https://hdl.handle.net/2123/17246 2026-06-04T23:21:57Z 2026-06-04T23:21:57Z Sun, Alex (Yu) https://hdl.handle.net/2123/35354 2026-05-31T23:29:22Z 2026-05-25T00:00:00Z

Do Plants Grow Differently Around Leaky Weirs? Sun, Alex (Yu) Degraded river systems lead to problems beyond poor water quality. Alluvial pastures along degraded rivers lose their resilience against floods and droughts, and aquatic animals are deprived of their breeding grounds when tributaries dry up too quickly. Conventional strategies to repair degraded rivers are costly, driving landscape managers to seek better solutions. In-stream structures such as leaky weirs, rock gabions, and Beaver Dam Analogues are gaining popularity due to their immediate hydrological impacts and their use of cheap, natural materials. Some policy makers, however, distrust these nature-based solutions, as they believe such methods rest on claims unsubstantiated by research. Our study, conducted from 2023 to 2024, explored leaky weirs. These low, in-stream structures are thought to facilitate wetland recovery by altering local hydrology, but their effects on riparian plants have not been studied. Our study aimed to determine whether plant communities differed between sites with leaky weirs compared to sites without leaky weirs. We found that plant did grow differently around leaky weirs; however, this difference was only seen within 50m of the riverbank. In treatment sites, the abundance and richness of wetland plants along the inner riparian zone was significantly higher than in control sites. However, we saw no significant differences in pasture and canopy compositions. From this, we conclude that leaky weirs may have a positive impact on plant communities; however, this effect is only local in the short term and must be further tested through manipulative studies.

2026-05-25T00:00:00Z Thucker, Madhur https://hdl.handle.net/2123/35349 2026-05-25T06:10:12Z 2026-05-25T00:00:00Z

From Malacca to the arctic: understanding the arctic strategy through the Malacca Thucker, Madhur China is a prisoner of its geography, where approximately 80 Per cent of its crude oil imports come through the Strait of Malacca, showing a fundamental strategic vulnerability and exposing its energy supply chain to potential disruption by rival powers, particularly the United States with its chain of alliances and India with its geographic presence in the Indian Ocean. Drawing on Mahanian’s concept of sea power, this paper examines how China has pursued strategic diversification of maritime routes to mitigate its structural chokepoint dependency, with particular focus on the Arctic as an emerging supplementary corridor. The analysis evaluates two Principled mitigation strategies. First, the string of pearls - a network of dual-use infrastructure spread across South and Southeast Asia developed under the envelope of the Belt and Road Initiative seeking to establish a forward naval presence in the Indian Ocean; however, major parts of this initiative, such as CPEC and CMEC, are struggling from operational constraints due to armed conflicts or anti-Chinese sentiment. Second, the Arctic policy formalised in 2017 through Vision for Maritime Cooperation and the 2018 Arctic White Paper, positions the Northern Sea Route as a strategic alternative to Suez-dependent trade lanes, offering a potential 40 per cent reduction in shipping distance between East Asian and European ports. The paper finds that, though Sino-Russian cooperation has accelerated following Russia's post-2022 international isolation, the Northern Sea Route remains constrained by severe infrastructure deficits, seasonal navigability limitations, and the withdrawal of Chinese firms from sanctioned projects, revealing financial pragmatism over strategic commitment. Furthermore, a coordinated strategic push from the Western alliance system in the Arctic region has significantly slowed Chinese resource and infrastructure investments across the wider Arctic region. The paper concludes that the Chinese Arctic strategy is a long-term investment fuelled by commercial incentives compelling enough to overcome Nordic reluctance and to prioritise economic rationality over security concerns, though the ultimate viability is contingent on the Northern Sea Route's operational maturation and the sustainability of the Sino-Russian partnership amid escalating geopolitical polarisation.

2026-05-25T00:00:00Z Biniares, Amy https://hdl.handle.net/2123/35114 2026-05-05T03:34:09Z 2026-04-20T00:00:00Z

Of Music and Magic: Macro and Micro Narrative Threads in the Music of the Harry Potter Series Biniares, Amy The Harry Potter series is a cultural phenomenon and has received much recognition for its unique and captivating storytelling. Its film music, however, has rarely been explored, particularly in terms of its contribution to the narrative. This thesis explores the role of music in shaping the narrative of the Harry Potter series, introducing the concept of micro and macro narrative structures. A micro narrative, or individual film, serves a purpose to the macro narrative, the series as a whole sum of its parts. When directors have varying perspectives and interpretations of a series, crucial narrative elements such as tonality, mood, and music change over the course of the series, disrupting continuity. The Harry Potter series is therefore relevant in exploring the threads of music that combine micro and macro narrative contexts.

2026-04-20T00:00:00Z Goldman, Benjamin Thomas https://hdl.handle.net/2123/35111 2026-05-05T03:34:11Z 2025-01-01T00:00:00Z

Reading Pace in Lucan’s De Bello Civili and Silius Italicus’ Punica Goldman, Benjamin Thomas This thesis seeks to establish pace as a framework for reading Lucan’s De Bello Civili (BC) and Silius Italicus’ Punica. Drawing on the study of exemplarity and the scholarship on fortuna, it examines the most significant moments in the development of a character’s pace across both texts. Chapter 1 focusses on the creation of three pace paradigms linked to Julius Caesar, Pompey the Great, and Cato the Elder in BC: celeritas Caesariana, mora Pompeiana, and patientia Catoniana. They reflect the speed of Caesar, the idleness of Pompey, and the endurance of Cato. Chapter 2 explores Silius’ treatment of pace in the first ten books of the Punica, revealing that it is informed by Lucan’s pace paradigms. The Caesarian speed of Hannibal and the Roman leaders (Scipio the Elder, Sempronius, Flaminius, and Minucius) is explored, and particular emphasis is paid to Fabius’ emulatory cunctatio and its ability to save, endure, inspire, and slow Hannibal’s celeritas. However, the conflict between the consuls Varro and Paulus at the climactic Battle of Cannae places Roman celeritas and Fabian cunctatio in opposition to explain the catastrophic Roman defeat. Chapter 3 explores how the pattern of pace in the Punica changes because of fortuna after Cannae in books 11-17. Hannibal’s pace begins to resemble Pompey’s idleness, the Roman leaders’ swiftness (Fulvius, Marcellus, and Claudius Nero) becomes effective, and Scipio Africanus emerges as a unique paradigm of celeritas.

2025-01-01T00:00:00Z Elton, Thomas James https://hdl.handle.net/2123/35075 2026-05-05T03:34:11Z 2026-04-02T00:00:00Z

Designing and Testing an AI System to Understand Student Muddy Card Responses Elton, Thomas James Muddy cards are an active learning technique where students record the most confusing point from a lecture. They improve students’ memory retention and self-efficacy, and aid in developing their under- standing of course material. Despite their many benefits, reading and analysing muddy card responses requires a substantial time commitment from teachers. In this thesis, we developed a system that stream- lines the process of collecting and analysing muddy cards. This system uses embedding algorithms and agglomerative clustering to enable teachers to quickly identify the most commonly occurring confusing points in their lecture. We have also implemented a ‘student-assisted’ approach, where students identify peer responses that are semantically similar to what they entered to improve the quality of clustering. To explore the performance of the embedding models central to the muddy card system, we man- ually clustered 2,327 muddy cards (split into eight samples). We developed a new clustering metric called the ‘student questions answered satisfaction’ (SQAS) score to better measure clustering quality for muddy card applications. Using the SQAS score, we found that no embedding model markedly out- performed the others. This is in contrast to embedding benchmarks, which do reveal differences between embedding models. When incorporating the ‘student-assisted’ data in clustering, the ‘multi-evidence’ approach consistently improves SQAS score performance. To investigate the effectiveness of our muddy card system, we conducted a user study with 20 units at the University of Sydney. On a two-week cycle, teachers would use our clustering interface, and as a control, a baseline version with simple options for alphabetically sorting responses. Students and teachers completed an end-of-study survey, and 13 teachers agreed to be interviewed regarding their ex- perience with the system. During the study, there was a low student muddy card response rate. Through interviews, teachers explained that students do not generally complete optional activities, especially if they do not see the benefit in participating. We found that lecturers tended to prefer the clustering interface over the baseline interface. To build upon this study’s findings, we propose a follow-up user study where the muddy card system is modified to be more conducive to live lecture analysis. We hypothesise that this will increase the low response rate. The follow-up study will also include international universities to investigate the effect of societal differences on the uptake of muddy cards.

