Digital Commons Network^™

Deriving Statistical Inference From The Application Of Artificial Neural Networks To Clinical Metabolomics Data, Kevin M. Mendez

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

Metabolomics data are complex with a high degree of multicollinearity. As such, multivariate linear projection methods, such as partial least squares discriminant analysis (PLS-DA) have become standard. Non-linear projections methods, typified by Artificial Neural Networks (ANNs) may be more appropriate to model potential nonlinear latent covariance; however, they are not widely used due to difficulty in deriving statistical inference, and thus biological interpretation. Herein, we illustrate the utility of ANNs for clinical metabolomics using publicly available data sets and develop an open framework for deriving and visualising statistical inference from ANNs equivalent to standard PLS-DA methods.

Development, Assessment And Application Of A Novel Algorithm To Automatically Detect Change Of Direction Movement And Quantify Its Associated Mechanical Load In Elite Australian Football, Aaron Balloch

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

The ability to change direction rapidly and efficiently is critical to team-sport performance, including Australian football (AF), where a player’s capacity to rapidly decelerate, move laterally and re-accelerate is critical when evading opponents, tackling, or reacting to the unpredictable bounce of the ball or movement of another player. The biomechanical loading requirements of change of direction (COD) movement are angle and velocity dependant. Cumulative COD movement can impart high levels of neuromuscular and metabolic fatigue which can adversely affect the efficiency of subsequent movement efforts. Despite widespread use of microtechnology devices (the vast majority containing a global navigation satellite system …

Digital Storytelling As An Astronomy Disciplinary Literacy Enhancement Approach For Adolescent Kyrgyzstani Efl Students, Nadezhda Chubko

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

This research explored the impact of a digital storytelling (DST) video-making intervention in an astronomy course (STEM-A) on EFL students’ STEM-A disciplinary literacy acquisition in English. The research was motivated by the increased significance of English as an international language of STEM instruction and addressed the transition between discourses encountered by students learning STEM in a foreign language.

The study was designed and implemented as a mixed methods four-cycle action research with multiple Case Study, multiple-probe quasi-experimental design. In the first cycle, the researcher transitioned from a teacher of English to speakers of other languages (TESOL) to a teacher of …

Characterising Pd-L1 Expression In Circulating Melanoma And Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer Cells, Isaac Spencer

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

Incidence rates for both melanoma and non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) have risen in recent decades. While advanced cases of both diseases have previously demonstrated low survivability, novel therapies such as immune checkpoint inhibitors, have significantly improved the outcome of patients suffering from these cancers. Recent clinical trials have led to the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approving the use of antibodies targeting the PD-1 immune checkpoint for both melanoma and NSCLC. Anti-PD-1 antibodies have been seen to illicit responses in up to 40% of patients, however, particularly for melanoma, there is a lack of biomarkers to select …

Effects Of High-Intensity Position-Specific Drills On Physical And Technical-Skill Performance In Young Soccer Players, Cao Cuong Le

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

Soccer is the most widely played sport in the world, and physical preparation for soccer players has been extensively researched over the years. As the average intensity of a soccer match is close to 80-90% of maximal heart rate (HRmax), it is necessary to train at or above this intensity. Thus, high-intensity interval running and small-sided games are often used to improve aerobic capacity and repeated sprint ability (RSA). However, neither of these approaches consider positional variations in the frequency and type of specific technical skills required in real match situations. Thus, the purpose of this study was to investigate …

Exploring Leadership And Research In Nurse Practitioner Roles Across Australia And Ireland: A Mixed-Methods Study, Mary Ryder

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

Introduction

The Nurse Practitioner role is recognised as the highest level of clinical nursing. Leadership and research are identified as core attributes for Nurse Practitioners in the regulatory frameworks. There is an expectation that as clinical leaders, Nurse Practitioners have the ability to transform healthcare delivery within their specialist area of practice.

Background

The voice of Nurse Practitioners is limited in the current literature related to how they view their leadership contribution to Nursing. There has been some criticism in the evidence to date related to volume, consistency and transferability of Nurse Practitioner research. However, there is a shortage of …

Determining Ground-Level Composition And Concentration Of Particulate Matter Across Regional Areas Using The Himawari-8 Satellite, Miles Sowden

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

Speciated ground-level aerosol concentrations are required to understand and mitigate health impacts from dust storms, wildfires and other aerosol emissions. Globally, surface monitoring is limited due to cost and infrastructure demands. While remote sensing can help estimate respirable (i.e. ground level) concentrations, current observations are restricted by inadequate spatiotemporal resolution, uncertainty in aerosol type, particle size, and vertical profile. One key issue with current remote sensing datasets is that they are derived from reflectances observed by polar orbiting imagers, which means that aerosol is only derived during the daytime, and only once or twice per day.

