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Artificial intelligence (AI) is not only disrupting industries and businesses, particularly the ones have fallen behind the adoption, but also significantly impacting public life as well. This calls for government authorities pay attention to public opinions and sentiments towards AI. Nonetheless, there is limited knowledge on what the drivers behind the public perception of AI are. Bridging this gap is the rationale of this paper. As the methodological approach, the study conducts an online public perception survey with the residents of Sydney, Melbourne, and Brisbane, and explores the collected survey data through statistical analysis. The analysis reveals that: (a) the public is concerned of AI invading their privacy, but not much concerned of AI becoming more intelligent than humans; (b) the public trusts AI in their lifestyle, but the trust is lower for companies and government deploying AI; (c) the public appreciates the benefits of AI in urban services and disaster management; (d) depending on the local context, public perceptions vary; and (e) the drivers behind the public perception include gender, age, AI knowledge, and AI experience. The findings inform authorities in developing policies to minimise public concerns and maximise AI awareness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Understanding and evaluating the implications of photovoltaic solar panels (PVSPs) deployment on urban settings, as well as the pessimistic effects of densely populated areas on PVSPs efficiency, is becoming incredibly valuable. Thus, the deployment of low-efficiency, low-cost, and widely available PVSPs may diminish total solar reflectance, raising the risks of PVSPs-based urban heating, particularly during the summertime heatwaves. This study employs and assesses physical parameterizations that account for the impact of PVSPs on Sydney's urban environment in the context of the mesoscale model weather research and forecasting (WRF). To account for the impacts of PVSPs, the parameterization presented in this paper assumes that PVSP arrays are parallel, detachable from roofs, and consist of a single layer. Results showed that increasing PVSPs can raise peak summer ambient temperatures by up to 1.4 °C and surface temperatures by up to 2.3°C at city-scale. Temperature variability was found between the city's eastern and western parts due to the presence of PVSPs. In addition, local warming effects of PVSP were observed at urban district-scale as well. The large-scale deployment of PVSPs at local district-scale of the Sydney during a typical hot day caused air temperature to rise by 1.5 °C during the daytime and decrease by 2.7 °C at nighttime. The patterns of the city's ambient temperature distribution were found to be strongly dependent on synoptic meteorological conditions and advection flow strength. The maximum increases in sensible heat flux and latent heat flux were 245.5 Wm−2 and 11.5 Wm−2, respectively. Wind speed may be raised by up to 1.2 ms−2 due to regional low effect over city domain. As a result, large-scale deployment of PVSPs promotes advective flow between the city and its environs. Modification of the PVSPs in Sydney results in an increase in planetary boundary layer (PBL) heights of up to 537.9 m above the city and may lower pollutant concentrations at ground level. The advent of sea breeze in the city's eastern parts, which reduces the temperature of the coastal zone, along with inland westerly winds, which heat the city's western zones, lessened the intensity of the urban heat island (UHI) phenomenon induced by PVSPs warming. The findings of this study can be used to help policymakers make informed decisions about the use of PVSPs systems. PVSPs with a high solar reflectance in wavelengths that do not convert solar energy to electricity can be considered as an alternative solution to reduce local warming in urban environments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The positive effects that Mobility-as-a-Service (MaaS) is envisioned to have on transport can only be reaped if people are using MaaS. Yet, the understanding of the user perspective on MaaS is incomplete and primarily based on experiments with non-users. To address this shortcoming, this paper reports user experiences from a trial of a high-level MaaS service in Sydney, Australia. Based on questionnaires and interviews, it analyses who participated in the trial and why, and whether the trial experience satisfied their motives. The contribution to the literature on MaaS is three-fold. Firstly, most of the people that participated in the trial were frequent users of both public transport and private cars. This supports the notion that multi-modal travellers are likely early adopters of MaaS and contradicts the fear that MaaS does not appeal to private car users. Secondly, a desire to contribute to innovation and curiosity about MaaS were the main motives for signing up for the trial, which highlights the important role an inviting setting for experimentation, such as a trial, can play in stimulating MaaS adoption. Thirdly, many participants struggled with making the trialled service work for them and on average they seemed to value the support and feedback functions higher than other service features. This underscores the novelty of MaaS, compared to existing service models, and reiterates the notion that more than an app and a few subscription plans is needed to make MaaS useful for users. