A System Dynamics analysis of the causes of Australian recycling rates plateauing below full potential

As Australia enters the 21st century, there is increasing discussion around waste and circular economies. The mindset of landfilling waste is becoming more difficult to justify and as natural resources are depleting is it increasingly necessary to move toward a circular economy. An existing option to improve sustainability is the recycling of waste materials, a process that has a long history in Australia. However, we are now seeing Australian Municipal Solid Waste (MSW) and certain material recycling rates plateauing below their full capacity. To continue recycling momentum, it is necessary to identify barriers preventing improvement in recycling rates. Existing research on recycling has commonly concentrated upon a part of the recycling system, but ignored the whole. This thesis uses System Dynamics (SD) to address the MSW recycling plateau problem and to resolve the following issues: (a) how do MSW recycling plateaus relate to material recycling plateaus, (b) what role do recycling influences play with MSW recycling plateaus and bin contamination, and (c) are the forces driving MSW recycling rates exogenous or endogenous to the waste control system? A case study on Old Newspaper (ONP) recycling plateaus addressed the link between a material experiencing plateauing recycling rates and its relationship to MSW plateauing recycling rates. The intention of this study was to determine whether the barrier to higher ONP recycling rates was the capture of ONP in the MSW recycling system (supply) or the demand for ONP as a raw material for remanufacture. The key limiting factor in ONP recycling rates was found to be supply, predominantly from MSW, thus emphasising the importance of MSW recycling systems in material recovery and leading to the analysis of MSW to better understand recycling plateaus. The role of recycling influences on MSW recycling plateaus and bin contamination was investigated via a local government case study. Recycling influences refers to the ten variables found via the literature review that could possibly act as barriers to recycling rates; demographics, policy, disposal knowledge, waste collection service quality, dwelling type, attitude toward recycling, time devoted to recycling, recycling social norms, MRF sorting quality and household consumption trends. These variables were investigated using Australian census data, a household survey and a waste audit. It was determined that the level of plateau was primarily caused by consumption trends. If a higher proportion of recyclables was in the waste stream, then the recycling plateaus would also rise. MSW bin contamination was also an important factor in determining recycling rate levels, with incorrectly disposed waste showing potential to inflate or deflate recycling rates. Household disposal knowledge and biases when making uncertain decisions were found to be the key influences on bin contamination levels. When using System Dynamics to model the municipal waste system, a purely endogenous explanation for plateauing recycling rates could not be found. Recycling rate plateau level was largely determined by exogenous waste stream proportions, which could also be described as residential consumption trends. The only endogenous feedback was in the form of council education campaigns, responding to increased recycling bin contamination. When this feedback loop was active it resulted in significant decreases in bin contamination and a small increase in the recycling rate plateau. From this research, two potential endogenous pathways for increasing MSW recycling rates were identified and recommended for further research; (a) councils influencing consumption habits, and (b) council influencing retail packaging types. Both feedback loops represented a means for Australian local government to influence their recycling rates through behaviour change

Contributing factors that influence medication errors in the prehospital paramedic environment: a mixed-method systematic review protocol

Introduction There is limited reliable research available on medication errors in relation to paramedic practice, with most evidence-based medication safety guidelines based on research in nursing, operating theatre and pharmacy settings. While similarities exist, evidence suggests that the prehospital environment is distinctly different in many aspects. The prevention of errors requires attention to factors from the organisational and regulatory level down to specific tasks and patient characteristics. The evidence available suggests errors may occur in up to 12.76% of medication administrations in some prehospital settings. With multiple sources stating that the errors are under-reported, this represents significant potential for patient harm. This review will seek to identify the factors influencing the occurrence of medication errors by paramedics in the prehospital environment. Methods and analysis The review will include qualitative and quantitative studies involving interventions or phenomena regarding medication errors or medication safety relating to paramedics (including emergency medical technicians and other prehospital care providers) within the prehospital environment. A search will be conducted using MEDLINE (Ovid), EBSCOhost Megafile Search, the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors trial registry, Google Scholar and the OpenGrey database to identify studies meeting this inclusion criteria, with initial searches commencing 30 September 2019. Studies selected will undergo assessment of methodological quality, with data to be extracted from all studies irrespective of quality. Each stage of study selection, appraisal and data extraction will be conducted by two reviewers, with a third reviewer deciding any unresolved conflicts. The review will follow a convergent integrated approach, conducting a single qualitative synthesis of qualitative and 'qualitised' quantitative data. Ethics and dissemination No ethical approval was required for this review. Findings from this systematic review will be disseminated via publications, reports and conference presentations

