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Digital transformation in healthcare improves the safety of health systems. Within our health service, a new digital hospital has been established and two wards from a neighbouring paper-based hospital transitioned into the new digital hospital. This created an opportunity to evaluate the impact of complete digital transformation on medication safety. Here we discuss the impact of transition from a paper-based to digital hospital on voluntarily reported medication incidents and prescribing errors. This study utilises an interrupted time-series design and takes place across two wards as they transition from a paper to a digital hospital. Two data sources are used to assess impacts on medication incidents and prescribing errors: (1) voluntarily reported medication incidents and 2) a chart audit of medications prescribed on the study wards. The chart audit collects data on procedural, dosing and therapeutic prescribing errors. There are 588 errors extracted from incident reporting software during the study period. The average monthly number of errors reduces from 12.5 pre- to 7.5 post-transition (p < 0.001). In the chart audit, 5072 medication orders are reviewed pre-transition and 3699 reviewed post-transition. The rates of orders with one or more error reduces significantly after transition (52.8% pre- vs. 15.7% post-, p < 0.001). There are significant reductions in procedural (32.1% pre- vs. 1.3% post-, p < 0.001), and dosing errors (32.3% pre- vs. 14% post-, p < 0.001), but not therapeutic errors (0.6% pre- vs. 0.7% post-, p = 0.478). Transition to a digital hospital is associated with reductions in voluntarily reported medication incidents and prescribing errors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Automated Vehicles (AVs) are designed and programmed to follow traffic rules. However, there is no separate and comprehensive regulatory framework dedicated to AVs. The current Queensland traffic rules were designed for humans. These rules often contain open texture expressions, exceptions, and potential conflicts (conflict arises when exceptions cannot be handled in rules), which makes it hard for AVs to follow. This paper presents an automatic compliance checking framework to assess AVs behaviour against current traffic rules by addressing these issues. Specifically, it proposes a framework to determine which traffic rules and open texture expressions need some additional interpretation. Essentially this enables AVs to have a suitable and executable formalization of the traffic rules. Defeasible Deontic Logic (DDL) is used to formalize traffic rules and reasoning with AV information (behaviour and environment). The representation of rules in DDL helps effectively in handling and resolving exceptions, potential conflicts, and open textures in rules. 40 experiments were conducted on eight realistic traffic scenarios to evaluate the framework. The evaluation was undertaken both quantitatively and qualitatively. The evaluation result shows that the proposed framework is a promising system for checking Automated Vehicle interpretation and compliance with current traffic rules. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Regional cities are having their unique water security challenges due to regional urban water contexts, regional socio-economic structure, and climate conditions. Regional urban community's perceptions of water usage are expected to be different from the communities in large metropolitan cities. The city of Townsville is the largest regional city in the northern tropical region of the state of Queensland in Australia, and it is known to have its unique dry tropic climate condition. The city faced a water crisis due to a prolonged drought in 2013–2018. As part of this research, at first, a literature review was conducted to understand what water demand management (WDM) tools worked well during urban water crisis in different parts of the world. This paper then investigates how residential water usage changed with the changes in drought measures in the city of Townsville in the last decade. A minimum per capita residential water requirement is established for the study region to benchmark the effects of tools implemented in the region. The paper investigates the WDM policies implemented in the city of Townsville including when the policies were applied and the impacts and efficacy of these policies before water crisis, during water crisis and after water crisis. The most effective WDM tools identified are water restrictions, public awareness raising and education programmes. The impacts of water restriction policies and the perceptions of local water professionals on their success elements are also studied. The results are compared and the reasons behind the findings are investigated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this guest editor's introduction to this thematic volume on the historical archaeology of Queensland, Australia, I briefly discuss some of the history and archaeology of Queensland in light of some of the major themes currently being investigated. The papers presented in this volume are also introduced. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Historical hunting pressures on koalas in the southern part of their range in Australia have led to a marked genetic bottleneck when compared with their northern counterparts. There are a range of suspected genetic disorders such as testicular abnormalities, oxalate nephrosis and microcephaly reported at higher prevalence in these genetically restricted southern animals. This paper reports analysis of differential expression of genes from RNAseq of lymph nodes, SNPs present in genes and the fixation index (population differentiation due to genetic structure) of these SNPs from two populations, one in south east Queensland, representative of the northern genotype and one in the Mount Lofty Ranges South Australia, representative of the southern genotype. SNPs that differ between these two populations were significantly enriched in genes associated with brain diseases. Genes which were differentially expressed between the two populations included many associated with brain development or disease, and in addition a number associated with testicular development, including the androgen receptor. Finally, one of the 8 genes both differentially expressed and with a statistical difference in SNP frequency between populations was SLC26A6 (solute carrier family 26 member 6), an anion