Sub-hourly, infrared (IR), geostationary …

Adolescents With Autism Spectrum Disorder: Understanding The Influence Of Psychosocial Risk Factors And Mothers’ Help-Seeking Behaviour On The Experience Of Depressive Symptoms, Rachel Gallagher

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

Research has shown that adolescents with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) are at an increased risk for experiencing depressive symptoms (DS) resulting in poor quality of life and further vulnerability for the recurrence of DS in adulthood. Adolescence is a complex developmental period marked by dynamic social contexts that must be effectively navigated for the maturation processes associated with psychological wellbeing. This period is particularly challenging for individuals with ASD due to deficits in social communication skills leading to atypical social functioning. Consequently, psychosocial risk factors of DS for ASD adolescents are likely to be multiple and complex, and prominent risk …

I Walk To See, I Walk To Know: Walking To Wongawol. An Exhibition And I Walk To See, I Walk To Know: Walking To Wongawol. An Exegesis, Cim Sears

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

The context of my embodied project, I Walk to See, I Walk to Know: Walking to Wongawol, is an exploration into 1) the absence of Western Desert Aboriginal narratives via the act of walking as knowing and 2) my recently discovered ancestral connections, which were historically erased by the state. The location of my project is Wongawol Station in the Western Desert, Western Australia, where my Indigenous ancestors lived, and whose lives I draw upon to make connections with the narratives and sensations of the desert landscape. I use the methodology of walking to investigate the interconnectivity between body and …

A Study On Performing The Hungarian Rhapsodies In The Liszt Tradition, Nicholas Mark Williams

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

Franz Liszt’s Hungarian Rhapsodies (1851, 1853) have long been among the most popular collections of piano music. They have also long garnered a reputation for “superficial brilliance and effect” which seems to have influenced the way that famous pianists play the works in public. But would a performer immersed in the Liszt tradition have approached them differently? This dissertation aims to promote a re-evaluation of the Hungarian Rhapsodies from this perspective: considering Liszt’s own ideas on music and performance, the writings and recordings of his pupils, and Liszt’s book Des Bohémiens et de leur musique en Hongrie (1859).

Generation 1.5 Learners: Using An Arts-Informed, Grounded Theory Approach To Understanding How These Students Managed Their Undergraduate Studies In A Perth-Based, Public University In Western Australia Over An Academic Year, Elizabeth Jane Charlotte Serventy

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

The International Organization for Migration’s World Migration Report (2020) estimates the number of migrants worldwide to be approximately 272 million. In an era of demographic scarcity and globalisation-driven uncertainties, asylum seeker, migration, and refugee re-settlement programs are now a worldwide phenomenon. Major English-speaking, immigrant-receiving countries such as Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States of America (USA) face associated educational, political, and social repercussions.

Rumbaut and Ima (1988) introduced the term ‘Generation 1.5’ in relation to a distinct cohort of immigrant youth, English as second language (L2) learners studying in San Diego, California in the USA. …

Barriers To Ghanaian Midwives’ Ability To Provide Quality Care: A Glaserian Grounded Theory Study, Yakubu Ismaila

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

The midwifery model of care that promotes the employment of trained and regulated midwives for the provision of maternal and neonatal care has been found to be beneficial, especially in Low and Middle-Income Countries that have high maternal and neonatal mortalities. Midwives in those setting are however, facing a myriad of barriers which negatively affect their ability to provide optimal care. Although Ghana is implementing the midwifery model of care, maternal and neonatal mortality remains high in the country. Little is known from the point of view of midwives, who are the primary providers of maternal and neonatal care, about …

Testing Alphas In Conditional Time-Varying Factor Models With High Dimensional Assets, Shujie Ma, Wei Lan, Liangjun Su, Chih-Ling Tsai

