Balancing Privacy and Security in the Australian Passport System

Passports are government-issued identification documents. They provide evidence of identity and citizenship, facilitating international travel and national security measures. This places them at the centre of debates regarding the balance between an individual’s privacy and the security of the community. Understanding the technologies used to implement passport systems can shift the discussion from privacy versus security, towards privacy and security — enhancing both. This article reviews these issues from the perspective of existing laws and future policy-making

Bridging the gap: rewritable electronics using real-time light-induced dielectrophoresis on lithium niobate

In the context of micro-electronics, the real-time manipulation and placement of components using optics alone promises a route towards increasingly dynamic systems, where the geometry and function of the device is not fixed at the point of fabrication. Here, we demonstrate physically reconfigurable circuitry through light-induced dielectrophoresis on lithium niobate. Using virtual electrodes, patterned by light, to trap, move, and chain individual micro-solder-beads in real-time via dielectrophoresis, we demonstrate rewritable electrical contacts which can make electrical connections between surface-bound components. The completed micro-solder-bead bridges were found to have relatively low resistances that were not solely dominated by the number of interfaces, or the number of discrete beads, in the connection. Significantly, these connections are formed without any melting/fusing of the beads, a key feature of this technique that enables reconfigurability. Requiring only a low-power (~3.5 mW) laser source to activate, and without the need for external power supply or signal generation, the all-optical simplicity of virtual-electrodes may prove significant for the future development of reconfigurable electronic systems

Paired Programming in a Clayton’s Capstone Project Course

In this paper the authors describe an Information Systems course where paired programming was trialled in the hope of improving both the assessment outcomes and the resourcing of an existing systems design course which incorporated a capstone project. The authors found that it did offer a significant improvement, but the improvements did not match the predicted outcomes, with a number of weaknesses to the model being highlighted. In particular, it was found that paired programming did not reduce teaching load when the group size was reduced

The Growth of Government, Trust in Government, and Evidence on Their Coevolution

The coevolution of trust in government alongside the growth of government is an aspect of the latter topic that has not been explored. Moreover, trust is viewed as part of social capital, facilitating social and economic transactions and the governance of society, and its decline has caused concern. We consider this coevolution in the context of a political economy model and a public interest view of government growth, incorporating the role of trust in government. Though a negative association of the growth in government with trust in government is broadly consistent with the historical data since the late 1950s, we present an econometrically sophisticated, time series analysis of the data. We find strong evidence that two aspects of government size—transfer payments and regulatory activity—align with the political economy model where government growth erodes trust. Specifically, we find cointegration indicating the following: negative associations of trust and lobbying activity and of trust and each of these two measures of government, and a positive association of trust and productivity. Though other measures of government size do not produce such robust findings, we do not find evidence of positive associations of trust and government size nor of trust and lobbying, as might be expected from a public interest view of government

An engineering approach for the application of textile composites to a structural component

An engineering approach for the application of textile composites to a structural component is addressed. The main objective is to improve impact resistance of composite blades by using some form of 3-D reinforcement. Project goals, results, and conclusions are discussed

Multilayered nanoplasmonic arrays for self-referenced biosensing

Nanostructured sensors based on localized surface plasmon resonance (LSPR) offer a number of advantages over other optical sensing technologies, making them excellent candidates for miniaturized, label-free chemical and biological detection. Highly sensitive to local refractive index changes, the resonance peaks of the nanosensors shift by different amounts when subject to different biological and chemical environments. Modifications to the nanostructure surface allow for the detection of specific molecules and chemicals with shifts so sensitive that the presence of single molecules can be detected. However, this extreme sensitivity has its drawbacks. Resonance shifts also occur because of temperature shifts, light-intensity fluctuations, and other environmental factors. To distinguish detection from drift, a secondary sensor region is often required. This often doubles the size of the device, requires two light sources and detectors (or complex optics), doubles the sample volume required (which may be expensive, or may not be possible if the sample quantity is limited), and subjects the reference to potential biofouling. Here, we present a new proof-of-concept multilayered LSPR sensor design that incorporates both a sensing layer and an encapsulated reference layer within the same region. By doing so, we are able to monitor and correct for sensor drift without the need for a secondary reference channel. We demonstrate the suitability of this sensor for sucrose concentration measurements and for the detection of biotin–avidin interactions, while also showing that the sensor can self-correct for drift. We believe that this multilayer sensor design holds promise for point-of-care diagnostics

