The new frontier: Singaporean and Malaysian public relations practitioners’ perceptions of new media

Recent research into social media use identified mid-2006 to early 2007 as the period when Singaporean public relations agencies first recognised the need to embrace new media (Fitch, 2009a). This research draws on interviews conducted with ten senior Singaporean and Malaysian public relations practitioners in mid-2006 and offers an historical review of their attitudes to new media at that time. The results reveal that experienced public relations practitioners were fearful of the changing communication environment, even as some embraced the opportunities created by new media. These findings are significant in terms of understanding the implications of new media and changing communication patterns for public relations

Photometry of GSC 762-110, a new triple-mode radially pulsating star

Stars pulsating in three radial modes are very rare; only three examples are known in the Galaxy. These stars are very useful since their periods may be measured very precisely, and this will constrain the global stellar parameters and the models of the star's interior. The purpose of this paper is to present a new example of the class of triple-mode radial pulsators. A search for candidate multi-mode pulsators was carried out in public survey data. Time-series photometry of one of the candidates, GSC 762-110, was performed. GSC 762-110 was found to be a triple-mode radial pulsator, with a fundamental period of 0.1945d and period ratios of 0.7641 and 0.8012. In addition two non-radial modes were found, for which the amplitude has diminished considerably over the last few years.Comment: Accepted for publication in Astronomy & Astrophysic

Evidence of a structural anomaly at 14 K in polymerised CsC60

We report the results of a high-resolution synchrotron X-ray powder diffraction study of polymerised CsC$_{60}$ in the temperature range 4 to 40 K. Its crystal structure is monoclinic (space group I2/m), isostructural with RbC$_{60}$. Below 14 K, a spontaneous thermal contraction is observed along both the polymer chain axis, $a$ and the interchain separation along [111], $d_1$. This structural anomaly could trigger the occurrence of the spin-singlet ground state, observed by NMR at the same temperature.Comment: 8 pages, 5 figures, submitte

Capacity Distribution for Interference Alignment With CSI Errors and Its Applications

Interference alignment (IA) is known to achieve the degree-of-freedom (DoF) capacity of the interference channel, if full channel state information (CSI) is available at the transmitters perfectly. Challenges, however, arise when CSI is not perfect, and the achievable capacity of IA is not well understood. In this paper, we study the achievable performance of the interference channel using perfect IA techniques based on imperfect CSI. In particular, we obtain the statistical distribution of the maximum achievable rate per stream of the channel. Utilizing our analytical results, we derive new nonasymptotic performance metrics that are then used to 1) optimize the number of streams per user for maximizing the network sum-rate and 2) assess the performance of IA in the time-varying block fading channel. Numerical results are provided to reveal the accuracy of our analytical results

Cross modal perception of body size in domestic dogs (Canis familiaris)

While the perception of size-related acoustic variation in animal vocalisations is well documented, little attention has been given to how this information might be integrated with corresponding visual information. Using a cross-modal design, we tested the ability of domestic dogs to match growls resynthesised to be typical of either a large or a small dog to size- matched models. Subjects looked at the size-matched model significantly more often and for a significantly longer duration than at the incorrect model, showing that they have the ability to relate information about body size from the acoustic domain to the appropriate visual category. Our study suggests that the perceptual and cognitive mechanisms at the basis of size assessment in mammals have a multisensory nature, and calls for further investigations of the multimodal processing of size information across animal species

Fast path planning for precision weeding

Agricultural robots have the potential to reduce herbicide use in agriculture and horticulture through autonomous precision weeding. One of the main challenges is how to efficiently plan paths for a robot arm such that many individual weeds can be processed quickly. This paper considers an abstract weeding task among obstacles and proposes an efficient online path planning algorithm for an industrial manipulator mounted to a mobile robot chassis. The algorithm is based on a multi-query approach, inspired by industrial bin-picking, where a database of high-quality paths is computed offline and paths are then selected and adapted online. We present a preliminary implementation using a 6-DOF arm and report results from simulation experiments designed to evaluate system performance with varying database and obstacle sizes. We also validate the approach using a Universal Robots UR5 manipulator and ROS interface

Professionalising public relations: A history of Australian public relations education, 1985 - 1999