2026-04-02T00:00:00Z Boey, Shalee Wai Mun https://hdl.handle.net/2123/34981 2026-05-05T03:34:09Z 2026-03-13T00:00:00Z

When Did My Feed Become A Marketplace? Negotiating Commercialisation on Instagram Boey, Shalee Wai Mun Since its launch in 2010, Instagram has evolved from a simple photo-sharing application into a multifaceted platform that integrates communication, creativity, commerce, and entertainment. This thesis analyses the evolution of Instagram from a social networking platform to an “all-in-one” hub, and its impact on user engagement and the concept of social connection. Moving beyond the extensively studied marketing and influencer dimensions of Instagram, this research focuses on general users and how they continue to use the platform as a site for social connection amidst its growing commercialisation. Analysing Instagram’s growth from 2010 to 2025, this study traces key feature developments and their cultural implications. Grounded in Pinch and Bijker’s (1987) social construction of technology (SCOT) framework and Hall’s (1973) encoding and decoding model (E/D), it explores the interplay between Instagram’s technological design, user interpretation, and cultural context. The research highlights how algorithmic systems and commercial imperatives have redefined everyday participation and visibility online. Using a qualitative mixed-method design, this study uses in-depth interviews with Light et al.’s (2018) walkthrough method to explore the experiences of long-term users in Australia who joined Instagram before 2015. Through thematic analysis, it examines how users interpret Instagram’s evolving features, negotiate its algorithmic structures, and engage with the platform for both social and personal purposes. This thesis contributes to broader discussions of social media commercialisation by illustrating how digital platforms embed capitalist values into social interaction. By focusing on user experiences, this research shows how technological change and cultural production work together to shape today’s digital world—a space where the drive to connect increasingly intertwines with visibility, exposure, and economic value.

2026-03-13T00:00:00Z Patmore, Anna https://hdl.handle.net/2123/34970 2026-05-05T03:34:10Z 2025-01-01T00:00:00Z

Listening Beyond the Stave: Context, Curriculum and Continuity of Musicology in NSW Senior Secondary Schools Patmore, Anna This qualitative multi-case study examines the relationship between school-based musicology in the NSW senior secondary curriculum and the practices of tertiary music researchers. While school teachers have become accustomed to syllabi and external assessment requirements that have remained unchanged since 1999, NSW tertiary institutions have engaged in continuous revision of course structures, responding to increasingly diverse and culturally relevant representations of music scholarship. Drawing on semi-structured interviews with school teachers and tertiary music researchers, the study seeks to identify the pedagogical and methodological gaps between the two sectors, proposing strategies to promote a more inclusive interpretation of musicology in schools. With the NSW senior secondary music curriculum currently undergoing a period of revision, the perspectives tabled in this study are particularly timely. Ultimately, this study endeavours to provide a foundation for increased collaboration between sectors, highlighting the potential for more coherent, culturally responsive, and innovative frameworks to music research education.

2025-01-01T00:00:00Z Readford, Thomas R https://hdl.handle.net/2123/34968 2026-05-05T03:34:09Z 2021-01-01T00:00:00Z

Factors Affecting Chiropractor Requests for Full-length Spinal Radiography: A Scoping Review Readford, Thomas R Chiropractors often refer their patients for full-length (three to four region) radiographs of the spine as part of their clinical assessment, which are frequently completed by radiographers in medical imaging practices. Overuse of spinal radiography by chiropractors has previously been reported and remains a contentious issue. The purpose of this scoping review was to explore the issues surrounding the utilisation of FLS radiography by chiropractors and examine the alignment of this practice with current evidence. A search of four databases (AMED, EMBASE, MedLine and Scopus) and a hand search was conducted using key words. Articles were screened against an inclusion/exclusion criterion for relevance. Themes and findings were extracted from eligible articles and evidence was synthesised using a narrative approach. In total, 25 articles were identified, six major themes were extracted, and subsequent conclusions drawn by authors were charted to identify confluent findings. This review identified a paucity of literature addressing this issue and an underrepresentation of relevant perspectives from radiographers. Several issues surrounding the use of full-length spinal radiography by chiropractors were identified and examined, including barriers to the adherence of published guidelines for spinal imaging, an absence of a reporting mechanism for the utilisation of spinal radiography in chiropractic and the existence of a spectrum of beliefs amongst chiropractors about the clinical utility and limitations of full-length spinal radiography. Further investigation is required to further understand the scope of this issue and its impacts for radiation protection and patient safety.

2021-01-01T00:00:00Z Weeks, Benjamin https://hdl.handle.net/2123/34966 2026-05-05T03:34:09Z 2026-03-09T00:00:00Z

A sparsity constrained dynamic trading framework to identify stochastic arbitrage opportunities with market index options Weeks, Benjamin This paper formulates a mixed-integer linear program that applies sequential stochastic dominance in a dynamic, daily-rebalanced trading framework to identify stochastic arbitrage opportunities with options written on the S&P 500 index. This paper finds that a dynamic trading framework succeeds at identifying stochastic arbitrage opportunities more frequently than static trading frameworks explored in recent research, but both strategies invariably return payoffs inferior to the market. This paper shows that the application of sparsity constraints to both static and dynamic trading strategies yields improved performance.

2026-03-09T00:00:00Z Patawaran, Sabina https://hdl.handle.net/2123/34919 2026-05-05T03:34:09Z 2025-01-01T00:00:00Z

Financial Wellbeing and the Early Release of Superannuation Patawaran, Sabina The Early Release of Superannuation (ERS) is one of the Australian federal government’s policy responses to the COVID-19 pandemic, allowing individuals who were financially impacted by the crisis to withdraw up to A$20,000 over two periods from their superannuation accounts. This thesis investigates the impact of the ERS and if it disproportionately affected low-income earners’ subjective financial wellbeing relative to higher-income earners’. Using data from the Household Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) Survey and a triple difference framework, I find no substantial evidence supporting this. However, I find statistically significant evidence suggesting that, in general, the ERS improved individuals’ reported satisfaction with their personal finances.

2025-01-01T00:00:00Z Shwe, Romana https://hdl.handle.net/2123/34918 2026-05-05T03:34:11Z 2025-01-01T00:00:00Z

Forecasting Electricity Price Spikes: A Comparative Analysis of GAM and SVM Shwe, Romana The Australian National Electricity Market (NEM) exhibits high price volatility, with prices determined every five minutes. Sudden and unpredictable price spikes create substantial uncertainty and financial risk for market participants, including generators, retailers, and households. Forecasting these rare events is challenging because non-spike periods can dominate the data, leading to the issue of data imbalance. This can bias traditional models toward the majority class, reducing their ability to accurately forecast the minority class (price spikes). This thesis addresses this challenge by adapting the Generalised Additive Model (GAM) and Support Vector Machine (SVM) with class weights to improve the prediction of rare spikes. Moreover, model performance is evaluated using imbalance-aware metrics such as the F1-score, G-mean, and the precision–recall area under the curve (PR-AUC). Results indicate that the GAM outperforms the SVM in predicting spikes while maintaining low false-positive rates. Both models balance performance across spike and non-spike classes and are robust to variations in weighting schemes and hyperparameters. These findings demonstrate the potential of GAM and SVM for electricity price spike forecasting (EPSF) in Australia, enabling generators to optimise production, retailers to maximise profits, and households to reduce costs.

2025-01-01T00:00:00Z Cao, Ray Xi https://hdl.handle.net/2123/34880 2026-05-05T03:34:10Z 2026-02-23T00:00:00Z

The Impact of Protestantism on Women's Education in Japan Cao, Ray Xi Gender gaps in education persist in many developing countries. Understanding how some nations narrowed these gaps in the past can provide insights into human-capital formation. This thesis examines whether Protestant missionary activity, particularly the work of single female missionaries, influenced women’s educational attainment in Japan. Using historical and census data from 46 Japanese prefectures, I use a two-stage least squares (2SLS) approach, instrumenting on the number of missionaries to identify potential causal effects. The result shows the presence of Protestant missionaries in Japan, especially single female missionaries, is a strong predictor of the establishment of Protestant girls’ high schools. These schools appear to have a positive impact on women’s tertiary educational attainment. IV estimates indicate: using single Protestant female missionaries to instrument schools, one additional Protestant girls’ high school per million people raised women’s tertiary attainment by 0.584%, relative to a mean of 1.522% (a 0.81 standard-deviation increase). Comparable effects are observed for Catholic missions. Effects at the secondary level were primarily observed among women, though tertiary gains also extended to men. This study contributes to literature on religion, human capital formation, and female role models in shaping women’s education. Keywords: Protestantism; Missionaries; Japan; Gender; Human capital.

2026-02-23T00:00:00Z Gillespie, Victoria https://hdl.handle.net/2123/34432 2026-05-05T03:34:11Z 2025-10-23T00:00:00Z

Remembering resistance: Traversing the memoryscape of Sydney’s green bans movement Gillespie, Victoria From 1971 to 1974, the ‘green bans movement’ captured Sydney’s attention, for its novel coalitions holding up development for social, ecological or heritage reasons. The historical period has become part of a narrative that Sydney likes to tell about itself, told and retold everywhere from state funerals to union trainings. Cultural memory emerges in plaques, murals, buildings, place names across the city, and in films and stories, depicting the city. How does cultural memory structure our understanding of Sydney’s 1970s green bans? Memory can seal off the past or mobilise it in pursuit of a different future.

