity on occupational change. While the concept of occupational identity has been the topic of extensive research for several decades there is no consensus regarding its definition, or how it is different from related concepts and very limited research into how …

Specification Of Dorsal Root Ganglia Sensory Neuron Subpopulations Derived From Human Pluripotent Stem Cells, Amy Jane Hulme

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

The detection of sensations is essential for everyday functions and requires specialised dorsal root ganglia (DRG) sensory neurons to detect and transmit the stimuli to the central nervous system for processing. The DRG sensory neurons can be broadly classified as either (1) proprioceptors (that detect movement, muscle pressure, and tension), (2) low threshold mechanoreceptors (LTMRs) (that detect touch, hair deflection, and vibration) or (3) nociceptors (that detect pain arising from harmful thermal, mechanical, and chemical stimuli). Unfortunately, there are major challenges in studying sensory perception and disease, including the difficulty in acquiring human tissue samples and the limitations in the …

Assessment Of Potential Rooftop Solar Pv Electricity At A Suburban Scale, And A Comparative Analysis Based On Topographical Obstruction And Seasonality, Alok Singh

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

Long-term climate change mitigation calls for a switch from the current global non-renewable energy system to low greenhouse gas (GHG) emission energy solutions. Many nations have started adopting energy-efficient technology as part of their climate change programs and the built environment has been identified as a key lever for reducing emissions linked to energy efficiency. Building rooftop photovoltaic (PV) system is an effective technology to reduce emissions through the use of solar energy. In recent years, rooftop PV systems have become the main source of solar-generated energy, and forecasting their output is critical when assessing a site's PV energy potential. …

Research On Information Flow Topology For Connected Autonomous Vehicles, Yan Yan

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

Information flow topology plays a crucial role in connected autonomous vehicles (CAVs). It describes how CAVs communicate and exchange information with each other. It predominantly affects the platoon's performance, including the convergence time, robustness, stability, and scalability. It also dramatically affects the controller design of CAVs. Therefore, studying information flow topology is necessary to ensure the platoon's stability and improve its performance. Advanced sliding mode controllers and optimisation strategies for information flow topology are investigated in this project.

Firstly, the impact of information flow topology on the platoon is studied regarding tracking ability, fuel economy and driving comfort. A Pareto …

A Study Of Discrete And Integral Transforms With Logarithmic Separable Kernels, Thomas Futcher

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

In this thesis, we will be examining different classes of discrete and integral transforms. We start with a general class of integral transforms which include those logarithmic separable kernels. Transforms with logarithmic separable kernels include the Fourier transform, the Laplace transform and the Mellin transform. The shifting and convolution properties for this class of transforms are examined, and sufficient conditions which guarantee the existence of the convolution formula will be given. It will be shown that a subclass of these integral operators are injective and an inversion formula will be presented on some class of continuously differentiable functions. We will …

Protecting Micro-Data Privacy: The Moment-Based Density Estimation Method And Its Application, Bradley Wakefield

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

Privacy concerns pertaining to the release of confidential micro-level information are increasingly relevant to organisations and institutions. Controlling the dissemination of disclosure-prone micro-data by means of suppression, aggregation and perturbation techniques often entails different levels of effectiveness and drawbacks depending on the context and properties of the data.

In this dissertation, we briefly review existing disclosure control methods for microdata and undertake a study demonstrating the applicability of micro-data methods to proportion data. This is achieved by using the sample size efficiency related to a simple hypothesis test for a fixed significance level and power, as a measure of statistical …

The Role Of The Enrolled Nurse In The Australian Nursing Workforce: A Mixed Methods Study, Rebecca Jane Leon

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

Background The enrolled nurse (EN) is the second-level regulated nursing role in Australia. It was designed to support and assist the registered nurse (RN) role by providing more hands-on, practical bedside nursing care. Despite many reports and research papers indicating that this role is integral to the nursing workforce, persistent challenges have been identified. Exploring the role of the EN will provide a greater understanding through the perspective of the EN as an individual, as a member of the nursing team and within the hospital or facility and the nursing profession. This will inform the development of strategies to address …