Sensitivity of Prescribing High-Intensity, Interval Training Using the Critical Power Concept

International Journal of Exercise Science 8(3): 202-212, 2015. The critical power (CP) concept enables the calculation of time to exhaustion (tLIM) for a given power output above CP using the equation of tLIM = W’/(power – CP), where W’ is the curvature constant, and CP is the asymptote for the power-tLIM relationship. The CP concept offers great promise for prescribing high-intensity interval training (HIIT); however, knowledge on the concept’s sensitivity is lacking (i.e., how much of a difference in W’ expenditure is needed to evoke different metabolic responses). We tested if two different power-tLIM configurations expending identical proportions of W’ would evoke different end-exercise oxygen uptake (VO2) and heart rate (HR) values. Five men and five women completed a graded exercise test, 3-min all-out exercise tests, and intervals prescribed to deplete either 70 or 80% of W’ on separate visits. Consistency statistics of intraclass correlation (ICC a), standard error of measure (SEM), and coefficient of variation (CV) were calculated on end-exercise values. End-exercise VO2 were similar for the 3.5- and 5-min bouts, depleting 70% of W’ (ICC a = 0.91, SEM = 3.23 mL·kg-1·min-1, CV = 8.1%) and similar for the 4- and 5-min bouts, depleting 80% of W’ (ICC a = 0.95, SEM = 2.34 mL·kg-1·min-1, CV = 8.1%). No VO2 differences were observed between trials or conditions (p = 0.58). Similarly, HR values (~181 b·min-1) did not differ between trials or conditions (p = 0.45). Use of the CP concept for HIIT prescriptions of different power-tLIM configurations evokes similar end-exercise VO2 values on a given day. Our findings indicate that \u3e10% W’ depletion is necessary to evoke different metabolic responses to HIIT

Whisky tasting using a bimetallic nanoplasmonic tongue

Metallic nanostructures are ideal candidates for optical tongue devices thanks to their chemical stability, the sensitivity of their plasmonic resonance to environmental changes, and their ease of chemical-functionalization. Here, we describe a reusable optical tongue comprised of multiplexed gold and aluminum nano-arrays; a bimetallic device which produces two distinct resonance peaks for each sensing region. Through specific modification of these plasmonic arrays with orthogonal surface chemistries, we demonstrate that a dual-resonance device allows us to halve sensor sizes and data-acquisition times when compared to single-resonance, monometallic devices. We applied our bimetallic tongue to differentiate off-the-shelf whiskies with > 99.7% accuracy by means of linear discriminant analysis (LDA). This advance in device miniaturization, functionalization, and multiplexed readout indicates nanoplasmonic tongues will have future applications in chemical mixture identification in applications where portability, reusability, and measurement speed are key

Size-scaling effects for microparticles and cells manipulated by optoelectronic tweezers

In this work, we investigated the use of optoelectronic tweezers (OET) to manipulate objects that are larger than those commonly positioned with standard optical tweezers. We studied the forces that could be produced on differently sized polystyrene microbeads and MCF-7 breast cancer cells with light-induced dielectrophoresis (DEP). It was found that the DEP force imposed on the bead/cell did not increase linearly with the volume of the bead/cell, primarily because of the non-uniform distribution of the electric field above the OET bottom plate. Although this size-scaling work focuses on microparticles and cells, we propose that the physical mechanism elucidated in this research will be insightful for other micro-objects, biological samples, and micro-actuators undergoing OET manipulation