2025-10-23T00:00:00Z Ansted, Oscar https://hdl.handle.net/2123/34392 2026-05-05T03:34:10Z 2025-10-10T00:00:00Z

Modelling of Supersonic Combustion using a Filtered Rankine-Hugoniot LES-FDF Method Ansted, Oscar A new energy consistency scheme using the filtered Rankine-Hugoniot (R-H) relation is tested and validated for a hybrid Eulerian/Lagrangian Large Eddy Simulation Filtered Density Function (LES-FDF) numerical method for modelling compressible high-speed combustion. This involves computing enthalpy redundantly on an Eulerian finite volume scheme, and an ensemble of Lagrangian particles which uses the filtered R-H relation to account for sub-grid effects. The method is tested against a three-dimensional, practical flame case: a turbulent non-premixed shear layer into an oblique shock. This was done including viscosity, and with a 35-step, 20-species chemistry model. Instantaneous and time-averaged measurements across the whole domain show numerically consistent temperature and enthalpy, validating energy consistency. Species were found to be better resolved in the FDF solver. Also, exclusion of Lagrangian sub-grid kinetic energy relaxation is shown to increase energy consistency error between solvers. Further, LES-FDF results were validated against DNS data showing low physical error. Overall, these results successfully validate the application of this novel method in practical, three-dimensional flame cases.

2025-10-10T00:00:00Z Xie, Jiacheng https://hdl.handle.net/2123/34204 2026-05-05T03:34:09Z 2025-08-08T00:00:00Z

Instrument Assignment Based on LATE Results with Defiers Xie, Jiacheng While most previous studies have focused on treatment assignment, this thesis emphasises instrument assignment to estimate Local Average Treatment Effects (LATE). We introduce a refined methodology to address limitations in the traditional assumptions set by Imbens and Angrist (1994), specifically by relaxing the monotonicity assumption to account for defiers. This work extends the contributions of Liao (2022) by integrating continuous control variables, namely KWW(Knowledge of the World Work) and IQ scores, into the LATE framework. We empirically validate our approach using college proximity as an instrumental variable. This study examines the impact of college attendance on wage outcomes, offering new insights into how treatment effects vary among individuals with different cognitive and job-related skills. The results conclude that individuals with lower KWW and IQ scores experience the highest wage gains from college attendance, highlighting the potential of targeted educational interventions. By accommodating defiers, this approach improves the robustness and applicability of LATE estimation across diverse empirical settings.

2025-08-08T00:00:00Z Fisher, Angus https://hdl.handle.net/2123/34115 2026-05-05T03:34:11Z 2025-07-17T00:00:00Z

Abortion-Policy-Induced Behavioural Shifts: Examining the Effects of the Abortion Pill PBS Listing on Risky Sexual Behaviour Fisher, Angus This thesis empirically examines the sexual behavioural response of the Australian Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS) listing of the medical abortion pill, which subsidised access to this abortion treatment. Using a regression discontinuity in time (RDiT) framework, we exploit the August 1st 2013 listing date to find a significant increase in abortion uptake and births with no change in pregnancies as well as a shift towards more pro- tective sexual behaviours. This is evidenced by a greater use of long-acting reversible contraceptives (LARCs) and permanent contraceptive treatments as well as simultaneous reductions in STI transmission and increases in STI testing.

2025-07-17T00:00:00Z Mizon, Andrew https://hdl.handle.net/2123/34100 2026-05-05T03:34:10Z 2025-07-14T00:00:00Z

Wealth and Wellbeing: the role of parental housing wealth in shaping youth health Mizon, Andrew In Australia, two of the most pressing concerns are the state of the housing market and the declining health of youth. Whilst the two are intertwined, the impact of the housing market on youth health is not well understood. On the one hand, the family home is the most common form of wealth, and thus higher house prices translate to higher parental wealth, which has the propensity to benefit youth through greater resources and investments. However for youth, higher house prices make home ownership more unattainable. Thus, the net effect of changes in housing prices and housing wealth is ambiguous. This thesis identifies the causal effect of changes to housing wealth - through house prices - on the physical and mental health of adolescents and young adults living in the parental home. Using a first-difference model with year and local area fixed effects, I find that mental and physical health both fall with an increase in local house prices, in spite of evidence for increased parental investments. These findings are particularly salient for children in mortgaged households, and households with fewer economic resources. To the best of my knowledge, this thesis is novel, in that it is the first to empirically investigate the link between the wellbeing outcomes of Australian youth living at home and the variation in the housing wealth of their parents.

2025-07-14T00:00:00Z Tang, Liwen https://hdl.handle.net/2123/33910 2026-05-05T03:34:11Z 2025-05-15T00:00:00Z

Mutual Fund Investments in Response to Local Declining Regulatory Climate Risk Tang, Liwen Donald Trump’s election in 2016 and the Republican Party’s resistance to climate regulatory reforms may have lowered investors’ expectations regarding national climate change policy progress. This study leverages this local political shift in climate policy to examine the response of U.S. mutual funds following the election of the Trump Administration. My findings indicate that institutional investors continued to reduce their holdings in high-pollution firms, despite the prospect of less stringent climate regulations under the Trump-led government. This evidence strongly supports the market perception of climate change regulation as a long-term, global regulatory focus. The primary findings are robust across both ESG-oriented and non-ESG-oriented mutual funds. The continued divestment by mutual funds is more pronounced among those with high past fund flows and higher management fees. Finally, the mutual funds’ divestment from high-emission companies has real effects, with evidence of more intensive carbon emissions reduction among firms underweighted by mutual funds.

2025-05-15T00:00:00Z McGrath, R.F. https://hdl.handle.net/2123/33905 2026-05-05T03:34:09Z 1976-01-01T00:00:00Z

A Biography of Sir Nicholas Throckmorton 1515-1571 McGrath, R.F. There is no comprehensive biography of Sir Nicholas Throckmorton. This account is concerned primarily with the public world of the Throckmorton who lived under five monarchs in England and served another four abroad as England's ambassador. Emphasis is placed on the political man for two reasons: firstly that the source material available is almost all of a public nature, consisting of his diplomatic despatches and other public documents; secondly, that his life was to a great degree shaped by his political actions crossed with his religious beliefs as reflected in those documents. But to give the context for this public figure I have resorted to the political background to illustrate the importance of his actions. A biography of course, is incomplete without considering the individual behind his actions; hence I have tried to show something of the private man through the documents, for in Throckmorton's case the action was so much the man. To discover his personal idiosyncrasies, however, is beyond the scope of this thesis; to do so would involve seeking out for instance the surviving private correspondence that is not readily available. The method of approach is chronological to the extent that Throckmorton's life and changing fortunes were marked by the accession and passing of Kings and Queens. The chapters thus consider the development of his career through the reigns of Henry VIII, Edward VI, Jane Grey, Mary Tudor and Elizabeth I. The biography begins in the latter years of the reign of Henry VIII and ends about one-third of the way through that of Elizabeth I. As the account was compiled almost solely from primary sources, it was necessary to support the narrative with essential documentation. Further, where some confusion has arisen over dating, I have given precedence to the consistency of information. Often cited in the text is the only biographical work on Throckmorton: The Legend of Sir Nicholas Throckmorton (c. 1580–1600?), a long poem by his nephew Thomas Throckmorton in the manner of The Mirror for Magistrates (1559). Owing to its importance as the only contemporary account and, indeed in view of its inaccuracies, I have included the Legend as an appendix.

1976-01-01T00:00:00Z Mock, Sabrina https://hdl.handle.net/2123/33866 2026-05-05T03:34:11Z 2024-01-01T00:00:00Z

Is a Deposits Channel Relevant for Monetary Policy in Australia? Mock, Sabrina Despite the implications on monetary policy transmission and financial stability, there has been no literature on a deposits channel of monetary policy transmission in Australia. This thesis investigates the existence of a deposits channel in Australia using a structural vector auto-regressive (SVAR) model with sign restrictions, an approach that is novel in the deposits channel literature. In terms of results, I find no evidence of a deposits channel. I find that, in fact, when the sample period is limited to the inflation targeting regime period, deposits increase in response to a contractionary monetary policy shock which is more consistent with an intertemporal substitution channel rather than a deposits channel. There are two main implications of these results which are relevant to the current Australian economic environment. The first is that policy makers should not be concerned about the impact of monetary policy on bank funding. The second is that policy rate setters do not need to consider the impact of a deposits channel when setting the cash rate in Australia.

2024-01-01T00:00:00Z Smith, Marty https://hdl.handle.net/2123/33836 2026-05-05T03:34:11Z 2023-01-01T00:00:00Z

Evaluation of Structured Complication Scores in Operative and Non-Operative Emergency General Surgery. Smith, Marty Introduction: Emergency General Surgery (EGS) is a field growing in volume and specialty recognition. EGS Quality assessment is lagging due to a heterogenous patient group including ~70% nonoperative admissions, and a lack of validated quality assessment frameworks. Central to such assessments are working definitions and classifications of patient morbidity-none have been validated in this field. This study aims to evaluate the performance of the Clavien-Dindo (CD) classification of complications and related scores in EGS. Methods: A preliminary review of ten-years of EGS patients at our institution found poor recording of complications to audit, leading us to construct a smaller detailed cohort and a complication dataset. Surgeon’s interpretations of the CD complication definition were surveyed. Correlation and multivariate regression were used to analyse the relationship between the Clavien-Dindo based complication scores, length of stay and cost outcome; guided by our surgeons survey and Delphi process. Results: Our institution managed a >2-fold increase in the EGS workload over ten years. Complications were underreported-only 4.3% of all complications were entered. The survey revealed support for pre-op and non-operative complications despite the Clavien-Dindo definition excluding such events, the definition was inconsistently interpreted. The complication scores correlated to the LOS/Cost outcomes. The regression analyses revealed the complication scores as the predominant independent predictor of LOS and Cost variability in surviving patients. Conclusion: Four Key findings emerged. Emergency general surgery is expanding in our institution. The Clavien-Dindo complication definition lacks specificity and is inconsistently interpreted by surgeons. Complication scores performed well in correlative and regression analysis, emerging as the primary predictors of the LOS and Cost in surviving patients. Application choice of scores should be determined by use case.