Research Collection School Of Economics

For conditional time-varying factor models with high dimensional assets, this article proposes a high dimensional alpha (HDA) test to assess whether there exist abnormal returns on securities (or portfolios) over the theoretical expected returns. To employ this test effectively, a constant coefficient test is also introduced. It examines the validity of constant alphas and factor loadings. Simulation studies and an empirical example are presented to illustrate the finite sample performance and the usefulness of the proposed tests. Using the HDA test, the empirical example demonstrates that the FF three-factor model (Fama and French, 1993) is better than CAPM (Sharpe, 1964) …

The Legal Recognition Of Electronic Bills Of Lading, Ali Abbas Khayoon Al-Naseri

World Maritime University Ph.D. Dissertations

The increasing use of electronic devices, new means of communication and Internet affects many areas of life, including trade and transportation. One effect is the dematerialization of bills of lading. Paper bills of lading have traditionally performed three main functions in maritime transportation: (1) as a receipt for the goods, (2) as containing or evidencing the contract of carriage of goods and (3) as a document of title. This legal research examines whether electronic bills of lading can legally perform these three functions as functional equivalents to paper bills of lading. It studies the recognition of electronic bills of lading …

Reply To Lipworth Et Al., Angela M. Moran, Sanjay Ramakrishnan, Catherine A. Borg, Clare M. Connolly, Simon Couillard, Christine M. Mwasuku, Ian D. Pavord, Timothy S.C. Hinks, Lauri Lehtimӓki

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

We thank Dr. Lipworth and colleagues for their interest in our work published recently in the Journal (1). They rightly point out that the biology of asthma attacks is more complex than blood eosinophils alone and that corticosteroids have a wide range of other potentially relevant antiinflammatory effects. However, local treatment with inhaled corticosteroids (ICS) is usually the mainstay of patients with frequent eosinophilic exacerbations, and therefore in the great majority of patients, the key question is what oral corticosteroids (OCS) add to ICS in an acute attack (2) and whether this effect is seen with benralizumab. We suggest that …

Correction To: Cooperative Co‑Evolution For Feature Selection In Big Data With Random Feature Grouping (Journal Of Big Data, (2020), 7, 1, (107), 10.1186/S40537-020-00381-Y), A. N.M.Bazlur Rashid, Mohiuddin Ahmed, Leslie F. Sikos, Paul Haskell‑Dowland

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

© 2020, The Author(s). Following publication of the original article [1], the author reported that the 2nd author affiliation was incorrect. It should only be “School of Science, Edith Cowan University, Joondalup, WA, Australia”. The affiliation is presented correctly in this correction article. The original article [1] has been corrected.

Aesthetic-Ethical-Political Movements In Professional Learning: Encounters With Feminist New Materialisms And Reggio Emilia In Early Childhood Research, Stefania Giamminuti, Jane Merewether, Mindy Blaise

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

© 2020 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. Professional learning is considered essential for early childhood teachers, and is frequently associated with childhood outcomes and dominant constructs of quality which perpetuate neoliberal ideals and position early childhood teachers within a framework of rationality, privileging discourses of masculinity and power. By engaging with feminist new materialist perspectives, with the concept of ‘movement’, and with the theory-practice of the educational project of the city of Reggio Emilia, Italy, this paper extends understandings of professional learning to include nonhuman others as worthy interlocutors, and puts forth …

Tripping Over The Other: Could Psychedelics Increase Empathy?, Emily Blatchford, Stephen Bright, Liam Engel

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

There is increasing evidence that psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy is effective for a range of psy-chological conditions. There are likely numerous mechanisms of action that contribute to these clinicaleffects. One such mechanism of action might involve psychedelics increasing levels of empathicfunctioning. This paper synthesises research concerning the relationship between psychedelics andempathy, emphasising neuroscientific and clinical contexts. We conclude that neuropsychological andclinical evidence imply psychedelics could lead to increased empathic functioning. The effects of psy-chedelics on the 5-HT system, default mode network, neural connectivity and ego dissolution areimplicated in these changes. Changes in empathic functioning also likely relate to increases in thepersonality trait …

Recent High School Graduates Support Mandatory Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation Education In Australian High Schools, Tim Rankin, Lisa Holmes, Leanne Vance, Tom Crehan, Brennen Mills

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

Objective:

To evaluate recent high school graduates' opinions on mandatory cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) training in the high school curriculum as a solution to improving bystander CPR rates.

Methods:

Participants completed questionnaires assessing their CPR training history during their high school education, their willingness to learn CPR during their high school years and their opinion on making CPR training mandatory for high school curricula.