This thesis is concerned with public relations education in Australia. It focuses on 1985–1999, as in these years there was significant growth in education and the Public Relations Institute of Australia (PRIA) sought greater regulation and jurisdiction over public relations activity. Existing historical scholarship focuses on the evolution of the Australian public relations industry towards professional status, and tertiary education is perceived to confirm the field’s professional standing. In contrast, I consider the development of public relations education in a broader social context and the involvement of the PRIA in tertiary education. This thesis aims to investigate the role of public relations education in the professionalisation of public relations in Australia. It uses a qualitative approach, combining archival research, focusing on the previously unstudied archives of the PRIA’s National Education Committee, and interviews with practitioners and educators. This thesis provides an analysis of how, and why, the PRIA sought to regulate public relations education. The use of historical sociology allows the findings to be interpreted in relation to broader societal structures and institutional processes, such as the expansion of the Australian higher education sector, the PRIA’s preoccupation with professional status, and the increase in female practitioners. In developing a critical account of Australian public relations education, this thesis argues that higher education was pivotal to the PRIA’s professional project. The findings confirm the constitution of public relations knowledge and its institutionalisation in the Australian academy were dynamic and contested, and that the PRIA’s professional drive informed its attempts to regulate the transmission of that knowledge. A significant finding is the ambivalent attitudes towards gender and education, given the increasing number of female graduates. These findings contribute a unique Australian perspective to the global public relations scholarship on history and professionalisation and allow a reconceptualisation of the development of public relations in Australia

Visualizing sound emission of elephant vocalizations: evidence for two rumble production types

Recent comparative data reveal that formant frequencies are cues to body size in animals, due to a close relationship between formant frequency spacing, vocal tract length and overall body size. Accordingly, intriguing morphological adaptations to elongate the vocal tract in order to lower formants occur in several species, with the size exaggeration hypothesis being proposed to justify most of these observations. While the elephant trunk is strongly implicated to account for the low formants of elephant rumbles, it is unknown whether elephants emit these vocalizations exclusively through the trunk, or whether the mouth is also involved in rumble production. In this study we used a sound visualization method (an acoustic camera) to record rumbles of five captive African elephants during spatial separation and subsequent bonding situations. Our results showed that the female elephants in our analysis produced two distinct types of rumble vocalizations based on vocal path differences: a nasally- and an orally-emitted rumble. Interestingly, nasal rumbles predominated during contact calling, whereas oral rumbles were mainly produced in bonding situations. In addition, nasal and oral rumbles varied considerably in their acoustic structure. In particular, the values of the first two formants reflected the estimated lengths of the vocal paths, corresponding to a vocal tract length of around 2 meters for nasal, and around 0.7 meters for oral rumbles. These results suggest that African elephants may be switching vocal paths to actively vary vocal tract length (with considerable variation in formants) according to context, and call for further research investigating the function of formant modulation in elephant vocalizations. Furthermore, by confirming the use of the elephant trunk in long distance rumble production, our findings provide an explanation for the extremely low formants in these calls, and may also indicate that formant lowering functions to increase call propagation distances in this species'

Beyond the catwalk: Fashion public relations and social media in Australia

This study explores social media use in public relations in the Australian fashion industry, using ethnographic inquiry and semi-structured interviews. There has been limited research into fashion public relations (fashion PR), despite the economic and cultural significance of the fashion industry. The findings suggest social media is transforming fashion PR, but its adoption is uneven, with overlaps in marketing and public relations activity. Participants use social media to engage fashion publics, keep up-to-date with trends, monitor competitors and promote clients. Bloggers are increasingly influential. Participants perceive they must embrace social media, or risk getting left behind. The findings contribute to understanding diverse public relations practices and the ways public relations activity is changing in response to social media

“Parties, air-kissing and long boozy lunches”? Public relations in the Australian fashion industry

There has been limited research into fashion public relations. This study explores public relations in the Australian fashion industry using ethnographic research and semistructured interviews with six fashion public relations practitioners. The findings suggest fashion public relations does not easily fit into mainstream understandings of public relations. Rather, fashion public relations is assigned a low status due to its close association with marketing, promotion and publicity and popular representations of the fashion sector as glamorous and superficial. Despite this, participants perceived their work to be professional, where the dominant activities of media relations, celebrity endorsement, and relationship management form part of a carefully devised strategic plan to meet organisational and client objectives. The findings offer an alternative perspective on public relations by considering practitioner experiences in a niche industry field. The study provides new understandings of public relations and calls for a reconceptualisation of the field beyond the narrow remit of mainstream public relations definitions and professional associations