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Outdoor thermal comfort is influenced by people's climate expectations, perceptions and adaptation capacity. Varied individual response to comfortable or stressful thermal environments results in a deviation between actual outdoor thermal activity choices and those predicted by thermal comfort indices. This paper presents a passive activity observation (PAO) method for estimating contextual limits of outdoor thermal adaptation. The PAO method determines which thermal environment result in statistically meaningful changes may occur in outdoor activity patterns, and it estimates thresholds of outdoor thermal neutrality and limits of thermal adaptation in public space based on activity observation and microclimate field measurement. Applications of the PAO method have been demonstrated in Adelaide, Melbourne and Sydney, where outdoor activities were analysed against outdoor thermal comfort indices between 2013 and 2014. Adjusted apparent temperature (aAT), adaptive predicted mean vote (aPMV), outdoor standard effective temperature (OUT_SET), physiological equivalent temperature (PET) and universal thermal comfort index (UTCI) are calculated from the PAO data. Using the PAO method, the high threshold of outdoor thermal neutrality was observed between 24 °C for optional activities and 34 °C for necessary activities (UTCI scale). Meanwhile, the ultimate limit of thermal adaptation in uncontrolled public spaces is estimated to be between 28 °C for social activities and 48 °C for necessary activities. Normalised results indicate that city-wide high thresholds for outdoor thermal neutrality vary from 25 °C in Melbourne to 26 °C in Sydney and 30 °C in Adelaide. The PAO method is a relatively fast and localised method for measuring limits of outdoor thermal adaptation and effectively informs urban design and policy making in the context of climate change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study creates a historic dataset of road opening dates in Sydney. A method was developed for map digitization to extract spatial data from historic maps and place them in a collective vector layer. The method includes extensive georeferencing of the maps, as well as editing and cleaning the maps through raster and vector analysis. Preferred methods for map digitization used in the project were identified. For a considerable area of Sydney, in which approximately 52000 road links were included, almost half of the links were identified with an open date by the start of the twentieth century. A further half of these links were confined to opening within a thirty-year period. The project has established a strong foundation for a historic road dataset for Sydney. It has also outlined methods and procedures that can be followed to progress the dataset further. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Multi-way data analysis has become an essential tool for capturing underlying structures in higher-order data sets where standard two-way analysis techniques often fail to discover the hidden correlations between variables in multi-way data. We propose a multi-objective variational autoencoder (MO-VAE) method for smart infrastructure damage detection and diagnosis in multi-way sensing data based on the reconstruction probability of autoencoder deep neural network (ADNN). Our method fuses data from multiple sensors in one ADNN at which informative features are being extracted and utilized for damage identification. It generates probabilistic anomaly scores to detect damage, asses its severity and further localize it via a new localization layer introduced in the ADNN. We evaluated our method on multi-way laboratory-based and real-life structural datasets in the area of structural health monitoring for damage diagnosis purposes. The data was collected from our deployed data acquisition system on a cable-stayed bridge in Western Sydney, a reinforced concrete cantilever beam which replicates one of the major structural components on the Sydney Harbour Bridge and a laboratory based building structure obtained from Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL). Experimental results show that the proposed method can accurately detect structural damage. It was also able to estimate the different levels of damage severity, and capture damage locations in an unsupervised aspect. Compared to the state-of-the-art approaches, our proposed method shows better performance in terms of damage detection and localization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Harmful algal and bacterial blooms linked to deforestation, soil loss and global warming are increasingly frequent in lakes and rivers. We demonstrate that climate changes and deforestation can drive recurrent microbial blooms, inhibiting the recovery of freshwater ecosystems for hundreds of millennia. From the stratigraphic successions of the Sydney Basin, Australia, our fossil, sedimentary and geochemical data