Results:

Of the 178 participants in this study, 60% had undertaken CPR training during their high school education. Of those who had not undertaken CPR training, 75% reported that they would have been willing …

Hiding In Plain Sight: The Globally Distributed Bacterial Candidate Phylum Pauc34f, Michael L. Chen, Eric D. Becraft, Maria Pachiadaki, Julia M. Brown, Jessica K. Jarett, Josep M. Gasol, Nikolai V. Ravin, Duane P. Moser, Takuro Nunoura, Gerhard J. Herndl, Tanja Woyke, Ramunas Stepanauskas

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

Bacterial candidate phylum PAUC34f was originally discovered in marine sponges and is widely considered to be composed of sponge symbionts. Here, we report 21 single amplified genomes (SAGs) of PAUC34f from a variety of environments, including the dark ocean, lake sediments, and a terrestrial aquifer. The diverse origins of the SAGs and the results of metagenome fragment recruitment suggest that some PAUC34f lineages represent relatively abundant, free-living cells in environments other than sponge microbiomes, including the deep ocean. Both phylogenetic and biogeographic patterns, as well as genome content analyses suggest that PAUC34f associations with hosts evolved independently multiple times, while …

Visual Flight Into Instrument Meteorological Condition: A Post Accident Analysis, Ayiei Ayiei, John Murray, Graham Wild

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

The phenomenon of encountering instrument meteorological conditions (IMCs) while operating an aircraft under visual flight rules (VFRs) remains a primary area of concern. Studies have established that pilots operating under VFRs that continue to operate under IMCs remains a significant cause of accidents in general aviation (GA), resulting in hundreds of fatalities. This research used the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) database, which contained a total of 196 VFR to IMC occurrences, from 2003 to 2019, with 26 having formal reports. An explanatory design was adopted, commencing with a qualitative study of the 26 occurrences with reports followed by a …

The Role Of Virtual Reality In Improving Health Outcomes For Community-Dwelling Older Adults: A Systematic Review, Gordana Dermody, Lisa Whitehead, Graham Wilson, Courtney Glass

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

Background:

Virtual reality (VR) delivered through immersive headsets creates an opportunity to deliver interventions to improve physical, mental, and psychosocial health outcomes. VR app studies with older adults have primarily focused on rehabilitation and physical function including gait, balance, fall prevention, pain management, and cognition. Several systematic reviews have previously been conducted, but much of the extant literature is focused on rehabilitation or other institutional settings, and little is known about the effectiveness of VR apps using immersive headsets to target health outcomes among community-dwelling older adults.

Objective:

The objective of this review was to evaluate the effectiveness of VR …

Application Of A Brain-Inspired Spiking Neural Network Architecture To Odor Data Classification, Anup Vanarse, Josafath Israel Espinosa-Ramos, Adam Osseiran, Alexander Rassau, Nikola Kasabov

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

Existing methods in neuromorphic olfaction mainly focus on implementing the data transformation based on the neurobiological architecture of the olfactory pathway. While the transformation is pivotal for the sparse spike-based representation of odor data, classification techniques based on the bio-computations of the higher brain areas, which process the spiking data for identification of odor, remain largely unexplored. This paper argues that brain-inspired spiking neural networks constitute a promising approach for the next generation of machine intelligence for odor data processing. Inspired by principles of brain information processing, here we propose the first spiking neural network method and associated deep machine …

A Multipurpose Desalination, Cooling, And Air-Conditioning System Powered By Waste Heat Recovery From Submarine Diesel Exhaust Fumes And Cooling Water, Abdellah Shafieian, Mehdi Khiadani

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

The role of cooling and air-conditioning systems in submarines is assessed as indispensable, and a reliable water supply is essential for both crew and equipment. At the same time, the large amounts of high-temperature exhaust fumes discharged from submarine engines provide an excellent opportunity to recover and apply this waste energy in required applications. This paper introduces a novel multipurpose desalination, cooling, and air-conditioning system to recover waste heat from both the exhaust fumes and the cooling water of submarine engines. The whole system is mathematically modelled and analysed based on the actual thermo-physical parameters of the engine's exhaust fumes. …

Seagrass Losses Since Mid‐20th Century Fuelled Co2 Emissions From Soil Carbon Stocks, Cristian Salinas, Carlos M. Duarte, Paul Lavery, Pere Masque´, Ariane Arias-Ortiz, Javier X. Leon, David Callaghan, Gary A. Kendrick, Oscar Serrano