transporter that was upregulated in SA koalas and is associated with oxalate transport and calcium oxalate uroliths in humans. Together the differences in SNPs and gene expression described in this paper suggest an underlying genetic basis for several disorders commonly seen in southern Australian koalas, supporting the need for further research into the genetic basis of these conditions, and highlighting that genetic selection in managed populations may need to be considered in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Platycephalids Ambiserrula jugosa (McCulloch 1914) and Inegocia harrisii (McCulloch 1914) were described as new species based on 10 and 2 specimens, respectively, collected from the coast of Queensland, Australia by the F.I.S. Endeavour in 1910. McCulloch (1914) listed additional specimens at the end of the description, which he did not exclude from the type series. Previous authors considered the specimens, which McCulloch stated the species to have been described from, to be types of the two species, it was revealed that all 43 and 9 specimens included in these species by McCulloch are type specimens, according to the fourth edition of International Code of Zoological Nomenclature, stating "type series of a nominal taxon consists of all the specimens included by the author in the new nominal taxon" in Article 72.4.1. In I. harrisii, it was assumed that a specimen later designated as the lectotype was figured with the original description. Because its plate legend includes the words "sp. nov. Type", the specimen is regarded to be the holotype of the species and the designation of the lectotype was unnecessary. This study newly recognizes additional 12 paratypes of A. jugosa and 5 paratypes of I. harrisii, and gives taxonomic accounts of the two species to show range extensions of intraspecific variation and distribution newly found. Also comments are given about the type status of other species taken by the Endeavour described by McCulloch in a series of five papers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In past few decades, there was a tremendous enhancement in natural disaster and their effects on economy and population. An adverse events like floods, wildfires, cyclones, earthquakes, tsunamis, etc., are regarded as a natural disaster once it strikes the vulnerable population areas. An early tracking of susceptibility areas and immediate tracking of affected areas might help in facilitating rescue and early warnings to the public. To achieve autonomous natural disaster prediction, this paper makes use of current developments in remote sensing, which speed up the availability of aerial/satellite data and are reinforced by progress in the computing sector. The aerial/satellite imageries are employed for acquiring the data from areas of Queensland-Australia that are more prone to natural disaster in an eagle-eye perspective. Since there were several techniques employed so far for the automatic prediction of natural disaster susceptibilities, there were some limitations like reduced rate of accuracy and so on. So as to overcome these limitations, deep learning based automated process is employed for predicting the natural disaster areas and probability of event occurrences. The main intention of the work is to detect the natural disaster occurrence from the sensed data which aids in providing warning to public and to safeguard them by taking necessary actions. Initially, remote sensing data is pre-processed and the features are extracted using Adaptive linear Internal embedding algorithm-based feature extraction (ALIE-FE). The extracted features are selected using Recursive Wrapper-based feature subset selection. To estimate best fitness function and to enhance the prediction accuracy, the optimization process is carried using Bio-Inspired Squirrel Search Optimization algorithm (BI-SSOA). Finally, the classification is carried by means of Deep learning based Multi-layer Alex Net classifier (DBMLA) approach. The simulation is carried and the outcomes attained are estimated for predicting flood susceptibility and wildfire susceptibility. The proposed BISSOA-DBMLA offers sensitivity of 98%, specificity of 99%, and TSS of 97%. The proposed system offers 98.99% classification accuracy. Accuracy, sensitivity, specificity, TSS, and area under the curve (AUC) are used to evaluate the efficacy of the suggested system in light of the achieved results from other approaches. To demonstrate the efficacy of the suggested mechanism, the achieved results are compared with those of current approaches. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper outlines the evolution of an Australian form of Open Marsh Water Management (OMWM) called runnelling which was implemented in relatively pristine saltmarshes. Runnelling involves shallow channels and was distinguished from OMWM which involves ditching. Both methods aim to conserve tidal hydrology. The core research covers 28 years of research on the original experimental site (Coomera Island, Queensland), in routine monitoring and impact assessments that were made periodically. It also introduces and incorporates information from associated research. This includes effects of runnelling on non-target aspects—snails and crabs. Emerging issues during the course of the longer-term research included the risk of mobilising acid sulfates and of mangrove encroachment into the saltmarsh. As well, use of the data was extended to retrofit it to address broader questions about saltmarsh processes and how to identify them. That identified progressive changes at the Coomera site, and so a further query was whether the system showed signs of approaching a tipping point. In summary, there were some identifiable effects of runnelling in all parts of the research. These were mostly related to the increased wetness near runnels, as flooding by tides would occur at tides up to 0.30 m lower than the pre-runnelling situation. The increased wetness was related to plants, snails and crabs. From a mosquito management perspective the method was successful. From an environmental perspective the environmental changes were only very close to runnels (within 10 m). The overall changes at the experimental site were consistent with other changes in eastern Australia, especially of mangrove encroachment into saltmarshes. Once the runnelling method appeared to manage mosquitoes without damaging wetland values it was adopted widely throughout south east Queensland, encouraged by the positive attitude of permitting agencies, but longer-term evaluation was hindered by lack of relevant records. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Highly Accomplished and Lead Teacher (HALT) Certification process introduced in Australia in 2012 was designed to recognise expert teachers, to encourage them to continue to influence and impact their students and colleagues through their exemplary classroom practice. Expert teachers prepare evidence of their impactful practices, and have this evidence evaluated through a National Certifying Authority. HALTs are a relatively new role in Australian education, and little is known about their impact in schools, or the potential for their ongoing role as middle leaders in schools. This paper analyses the experiences of HALT teachers who had been certified by Independent Schools Queensland (ISQ) in 2018, and what impact they recognised they were having in the schools who supported them through their certification process. Impact is theorised as a temporal, reflexive narrative. Data were gathered in a cascading evaluative process through portfolio analysis, interviews with nationally certified teachers, school-based mentors and school leaders and a survey about their teacher and middle leader efficacy. The process of applying for HALT Certification had significant positive personal impact for the teachers, their students, their colleagues in their school and for some, beyond their school. The recognition of impact as a temporal narrative with distinct genres, and the concept of HALT teachers as middle leaders may point to new avenues of supporting applicants and to potential benefits for schools to encourage teachers to consider national certification. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates use of inventories, or checklists of activities, as an emergency management tool to motivate preparedness action in individuals. It develops the inventory concept to provide the foundation for a more targeted approach to storm preparation communication and community engagement. It also examines the potential efficacy of alternatives to paper-based checklists, such as web or smartphone applications. Academic and grey literature was reviewed to collect activities for a storm inventory for emergency agencies to measure individual preparedness and for individuals to measure their preparation progress. The resulting master list was refined for application and tested for useability in a pilot study of semi-structured interviews in a storm-susceptible community in Queensland, Australia. Also, clustering items by type of preparedness activity reveal where strengths and weaknesses exist in individual preparedness. For instance, preparation for leaving and safety planning were shown to be the areas of weakest activity in the pilot sample, while preparation of the house for a storm was the strongest area. In addition, behaviour change literature shows potential for effective use of an inventory-based smartphone application in motivating preparation activity. Data collected by a storm preparedness smartphone application could show where a communication or engagement program for targeted communities should be focused. It is supported by health literature that identifies preferences of individuals to make progress on complex tasks in stages, the value of lists to achievement of goals and demonstrated increase in uptake of activities prompted by smartphone applications over web or paper-based diaries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Compound extreme natural events cause a significantly larger impact than individual extreme events. Therefore, the urgency of exploring the climatology of compound events is growing. This paper is aimed to identify the current hotspots of compound heatwaves and droughts (CHD) and trends in their occurrence in southeast Australia. In this context, 61 weather stations were selected from the study area, and analyses were carried out over the extended summer season of the time period 1971–2021. The hotspots of CHDs in southeast Australia were identified considering both the total count of CHD days and 90th percentile of CHDs during the study period. The study period was divided into two periods 1971–2000 and 2001–2021, to assess the change in hotspots spatially and temporally. Four different attributes of CHDs based on the number, duration, severity and amplitude of CHDs were also calculated, and Mann–Kendall (MK) test followed by Sen's slope was adopted to detect the trends in all these four attributes of CHDs. Trends in CHD indices were also calculated for the two periods of 1971–2000 and 2001–2021. For calculating the CHD, excess heat factor (EHF) was used to identify the heatwaves. In the case of drought identification, SPEI and SPI drought indices were adopted with aggregation of 3 and 126 antecedent months, and three different threshold values were selected to consider three levels of dry conditions, e.g. 0, − 0.5 and − 1.0. It has been found that more CHDs occurred on the eastern side of NSW and Queensland states. Furthermore, the total count of CHD days increased notably during the last two decades. The trends in CHD indices were found to be significant in the recent period (2001–2021), and there was no trend in the earlier period (1971–2000). The findings of this study will help to plan heat and drought-related emergency management in the study area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Environmental impact assessment (EIA) has evolved as an environmental management and sustainability tool. Despite common principles shared by EIA globally, there are considerable variations in EIA processes across countries. In this paper, we reviewed and compared EIA processes of China, Queensland State of Australia and Nepal considering five key steps (selection of consultants, report preparation, public participation, report review and approval, and monitoring and evaluations) of EIA. Our review indicated that the EIA is well recognised in legal instruments in all state and countries under consideration and there are both similarities and differences in key steps of EIA. Monitoring of EIA recommendations and the integration of feedbacks from the past and current practices are important in improving EIA processes. This study also found that there are elements for possible improvement in existing EIA processes by each state and country introducing the best practices from others' EIA system. Some of the practices that Nepal can follow from the EIA processes of Queensland and China are licensing and accreditation of individuals and firms to conduct EIA, establishment of separate monitoring unit within regulating department, development of clear guidelines for approvals and monitoring, and the use of independent third-party auditing in EIA monitoring. The findings of this paper are useful in revising and improving EIA policies, practices and processes in the selected state, countries and elsewhere. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents the development of the Wavelet Artificial Neural Networks (WANN) model to forecast seasonal rainfall in Queensland, Australia, using the Inter-decadal Pacific Oscillation (IPO), Southern Oscillation Index (SOI), and Nino3.4 climate indices as predictors. Eight input sets with different combinations of predictive variables from 1908 to 2016 were considered to develop forecast models for ten selected rainfall stations in Queensland, Australia. The outcomes of WANN modeling are compared with Artificial Neural Networks (ANN). Moreover, the skillfulness of the WANN in comparison to the current climate prediction system used by the Australian Community Climate Earth-System Simulator–Seasonal (ACCESS–S) and climatology forecasts are investigated. Besides, the WANN predictions are compared with two other conventional approaches like autoregressive integrated moving average (ARIMA) and multiple linear regression (MLR) for further investigations. The comparisons indicated that the WANN achieves the lower average root mean square error (RMSE) in all the stations with 112.2mm compared to ANN with 178.9mm, ACCESS-S with 281.8mm, climatology prediction with 279.7mm, MLR with 195.1mm, and ARIMA with 187.7mm. The WANN seasonal rainfall forecasts are more accurate than the ANN, ACCESS-S, Climatology, MLR, and ARIMA by 37%, 60%, 53%, 42%, and 40%, respectively. It was also found that the ACCESS-S underestimates the extreme seasonal rainfall during the testing period up to 80%, while it is limited to 21% for the WANN among the selected stations. The results show that the WANN model outperforms the MLR, ARIMA, climatology, ACCESS-S, and ANN forecasts in all the selected stations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

First Nations languages can play a significant role in ensuring connection to land, culture, Songlines, kinship, history, and stories. Ongoing language attrition for First Nations peoples of Australia has been due to colonization and past adverse government policies, which rendered First Nations languages a threat to the expansion of the colony. Through processes of dislocation from country and punishment for speaking language, many First Nations peoples began to lose their languages and were forcefully compelled to speak the English language on missions and reserves. Promoting First Nations languages in early educational contexts can instill a sense of cultural identity and connectedness to schooling for First Nations children, helping to ensure that languages are passed on to future generations. In many parts of Australia, First Nations languages are being revitalized and are being taught to both First Nations children and non-Indigenous children in early learning centers and in classrooms. This paper draws upon existing literature, briefly examining the removal of First Nations languages in Queensland from a historical perspective. The authors consider three essential elements required to work with First Nations communities when revitalizing First Nations languages and implementing a successful language program into schools: co-design, authentic delivery, and cultural inclusivity. We demonstrate how these elements have been used in the revitalization of First Nations languages in two Queensland schools. Finally, the importance of using an Indigenous centered approach to maintain languages at a local level is posited as a critical step in creating culturally inclusive environments for First Nations children in mainstream school settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Accessible and efficient service are vital features of well-utilized public transit systems. Modeling approaches to support the evaluation of transit operations for management and planning are essential for continued improvement. A hybrid coverage model is developed in this paper for simultaneously expanding service access and increasing accessibility. This paper discusses the use and integration of this model in a geographic information system environment for strategic planning. Analysis is presented for public transit service in Brisbane, Australia. The structured model provides flexibility in developing viable policies for addressing system improvements and service expansion, all of which are likely to promote increased utilization of public transit. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Palaeoclimate data relating to hydroclimate variability over the past millennia have a vital contribution to make to the water sector globally. The water industry faces considerable challenges accessing climate data sets that extend beyond that of historical gauging stations. Without this, variability around the extremes of floods and droughts is unknown and stress-testing infrastructure design and water demands is challenging. User-friendly access to relevant palaeoclimate data is now essential, and importantly, an efficient process to determine which proxies are most relevant to a planning scenario, and geographic area of interest. This paper presents PalaeoWISE (Palaeoclimate Data for Water Industry and Security Planning) a fully integrated, and quality-assured database of proxy data extracted from data repositories and publications collated in Linked Paleo Data (LiPD) format. We demonstrate the application of the database in Queensland, one of Australia's most hydrologically extreme states. The database and resultant hydroclimate correlations provides both the scientific community, and water resource managers, with a valuable resource to better manage for future climate changes. Measurement(s) climate Technology Type(s) digital curation Factor Type(s) proxy type • geographic location • temporal interval • environmental material Sample Characteristic - Environment climate system Sample Characteristic - Location Earth (planet) Machine-accessible metadata file describing the reported data: https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.16607162 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Freshly excavated overburden (spoils) dumped during