Matched doppler processing

This thesis describes a method for estimating the ranges and speed of a near field narrow band sound source as it moves past a receiver. This is applied to analysis of source motion in the underwater acoustic environment.Thesis (M.App.Sc.) -- University of Adelaide, Dept. of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, 199

Incidence and severity of radiological lateral osteoarthritis 15 years following medial unicompartmental knee arthroplasty

Aims: To assess the incidence of radiological lateral osteoarthritis (OA) at 15 years after medial unicompartmental knee arthroplasty (UKA) and assess the relationship of lateral OA with symptoms and patient characteristics. Methods: Cemented Phase 3 medial Oxford UKA implanted by two surgeons since 1998 for the recommended indications were prospectively followed. A 15-year cumulative revision rate for lateral OA of 5% for this series was previously reported. A total of 163 unrevised knees with 15-year (SD 1) anterior-posterior knee radiographs were studied. Lateral joint space width (JSWL) was measured and severity of lateral OA was classified as: nil/mild, moderate, and severe. Preoperative and 15-year Oxford Knee Scores (OKS) and American Knee Society Scores were determined. The effect of age, sex, BMI, and intraoperative findings was analyzed. Statistical analysis included one-way analysis of variance and Kruskal-Wallis H test, with significance set at 5%. Results: The mean age was 80.6 years (SD 8.3), with 84 females and 79 males. The mean JSWL was 5.6 mm (SD 1.4), and was not significantly related to age, sex, or intraoperative findings. Those with BMI > 40 kg/m2 had a smaller JSWL than those with a ‘normal’ BMI (p = 0.039). The incidence of severe and moderate lateral OA were both 4.9%. Overall, 2/142 (1.4%) of those with nil/mild lateral OA, 1/8 (13%) with moderate, and 2/8 (25%) with severe subsequently had a revision. Those with severe (mean OKS 35.6 (SD 9.3)) and moderate OA (mean OKS 35.8 (SD 10.5)) tended to have worse outcome scores than those with nil/mild (mean OKS 39.5 (SD 9.2)) but the difference was only significant for OKS-Function (p = 0.044). Conclusion: This study showed that the rate of having severe or moderate radiological lateral OA at 15 years after medial UKA was low (both 4.9%). Although patients with severe or moderate lateral OA had a lower OKS than those with nil/mild OA, their mean scores (OKS 36) would be classified as good

Editorial

This issue of Literacy and Numeracy Studies: An international journal in the education and training of adults marks the 21st volume of the journal, previously published as Open Letter: Australian Journal for Adult Literacy Research and Practice

OXBench:a benchmark for evaluation of protein multiple sequence alignment accuracy

BACKGROUND: The alignment of two or more protein sequences provides a powerful guide in the prediction of the protein structure and in identifying key functional residues, however, the utility of any prediction is completely dependent on the accuracy of the alignment. In this paper we describe a suite of reference alignments derived from the comparison of protein three-dimensional structures together with evaluation measures and software that allow automatically generated alignments to be benchmarked. We test the OXBench benchmark suite on alignments generated by the AMPS multiple alignment method, then apply the suite to compare eight different multiple alignment algorithms. The benchmark shows the current state-of-the art for alignment accuracy and provides a baseline against which new alignment algorithms may be judged.RESULTS: The simple hierarchical multiple alignment algorithm, AMPS, performed as well as or better than more modern methods such as CLUSTALW once the PAM250 pair-score matrix was replaced by a BLOSUM series matrix. AMPS gave an accuracy in Structurally Conserved Regions (SCRs) of 89.9% over a set of 672 alignments. The T-COFFEE method on a data set of families with &lt;8 sequences gave 91.4% accuracy, significantly better than CLUSTALW (88.9%) and all other methods considered here. The complete suite is available from http://www.compbio.dundee.ac.uk.CONCLUSIONS: The OXBench suite of reference alignments, evaluation software and results database provide a convenient method to assess progress in sequence alignment techniques. Evaluation measures that were dependent on comparison to a reference alignment were found to give good discrimination between methods. The STAMP Sc Score which is independent of a reference alignment also gave good discrimination. Application of OXBench in this paper shows that with the exception of T-COFFEE, the majority of the improvement in alignment accuracy seen since 1985 stems from improved pair-score matrices rather than algorithmic refinements. The maximum theoretical alignment accuracy obtained by pooling results over all methods was 94.5% with 52.5% accuracy for alignments in the 0-10 percentage identity range. This suggests that further improvements in accuracy will be possible in the future.</p