Enhancement of the Nutritional Value and Eating Quality of Beef

End of Project ReportThis project was supported by the European Commission (Healthy Beef, QLRT-CT-2000-31423).Consumer interest in the nutritional aspects of health has increased interest in developing methods to manipulate the fatty acid composition of ruminant products. Ruminant meats such as beef and lamb are often criticised by nutritionists for having high amounts of saturated fatty acids (S) and low polyunsaturated fatty acids (P).The P:S ratio in beef is approximately 0.1, the ideal being about 0.4. This project is part of a larger EU-supported project entitled Healthy Beef (Enhancing the content of beneficial fatty acids in beef and improving meat quality for the consumer: QLRT-CT-2000-31423). The Teagasc contribution, which was a collaboration between Grange Research Centre and The National Food Centre, focussed on nutritional manipulation of beef cattle. In particular, on exploiting grazing and fishoil as tools to enhance the concentration of “healthy” fatty acids in beef. The conclusions were: • The beneficial effect of a grazed grass-based diet on the fatty acid composition of beef was confirmed • The scale of this beneficial effect is strongly dependent on the duration of grazing • The optimum concentration of beneficial fatty acids was not achieved suggesting that feeding management prior to grazing is important • Grazing influenced beef colour and drip-loss in a durationdependent manner • Animals finished off grass for 40 or 98 days produced meat that was tougher than that from animals finished on silage and concentrates or fed grass for the last 158 days. • Fish oil supplementation enhanced the concentration in beef, of fatty acids that are beneficial to human health • The linear response to increasing level of fish oil consumption indicates scope to further enhance the concentrations of beneficial fatty acids in beef Wilting of grass prior to ensiling did not impact negatively on the overall content of n-3P in muscle, but it increased the concentration of conjugated linoleic acid • Dietary inclusion of fish oil or wilting of grass prior to ensiling did not affect muscle appearance • Fish oil seemed to increase tenderness but only at the high level of inclusion. This merits further study • There was some evidence that wilting of grass prior to ensiling enhanced meat tenderness. This needs to be confirmed.European Unio

The impact of arterial input function determination variations on prostate dynamic contrast-enhanced magnetic resonance imaging pharmacokinetic modeling: a multicenter data analysis challenge, part II

This multicenter study evaluated the effect of variations in arterial input function (AIF) determination on pharmacokinetic (PK) analysis of dynamic contrast-enhanced magnetic resonance imaging (DCE-MRI) data using the shutter-speed model (SSM). Data acquired from eleven prostate cancer patients were shared among nine centers. Each center used a site-specific method to measure the individual AIF from each data set and submitted the results to the managing center. These AIFs, their reference tissue-adjusted variants, and a literature population-averaged AIF, were used by the managing center to perform SSM PK analysis to estimate Ktrans (volume transfer rate constant), ve (extravascular, extracellular volume fraction), kep (efflux rate constant), and τi (mean intracellular water lifetime). All other variables, including the definition of the tumor region of interest and precontrast T1 values, were kept the same to evaluate parameter variations caused by variations in only the AIF. Considerable PK parameter variations were observed with within-subject coefficient of variation (wCV) values of 0.58, 0.27, 0.42, and 0.24 for Ktrans, ve, kep, and τi, respectively, using the unadjusted AIFs. Use of the reference tissue-adjusted AIFs reduced variations in Ktrans and ve (wCV = 0.50 and 0.10, respectively), but had smaller effects on kep and τi (wCV = 0.39 and 0.22, respectively). kep is less sensitive to AIF variation than Ktrans, suggesting it may be a more robust imaging biomarker of prostate microvasculature. With low sensitivity to AIF uncertainty, the SSM-unique τi parameter may have advantages over the conventional PK parameters in a longitudinal study

