Building meaningful assessment around Mudang-Dali – an Indigenous-connected curriculum

In 2017, Universities Australia launched its Indigenous Strategy 2017–2020, with its aim being to “support the advancement of Indigenous peoples in and through Australia’s universities”. A core part of this aim was to ensure “all students will encounter and engage with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultural content as integral parts of their course of study”. In 2022, Universities Australia launched its 2022-2025 Indigenous Strategy, which expanded upon its 2017-2020 strategy to promote action rather than being aspirational. The strategy continues to have a focus on embedding Indigenous knowledge into curriculum so that all graduates will have “a strong foundational understanding of Indigenous values and knowledges” and to ensure that the Indigenous content is “meaningful, appropriately developed and appropriately resourced”. Mudang-Dali means ‘to live’ in the Dharug language. At Macquarie University, situated on Dharug land, the Mudang-Dali Indigenous Connected Curriculum Framework has been providing academics with the confidence and support to embed Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander knowledge, values, and philosophies into the curriculum. We have been seeing positive learning examples across all disciplines, showcasing the richness of Indigenous knowledge systems in different learning settings including in lectures, workshops, field trips and practicals. There has, however, been limited discussion on assessment accompanying these learnings. To emphasise and reinforce the significance of these learnings to our students, it is important that there are meaningful assessment tasks related to the Indigenous content in the curriculum. In doing so, students obtain a deeper understanding of Indigenous knowledge, ways of learning, and perspectives, and we show them that we value Mudang-Dali. We also enrich our own knowledge as educators. In this presentation, we will provide examples of assessments that have accompanied Mudang-Dali content and have given meaningful learning and transformative experiences for our students and the educators. This includes examples that have fostered exchange of knowledge, skills and capability strengthening for Macquarie University staff and students and our First Nations collaborators. REFERENCE Universities Australia (2022) Indigenous Strategy 2022-25; https://www.universitiesaustralia.edu.au/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/UA-Indigenous-Strategy-2022-25.pd

Free energy of formation of clusters of sulphuric acid and water molecules determined by guided disassembly

We evaluate the grand potential of a cluster of two molecular species, equivalent to its free energy of formation from a binary vapour phase, using a nonequilibrium molecular dynamics technique where guide particles, each tethered to a molecule by a harmonic force, move apart to disassemble a cluster into its components. The mechanical work performed in an ensemble of trajectories is analysed using the Jarzynski equality to obtain a free energy of disassembly, a contribution to the cluster grand potential. We study clusters of sulphuric acid and water at 300 K, using a classical interaction scheme, and contrast two modes of guided disassembly. In one, the cluster is broken apart through simple pulling by the guide particles, but we find the trajectories tend to be mechanically irreversible. In the second approach, the guide motion and strength of tethering are modified in a way that prises the cluster apart, a procedure that seems more reversible. We construct a surface representing the cluster grand potential, and identify a critical cluster for droplet nucleation under given vapour conditions. We compare the equilibrium populations of clusters with calculations reported by Henschel et al. [J. Phys. Chem. A 118, 2599 (2014)] based on optimised quantum chemical structures

The stability of boundary layers on curved surfaces and surfaces involving abrupt changes

This thesis is concerned with the effect that boundary-layer instabilities have on laminar- turbulent transition over a commercial aircraft wing. We consider the effect that changing the structure of a wing’s surface may have on these instabilities. This thesis is separated into two parts, each concerning a different instability. Firstly our focus is on Tollmien-Schlichting waves; we investigate how abrupt changes may affect boundary-layer transition. The abrupt changes considered are junctions between rigid and porous surfaces. A local scattering problem is formulated; the abrupt changes cause waves to scatter in a subsonic boundary layer. The mechanism is described mathematically by using a triple-deck formalism, while the analysis across the junctions is based in a Wiener- Hopf factorisation. The impact of the wall junctions is characterised by a transmission coefficient, defined as the ratio of the amplitudes of the transmitted and incident waves. From our analysis we determine the effectiveness of porous strips in delaying transition. In the second part of this thesis we concentrate on a curved wing. Over curved sur- faces Go ̈rtler vortices may be generated; our focus is on long-wavelength Go ̈rtler vortices and the effect of changing curvature. The flow is described using a three-tiered system that balances the displacement and centrifugal forces. Two different problems concerning Go ̈rtler vortices are investigated, firstly we consider the effect of slowly varying curvature. Using a WKB approximation we derive multi-scale systems of equations, allowing us to find leading-order analytic solutions. The second problem concerning curved surfaces considers the effect of long-wavelength Go ̈rtler vortex-wave interaction. We use vortex-wave interaction theory to describe the evo- lution of this nonlinear interaction over a concave surface, where the curvature is modified in the streamwise direction. Analytical solutions are found for the vortex-induced shear stress and the wave pressure amplitude, using these solutions we solve for the remaining variables numerically.Open Acces