2023-01-01T00:00:00Z Xu, Chuanzhi https://hdl.handle.net/2123/33750 2026-05-05T03:34:10Z 2025-03-31T00:00:00Z

Event-based 3D Reconstruction: Innovative Event Representation Methods Xu, Chuanzhi The event camera is a bio-inspired asynchronous brightness-change sensor capable of performing various computer vision tasks such as object tracking, object recognition, depth estimation, etc. The sparse event stream generated by the event camera contains pixel coordinates, timestamps, and polarity information corresponding to changes in brightness. Event representation refers to the specialised data preprocessing and arrangement on the event stream, which facilitates feature information extraction. Many types of event representations have been developed, but each has characteristics that vary in their applicability to different tasks. Meanwhile, many studies have attempted to use event cameras for 3D reconstruction tasks. Stereo event cameras have been more widely used in 3D reconstruction, mainly for real-time semi-dense reconstruction by calculating disparity information. On the other hand, methods based on monocular event cameras are fewer and can be divided into geometry-based real-time semi-dense reconstruction methods and deep learning-based dense reconstruction methods. Most of these methods require physical prior information, such as trajectories, and rely on a pipeline for arranging the procedures. Recently, the E2V method innovatively proposed a direct deep learning-based approach for dense voxel 3D reconstruction without requiring physical priors or a pipeline, which is a complete simplification of the event processing structure. We use the E2V method as the experimental baseline and aim to improve it through event representation. In this study, we propose five new event representation methods: Differencing Event Frame, Sobel Event Frame, Differencing Sobel Event Frame, High-Pass Event Frame, and Differencing High-Pass Event Frame. These methods enhance edge information in event frames to improve the reconstruction accuracy of the E2V method. Experiments show that our proposed best event representation method can improve the mIoU by 54% and F-Score by 38% compared to the E2V method under the same experimental conditions, which is a significant improvement. Additionally, we are the first to propose that the binarisation threshold in deep learning-based event-driven 3D reconstruction tasks should be dynamically selected for optimal performance.

2025-03-31T00:00:00Z Duffy, Harry https://hdl.handle.net/2123/33706 2026-05-05T03:34:10Z 2025-03-17T00:00:00Z

The Application of Deep Learning Models for the Extraction of a Historical Street Map of Sydney Duffy, Harry This thesis investigates the application of deep learning models for the extraction of historical street maps of Sydney, focusing on two primary methodologies: the proposed Edge Extraction method with a novel hyperparameter optimisation approach and the existing GIS Labelling Overlay (GLO) method (Huang, 2023). The research aims to improve the accuracy and efficiency of road network extraction from historical maps, a task traditionally accomplished through labour-intensive manual methods. By leveraging Convolutional Neural Networks, specifically the U-Net model and the DiResNet ensemble, this study evaluates the performance of these models in terms of accuracy, F1 Score, and the Intersection over Union metric. Additionally, this thesis introduces an innovative approach to hyperparameter optimisation. It involved reducing the hyperparameter permutation space with Random Search to run a complete search on the optimally reduced space with the Grid Search algorithm. This was applied to the Edge Extraction technique in Experiment 1, contributing to significantly better performance than the GLO method. The experiments reveal a clear superiority of the proposed Edge Extraction method over the GLO method, with significant improvements of the F1 Score and IoU, thereby demonstrating its robustness and reliability. Further, both the U-Net and DiResNet models exhibit high performance in road network extraction, with U-Net achieving slightly higher accuracy and F1 Score while DiResNet shows better Intersection over Union metric. These results indicate that while both models are effective, each has its strengths in different aspects of performance. Ultimately, U-Net had a clear edge in training time which is practically advantageous with regards to model optimisation and testing. Future research should focus on refining the Edge Extraction method to automate the removal of non-road, extraneous objects from the extracted images, aiming for a fully automated data labelling process. This research contributes to the field of digital cartography and historical analysis, offering enhanced tools for studying urban development and human settlement patterns through improved road network extraction techniques.

2025-03-17T00:00:00Z Boland, James https://hdl.handle.net/2123/33670 2026-05-05T08:31:07Z 2025-03-05T00:00:00Z

The Effect of Nocebo Education on Socially-Induced Nocebo Cybersickness in Virtual Reality Boland, James The nocebo effect occurs when aversive physiological symptoms are elicited psychologically, typically via negative health-related expectations. Social modelling is a key mode of inducing nocebo effects. Despite this, there is a paucity of research into interventions to reduce social modelling of negative symptoms. The current study investigated nocebo education as a potential intervention to attenuate socially-induced nocebo cybersickness in a VR paradigm. Nocebo education involves explaining the nocebo effect to participants prior to a treatment or procedure known to cause negative symptoms. Additionally, the effects of social modelling and nocebo education on two proposed mechanisms of the nocebo effect, expectancy and anxiety, were investigated. In line with predictions, social modelling increased cybersickness, an effect that was mediated by increases in expectancy and anxiety. However, contrary to hypotheses, nocebo education had no significant effect on cybersickness. Moreover, nocebo education increased participants’ expectancy and anxiety. This study makes several contributions to the literature. Firstly, the social modelling effect is replicated. Secondly, the role of expectancy and anxiety as key mechanisms underlying social modelling are demonstrated, an area where, despite evidence for these mechanisms in other modes of nocebo induction, research is sparse. Finally, it is demonstrated that nocebo education is not appropriate for inhibiting social modelling of negative symptoms, due both to its lack of effects on cybersickness and its expectancy and anxiety-inducing effects. This is not only empirically significant; it is also pertinent for clinical practice, where nocebo education has been promoted but negative social influences on health are widespread. Recommendations for future research are made. Specifically, other interventions that may be applied to social modelling, such as latent inhibition, are recommended. Moreover, the need to directly compare the relative strength of different modes of nocebo induction, and the respective effects of nocebo education on each, is emphasized.

2025-03-05T00:00:00Z Elmasry, Jacob https://hdl.handle.net/2123/33614 2026-05-05T03:34:09Z 2025-02-12T00:00:00Z

Quantifying and Improving Bus Delay Prediction Accuracy in Sydney Elmasry, Jacob The reliability of transit operations is a crucial factor in a user’s mode choice, as it affects their ability to make an accurate travel plan and arrive at their destination on time. Transit reliability, however, is not just about schedule adherence. Users can anticipate and adjust to regular deviations from a schedule and thus, for a user, transit reliability is often about schedule variance rather than absolute delay. With the advent of real-time data being made available to the public, users can make last-minute changes to their schedule based off the real-time delay reported in the transit network. These last-minute changes are dependent on the accuracy of the delay predictions, however, and so this thesis seeks to understand the accuracy of these predictions by quantifying the difference between them and the true delay. After quantifying this, the thesis proposes a series of post-processing additions to our current delay prediction models in order to improve the prediction accuracy. It was found that substantial improvements in delay prediction performance could be achieved, particularly when the buses were over 20 minutes away from a stop. Additionally, it was noted that this improvement varied depending on the error quantification method that was used, with the MAPE (Mean absolute percentage error) showing the greatest improvement. The thesis recommends the adoption of some of the improved prediction models and also discusses the implications of more transparently conveying the uncertainty in the prediction to users.

2025-02-12T00:00:00Z Tannous, Jessica Rose https://hdl.handle.net/2123/33523 2026-05-05T03:34:12Z 2025-01-10T00:00:00Z

"Before The Curtain Call" Secondary Music Teachers’ Perspectives On School Musicals Tannous, Jessica Rose School musicals are commonly facilitated by music teachers in secondary schools in NSW. They are an opportunity for students to develop their musicality, form friendships and bonds with their peers and teachers, and improve academically and developmentally. Music teachers assume music responsibilities in these productions and may be expected to oversee a range of other roles. However, there is a paucity of literature on the expectations and experiences of music teachers. This qualitative study sought to explore the perspectives of secondary music teachers in NSW regarding the factors that influenced their experience and facilitation of their school musicals. Seven teachers were interviewed, and data was analysed using thematic analysis. A Communities of Practice framework was applied to the interpretation of data. Six themes were identified. Music teachers took on multiple roles and responsibilities dependent on the support models of their school, levels of funding and resources. Their knowledge and skills in musical theatre were mostly acquired during the production. Teachers commonly collaborated within communities of practice to fulfil their responsibilities during their school musical. Student success kept teachers motivated despite the challenges of meeting multiple demands and the personal and professional sacrifices they made. The study revealed the importance of offering support and developing teacher capacity in school musical production through a Communities of Practice approach.