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

Seagrass meadows store globally significant organic carbon (C_org) stocks which, if disturbed, can lead to CO₂ emissions, contributing to climate change. Eutrophication and thermal stress continue to be a major cause of seagrass decline worldwide, but the associated CO₂ emissions remain poorly understood. This study presents comprehensive estimates of seagrass soil C_org erosion following eutrophication‐driven seagrass loss in Cockburn Sound (23 km² between 1960s and 1990s) and identifies the main drivers. We estimate that shallow seagrass meadows ( < 5 m depth) had significantly higher C_org stocks in 50 cm thick soils (4.5 ± 0.7 kg C_org/m²) …

Development Of A Human Activity Recognition System For Ballet Tasks, Danica Hendry, Kevin Chai, Amity Campbell, Luke Hopper, Peter O'Sullivan, Leon Straker

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

Background Accurate and detailed measurement of a dancer’s training volume is a key requirement to understanding the relationship between a dancer’s pain and training volume. Currently, no system capable of quantifying a dancer’s training volume, with respect to specific movement activities, exists. The application of machine learning models to wearable sensor data for human activity recognition in sport has previously been applied to cricket, tennis and rugby. Thus, the purpose of this study was to develop a human activity recognition system using wearable sensor data to accurately identify key ballet movements (jumping and lifting the leg). Our primary objective was …

Which Dual-Band Infrared Indices Are Optimum For Identifying Aerosol Compositional Change Using Himawari-8 Data?, Miles Sowden, D Blake

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

Aerosol optical depth algorithms predominantly use the visible portion of the electromagnetic spectrum. However, quantifying sporadic dust events throughout the full 24-h period requires using continuous wavelengths such as infrared (IR). Identifying aerosols, using IR from geostationary data, has relied on subtraction indices rather than normalised differences. Limited attention has been given to determining which IR indices could be suitable for identifying aerosol compositional change. Suitable IR indices could potentially result in multi-spectral data from geostationary satellites, such as Himawari, being used to separate dust from other types of aerosols.

This study evaluated three index types: subtraction (brightness temperature difference …

Time-Layered Cultural Map Of Australia, Paul Longley Arthur, Erik Champion, Hugh Craig, Ning Gu, Mark Harvey, Victoria Haskins, Andrew May, Bill Pascoe, Alana Piper, Lyndall Ryan, Rosalind Smith, Deb Verhoeven

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

Copyright © 2020 for this paper by its authors. Use permitted under Creative Commons License Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0). This paper reports on an Australian project that is developing an online system to deliver researcher-driven national-scale infrastructure for the humanities, focused on mapping, time series, and data integration. Australian scholars and scholars of Australia worldwide are well served with digital resources and tools to deepen the understanding of Australia and its historical and cultural heritage. There are, however, significant barriers to use. The Time Layered Cultural Map of Australia (TLCMap) will provide an umbrella infrastructure related to time …

A Handbook Of Wildfire Engineering: Guidance For Wildfire Suppression And Resilient Urban Design, Greg Penney, Daryoush Habibi, Marcus Cattani, Steven Richardson

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

A Handbook of Wildfire Engineering (the Handbook) provides firefighters, engineers and town planners with detailed technical approaches and analysis to enhance the resilience of communities in areas prone to wildfire impacts, and enhance the safety and effectiveness of wildfire suppression at the urban interface during catastrophic wildfire conditions

Co-Occurrence Across Time And Space Of Drug- And Cannabinoid- Exposure And Adverse Mental Health Outcomes In The National Survey Of Drug Use And Health: Combined Geotemporospatial And Causal Inference Analysis, Albert Stuart Reece, Gary Hulse

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

Background: Whilst many studies have linked increased drug and cannabis exposure to adverse mental health (MH) outcomes their effects on whole populations and geotemporospatial relationships are not well understood.

Methods

Ecological cohort study of National Survey of Drug Use and Health (NSDUH) geographically-linked substate-shapefiles 2010–2012 and 2014–2016 supplemented by five-year US American Community Survey. Drugs: cigarettes, alcohol abuse, last-month cannabis use and last-year cocaine use. MH: any mental illness, major depressive illness, serious mental illness and suicidal thinking. Data analysis: two-stage, geotemporospatial, robust generalized linear regression and causal inference methods in R.

Results

410,138 NSDUH respondents. Average response rate 76.7%. …