reveal bloom events following forest ecosystem collapse during the most severe mass extinction in Earth's history, the end-Permian event (EPE; c. 252.2 Ma). Microbial communities proliferated in lowland fresh and brackish waterbodies, with algal concentrations typical of modern blooms. These initiated before any trace of post-extinction recovery vegetation but recurred episodically for >100 kyrs. During the following 3 Myrs, algae and bacteria thrived within short-lived, poorly-oxygenated, and likely toxic lakes and rivers. Comparisons to global deep-time records indicate that microbial blooms are persistent freshwater ecological stressors during warming-driven extinction events. Harmful algal and bacterial blooms are increasingly frequent in lakes and rivers. From the Sydney Basin, Australia, this study uses fossil, sedimentary and geochemical data to reveal bloom events following forest ecosystem collapse during the end-Permian event and that blooms have consistently followed warming-related extinction events, inhibiting the recovery of freshwater ecosystems for millennia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

White-nose syndrome (WNS), caused by the fungus Pseudogymnoascus destructans, has caused catastrophic declines of bat populations in North America. Risk assessment indicates that cavers could pose a risk for the spread of the fungus, however, information on cavers' knowledge of WNS and their caving and biosecurity habits is lacking. An anonymous qualitative survey was completed by delegates (n = 134) from 23 countries at an international speleological conference in Sydney, Australia. Cavers indicated that they visit caves frequently (80.6% at least bimonthly), including outside of their own country, but 20.3% of respondents did not know about WNS prior to the conference. Some respondents were incorrect, or unsure, about whether they had visited caves in countries where P. destructans occurs (26.5%) or whether their own country was free of the fungus (7.8%). Although 65.9% of respondents were aware of current decontamination protocols, only 23.9% and 31.2% (when in Australian or overseas caves, respectively) fully adhered to them. Overall, cavers showed strong willingness to help prevent further spread of this disease, but further efforts at education and targeted biosecurity activities may be urgently needed to prevent the spread of P. destructans to Australia and to other unaffected regions of the world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Modelling and forecasting of air pollution from bushfires or hazardous reduction burnings is important in providing information and allowing measures to be taken to reduce the exposure of people from harmful effect of air pollutants from fire events. In this work, the meteorological, chemical transport model and air quality models developed by the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation of Australia are used in conjunction with the smoke emission model to simulate the formation and dispersion of particle aerosols (PM2.5) in the Greater Metropolitan Region of Sydney as the results of emission of different pollutant species from hazardous reduction burnings or from bushfires. The smoke emission model is based on a fire model describing two distinct fire behaviours: flaming and smothering. There are several schemes that can be used to estimate the emission factors of different emitted species from fire of various vegetation types. A comparison of these schemes is performed by comparing the air quality model output from air quality model with observation from monitoring stations in a case study, the May 2016 prescribed burning winter period, which caused elevated particle concentrations in the Sydney basin. The PM2.5 prediction over the Greater Metropolitan Region of Sydney from the forecasting modelling tool will then be used to calculate the population exposure and health impacts due to the May 2016 fire event as a case study. The three main health endpoints considered for health impacts are mortality, respiratory-related and cardiovascular hospitalisations. The results are comparable with other studies using non-modelling methods of determining the exposure and health impacts on this event. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Public health practitioners produce urban health indicator (UHI) tools to inform built environment policy and decision-making, among other objectives. Indicator producers perceive UHI tools as an easily understandable form of evidence about the urban environment impact on health for policy-makers' consumption. However, indicator producers often conceptualise policy-making as a rational and linear process, therefore underestimating the complex and contested nature of developing and implementing policy. This study investigates the health-promotion value of UHI tools in the complex urban planning policy and decision-making context. A thematic analysis was conducted following semi-structured interviews with 22 indicator producers and users in San Francisco, Melbourne and Sydney. The analysis was informed by collaborative rationality and systems theories and the results were used to develop causal loop diagrams (CLDs) of producers and users' mental