Scanner Specific Uncertainty Of Quantitative Mri: Assessing Consistency For Clinical Implementation, Madeline E. Carr

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

In the past, many of the steps involved in the radiotherapy workflow have been heavily reliant on X-ray based anatomical imaging. Incorporating additional imaging modalities in this workflow has been shown to be promising. This includes aiding in generating and modifying a patient’s treatment regimen and also helping determine a patient’s response to treatment. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is one of these modalities which can provide both enhanced soft-tissue anatomical images and supplementary information relating to changes in tissue physiology (which occurs at a faster rate than anatomical changes). Quantitative imaging biomarkers (QIBs), derived from quantitative MRI (qMRI) techniques, are …

The Black Summer Bushfires In The Eurobodalla Shire; The Role Of The Local Newspaper In Framing The Event And Experience, Katarina Culic

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

This thesis focuses on the Black Summer bushfires that occurred in the Eurobodalla Shire, which is located on the South Coast of New South Wales, Australia (NSW). The bushfires experienced in the Eurobodalla were a significant part of the devastating nation-wide bushfire season experienced across Australia, which has since become colloquially named as ‘Black Summer’. The Black Summer bushfires are the most recent of many other severe, ‘black’ bushfire events in Australia’s recorded history.1 Although Australia is familiar with severe bushfires due to its history, climate and ecology, the Black Summer bushfires have been labelled by mainstream media, politicians, and …

The Exhibition Of Indigenous Art As Contemporary Art, 1989-2015, Iris Bendor

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

Indigenous art first received widespread attention in the contemporary art world in the 1980s, when major institutions expanded their collections of it, and Indigenous curators were appointed at state museums and galleries. Ever since, Australian Indigenous art has been gradually accepted as a cultural practice in the public and institutionalised sphere. This shift bridged contemporary Indigenous and Western cultural domains, nonetheless, Indigenous art was a type of art that the West has been largely resistant to admitting as contemporary art. This thesis explores the relationship between the contemporary art world and Indigenous art from remote Australia. It argues that the …

Exploring The Effectiveness Of The Interpersonal Theory Of Suicide In Youth Suicide Prevention, Atanas Janackovski

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

Suicide is the primary cause of death among adolescents in Australia, and it continues to be a significant cause of mortality globally, with rates on the rise. The Interpersonal Theory of Suicide (ITS) posits that thwarted belongingness (low-belongingness) and perceived burdensomeness (burdensomeness) lead to suicide desire, and hopelessness moderates the intensity of the wish to die. Acquired capability (capability) is theorised to moderate the relationship between these factors and suicide desire, and is positively associated with resoluteness to enact a lethal suicide attempt. While the ITS posits that capability heightens the risk of lethal suicidal behaviour, the theory suggests that …

Assessing The Factors Which Determine The Effectiveness Of Ohs Regulation In The Era Of Globalisation And Neoliberalism: A Case Study Of Bangladesh's Ready-Made Garment (Rmg) Industry, Asm Anam Ullah

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

Globalisation is a power-driven force serving the vested interests of a group of people. More precisely, it is the extension of the capitalist mode of production and deregulation, where international firms operate their trade and business without much government interference. Transnational corporations' expansion of capital in developing countries has played a crucial role in the rise of globalisation since the 1980s. The Bangladesh Ready-Made Garment (RMG) industry's development has occurred in the tidal flow of globalisation and neoliberalism, which began in the 1980s.

The Government of Bangladesh and the RMG factory owners and managers seldom lead national policy development to …

Essays On Firm-Level Climate Change Disclosure, Dong Ding

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

This thesis on climate change disclosures comprises three empirical studies in which computerised textual analysis is used to develop a climate change disclosure score linked to asset pricing, analyst forecasts, and carbon emissions from the different perspectives of investors, analysts, and corporate management in capital markets.