2025-01-10T00:00:00Z Scheul, Alexander https://hdl.handle.net/2123/33509 2026-05-05T03:34:09Z 2025-01-07T00:00:00Z

"Truely there is no good music without queer people": A Narrative-Based Inquiry into the Inclusivity of Queerness in the Modern Australian Music Classroom Scheul, Alexander This narrative multi-case study examines how queer content and identities are incorporated into teaching practices to foster inclusive, visible, and safe environments for both educators and their students. Drawing from the narratives of three, queer identifying Australian music teachers, the research delves into the systematic, cultural, and institutional barriers they face, alongside their strategies to navigate heteronormative schooling systems. The findings underscore the significance of queer representation in music education, highlighting its impact on students’ and teachers’ identity formation, emotional well-being, and societal positioning. Additionally, the study evaluates the role of music as a transformative space that enables discussion, creation and acceptance. Through employing a queer research paradigm, this work situates itself within critical discourse and advocates for changes in music education policy and practice. Recommendations include integrating queer pedagogy into teacher education programs, queer content into the music curriculum and establishing more robust protections for queer teachers. This aims to address gaps in Australian queer music education scholarship and endeavours to influence more inclusive practices in music classrooms nationwide.

2025-01-07T00:00:00Z Sywak, Solomiya https://hdl.handle.net/2123/32969 2026-05-05T03:34:10Z 2023-01-01T00:00:00Z

Art's Relation to War. A Case Study of Ukraine. Sywak, Solomiya I was always embarrassed about being Ukrainian. My Saturday language school used to give us these badges that read “It’s cool to be Ukrainian!”. That definitely made it less cool. It was almost as if, until Russia launched its full-blown invasion of Ukraine in 2022, that Ukraine never existed at all. Just as the West swept over the Eastern Bloc after the fall of the Soviet Union, the whole world wrote-off Ukraine’s culture as merely a Russian copycat, except that it flourished in its own right. Ukraine’s diaspora somewhat ensconced in its own bubble, helped revitalise what the Motherland regarded as a ‘cultural cringe’. It is through this cultural exchange forced by the deportation, killings and genocide enacted by Russian invaders, that a new visual language flourished. This new language was one of war.

2023-01-01T00:00:00Z Lim, Bryan https://hdl.handle.net/2123/32637 2026-05-05T03:34:09Z 2018-01-01T00:00:00Z

Strain Mediated Band Gap Engineering of Bent Semiconductor Nanowires from First Principles Lim, Bryan Semiconductor nanowires (NWs) exhibit both extraordinary mechanical properties and excellent control in the conduction of electrons. NWs present a unique system to explore physical phenomena on a quantum scale and play a critical role in future electronic and optoelectronic devices. The band gaps of semiconductors are commonly tuned to exhibit desired behaviours through means such as alloying or doping. However, a novel method proposed in this work is the use of strain, due to large recoverable elastic strains observed in NWs. Of particular interest is that of strains exhibited in bent NWs; where simultaneous compressive and tensile strains occur along its cross-section. Herein, an ab initio investigation on strain-mediated band gap engineering of bent semiconductor nanowires, was performed using density functional theory (DFT). There are difficulties in simulating bent NWs due to symmetry loss in all directions in the bent structure. By considering that compressive and tensile strain occur simultaneously, this thesis proposes a simplified approach to simulating band gap evolution with strain, by using unit cells under tensions and compressions separately. Furthermore, it is well documented that the minute radial dimension of NWs induces solid state phenomena such as the quantum confinement effect and internal strains; which have considerable contributions to band gap modulation. Separation of the effects of these phenomena with external strain application to band gap evolution can be performed using the proposed simplified unit cell model. Both wurtzite (WZ) and zinc-blende (ZB-(111)) polytypes of III-V and II-VI semiconductors were considered in this study. Simulations implementing DFT were performed in the Vienna ab initio Simulation Package (VASP), using the hybrid HSE06 functional.

2018-01-01T00:00:00Z Wilaras, Andrew https://hdl.handle.net/2123/32634 2026-05-05T03:34:09Z 2017-01-01T00:00:00Z

Redirecting Tregs to the HLA-A2 Antigen for Transplant Tolerance Wilaras, Andrew Kidney transplantation is currently the preferred solution for organ replacement in patients with end-stage renal disease (ESRD). While nearly all transplanted grafts will survive in a short-term (up to one year post-transplant) period, graft survival rates decline at a linear rate with increasing time. This is largely contributed by chronic allograft rejection against alloantigens in the transplanted graft. One of the most commonly mismatched alloantigen is HLA-A2. Immunosuppressants have proven to be effective in promoting short-term graft survival, but are ineffective at improving long-term tolerance due to their associated toxicities and adverse events. As such, a novel therapeutic solution is necessary to overcome chronic allograft rejection. This study proposes that chimeric antigen receptor (CAR)-expressing regulatory T-cell (Treg) therapy specific to the HLA-A2 antigen (CAR-A2 Tregs) may be the solution in overcoming the immunological barrier of long-term graft tolerance.

2017-01-01T00:00:00Z Biggs, Zoe https://hdl.handle.net/2123/32277 2026-05-05T03:34:11Z 2024-02-27T00:00:00Z

(In)Visible Queerness in Conflict: Examining the discursive construction of LGBTQI+ people during the Russian invasion of Ukraine Biggs, Zoe This thesis analyses the constructions of members of the LGBTQI+ community in Ukrainian and Russian news media during the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine. This thesis approaches the research question through a queer discursive lens, which is attentive to how power dynamics influence the (re)production of discourses. This thesis synthesises security concepts through this queer discursive theoretical lens to develop a greater understanding of how discourses contribute to the othering of queer people in conflict. A critical thematic analysis of 55 total Ukrainian and Russian news media articles was undertaken. This thesis finds that in the case of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, news media from both states constructs queer people in ways that deprive them of their individual identities and contribute to the naturalisation of their insecurity. This thesis argues that despite differences in their specific constructions, each of the representations of LGBTQI+ people in Russian and Ukrainian news media signify power dynamics that essentialise queer identities in ways which benefit both Russia and Ukraine.

2024-02-27T00:00:00Z Blackwell, Justine https://hdl.handle.net/2123/32259 2026-05-05T03:34:09Z 2024-02-26T00:00:00Z

Assessing Indices of Transparency and Reproducibility in Animal Models of Opioid Addiction Blackwell, Justine Psychology’s reproducibility crisis has led to a reckoning of research practices in many fields. Moreover, several preclinical fields have come under scrutiny due to poor rates of treatment translation from animals to humans. This is true of the preclinical addiction field (Venniro et al., 2020). Ensuing investigation revealed that many of the same research design aspects that undermine reproducibility also threaten translation potential (Fergusson et al., 2019). We examined indices of transparency and reproducibility in animal models of opioid addiction from 2019 to 2023. In doing so, we aimed to understand whether efforts to improve reproducibility are relevant to this field. We measured the prevalence of transparency measures such as preregistration, registered reports, open data, and open code as well as compliance to the Animal Research: Reporting of In Vivo Experiments (ARRIVE) guidelines. We also measured reported rates of bias minimisation practices, sample size calculations and multiple corrections adjustments. Lastly, we estimated the accuracy of test statistic reporting. Appraising 247 articles revealed poor uptake of transparency measures, the ARRIVE guidelines, bias minimisation practices and sample size calculations. Adjustments for multiple comparisons was alone in being implemented in most articles (76.5%). Lastly, half of articles contained non-decision errors and 11% contained decision errors. We discuss the implications of these results and potential explanations as well as solutions for their improvement. Our study is the first of its kind in this field and demonstrates that attempts to improve reproducibility and, in turn, translation, are needed in the animal models of opioid addiction field.

2024-02-26T00:00:00Z Meng, Weijian https://hdl.handle.net/2123/31786 2026-05-05T03:34:11Z 2016-01-01T00:00:00Z

Word classes of White Hmong: a computational approach Meng, Weijian This thesis employs a computational approach to study the word classes in White Hmong, a minority language of Mainland Southeast Asia. It proposes an automatic discovery procedure for word classes based on a careful review and comparison of existing algorithms. Motivated by the distributional hypothesis, which posits that similar words occur in similar environments, the procedure represents words as vectors defined by pairwise co-occurrence. It then measures their grammatical similarity in terms of spatial proximity and clusters them into a hierarchical taxonomy. The procedure is applied to an unannotated corpus of White Hmong, yielding a classification of its lexicon. The classification is evaluated against known grammatical properties of the language, demonstrating the linguistic meaningfulness of the results.

2016-01-01T00:00:00Z Short, Benjamin https://hdl.handle.net/2123/31544 2026-05-05T03:34:12Z 2023-08-09T00:00:00Z

John of Salisbury’s ‘Duel’ with the English Military Class: A Twelfth-Century Cleric’s Lifelong Obsession with Critiquing Martial Ethos and Identity Short, Benjamin This thesis uncovers pervasive critiques of milites (soldiers) in the writings of the twelfth-century English cleric, John of Salisbury (c.1110s-1180s). Previous scholarship has proposed John’s descriptions of the social function of milites were detached from his historical context. This study breaks from that theory by examining the development of these ideas across all John's works, revealing an ideology of social reform which responded to the role of milites in the contemporary disputes of the English Church and Crown. This thesis thus broadens understandings of medieval socio-political theories and presents a new legacy for a major figure of the Twelfth-Century Renaissance.

