The contribution of sleep to ‘Closing the Gap’ in the health of Indigenous children: a methodological approach

Examination of the sleep of Australian Indigenous children presents some unique challenges, particularly in terms of community input, study design and in the collection of relevant data. Abstract Objectives: Research on Indigenous children’s sleep quality is likely to play a significant part in ‘Closing the Gap’ between Indigenous and non-Indigenous children’s health, academic performance and social outcomes. However, examination of the sleep of Australian Indigenous children presents some unique challenges, particularly in terms of community input, study design and in the collection of relevant data. Methods: The current literature on Indigenous sleep research is reviewed and includes factors such as mental and physical health, socioeconomic disadvantage, and their relationships to sleep. Challenges encountered in researching Indigenous sleep and strategies for best practice are explored. Conclusion: Many challenges exist in researching sleep in Indigenous children, but the imperative of undertaking this task is clear. An assessment of the sleep of Australian Indigenous children requires a thorough evaluation of factors that contribute to sleep health such as co-morbid disease, regional factors and social disadvantage. Methodological issues include appropriate assessment tools, affordable and objective sleep quality measures, accounting for differing cultural beliefs and practices and timekeeping associated with bedtimes and get-up times

Antenna design challenges and solutions for compact MIMO terminals

The design of antennas for compact multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) terminals is a challenging feat, due to the space constraint and the physical structure of the terminal. The space constraint forces the antennas to be closely spaced, which degrades MIMO performance due to high signal correlation and low antenna efficiency. Moreover, the terminals are equipped with ground planes which further complicate the implementation of antennas for good MIMO performance. This paper elaborates on the two aforementioned challenges in MIMO antenna design and surveys recent techniques that are developed to address these challenges

Sensitivity analysis modelling for microscale multiphysics robust engineering design

Sensitivity Analysis (SA) plays an important role in the development of any practical engineering model. It can help to reveal the sources and mechanisms of variability that provide the key to understanding system uncertainty. SA can also be used to calibrate simulation models for closer agreement with experimental results. Robust Engineering Design (RED) seeks to exploit such knowledge in the search for design solutions that are optimal in terms of performance in the face of variability. Microscale and multiphysics problems present challenges to modelling due to their complexity, which puts increased demands on computational methods. For example, in developing a model of a piezoelectric actuator, the process of calibration is prolonged by the number of parameters that are difficult to verify with the physical device. In the approach presented in this paper, normalised sensitivity coefficients are determined directly and accurately using the governing finite element model formulation, offering an efficient means of identifying parameters that affect the output of the model, leading to increased accuracy and knowledge of system performance in the face of variability

Secure, performance-oriented data management for nanoCMOS electronics

The EPSRC pilot project Meeting the Design Challenges of nanoCMOS Electronics (nanoCMOS) is focused upon delivering a production level e-Infrastructure to meet the challenges facing the semiconductor industry in dealing with the next generation of ‘atomic-scale’ transistor devices. This scale means that previous assumptions on the uniformity of transistor devices in electronics circuit and systems design are no longer valid, and the industry as a whole must deal with variability throughout the design process. Infrastructures to tackle this problem must provide seamless access to very large HPC resources for computationally expensive simulation of statistic ensembles of microscopically varying physical devices, and manage the many hundreds of thousands of files and meta-data associated with these simulations. A key challenge in undertaking this is in protecting the intellectual property associated with the data, simulations and design process as a whole. In this paper we present the nanoCMOS infrastructure and outline an evaluation undertaken on the Storage Resource Broker (SRB) and the Andrew File System (AFS) considering in particular the extent that they meet the performance and security requirements of the nanoCMOS domain. We also describe how metadata management is supported and linked to simulations and results in a scalable and secure manner