The growth of agricultural administration 1880-1900 : the dairy industry as a test case : thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in History at Massey University

No historical writer is likely to deny that the growth of a relatively intensive administration was an integral part of the total Liberal achievement. Nevertheless, little enough research has been done on the nature of governmental growth in this period. Gibbons and Brooking have performed some of the spadework in this field and this thesis will attempt to slightly broaden and deepen the enquiry. 1 Sea Gibbons, P.J. "'Turning Tramps into Taxpayers' – The Department of Labour and the Casual Labourer in the 1890's", unpublished M.A. thesis, Massey University, Palmerston North, 1970; and T.W.H. Brooking, "Sir John McKenzie and the Origins and Growth of the Department of Agriculture, 1391-1900", unpublished M.A. thesis, Massey University, Palmerston North, 1972. It is particularly in the explanation of Liberal administrative growth, comparable only with that experienced in the early years of the first Labour Government, that the hypothesis developed below will take a different course. Gibbons on the Labour Department, and Brooking on the Department of Agriculture, have emphasized the role of personalities, especially master bureaucrats, in their explanations of the massive quantitative and qualitative growth that the Liberal period of government (1891-1911) witnessed. The zealot Tregear, it would seem, successfully applied his peculiar bureaucratic ethic during those years of the 1890's when his idealism and effective control of the Labour Department existed in a relationship which enabled him to provide his conscious contribution to the "administrative revolution" then taking place. J.D. Rtitchie, Brooking suggests, was only able to work his unobstrusive revolution once he was under the supervision of T.Y. Duncan and R. McNab, both decidedly weaker Ministers of Agriculture than Sir John McKenzie. [From Introduction

Screening Program on Superalloys for Trisonic Transport. Report No. 2. Results for Cold-Worked N155 Alloy

N155 alloy sheet cold reduced 40 and 65 percent was subjected to a screening program in the as-rolled condition designed to rate materials for possible usefulness for the airframe of a trisonic transport plane, Cold reductions of 40 to 65 percent produced the following properties at room temperature in the as-rolled N155 sheet investigated

College Wellness

The purpose of this study is to examine ways to increase physical fitness activity in overweight and obese college students. The study seeks to test the effectiveness of health campaign messages that include visuals of overweight and obese students engaged in physical activity. It is hypothesized that the inclusion of weight diverse students engaged in activity will decrease both obesity public stigma and self-stigma. Moreover, the researchers hypothesize that the inclusion of efficacy statements will increase overweight and obese students’ behavioral intention to engage in physical fitness activities at the campus recreation center

A systems study of the effect of osmotic stress on hormone crosstalk and growth in Arabidopsis thaliana roots

Understanding the mechanisms regulating root development under drought conditions is an important question for plant biology and world agriculture. This thesis examines the effect of osmotic stress on the plant hormones abscisic acid (ABA), cytokinin and ethylene responses and how they mediate auxin transport, distribution and root growth via PIN proteins Root growth is reduced under osmotic stress, and ABA responses increase. Root growth can be rescued by inhibiting ABA biosynthesis, indicating its critical role in the regulation of growth under stress. There was also a reduction in cytokinin signalling under stress. The inhibition of root growth under osmotic stress does not require ethylene signalling, however auxin can rescue growth. Osmotic stress also modulates auxin transporter levels, particularly PIN1, which regulates auxin transport to the root tip. As PIN1 levels are reduced under stress in an ABA-dependent manner, overriding the ethylene effect on PIN1 levels, and auxin responses decrease under stress, I present the hypothesis that ABA is limiting auxin transport to the root under stress to reduce growth. However, the interplay between ABA, ethylene, cytokinin and auxin is tissue-specific, with the result that PIN1 and PIN2 differentially respond to osmotic stress. Combining experimental analysis with extensive literature searches allowed the systematic construction of interaction networks, incorporating the known interactions between the hormones and stress. This network analysis reveals that ABA regulates root growth under osmotic stress conditions via interactions with cytokinin, ethylene and auxin demonstrating complicated non-linear relationships and providing a framework for further kinetic modelling. Kinetic modelling (using differential equations to simulate these interactions) of ethylene and ABA effects on PIN1 levels reveals that the hormones most likely act on the same pathway to regulate PIN1 levels. The work presented here provides novel insights into how root growth is regulated by hormones under drought and osmotic stress conditions