2023-08-09T00:00:00Z McCahon-Boersma, Jaspar https://hdl.handle.net/2123/31209 2026-05-05T03:34:10Z 2023-05-10T00:00:00Z

Cut the Sound: The Role of Musician Strikes in Movements for Societal Change McCahon-Boersma, Jaspar This thesis examines the potential for musicians to contribute to societal change, on global and local scales, by engaging in strike action. While reaffirming the potent impacts of the music they create, it posits that musicians, as a result of their place within the economic structures of capitalism, also hold the ability to contribute to societal good through its strategic withdrawal. Through case study analysis of the 2022 Sydney Festival strike, it argues that musician strikes contribute to local and global societal change through directly and effectively challenging the intertwined economic and cultural processes which constitute destructive hegemonic forms.

2023-05-10T00:00:00Z Mazin, Allegra https://hdl.handle.net/2123/31046 2026-05-05T03:34:10Z 2023-03-29T00:00:00Z

Art Exhibitions: A Tool of Cultural Diplomacy Mazin, Allegra Cultural diplomacy is a resource deployed by governments to build relationships that support policy agendas. This thesis examines how art exhibitions are a tool of cultural diplomacy in Australia in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. It considers how three case studies - Modern Masters: Manet to Matisse (1975), Utopia: The Genius of Emily Kame Kngwarreye (2008) and Culture Warriors (2009) - were used to build diplomatic, political and economic influence. Politicians, diplomats and government officials often use the term soft power to describe cultural diplomacy. However, this interchanging use of a broad term obscures the specifics of cultural diplomacy and how it is used as a resource to achieve soft power objectives. Art exhibitions have been recognised as being a form of cultural diplomacy, but Australian scholarship on this is limited. This thesis examines specific case studies that reveal how art exhibitions enhance a nation’s ability to influence and strengthen bilateral relations when conventional diplomatic initiatives fail. It argues that art exhibitions are important examples of cultural diplomacy because they are inextricably tied to state actors, diplomatic situations of the day, politics and investment.

2023-03-29T00:00:00Z Li, Borui https://hdl.handle.net/2123/30128 2026-05-05T03:34:09Z 2023-01-01T00:00:00Z

Who uses Fintech products: evidence from the pay-on-demand market Li, Borui This thesis examines a novel Fintech lending product in Australia named pay-ondemand. This product claims to let its users access their wages in advance, at a flat “5% transaction fee” without any hidden cost. Using the transaction data of customers at a major Australian bank, I have found that, on average, pay-on-demand users are usually more financially constrained compared to the general public. They tend to live in poorer socioeconomic regions, earn lower incomes, have less savings, and lack alternative access to credit due to past delinquency records and damaged credit reputation. The product is predominantly accessed by younger males. Almost half of the users are additionally paying an unpaid payment fee, which is a cost imposed by the banks due to a failed direct debit request and represents a hidden cost of using pay-on-demand. An average user of pay-on-demand will be charged unpaid payment fees 2.24 times a month, which given the average loan size of $250.73, increased the Effective Annual Rate by 54%. On average, users who are from poorer socioeconomic region, have less saving balance, earn lower wages, have high credit risks, and are in hardship are more likely to pay an unpaid payment fee. Finally, I found that users with lower savings balance use pay-on-demand more frequently, although they borrow less in total because they are deemed riskier by pay-ondemand lenders. These users paid more unpaid payment fees, which worsened their financial status and forced them to borrow more from pay-on-demand to guard against future cash flow mismatches. Overall, the results highlight the importance of a strict underwriting procedure. Payon- demand is excluded from the responsible lending criteria, so lenders do not perform a credit check. If a credit check is performed, constrained borrowers would be better off, because they could save on unpaid payment fees and their financial resilience would improve.

2023-01-01T00:00:00Z huang, weijia https://hdl.handle.net/2123/30074 2026-05-05T03:34:09Z 2023-02-21T00:00:00Z

Deconstruction of Monetary Surprises and the Information Effect: A Case of Australia huang, weijia Monetary policies surprises extracted from high-frequency data are a common instrument used to study the impact of monetary policy. It is often found that these shocks have ‘counter-intuitive’ effects, which are not explained by conventional interest rate transmission mechanisms. Following Jarocinski and Karadi (2020), I decompose high-frequency surprises in the 1-month Overnight Indexed Swap (OIS) into two distinct shocks, a central bank information shock and a classic monetary policy shock. By tracing their co-movements with high-frequency surprises in stock prices using a sign-restriction identification technique in SVAR model, I find evidence for both a central bank information shock and a ‘RBA information effect’, which functions by informing the public sector about the current state of the economy rather than tightening or loosening policy. The two effects have comparable impacts on a variety of macroeconomic variables. Controlling for the information effect somewhat mitigates the price puzzle.

2023-02-21T00:00:00Z CARO DIAZ, FREDDY SANTIAGO https://hdl.handle.net/2123/30023 2026-05-05T03:34:12Z 2015-01-01T00:00:00Z

ANALYSIS OF FLUID STRUCTURE-INTERACTION (FSI) PROBLEMS IN ANSYS CARO DIAZ, FREDDY SANTIAGO The Fluid-Structure Interaction problems occur in many natural phenomena and man-made engineering systems, this fact has promoted the research in this area. The research in this field of study is implementing two different methodologies. The first one is the use of commercial programs that have developed FSI capabilities such as Ansys or ADINA. The second methodology is the development of computational codes to solve specific problems of FSI analysis. This Project in particular focuses in the evaluation of Ansys-Fluent to perform FSI simulations. Two aeroelastic cases were simulated in Ansys, they were: the delta wing, and the Onera M6 wing. The delta wing simulation is subsonic and its structure is a simple flat plate made out of aluminum. The Onera M6 wing simulation is transonic and its structure has multiple components that are made out of an orthotropic material. The FSI simulations of the delta wing were validated through comparison with experimental data reported in literature. A turbulence analysis and a mesh independence analysis were carried out as well. The validation showed a limited capability to replicate the results that were obtained in the experiment. The FSI simulations of the Onera M6 wing were validated through comparison with a simulation that was carried out in Patran-Nastran. In addition, a computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulation in steady state was performed in Ansys in order to establish the bases of the configuration that was implemented in the FSI simulations in Ansys. The validation showed that Ansys-Fluent is able to reproduce the results obtained in Patran-Nastran.

2015-01-01T00:00:00Z Britt, Olivia Grace https://hdl.handle.net/2123/30017 2026-05-05T03:34:09Z 2023-02-14T00:00:00Z

Assessing the Suitability of Typical Timber Testing Methods for Australian Heritage Timber Structures Britt, Olivia Grace This research aims to examine the applicability of conventional inspection methods for timber structures where structures have recognised heritage value. The research seeks to understand the appropriateness of inspection methodologies typically prescribed for timber in heritage applications. A literature review of current inspection methods utilised by engineers, architects and others within the heritage structures field has been undertaken, and the appropriateness of timber structural inspection methods used in practice (destructive testing, semi-destructive testing, and non-destructive testing methods) reviewed in light of heritage aims for Australian structures, and interviews conducted with practicing industry professionals to discuss uptake of these methods in practice. A review of current literature indicates that non-destructive technologies present significant potential for further analysis of timbers in-situ without damage to the fabric itself, and represent a particular opportunity for heritage sites, as analysis can be conducted with minimal invasiveness. Interviews with practicing professionals within this industry indicates that currently, such methods have been incorporated only minimally into standard professional practice methodologies. While a lack of familiarity with many available methods is evident, the reasons behind the limited uptake are complex, including but not limited to a lack of pre-defined Australian guidelines prescribing their use, a perception of high associated costs, and an unwillingness on the part of clients to request the use of these methods. It is found that significant opportunity exists for an improvement in the uptake of non-destructive methods as preferential over semi-destructive test methods. Indicative processes of example best-practice methods incorporating non-destructive testing into a typical assessment regime are presented.