The first study examines the role of climate change disclosures in predicting stock returns. I find that a long-short trading portfolio sorted on climate change disclosures earns an annualised risk-adjusted return of 9.11% and 6.96% in Australia and the US respectively, after controlling for common risk factors. The Fama-MacBeth regressions consistently show that climate …

Development Of Redox-Gel Electrolyte For Wearable Thermocells, Yuetong Zhou

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

The thermo-electrochemical cells (TECs, known as thermocells) provide a new potential for self-powered devices by converting heat energy into electricity through redox reactions driven by the presence of a temperature gradient. Among multiple power sources, human body heat has attracted the attention in last decades due to its continuously releasing heat energy. For harvesting body waste heat, the wearable thermocell is urgent to develop, where the gel electrolyte is the most essential component. Wearable thermocell devices could be twisted or stretched during realistic applications, therefore flexible gel-based solid-state electrolytes are the ideal candidate to avoid the leakage issue and maintain …

Creating New Mof-Based Interfaces For Electrocatalytic Co2 Reduction, Lisha Jia

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

Metal-organic frameworks (MOFs)-based materials is a promising candidate as electrolycatalysts for energy conversion. MOF-derived materials have been widely employed as catalysts for overall water splitting, benefiting from MOF precursors’ unique porous structure, large surface area, and adjustable morphology/thickness, etc. Also, MOFs work well as desirable catalysts for mainly CO and formate production in electrochemical CO₂ reduction reaction (CO₂RR). Cu-based MOFs acting as catalysts have demonstrated great potential for producing formate. In this thesis, one MOF-derived catalyst and two MOFs catalysts were designed and prepared for water splitting and CO₂RR. The thesis provided strategies to boost …

Surrogate Accountability In Humanitarian Aid: A Critical Examination Of The Vulnerability Assessment Framework For Syrian Refugees In Jordan, Jwana Jireis

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

Purpose: The global refugee crisis affects an estimated 32.5 million refugees worldwide. However, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) estimated budget of USD10 billion in 2022 and 2023 to cover the basic needs of all refugees is only funded at 50-53% from international donors (UNHCR 2023a). This problem of limited resources forces humanitarian aid organisations to make critical decisions about the allocation of funds and services to refugee communities. Thus, the humanitarian aid context is infused with unequal and competing interests since the decisions made can significantly impact the lives of individuals and communities, raising questions of accountability. …

Cuntz-Krieger Algebras Associated To Self-Similar Groupoids, Isnie Yusnitha

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

In this thesis, we study self-similar actions of groupoids on row-finite directed graphs and their associated Cuntz-Krieger algebras. Roughly speaking, if for all scales of parts of the object reiterate the whole, then the object is self-similar. For algebraic objects such as groups or groupoids that have this self-similarity property, we simply call them selfsimilar groups or self-similar groupoids. As an illustration of this self-similarity property, we recall the addition algorithm of integers that we learned from primary school, there is a so-called carrying operation that takes place to deal with addition of larger integers. Analogous to this carrying operation …

Targets Coverage And Data Computation In Energy Harvesting Iot Networks, Longji Zhang

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

To date, a wide range of industries leverage the Internet of Things (IoT) to improve efficiency and productivity. Briefly, an IoT network consists of wireless sensor devices that are used to monitor an environment, provide coverage, or collect data of targets. The collected data can then be processed before it is uploaded to a sink/gateway or the cloud to be used by various applications. The full potential of IoT, however, is limited by a number of issues. First, most IoT networks are designed for a specific application. This motivates the use of virtualization technologies, where the same network substrate runs …

Abductive Design Of Bdi Agent-Based Digital Twins Of Organizations, Ahmad Ali Meqbel Alelaimat