Assessing global renewable energy forecasts

In 2013, renewable energy accounted for only 8.9% of global commercial primary energy use, with fossil fuels supplying nearly all the rest. A number of official forecasts project such global energy growing by 50% or more by mid-century, and continuing to rise thereafter, in parallel with continued global economic growth. All energy sources of the future must meet three criteria: reserves or annual technical capacity must be adequate to meet projected demand; their climate change effects must be minimal; finally, they must be able to be widely deployed in the limited time available for climate mitigation. It is argued here that existing future energy scenarios generally fail to meet all three criteria. Most scenarios assume that adequate fossil/nuclear reserves are available, and that technical fixes can overcome greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuels. The few scenarios projecting that renewables will supply most of the world's energy by mid-century assume unrealistic technical potentials and implementation times. To meet all three criteria, global energy use will need to be reduced, through a combination of energy efficiency improvements and energy conservation efforts

Formation and Disruption of W-Phase in High-Entropy Alloys

High-entropy alloys (HEAs) are single-phase systems prepared from equimolar or near-equimolar concentrations of at least five principal elements. The combination of high mixing entropy, severe lattice distortion, sluggish diffusion and cocktail effect favours the formation of simple phases—usually a bcc or fcc matrix with minor inclusions of ordered binary intermetallics. HEAs have been proposed for applications in which high temperature stability (including mechanical and chemical stability under high temperature and high mechanical impact) is required. On the other hand, the major challenge to overcome for HEAs to become commercially attractive is the achievement of lightweight alloys of extreme hardness and low brittleness. The multicomponent AlCrCuScTi alloy was prepared and characterized using powder X-ray diffraction (PXRD), scanning-electron microscope (SEM) and atomic-force microscope equipped with scanning Kelvin probe (AFM/SKP) techniques. Results show that the formation of complex multicomponent ternary intermetallic compounds upon heating plays a key role in phase evolution. The formation and degradation of W-phase, Al2Cu3Sc, in the AlCrCuScTi alloy plays a crucial role in its properties and stability. Analysis of as-melted and annealed alloy suggests that the W-phase is favoured kinetically, but thermodynamically unstable. The disruption of the W-phase in the alloy matrix has a positive effect on hardness (890 HV), density (4.83 g·cm−3) and crack propagation. The hardness/density ratio obtained for this alloy shows a record value in comparison with ordinary heavy refractory HEAs

Toward Early-Warning Detection of Gravitational Waves from Compact Binary Coalescence

Rapid detection of compact binary coalescence (CBC) with a network of advanced gravitational-wave detectors will offer a unique opportunity for multi-messenger astronomy. Prompt detection alerts for the astronomical community might make it possible to observe the onset of electromagnetic emission from (CBC). We demonstrate a computationally practical filtering strategy that could produce early-warning triggers before gravitational radiation from the final merger has arrived at the detectors.Comment: 16 pages, 7 figures, published in ApJ. Reformatted preprint with emulateap

Triangulation of gravitational wave sources with a network of detectors

There is significant benefit to be gained by pursuing multi-messenger astronomy with gravitational wave and electromagnetic observations. In order to undertake electromagnetic follow-ups of gravitational wave signals, it will be necessary to accurately localize them in the sky. Since gravitational wave detectors are not inherently pointing instruments, localization will occur primarily through triangulation with a network of detectors. We investigate the expected timing accuracy for observed signals and the consequences for localization. In addition, we discuss the effect of systematic uncertainties in the waveform and calibration of the instruments on the localization of sources. We provide illustrative results of timing and localization accuracy as well as systematic effects for coalescing binary waveforms.Comment: 20 pages, 5 figure

Esimulations for blended learning in professional education: capacity building, knowledge transfer and dissemination

A two-year collaborative project by Deakin, RMIT and Charles Sturt universities aims to build in each institution, the academic and professional staff capacities for developing and using a form of online, goal-based, role-play simulation (eSimulation/eSim). While the project embraces 'knowledge transfer', 'capacity building' and 'embedded dissemination', a greater challenge is transforming perceptions of eSims in blended learning contexts to improve flexible learning designs across the higher education sector. The project addresses the need for coordinated research and development in the field of eSimulations in Australian higher education. It aligns the educational, technical, evaluation and research strengths of the three parties to build academic and professional staff capacities for the 'local' development and use of an already successful approach to simulating 'professional workplace experiences' for student learning. This poster presents the ALTC Competitive Grants Program project (2008-2010): 'Building academic staff capacity for using eSimulations in professional education for experience transfer'. The project's website is http://www.deakin.edu.au/itl/insims/altc-project/