models. The preliminary CLDs were tested and improved through a participatory modelling workshop (six participants). A high-level CLD depicts users and producers' shared mental model in which indicator development and use are embedded in policy development and application processes. In the cases analysed, creating and using UHI tools increased inter-sectoral relationships, which supported actors to better understand each other's opportunities and constraints. These relationships spurred new advocates for health in diverse organisations, supporting health-in-all-policies and whole-of-society approaches. Constraints to health-promoting policy and implementation (such as those which are legal, political and economic in nature), were overcome through community involvement in UHI tools and advocacy effectiveness. A number of factors reduced the perceived relevance and authority of UHI tools, including: a high number of available indicators, lack of neighbourhood scale data and poor-quality data. In summary, UHI tools were a form of evidence that influenced local urban planning policy and decision-making when they were embedded in policy processes, networks and institutions. In contrast to the dominant policy impact model in the indicator literature, such evidence did not typically influence policy as an exogenous entity. Indicators had impact when they were embedded in local institutions and well-resourced over time, resulting in trusted relationships and collaborations among indicator producers and users. Further research is needed to explore other governance contexts and how UHI tools affect the power of different actors, particularly for under-represented communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigates the tropical cyclone (TC) activity associated with the two leading modes of interannual variability in synoptic disturbances. Both leading modes are found to be related to a dipole pattern of TC occurrence between the subtropical western North Pacific and the South China Sea. Therefore, in this study we performed composite analyses on TC tracks and landfalls, based on the cases of combined modes, to highlight the differences. The composite results indicate that these cases are characterized by distinct features of TC tracks and landfalls: more TCs tend to take recurving tracks and attack eastern China, Korea and Japan, or more TCs exhibit straight-moving tracks and hit the Philippines, Vietnam and southern China. Further analyses suggest that these distinctions in the TC prevailing tracks and landfalls can be attributed to the differences in large-scale steering flow and TC genesis location. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The inability of membranes to handle a wide spectrum of pollutants is an important unsolved problem for water treatment. Here we demonstrate water desalination via a membrane distillation process using a graphene membrane where water permeation is enabled by nanochannels of multilayer, mismatched, partially overlapping graphene grains. Graphene films derived from renewable oil exhibit significantly superior retention of water vapour flux and salt rejection rates, and a superior antifouling capability under a mixture of saline water containing contaminants such as oils and surfactants, compared to commercial distillation membranes. Moreover, real-world applicability of our membrane is demonstrated by processing sea water from Sydney Harbour over 72 h with macroscale membrane size of 4 cm2, processing ~0.5 L per day. Numerical simulations show that the channels between the mismatched grains serve as an effective water permeation route. Our research will pave the way for large-scale graphene-based antifouling membranes for diverse water treatment applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Approximately 85% of Australia's population live along the coastal fringe, an area with high exposure to extreme inundations such as tsunamis. However, to date, no Probabilistic Tsunami Hazard Assessments (PTHA) that include inundation have been published for Australia. This limits the development of appropriate risk reduction measures by decision and policy makers. We describe our PTHA undertaken for the Sydney metropolitan area. Using the NOAA NCTR model MOST (Method for Splitting Tsunamis), we simulate 36 earthquake-generated tsunamis with annual probabilities of 15100, 151,000 and 1510,000, occurring under present and future predicted sea level conditions. For each tsunami scenario we generate a high-resolution inundation map of the maximum water level and flow velocity, and we calculate the exposure of buildings and critical infrastructure. Results indicate that exposure to earthquake-generated tsunamis is relatively low for present events, but increases significantly with higher sea level conditions. The probabilistic approach allowed us to undertake a comparison with an existing storm surge hazard assessment. Interestingly, the exposure to all the simulated tsunamis is significantly lower than that for the 15100 storm surge scenarios, under the same initial sea level conditions. The results have significant implications for multi-risk and emergency management in Sydney. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]