2023-02-14T00:00:00Z Cheng, Wen-Hung (Ryan) https://hdl.handle.net/2123/29950 2026-05-05T03:34:10Z 2023-02-02T00:00:00Z

"Change for the better: The impact of Team Wise Proactive Change Management on burnout and team outcomes" Cheng, Wen-Hung (Ryan) Past research on proactivity has focused on the frequency of proactive behaviours of individuals rather than the content of such behaviours and its operationalisation within teams. It is no longer sufficient to be merely proactive when dealing with ongoing changes within organisations or working when working in teams. My thesis introduces team wise proactive change management (TWPCM), where teams proactively manage change in ways that consider the situational, relational, and their own resources in addressing future challenges and reaching their goals. This paper examines the impact of TWPCM on burnout and the flow-on effects to team withdrawal and performance outcomes within the healthcare sector. To examine this, I propose three research questions: Does TWPCM alleviate burnout within healthcare teams?, Does the effect of TWPCM on burnout flow onto withdrawal and performance outcomes within the teams?, and Do work demands inhibit the positive benefits of TWPCM and its effects on burnout, withdrawal and performance outcomes within healthcare teams?. I employed a quantitative research design and drew on team aggregated survey data from a local health district in NSW, comprising 2324 nurses and midwives across 196 teams,. I also linked this survey data in terms of participants’ perception work to objective archival data across 12 months post survey completion, including patient safety data – specifically the number of medication and IV-related errors, as well as human resources data on leave and turnover. Findings show that TWPCM was indirectly negatively associated with undesirable team outcomes (team turnover, absenteeism and medication and IV errors) via burnout. Further, work demands moderated these indirect effects, whereby the relationship was weaker (creating barriers to alleviating undesirable consequences) when work demands are high. Importantly, the results indicate that wise proactive behaviours have theoretical and practical implications on healthcare workers and hospitals, and future researchers. My findings shed light on to the important role of wise proactive change management for teams and advances the empirical evidence and knowledge on how to effectively manage change to benefit not just organisations but also employees and the society.

2023-02-02T00:00:00Z Sigler, Jack https://hdl.handle.net/2123/29921 2026-05-05T03:34:09Z 2023-01-23T00:00:00Z

Labour Supply responses in the face of a pandemic: Can varying incidences of COVID-19 explain differences in labour market participation across the OECD? Sigler, Jack This thesis examines the relationship between virus intensity, vaccination rates and government policy responses on labour force participation throughout the pandemic across OECD countries. Higher levels of virus intensity have likely created a disutility of labour supply at the individual level due to increased health risks of workplace transmission. Upon aggregation, this has likely contributed to broad reductions in labour supply across 38 OECD countries. This paper uses a panel Fixed Effect (FE) econometric design to investigate the labour supply response to per-capita vaccination rates, virus cases and deaths. The results vary by the age of workers and by country. Though there is evidence of a relationship at the aggregate level, there is no clear link between age dynamics and responses to the pandemic across labour markets. Additionally, panel stratification partially supports social and political interpretations of model results. The results of this paper suggest the positive labour supply response to vaccination rates is more significant in magnitude than the negative response to virus intensity.

2023-01-23T00:00:00Z Hua, Andrew https://hdl.handle.net/2123/29885 2026-05-05T03:34:11Z 2023-01-16T00:00:00Z

Catch Me If You Can - A Tale of Homeownership, Australian Immigrants and Australian Natives Hua, Andrew Do immigrants ever catch-up with native Australians on housing outcomes? Are there any barriers that inhibits them closing the gap? This thesis aims to document the gap in homeownership between immigrants and natives in Australia and examine the sources behind the gap. Using 30 years of Census data, I document life-cycle housing profiles for immigrants and natives and find that the homeownership rates of for both these groups have been decreasing as birth cohorts get younger. My pseudo-panel analysis shows that early-life differences in homeownership between birth cohorts are not completely eliminated in later stages of the life cycle. I also find that immigrants only partially make up the deficit in homeownership to natives over time. Then, using an Australian micro dataset, I assess the determinants and driving forces behind homeownership and how they differ between immigrants and natives. I find that despite having similar observed characteristics, natives are still more likely to be homeowners. This suggests possible discrimination towards immigrants, or weaker preferences for homeownership amongst immigrants in Australia.

2023-01-16T00:00:00Z Sharma, Avish https://hdl.handle.net/2123/29884 2026-05-05T03:34:11Z 2023-01-16T00:00:00Z

The Impact of Monetary Policy on Homeownership Sharma, Avish From a theoretical perspective, monetary policy has an ambiguous impact on homeownership. For instance, contractionary monetary policy leads to higher interest rates and lower incomes making housing more unaffordable, but counteracting this is lower house prices. I build a heterogeneous agent overlapping generations model of the Australian housing market parameterising these three key transmission channels to study the sign and magnitude of the response of homeownership to monetary policy. I find there is a small positive effect of homeownership to a one standard deviation unanticipated contractionary monetary policy shock, with the shift in house prices explaining much of the movement in the homeownership rate.

2023-01-16T00:00:00Z Viney, Jay https://hdl.handle.net/2123/29797 2026-05-05T03:34:09Z 2022-12-13T00:00:00Z

Analysing Applications of Teaching Methods Observed in Young Children's Free Musical Play Viney, Jay Implementation of musical play in children’s pedagogy has received extensive investigation from a range of researchers. From Marsh’s (2010) seminal work documenting instances of play in primary school playgrounds to Campbell’s (2005, 2007, 2010, 2011, 2015) comprehensive exploration into the importance of musical play in the social and personal development of young children, musical play has been demonstrated to have a positive effect on the outcomes of young children’s learning. Musical play refers to the “everyday forms of musical activity … that children initiate of their own accord and in which they may choose to play with others voluntarily” (Marsh & Young, 2006). This definition was expanded upon through the work of Nieuwmeijer et al. (2021) and is still used in contemporary literature to define and outline essential features of musical play. This thesis presents an investigation of musical play in early childhood and suggests tangible processes and interactions of musical play for children aged two to five years and explores their potential applications in music teaching. This research was conducted as a single-site ethnographic study of manifestations of musical play activities at Edith Cowan Early Learning Centre* in Sydney and involved the analysis of observational data to generate potential strategies for encouraging and supporting musical play activities in early childhood music settings. * pseudonym used The findings suggest that important features of musical play included imitation, experimentation, movement, social interaction, and accessibility. Strategies to support musical play in the early learning context include providing adequate access to numerous sound-producing objects, teaching a range of appropriate repertoire to the children, ensuring adequate space for learning activities to take place, and demonstrating leadership strategies such as counting in or repetition of a musical phrase to focus group learning activities.

2022-12-13T00:00:00Z Waugh, Harry https://hdl.handle.net/2123/29623 2026-05-05T03:34:09Z 2022-10-19T00:00:00Z

Allodium and Conquest: Renegotiating the Transnational History of the alod Waugh, Harry This thesis examines the history of the legal term “alod”, a condition denoting absolute ownership of land without acknowledgement to any superior. This longue durée study uncovers its origins in late antiquity, its medieval fortunes, and its vexed history as a rejected article in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century English legal discourse. Following the term to two British colonies (America and New South Wales), the thesis demonstrates the fate of the alod on the fringes of empire. The analysis reveals its power as a threat to English imperial land administration and renegotiates its current value in arguments for post-colonial Indigenous land reparation.

2022-10-19T00:00:00Z Jiacheng, Wu https://hdl.handle.net/2123/29538 2026-05-05T03:34:09Z 2022-09-12T00:00:00Z

Modelling 3D Zinc Anodes for Efficient Rechargeable Zinc-Ion Batteries Jiacheng, Wu Rechargeable Zn ion batteries have emerged as a promising candidate for energy storage owing to their advantages in low cost and high safety. Nevertheless, Zn anodes face the critical issues of Zn dendrite formation and undesired side reactions, which significantly limit their cycling stability and capacity. Constructing 3D Zn anodes with porous substrates has been proven to effectively inhibit the Zn dendrite growth via the enlarged surface area and homogenized electric field. However, some important structural parameters, including porosity, pore depth, etc. have been rarely studied for 3D Zn anodes. Exploring these parameters can provide valuable insights for the future design of 3D Zn anodes. In this work, previous research on 3D Zn anodes is firstly reviewed and critically compared. It is found that the current research mainly utilizes Zn anode composites with various 3D substrates (carbon, metal, Zn alloy), as well as 3D pure Zn structures. Following this, two different Zn anodes with varying porosity values are proposed and modelled, namely, 3D Zn pillar anode (porosity=0.3, 0.5, 0.7, 0.9) and 3D Zn concentric anode (porosity=0.1, 0.3, 0.5, 0.7). The electric field distributions of anodes are explored and simulated using Ansys Maxwell numerical analysis. Consequently, it is found that increasing porosity can disperse electric field distributions over anodes. In particular, the Zn pillar anode can accommodate Zn ions more effectively owing to its unique and open pillar channels, whereas the 3D Zn concentric anode can impose a weaker electric field across pores with its large volume of space. The studies of pore depth propose a low to moderate pore depth for effective Zn ion transport in 3D Zn anodes. These results pioneer the research on optimizing the performance of 3D Zn anodes by exploring their structural designs and parameters.