open-cut coal mining generate saline leachate that can lead to environmental impacts. Predictions of leachate salinity remain uncertain, largely due to incomplete knowledge of responses of spoils to varying moisture conditions. This study carried out column leaching experiments on four spoil types, originating from Queensland, Australia. Following characterisation of the fresh spoil material, four moisture regimes were tested: three wetting-drying conditions with leaching occurring biweekly, weekly, and fortnightly and one completely saturated regime with leaching occurring weekly. Thirty-four leaching cycles were conducted except for one spoil type for which only 12 cycles were completed. Results showed higher EC and leachate ion concentrations from the saturated regime, while among the wetting-drying regimes, the spoil leached on a fortnightly basis resulted in higher salt release for two geochemically similar spoil types. Overall, lower and steady pH was recorded for spoils leached under saturated conditions. Irrespective of spoil type, sodium was the dominating cation contributing to the overall leachate salinity. The paper provides new insights into parameterising leaching models and in the role of water-rock interactions which informs experimental design and conceptualisation of full-scale models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Data collection for fresh-water regions of The Ecosystem Health Monitoring Program (EHMP), in southeast Queensland, Australia, involves the sampling of over 130 sites among 19 catchments twice per year and has been ongoing for over ten years. The sampling design was derived following an exhaustive process of indicator and site selection to develop a composite indicator that represented aquatic ecosystem health. After 13 years of implementation, there was an interest in identifying redundancies in sampling to reduce sampling costs without making a substantial impact on the integrity of the program and its capacity to report on ecosystem health. This paper focuses on identifying a subset of sites and times that could be removed from sampling with a minimal impact on the subsequent ecosystem health scores. Herein, Mixed models are employed to assess a variance structure from which optimality criteria are utilized to identify the scheme. Integer programs are then used to ensure specific practical constraints are observed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While many remote places in Queensland, Australia have access to schools, very few have provision for preschool education. Recent efforts to change this have included the development of a kindergarten program delivered through the local school. An impact assessment undertaken in 2017 involved visiting 30 remote sites offering the program. Analysis of interview data indicated the importance of sense of place in the delivery of this program. Educators and family members were overwhelmingly supportive of the option of a kindergarten program in their sites, regarding it as an equity and social justice imperative to provide access to programs that seem to be taken-for-granted for children and families in urban and regional locations. The potential for the program to enhance social interactions and educational outcomes was highlighted, even when educators noted a range of challenges in the implementation of the program. Sense of place and the positioning of educators and families are explored in the paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we explore the efficiency of different groups of hospitals in Queensland, Australia, focusing on teaching and non-teaching hospitals, by adapting the most recent developments on statistical analysis of aggregate efficiency. We focus on the two approaches: the bootstrap approach proposed by Simar and Zelenyuk (J Appl Econ 22(7):1367–1394, 2007) and the central limit theorems recently developed by Simar and Zelenyuk (Oper Res 66(1):137–149, 2018), (Eur J Oper Res, 2020). To adapt these developments, we extend the central limit theorems to the context where there are several sub-groups in the population. Using real data on Queensland public hospitals, we found that teaching hospitals are significantly less efficient than non-teaching hospitals when benchmarking is done with respect to the constant returns to scale frontier, but are significantly more efficient when benchmarking with respect to the variable returns to scale frontier. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is evident that developing more accurate forecasting methods is the pillar of building robust multi-energy systems (MES). In this context, long-term forecasting is also indispensable to have a robust expansion planning program for modern power systems. While very short-term and short-term forecasting are usually represented with point estimation, this approach is highly unreliable in medium-term and long-term forecasting due to inherent uncertainty in predictors like weather variables in long terms. Accordingly, long-term forecasting is usually represented by probabilistic forecasting values which are based on probabilistic functions. In this paper, a self-organizing mixture network (SOMN) is developed to estimate the probability density function (PDF) of peak load in long-term horizons considering the most important drivers of seasonal similarity, population, gross domestic product (GDP), and electricity price. The proposed methodology is applied to forecast the PDF of annual and seasonal peak load in Queensland Australia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this paper was to identify characteristics and predictors of frequent emergency department (ED) use among people released from prisons in Queensland, Australia. Baseline interview data from a sample of sentenced adults were linked to ED and hospital records. The association between baseline characteristics and frequent ED attendance was modelled by fitting multivariate logistic regression models. Participants who had ≥ 4 visits to the ED in any 365-day period of community follow-up were defined as frequent attenders (FA). The analyses included 1307 people and mean follow-up time in the community was 1063 days. After adjusting for covariates, those with a dual diagnoses of mental illness and substance use (RR = 2.42, 95% CI 1.47–3.99) and those with mental illness alone (RR = 2.47, 95% CI 1.29–4.73) were at higher risk of frequent ED attendance, compared with those with no disorder. Future research should assess whether individually tailored transition supports from prison to community reduce the frequency of ED use among this population. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes a practical automated procedure to calibrate and validate a transit assignment model. An optimization method based on particle swarm algorithm is adopted to minimize a defined error term. This error term which is based on the percentage of root mean square error and the mean absolute percent error encompasses deviation of model outputs from observations considering both segment level as well as the mode level and can be applied to a large scale network. This study is based on the frequency-based assignment model using the concept of optimal strategy while any transit assignment model can be used in the proposed methodological framework. Lastly, the model is validated using another weekday data. The proposed methodology uses automatic fare collection (AFC) data to estimate the origin–destination matrix. This study combines data from three sources: the general transit feed specification, AFC, and a strategic transport model from a large-scale multimodal public transport network. The South-East Queensland (SEQ) network in Australia is used as a case study. The AFC system in SEQ has voluminous and high quality data on passenger boardings and alightings across bus, rail and ferry modes. The results indicate that the proposed procedure can successfully develop a multi-modal transit assignment model at a large scale. Higher dispersions are seen for the bus mode, in contrast to rail and ferry modes. Furthermore, a comparison is made between the strategies used by passengers and the generated strategies by the model between each origin and destination to get more insights about the detailed behaviour of the model. Overall, the analysis indicates that the AFC data is a valuable and rich source in calibrating and validating a transit assignment model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper draws from a study that explored issues of student equity, marginality and diversity in two secondary schools in regional Queensland (Australia). The paper foregrounds interview data gathered from administration, teaching and ancillary staff at one of the schools, 'Crimson' High School. The school has a high Indigenous student population and is well recognised within the broader community as catering well to this population. With reference to the school's concerns about Indigenous disadvantage and the various approaches undertaken to address this disadvantage, the paper articulates the significance of educators being critically aware of how they construct race and use it as an organising principle in their work. This awareness is central to moving beyond the culturalism and racial incommensurability that tend to predominate within Indigenous education-where cultural reductionism homogenises indigeneity within and against a dominant White norm. With reference to a specific approach at the school designed predominantly for Indigenous male students-to foster inter-cultural awareness and respect through sport-we highlight ways in which notions of culturalism and racial incommensurability might be disrupted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In most modern coal mines, there are many coal quality parameters that are measured on samples taken from boreholes. These data are used to generate spatial models of the coal quality parameters, typically using inverse distance as an interpolation method. At the same time, downhole geophysical logging of numerous additional boreholes is used to measure various physical properties but no coal quality samples are taken. The work presented in this paper uses two of the most important coal quality variables—ash and volatile matter—and assesses the efficacy of using a number of geostatistical interpolation methods to improve the accuracy of the interpolated models, including the use of auxiliary variables from geophysical logs. A multivariate spatial statistical analysis of ash, volatile matter and several auxiliary variables is used to establish a co-regionalization model that relates all of the variables as manifestations of an underlying geological characteristic. A case study of a coal mine in Queensland, Australia, is used to compare the interpolation methods of inverse distance to ordinary kriging, universal kriging, co-kriging, regression kriging and kriging with an external drift. The relative merits of these six methods are compared using the mean error and the root mean square error as measures of bias and accuracy. The study demonstrates that there is significant opportunity to improve the estimations of coal quality when using kriging with an external drift. The results show that when using the depth of a sample as an external drift variable there is a significant improvement in the accuracy of estimation for volatile matter, and when using wireline density logs as the drift variable there is improvement in the estimation of the in situ ash. The economic benefit of these findings is that cheaper proxies for coal quality parameters can significantly increase data density and the quality of estimations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Resilient organised crime groups survive and prosper despite law enforcement activity, criminal competition and market forces. Corrupt police networks, like any other crime network, must contain resiliency characteristics if they are to continue operation and avoid being closed down through detection and arrest of their members. This paper examines the resilience of a large corrupt police network, namely The Joke which operated in the Australian state of Queensland for a number of decades. The paper uses social network analysis tools to determine the resilient characteristics of the network. This paper also assumes that these characteristics will be different to those of mainstream organised crime groups because the police network operates within an established policing agency rather than as an independent entity hiding within the broader community. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although the last 200 years of colonisation has brought radical changes in economic and governance structures for thousands of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders living in remote areas of northern Australia, many of these Indigenous people still rely upon, and live closely connected to, their natural environment. Over millennia, living ‘on country’, many of these communities have developed a sophisticated appreciation of their local ecosystems and the climatic patterns associated with the changes in them. Some of this knowledge is recorded in their oral history passed down through generations, documented in seasonal weather calendars in local languages and, to a limited degree, transcribed and translated into English. This knowledge is still highly valued by these communities today, as it is used to direct hunting, fishing and planting as well as to inform many seasonally dependant cultural events. In recent years, local observations have been recognised by non-Indigenous scientists as a vital source of environmental data where few historic records exist. Similar to the way that phenological observations in the UK and US provide baseline information on past climates, this paper suggests that Indigenous observations of seasonal change have the potential to fill gaps in climate data for tropical northern Australia, and could also serve to inform culturally appropriate adaptation strategies. One method of recording recent direct and indirect climate and weather observations for the Torres Strait Islands is documented in this paper to demonstrate the currency of local observations of climate and its variability. The paper concludes that a comprehensive, participatory programme to record Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander knowledge of past climate patterns, and recent observations of change, would be timely and valuable for the communities themselves, as well as contributing to a greater understanding of regional climate change that would be useful for the wider Australian population. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Community-based natural resource management (CBNRM) institutions are challenged with finding common ground as a basis for action among diverse resource users and stakeholders. Establishing and maintaining institutional credibility within their regions, catchments, communities and among their membership is fundamental to overcoming the challenge. So too is applying appropriate institutional and governance structures and appointing appropriate leaders. Drawing on triangulated case study data collected over a 12-month period using multiple methods, this paper examines the influence of institutional credibility and leadership on the functioning, decision-making and governance of two CBNRM institutions in Queensland, Australia. The paper shows that stakeholders have very different expectations of what makes a CBNRM institution credible. Satisfying the multiple expectations requires CBNRM institutions to incorporate diverse stakeholder representation, assert their legitimacy and demonstrate accountability, transparency, fairness and justice. The paper also draws attention to the value and importance of appointing inspirational leaders who focus on encouraging followers to pursue collective goals. Comparing the merits and constraints of appointing average Joes versus community elites to the Boards of CBNRM institutions, the paper highlights the urgent need for community-based natural resource governance and inspirational leadership education and training programs to improve the availability and quality of CBNRM leadership in rural Australia. Since combining credible CBNRM institutions with inspirational leaders does not necessarily equate to sustainable on-ground NRM outcomes, it is critical that the education and training programs emphasise the importance of monitoring and evaluating the improvements in decision-making processes and in decision outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes a problem faced by CS Energy's Swanbank Power Station in the Australian state of Queensland. It involved the personnel scheduling (rostering) of staff with multiple skill levels at the power station. Such a problem can be classified using the six stage construction process proposed by Ernst et al. We assume that the three processes of ‘demand modelling,’ ‘shift starting times’ and ‘task scheduling’ are specified. We are concerned with the essential processes of ‘day off scheduling,’ ‘line of work construction’ and ‘shift assignment to staff’ with requirements to maintain multiple skills. Several other authors have reported results for staff with hierarchical skills while the methods proposed in this paper are for non-hierarchical skill sets. The paper describes a set covering approach to the multi-skilled rostering problem. We propose a number of solution strategies for the set covering approach and give a comparison of the results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Key message: Multi-environment models using marker-based kinship information for both additive and dominance effects can accurately predict hybrid performance in different environments. Sorghum is an important hybrid crop that is grown extensively in many subtropical and tropical regions including Northern NSW and Queensland in Australia. The highly varying weather patterns in the Australian summer months mean that sorghum hybrids exhibit a great deal of variation in yield between locations. To ultimately enable prediction of the outcome of crossing parental lines, both additive effects on yield performance and dominance interaction effects need to be characterised. This paper demonstrates that fitting a linear mixed model that includes both types of effects calculated using genetic markers in relationship matrices improves predictions. Genotype by environment interactions was investigated by comparing FA1 (single-factor analytic) and FA2 (two-factor analytic) structures. The G×E causes a change in hybrid rankings between trials with a difference of up to 25% of the hybrids in the top 10% of each trial. The prediction accuracies increased with the addition of the dominance term (over and above that achieved with an additive effect alone) by an average of 15% and a maximum of 60%. The percentage of dominance of the total genetic variance varied between trials with the trials with higher broad-sense heritability having the greater percentage of dominance. The inclusion of dominance in the factor analytic models improves the accuracy of the additive effects. Breeders selecting high yielding parents for crossing need to be aware of effects due to environment and dominance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Hydrogeology Journal is the property of Springer Nature and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Hydrogeology Journal is the property of Springer Nature