The Black Summer Bushfires in the Eurobodalla Shire; the Role of the Local Newspaper in Framing the Event and Experience

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 Royal Commission into National Natural Disaster Arrangements (2021) as ‘unprecedented’, due to the extent and severity of these fires. The bushfires received not only national but international media attention, and countries such as America, New Zealand, Canada and Singapore came to aid Australia in their fight against the fires. The devastation caused by the Black Summer bushfires on communities like the Eurobodalla is immense, and at least momentarily, brought the topic of bushfire disasters in Australia to the forefront of public, media and political debate

A Primer for Beginning Russian

A two week introductory course to the teaching of Russian featuring lessons, exercises, and supplements.https://scholarworks.wmich.edu/languages_books/1000/thumbnail.jp

Cloud-inclusive Aerial Imagery based on Commercial Flights as Remote Sensing Platform

Earth observation (EO) significantly increased in the second half of the 20th century and continues to advance rapidly, with remote sensing being a key component for gathering Earth-related information. Nowadays, satellites, manned aircraft, helicopters, UAVs and drones are used to capture aerial imagery in a periodic or schedule-based manner. This paper examine the feasibility of creating a novel remote sensing system by mounting cameras on commercial flights. The study evaluates flight coverage, including spatial and temporal resolutions, and considers the impact of clouds on image usability. We have compared flight coverage with cloud-inclusive flight coverage, which represents reduced flight coverage based on cloud quantity. Results show that entire country of Croatia is covered between 95% and 100% during the day and night. However, when clouds are included in the calculation, it is important to consider different altitudes and periods of the year because their distribution is not the same. In a less cloudy month (August), the highest differences between flight coverage and cloud-inclusive flight coverage for high-altitude flights are 70% for the worst-case scenario and 25% for the best-case scenario. Results show it is feasible to use commercial flights as a new remote sensing system

Religiosity, Spirituality, and Well-being in Emerging Adulthood

This chapter analyzes the relationship between religiosity, spirituality, and well-being in emerging adulthood. A primary contribution of this analysis is an examination of possible mediators. The examined mediators are satisfaction with life, meaning in life, and perceived health. Participants in the study are 319 Romanian social sciences students, aged between 18 and 24 (Mage = 19,87, SDage = 1,39), urban (82%), mostly female (76%), and orthodox (74%). The results of the study confirm that religiosity and spirituality are important protective factors. Well-being is higher for emerging adults who rate their mental health highly, and this appears to mediate the religiosity-well-being relationship. Implications for therapeutic practice and communication between counselors and clients are discussed at the end of the paper

Temporal integration and 1/f power scaling in a circuit model of cerebellar interneurons

This document is the Accepted Manuscript version of a published work that appeared in final form in Journal of Neurophysiology after peer review and technical editing by the publisher. Under embargo until 1 July 2018. To access the final edited and published work see: https://doi.org/10.1152/jn.00789.2016.Inhibitory interneurons interconnected via electrical and chemical (GABAA receptor) synapses form extensive circuits in several brain regions. They are thought to be involved in timing and synchronization through fast feedforward control of principal neurons. Theoretical studies have shown, however, that whereas self-inhibition does indeed reduce response duration, lateral inhibition, in contrast, may generate slow response components through a process of gradual disinhibition. Here we simulated a circuit of interneurons (stellate and basket cells) of the molecular layer of the cerebellar cortex and observed circuit time constants that could rise, depending on parameter values, to >1 s. The integration time scaled both with the strength of inhibition, vanishing completely when inhibition was blocked, and with the average connection distance, which determined the balance between lateral and self-inhibition. Electrical synapses could further enhance the integration time by limiting heterogeneity among the interneurons and by introducing a slow capacitive current. The model can explain several observations, such as the slow time course of OFF-beam inhibition, the phase lag of interneurons during vestibular rotation, or the phase lead of Purkinje cells. Interestingly, the interneuron spike trains displayed power that scaled approximately as 1/f at low frequencies. In conclusion, stellate and basket cells in cerebellar cortex, and interneuron circuits in general, may not only provide fast inhibition to principal cells but also act as temporal integrators that build a very short-term memory.NEW & NOTEWORTHY The most common function attributed to inhibitory interneurons is feedforward control of principal neurons. In many brain regions, however, the interneurons are densely interconnected via both chemical and electrical synapses but the function of this coupling is largely unknown. Based on large-scale simulations of an interneuron circuit of cerebellar cortex, we propose that this coupling enhances the integration time constant, and hence the memory trace, of the circuit.Peer reviewe

The Ophthalmic Anomalies in Children with Down Syndrome in Split-Dalmatian County

Our aim was to present the ophthalmic anomalies in patients with Down syndrome in Split-Dalmatia County born from 1992 until 2009 year. It was a cross-sectional study. 153 children with Down syndrome aged 0–18 years from the Split-Dalmatia County were examined. One hundred twelve participants were borne in Split,13 in Vrgorac,16 in Makarska, 12 in Sinj. All enrolled children underwent a complete ophthalmological examination (anterior segment, ocular motility, refractive status, fundus, measuring intraocular pressure (IOP). Of 89.5% percent of responders with refractive errors, 48.1% had myopia, 35.0% had hypermetropia, astygamtism in 16.7%, 28.7% strabismus, nystagmus (8.4%), cataracts (1.3%), glaucoma (1.9%), supernumerary optic disc vessels (24.1%) and keratoconus (1.3%). Conclusion: In patients with Down syndrome the prevalence of refractive errors (myopia prevalence), as well as other ophthalmological diseases was determined

Spectral changes of brain activity in rat offspring exposed to aluminium during gestation and lactation

Exposure to aluminium during gestation causes changes in mammalian brain development and behavior. Our aim was to perform spectral analysis on electrocortical activity of Sprague Dawley male pups (30±3 days of age) whose mothers were treated with aluminium during gestation and lactation. There was a higher presence of power spectra in the delta range of parietal electrocortical activity, a lower presence in the theta range and increased values of the parameter DT as the ratio of delta to theta range in pups indirectly exposed to aluminium (whose mothers were drinking a 0.5% water solution of aluminium chloride during the gestation and lactation periods), compared to controls