A POLICY AGENDA FOR PRO POOR AGRICULTURAL GROWTH

Economic growth has been low and the incidence and numbers of poor people remain very high in some parts of the world, notably in sub Saharan Africa and some parts of South Asia. Projections for poverty reduction suggest that these regions are likely to continue to hold very large numbers of very poor rural people in the foreseeable future. Theoretical arguments and empirical evidence suggest that in poor agrarian economies both the processes of structural change within national economies and micro-economic relations within rural economies give agriculture (and particularly intensive cereal based growth) a pre-eminent and unique role in economic development and in poverty reduction. However, reliance on pro-poor agricultural growth as the main weapon against rural poverty today faces more difficult challenges than those faced in the green revolution areas in the latter part of the 20th century, due to a number of features that together increase risk and uncertainty and raise costs and/or lower returns to agricultural investment. Many of these difficulties are endogenous to today's poor rural areas, others result from broader processes of global change, but it is argued that some are the direct result of policies supporting liberalisation and withdrawal of the state. A review of the green revolutions of the 20th century suggests that state interventions in agricultural markets were widely used and important in supporting sometimes short periods of critical market and technological development in the process of rural growth. Unfortunately the benefits of such interventions have been overlooked as a result of their very evident inefficiency and high costs, without a clear understanding of their institutional benefits. Policy and research implications of this analysis are discussed.Food Security and Poverty, International Development,

Distributed processing of a fractal array beamformer

Fractals have been proven as potential candidates for satellite flying formations, where its different elements represent a thinned array. The distributed and low power nature of the nodes in this network motivates distributed processing when using such an array as a beamformer. This paper proposes such initial idea, and demonstrates that benefits such as strictly limited local processing capability independent of the array’s dimension and local calibration can be bought at the expense of a slightly increased overall cost

Two Amino Acid Residues Contribute to a Cation-π Binding Interaction in the Binding Site of an Insect GABA Receptor

Cys-loop receptor binding sites characteristically possess an "aromatic box," where several aromatic amino acid residues surround the bound ligand. A cation-π interaction between one of these residues and the natural agonist is common, although the residue type and location are not conserved. Even in the closely related vertebrate GABA_A and GABA_C receptors, residues in distinct locations perform this role: in GABA_A receptors, a Tyr residue in loop A forms a cation-π interaction with GABA, while in GABA_C receptors it is a loop B residue. GABA-activated Cys-loop receptors also exist in invertebrates, where they have distinct pharmacologies and are the target of a range of pesticides. Here we examine the location of GABA in an insect binding site by incorporating a series of fluorinated Phe derivatives into the receptor binding pocket using unnatural amino acid mutagenesis, and evaluating the resulting receptors when expressed in Xenopus oocytes. A homology model suggests that two aromatic residues (in loops B and C) are positioned such that they could contribute to a cation-π interaction with the primary ammonium of GABA, and the data reveal a clear correlation between the GABA EC_(50) and the cation-π binding ability both at Phe206 (loop B) and Tyr254 (loop C), demonstrating for the first time the contribution of two aromatic residues to a cation-π interaction in a Cys-loop receptor

Global Perspectives on Volunteerism: Analysing the role of the State, Society and Social Capital

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the concept of volunteerism in three different case countries, namely, that of USA, UK and China while highlighting the role of the state, society and social capital. Design/methodology/approach – The paper reviews the extant literature on the volunteering traditions in the chosen case study countries highlighting the idiosyncrasies while analysing implications for future research. Findings – The paper highlights the role of the state, society and social capital in the chosen countries, each deriving its origins from the specific traditions in those countries. Research limitations/implications – This paper provides a conceptual review focusing on the key literature in the field. The authors have examined various academic texts and published materials. Practical implications – This paper provided an update critically discussion on the concept of volunteerism in three different case countries. Social implications – This paper is highly relevant to academics and social policy makers. Moreover, this paper has been written from an international context. Originality/value – The paper makes an original contribution by comparing and contrasting three important countries with different histories and traditions of volunteerism highlighting diversity of type and application. </jats:sec