2022-09-12T00:00:00Z Sierra, Isaura https://hdl.handle.net/2123/29512 2026-05-05T03:34:10Z 2022-01-01T00:00:00Z

Potentiation of the production of wind energy as a source of financing for the drive of the economic sectors of the department of La Guajira Sierra, Isaura The Colombian government opted to construct a variety of wind farms to develop energy efficiency policies and programmes that will aid in the energy-saving project's implementation. The majority of these farms are being established in La Guajira, one of Colombia's poorest districts. The government recently stated that the La Guajira Peninsula may provide 17% of Colombia's electricity by 2031. This region is characterised by a large number of indigenous peoples who have had their lands taken from them or had their territories encroached upon by mining and oil and gas exploration. On the other hand, renewable energy projects have become a rising source of conflict in the region in recent years, with claims of forced displacement and harm to Indigenous populations' livelihoods. As a result, the goal of this study is to provide a strategy for the Colombian government to strike a balance between development, environmental concerns, and indigenous rights to construct an accurate public policy that would help to alleviate poverty in the region. Outline of paper sections Latin America is known for its economic dynamism; countries such as Brazil, Chile, Mexico, Peru, and other members of the Energy and Climate Alliance of the Americas have already begun the transition to an energy efficient economy (ECPA, 2016), leveraging the region's abundant renewable resources and aiming to improve economic efficiency while reducing energy infrastructure investment. In Colombia, the energy matrix is gradually diversifying, with renewable energies and other technologies, as well as clean efforts boosted by rules and incentives that will be discussed later in this study (Caquimbo-Medina & Rodríguez-Urrego, 2018). It is vital to note that the country generates enough energy to meet its demand, with the transportation (45%), industrial (22%), and residential (19%) sectors consuming the majority of primary energy resources. The installed capacity is sufficient to meet domestic demand. However, the climatic variability generates a production that may be higher or lower than the necessary, this is why climatic phenomena like El Niño or La Niña produces abundance or shortage of energy. Colombia depends mainly on hydraulic generation, because have the third largest installed hydropower capacity in south America, at about 11725 MW (Ministerio de Minas y Energía and UPME, 2013), which for 2017 represented 80.3% of the total energy generated. In order to cover the Colombian demand in 2017, 66.668 GWh were generated in the country and 194.2GWh were imported, mainly from Ecuador, especially during the dry season (XM-Filial de ISA, 2016). Energy imports fell by 48.7% with respect to 2016, due to the increase in water availability and generation resources during 2017, as well as fuels and petroleum products. In terms of non-conventional renewable energies, especially wind and solar systems, excluding large hydroelectric plants, the installed capacity is 28.1 MW, with the expectation that these will represent up to 14% of the total generation capacity of energy for 2030 (ICEX, 2017). It is crucial to highlight that renewable energy has had a fast expansion in recent decades in Colombia. For instance, since 2007, the capacity of renewable energies has doubled, with a progressive yearly growth (Dwyer, 2018). Furthermore, through rules and incentives, Colombia has increasingly diversified its energy grid, encouraging renewable energies and other technologies, as well as sustainable projects (Caquimbo-Medina & Rodríguez-Urrego, 2018). Notably, one of the places where the Colombian government has implemented strategies to develop renewable energies projects has been La Guajira, one of the 32 departments in Colombia, located in the Colombian Caribbean. It is warm, dry, and inhospitable, with temperatures ranging from 28 to 38 degrees Celsius and significant levels of evaporation due to the severity of the winds. All of Colombia's current efforts in developing renewable energy technology could significantly boost the economy of Colombia's rural areas if the Colombian government reaches an agreement with Colombian indigenous communities. In La Guajira, there is an indigenous community called Wayuu, whose settlement lies in Nazareth, a rural section with about 2,000 people. Basically, given the dearth of research on wind farms in Colombia and the fact that environmental performance is largely overlooked, this community has been a hurdle to improving wind farm projects. Furthermore, this group has said that the government has missed components in wind energy installation studies' life cycle assessments, resulting in severe truncation mistakes and misestimation of results. As a result, indigenous groups predicted that they would be the most brutal hit (Vélez-Henao & Vivanco, 2021; Pomponi & Lenzen, 2018). La Guajira department's installed capacity as of December 2017 was 304.42 MW, with 94 per cent of that being coal and the remaining 6% being a wind turbine installation, resulting in an average output of 1513 GWh between 2012 and 2015 (Carvajal-Romo et al., 2019). However, by 2018, Colombia had an estimated potential of 21 GW wind power only in La Guajira state, but only had 19.5 MW of wind power installed with an efficiency of 28%; therefore, only 0.4% of its theoretical wind energy potential was used (Moya Chavez et al. 2018). Thus, the government decided to install five onshore wind farms in the Guajira region (Vélez-Henao & Vivanco, 2021). However, its renewable energy development depends on government policies, environmental impacts and indigenous consensus. The last is the most crucial, due to it is the mechanism to allow the fast development of wind farms to connect non-interconnected areas. Most areas where the government plans to build wind farms lack access to drinkable water, and energy is only available from diesel fuel to the power plant from 5:00 pm to 10:00 pm (Carvajal-Romo et al., 2019). Thus, the Colombian government must develop strategies to make an agreement with the indigenous community and boost its economy. Although Colombian institutions are structured to promote the development and use of non-conventional energy sources through integration into the electricity market, participation in non- interconnected areas, reduction of glasshouse gas emissions, and energy supply security (Rodríguez-Urrego, D., & Rodríguez-Urrego, 2018.), indigenous integration is lacking in the national energy system. As a result, indigenous consensus should be promoted through environmental, financial, and other guarantees. The consensus is the only method that can allow sustainable development of this rural area through wind farms projects. Moreover, it can potentialize La Guajira, one of the poorest states in Colombia, in financial terms that has the potential for wind generation of 18 GW, enough to cover national demand twice (Word Bank, 2021). It, in turn, means more financial resources to be distributed among sustainable projects that enhance indigenous well-being. If the government fails to reach an agreement, the power of Wayuu villages will interrupt present and future wind farm operations and infrastructure. It implies that the Colombian government must carve out a space for responsibility by tying the firm to long-term obligations and negotiating ethical, cultural and social ways of harnessing the wind in Wayuu territory (Schwartz, 2021). The Colombian government has set up a negotiation table with indigenous groups, employing persuasion tactics to save face. Nevertheless, this is not the case in reality. By contrast, the negotiations have been used to deflect attention because it is following the law. Thus, the indigenous community has been protesting against these projects, claiming their rights and demanding the government to be listened to. Negotiating with the indigenous group raises the question of whether they would allow the government to utilise all of their lands and, if so, what conditions they would impose. The second question is whether the private sector would engage in renewable energy projects that can dramatically reduce utility costs in light of local circumstances. However, several government sectors have come up with a solution to these problems that would help promote the economy of Colombia's rural areas and hold the indigenous people accountable for upholding its cultural, social, and environmental values. It recommends evaluating many criteria to consider indigenous needs, allowing private-sector proposals to be presented to the negotiating table. As a result, the government has the ability to transfer earnings to the former in a similar manner.

2022-01-01T00:00:00Z Cheng, Zifeng https://hdl.handle.net/2123/29350 2026-05-05T03:34:10Z 2020-01-01T00:00:00Z

Modelling Brittle Fractures with Finite Elements: A Time-independent Phase-field Model Cheng, Zifeng The objective of this paper is to propose a 2-D time-independent phase-field model with validating its performance as well as applying it for simulating existing representative experiments. Firstly, the section of the literature review provides an overview of quasi-brittle material and brittle fracture behaviours, as well as the existing FE models from both discontinuous and continuous approaches for simulating fracture behaviours. Next, the governing equations of the proposed phase-field model are determined, which are based on traditional Griffith’s theory as well as a specific variational method evolved from that. The proposed model is implemented in Abaqus. In particular, the implementation is achieved by using the User Subroutine in order to take the phase-field into account. The proposed model is validated by simulating a pure-tension and a pure shear test. In this part, not only the effect of discretisation but also the effects of length parameter and energy release rate has been discussed, of which the latter effect is exclusive in phase-field method. Finally, the validated model is used for simulating two sets of existing experiments, including a mixed-mode test and a series of Brazilian disks test. The results in both validation and simulation part indicate that the proposed model can successfully simulate both crack initiation and propagation in these cases, and good qualitative agreement with theoretical or experimental results can be observed.

2020-01-01T00:00:00Z Xu, Donnalyn https://hdl.handle.net/2123/28619 2026-05-05T03:34:11Z 2022-05-23T00:00:00Z

Echoes of Maria Clara: Memory, (Im)materiality, and Poetics in Filipino Dress Xu, Donnalyn This thesis explores the politics of materiality and memory in the national dress of the Philippines, the Maria Clara gown, which rose to prominence during the late Spanish colonial period. The dress was inspired by and is eponymous with the fictional character Maria Clara from José Rizal’s novel, Noli Me Tangere (1887). There is a complex relationship between the incorporeal identity of Maria Clara as a cultural figure and a literary heroine, and the materiality of the dress that has been given her name. Through an imagined sense of nationhood that has been impressed upon the bodies of women literally and metaphorically, the cult figure of Maria Clara lingers in the poetry of Filipino women writers, and in the poetry of fabric itself; neither present nor absent, but always in-between, below and troubled by the surface. Weaving together analysis of material culture, literary texts, and critical theory, this interdisciplinary study explores the productive frictions between the pieces of the Maria Clara gown across different time periods and geographies, and the poetry of contemporary Filipina poets whose writings are imbricated by the haunting figure of Maria Clara. It challenges the notion of national dress as a fixed and essentialised object, and looks towards the possibility of generative and vulnerable ways of reading into the archives of the Philippines through a close and intertextual reading of the fragments and distances that disrupt the naturalised language of colonisation.

2022-05-23T00:00:00Z