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

For a Digital Twin - a precise, virtual representation of a physical counterpart - of a human-like system to be faithful and complete, it must appeal to a notion of anthropomorphism (i.e., attributing human behaviour to non-human entities) to imitate (1) the externally visible behaviour and (2) the internal workings of that system. Although the Belief-Desire-Intention (BDI) paradigm was not developed for this purpose, it has been used successfully in human modeling applications. In this sense, we introduce in this thesis the notion of abductive design of BDI agent-based Digital Twins of organizations, which builds on two powerful reasoning disciplines: …

What Is The Relationship Between Professional Registration, Identity And Professionalisation In Australian Paramedics?, Buchanan Christopher Reed

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

This dissertation examines the relationship between identity, professionalism and regulation in Australian paramedics. This project specifically focuses on the period during the transition to national registration of paramedics in Australia. Paramedicine has existed in some form in Australia for almost a century and a half with origin in 19th century military and civil ambulance corps. Major reforms in the latter half of the 20th century led to the advent of “modern” paramedicine and seen the profession grow exponentially in size, scope and complexity. University education for paramedics was introduced in Australia in the mid-1990s. Advanced medical skills considered ground-breaking in …

Intentional And Unintentional Task-Unrelated Thought: Separable Associations And Outcomes In The Lab And Daily Life, Maryann Barrington

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

Mind wandering is a ubiquitous experience, which encompasses many different types of thought. Task-unrelated thought (TUT) is a commonly studied type of mind wandering and refers to thoughts which occur during the completion of an ongoing task, but which are unrelated to that ongoing task. Importantly, these TUTs can be engaged either intentionally or unintentionally and there is a growing body of evidence which documents and supports these types of TUTs as being meaningfully different in terms of their underpinning mechanisms, their phenomenological experience, and their outcomes. It is necessary to continue to study and document their differences, as this …

Acoustic Propagation Variation With Temperature Profile In Water Filled Steel Pipes At Pressure, John Eugene Hough

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

Conventional pressure leak testing of buried pipelines compares measurements of pressure with pipe wall temperature. An alternative proposed method uses acoustic velocity measurements to replace pipe wall temperature measurements. Early experiments using this method identified anomalous results of rising acoustic velocities thought to be caused by air solution.

This research investigated the anomalous acoustic velocity measurements by evaluation of acoustic velocity variation with pressure, temperature and air solution. Quiescent air solution rate experiments were carried out in water filled pipes. Computer modelling of the air bubble shape variation with pipe diameter was found to agree with bubble and drop experiments …

Development, Implementation And Evaluation Of The Acceptability And Feasibility Of A Shared Cancer Follow-Up Model Of Care, Tiffany Sandell

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

Background The increasing incidence of cancer, coupled with improved survivorship, has increased the demand for cancer follow-up care and the need to find alternative models of care. International and national guidelines advocate for including general practitioners (GP) in cancer follow-up care. Barriers to implementing shared care into practice include having clinical assessment protocols for GPs, and suitable health technology to allow two-way communication to enable oncologists to continue overseeing care. To address these barriers, this thesis aimed to develop and implement a novel shared cancer follow-up model of care, and evaluate the model's acceptability and feasibility to patients, GPs and …

Digital, Multimodal Composition In English For Architects And Civil Engineers Programs: Implications For Theory And Practice In Educational Semiotics, Anne Frances Jaensch Hellwig

University of Wollongong Thesis Collection 2017+

The applied disciplines of architecture and civil engineering (A&CE) require students to communicate multimodally and to manipulate meaning across media and modes. In their disciplinary studies for example, students must be able to transform the language of lectures and textbooks into diagrams; in their future workplaces, to transform reports into floor plans and 3D models. Such multimodal literacy, however, is not typically reflected in their related subject-specific English language courses, which are aimed at civil engineering and architecture track students for whom English is a second or additional language (L2). Rather than incorporating multimodal literacy skills, these courses tend to …