Assessing critical reading performance in an EAP classroom

Thesis (M.Ed.)--University of Melbourne, Dept. of Education, 2003A widespread perception among EAP teachers and course designers in Australia is that Asian university students need some formal training in text analysis and critical thought. To be more precise, Asian students are often portrayed as victims of Asian education, where students are taught to rote learn and memorise, rather than question and analyse as they might be taught in Australia. EAP classes often rest on generalisations about cultural differences, constructing critical reading tasks on the assumption that the problems students encounter in completing critical reading tasks relates to the way they read rather than how they respond to what they read (that is, their familiarity and ability to reproduce arguments in acceptable and culturally expected ways). While EAP researchers have spent considerable energy on improving critical reading methodologies, there has been very little research on the assessment of critical reading in EAP classes. In particular, very little research has offered any explanation of what might constitute evidence of learning to read and respond at a high level. In this thesis, I develop a criterion-referenced critical reading performance rubric, informed by Ballard and Clanchy's (1984; 1988; 1997) research on critical analysis and Toulmin's (1958; 1972; 1984) theories on reasoning and argumentation, to examine the clarity, evidence and logic (CEL) of students' critical reading responses and the influence of text selection on student reasoning skills. Secondly, I explore with students some factors they perceive as affecting their reading performances including text selection. The findings of this research reveal that there are distinct patterns in critical reading performances characterising low, medium and high level students, and that subject matter may be less significant to students' reading performances than they seem to believe. In discussing critical reading performances with students, they identified several factors such as a lack of subject knowledge, a lack of time and a misunderstanding of their purpose in completing the task which significantly affected their performance. Additionally, students perceived their future performances could be improved by choosing texts with subject matter more closely aligned to their academic field. The findings also reveal that most students feel that critically examining topics relating to Australian social issues are not helpful to the overall development of their critical reading skills

Ray coherence in parallel volume rendering

Ray coherence, meaning all processing along each ray is local to a single machine, is achieved in our parallel volume rendering environment by using a workload distribution scheme that divides the image space. This allows one to avoid the compositing stage when performing standard volume rendering in a parallel rendering pipeline. More importantly, there are a number of existing algorithms for volume rendering that either benefit from or require ray coherence when being adapted to a parallel environment. We discuss several of these algorithms and adapt and implement two of them, our own improved visibility culling technique to speed up rendering when occlusion occurs and a volumetric shadowing technique that produces more realistic and informative images. We also present novel algorithms for providing a consistent load balancing and efficiently loading and rendering pieces of a subdivided data set, addressing two of the major issues for data scalable image space distributions

The Mission of Mercy: Catholic High Schools, School Presidents, and Pope Francis

The purpose of this descriptive study was to examine the commitment of Catholic secondary schools to the poor, working, and middle class families of the New York City metropolitan area through the perception of the school president. This study sought to identify the socioeconomic class of students in the Catholic high school populations within three dioceses of the New York City metropolitan area and then to determine the Catholic secondary school’s dedication to the Catholic Church’s option for the poor as well as their identification of those responsible for the fulfillment of this mission. Additionally, the study explores whether the papacy of Pope Francis has influenced the commitment of Catholic secondary schools to those who cannot afford their tuition as well as his effect on their leadership. An internet questionnaire was distributed to the 45 Catholic secondary school presidents via email, and there were 28 participants. This study acknowledged the commitment of Catholic high schools and their presidents to the poor, working and middle class within the mission of their schools. Within their leadership, most school presidents are utilizing the language of Catholic Social Teaching by either using phrases such as the common good, the option for the poor, solidarity, Gospel message, and sacrifice, or using other language for such in their schools. The school presidents see Pope Francis as a leader and some identify that his impact has affected their actions as well as their leadership

Enhancing the healthiness, shelf-life and flavour of Irish fresh packaged beef

End of Project ReportConsumer concern about the nutritional aspects of health has heightened interest in developing methods for manipulation of the fatty acid composition of ruminant products. Ruminant meats such as beef and lamb are often criticised by nutritionists for having high amounts of saturated (S) fatty acids and low levels of polyunsaturated (P) fatty acids. The P:S ratio in beef is approximately 0.1, the ideal being about 0.4. However, an excessive increase in P concentration could predispose beef lipids to rancidity and loss of shelflife. Moreover, the colour of meat is an important influence on the purchase decision of the consumer. This report summarises the Teagasc contribution to a larger project supported under the Food Institutional Research Measure programme administrated by the Department of Agriculture and Food. The Teagasc contribution focused on enhancing the fatty acid composition of beef by nutritional manipulation of cattle using grazing and plant oils, the use of healthy - fatty acid enriched bovine tissue to make a processed beef product and the efficacy of dietary inclusion of tea catechins and rosemary to enhance the shelf-life of beef

Influence of feeding systems on the eating quality of beef

End of Project ReportThe objective was to determine pre-slaughter factors which may enhance the eating quality of beef and to assist the Irish beef production chain to exploit these factors to produce beef of higher quality and increased consumer acceptability. The effects of pre-slaughter growth rate, high energy diets, feed type and age at slaughter on beef quality were examined