Functional imaging of response selection

The functions of the prefrontal cortex remain controversial. Electrophysio- logical and lesion studies in monkeys have emphasised a role in working memory. In contrast, human functional neuroimaging studies and neuropsychology have emphasised a role in executive processes and volition. An alternative interpretation of the role of the prefrontal cortex is proposed in this thesis: that the prefrontal cortex mediates the attentional selection of sensory, mnemonic and motor representations in non-prefrontal cortex. This hypothesis is tested in a series of functional imaging experiments. In the first two experiments (chapters 4 and 5), event-related functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) was used to re-examine the role of the prefrontal cortex in spatial and spatio-temporal working memory. Maintenance of information in memory was associated with activation of posterior prefrontal cortex (area 8). In contrast, the selection of an item from several remembered items was associated with activation of the middle and anterior parts of the prefrontal cortex (including area 46). To test the generalisation of 'selection' as a function of prefrontal cortex, experiment three (chapter 6) required subjects to select either a finger to move, or a colour from a multicolour display. Free selection was associated with activation of the prefrontal cortex (area 46) bilaterally, regardless of sensory or motor modality. The selection of voluntary actions has been proposed to depend on top-down modulation of motor regions by prefrontal cortex. The fourth and fifth experiments used structural equation modelling of fMRI time -series to measure the effective connectivity among prefrontal, premotor and parietal cortex. In young (chapter 7) and old (chapter 8) normal subjects, attention to action specifically enhanced coupling between prefrontal and premotor regions. This effect was not seen in patients with Parkinson's disease (chapter 8). Lastly, positron emission tomography was used to study planning in the Tower of London task, a common clinical measure of prefrontal function. Several variants of the task were developed, to distinguish the neural basis of the task's multiple cognitive components (chapter 9). The prefrontal cortex was activated in association with generation, selection or memory for moves, rather than planning towards a specified goal. The results support a generalised role in attentional selection of neuronal representations, whether stimuli, actions, or remembered items. The hypothesised attentional selection of responses is consistent with the activation of prefrontal cortex in working memory tasks and during attention to voluntary action. This role is compatible with the neurophysiological properties of individual neurons in the prefrontal cortex and the results of neuroimaging and lesion studies

Beyond the “urge to move”: objective measures for the study of agency in the post-Libet era

The investigation of human volition is a longstanding endeavor from both philosophers and researchers. Yet because of the major challenges associated with capturing voluntary movements in an ecologically relevant state in the research environment, it is only in recent years that human agency has grown as a field of cognitive neuroscience. In particular, the seminal work of Libet et al. (1983) paved the way for a neuroscientific approach to agency. Over the past decade, new objective paradigms have been developed to study agency, drawing upon emerging concepts from cognitive and computational neuroscience. These include the chronometric approach of Libet’s study which is embedded in the “intentional binding” paradigm, optimal motor control theory and most recent insights from active inference theory. Here we review these principal methods and their application to the study of agency in health and the insights gained from their application to neurological and psychiatric disorders. We show that the neuropsychological paradigms that are based upon these new approaches have key advantages over traditional experimental designs. We propose that these advantages, coupled with advances in neuroimaging, create a powerful set of tools for understanding human agency and its neurobiological basis

Get up, stand up - giving people the means to respond to opioid overdose

Aims and objectives This report was written as an evaluation of the Take Home Naloxone (THN) program at Access Health in St Kilda, Victoria. Access Health is a primary health service, managed by The Salvation Army Crisis Services located in the adjoining building in Grey St, St Kilda. The THN program – established in conjunction with Harm Reduction Victoria (HRV) –was the first if its kind in the state, to facilitate the distribution of a (then) Schedule 4 drug to opioid users and their peers. However, the early success of the model was soon replicated at a number of further community and primary health care services within inner-urban Melbourne. The expansion of peer distribution complemented a State Government funded initiative, the Community Overdose Prevention and Education program (known as COPE), which built on a Government commitment to increase community access to naloxone. Naloxone is an antidote to heroin overdoses, insofar as it rapidly revives the victims of an opioid overdose. The possession and use of naloxone had largely been confined to medical professionals – such as paramedics and Emergency Department medics called to attend to a case of overdose. This evaluation was primarily conducted during the first twelve months of the program. Verbal briefings on the iterative findings from the evaluation were used by the staff team to improve elements of the program design over time