and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Despite the exponential growth of social media in emergency services design and delivery, academic research and managerial practice have paid little attention to how to adopt and use it to transform operations and enhance organizational performance. This paper aims to provide some insights of a longitudinal case study of the adoption and use of social media technologies by the New South Wales (NSW) state emergency service (SES) in Australia. The study identifies a set of internal and external factors explaining the adoption and use of social media by the NSW SES including: the social media bandwagon effect, the effectiveness of social media use during the January 2011 Queensland floods, the NSW state strategic planning on emergency services, the opportunity offered by the upgrade of the NSW SES web site, and a strong internal management leadership toward the use of social media to support emergency operations. Finally, implications for research and practice are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The koala is a specialist feeder with a diet consisting almost exclusively of potentially toxic eucalypt leaves. Monoterpenes, an abundant class of plant secondary metabolites in eucalypts, are highly lipophilic. Chronic absorption and systemic exposure can be anticipated for the koala, causing health effects in various ways when consumed in high amounts, but particularly causing alterations in immune function in this species. Therefore, careful leaf selection, efficient detoxification pathways, and other specialist adaptations are required to protect animals from acute intoxication. This is the first paper providing insight into the systemic exposure of koalas to these compounds. Profiles of six selected major monoterpenes were investigated in the ingesta of deceased koalas from four different regions of NSW and South-East Queensland. Concentrations of the same compounds were measured in lymphoid tissues of deceased koalas and in the blood of live koalas from other regions of NSW. Analytical methods included liquid extraction and solid-phase micro-extraction, followed by gas-chromatography/ mass-spectrometry. Concentrations in the ingesta of individual animals vary remarkably, though the average proportions of individual monoterpenes in the ingesta of animals from the four different regions are highly comparable. Blood concentrations of the selected monoterpenes also varied considerably. The highest blood concentrations were found for 1,8-cineole, up to 971 ng/ml. There was similarity between circulating monoterpene profiles and ingesta profiles. Based on the observed lack of similarity between blood and lymph tissue concentrations, individual monoterpenes either exhibit different affinities for lymphatic tissue compared to blood or their accumulation in blood and lymph tissue differs temporally. In general, blood monoterpene concentrations found in koalas were low compared to those reported in other marsupial eucalypt feeders, but significant concentrations of monoterpenes were detected in all samples analysed. This data on blood and lymphatic tissue monoterpene concentrations builds the fundamental groundwork for future research into the effects of dietary monoterpenes on various biological processes of specialist herbivores and into the significance of these animals' metabolic and behavioural strategies for coping with these compounds. We have shown that the systemic exposure of koalas to potentially anti-inflammatory eucalypt monoterpenes is continuous, and we provide data on physiological concentrations which will allow realistic future studies of the effects of monoterpenes on immune cell function. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The present paper represented the third installment on the monogenoidean parasites collected during a workshop exploring the diversity of the parasites of fishes in Moreton Bay, Queensland, Australia. Previous reports on monogenoids collected during the workshop included species parasitizing beloniform and gerreid fishes. Purpose: During January 2016, the author, having responsibility for the identification and description of monogenoids, participated in a workshop supported by an Australian Biological Resources Study Grant to Drs. Thomas Cribb and Scott Cutmore, University of Queensland, to explore the diversity of parasites infecting the fishes of Moreton Bay, Queensland, Australia. Methods: Approximately 100 species of marine fishes were necropsied for parasites. Standard procedures for collecting, mounting, drawing, and measuring of monogenoids were employed. Results: A new species of Euryhaliotrema was collected and described from the silver moony Monodactylus argenteus (Monodactylidae) and the first recording of Euryhaliotrema spirotubiforum on the dory snapper Lutjanus fulviflamma and Russell's snapper Lutjanus russellii (both Lutjanidae) in Moreton Bay was reported. Conclusion: The results suggested that the diversity of dactylogyrids off eastern Australia is under estimated in the literature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Monitoring stream networks through time provides important ecological information. The sampling design problem is to choose locations where measurements are taken so as to maximise information gathered about physicochemical and biological variables on the stream network. This paper uses a pseudo-Bayesian approach, averaging a utility function over a prior distribution, in finding a design which maximizes the average utility. We use models for correlations of observations on the stream network that are based on stream network distances and described by moving average error models. Utility functions used reflect the needs of the experimenter, such as prediction of location values or estimation of parameters. We propose an algorithmic approach to design with the mean utility of a design estimated using Monte Carlo techniques and an exchange algorithm to search for optimal sampling designs. In particular we focus on the problem of finding an optimal design from a set of fixed designs and finding an optimal subset of a given set of sampling locations. As there are many different variables to measure, such as chemical, physical and biological measurements at each location, designs are derived from models based on different types of response variables: continuous, counts and proportions. We apply the methodology to a synthetic example and the Lake Eacham stream network on the Atherton Tablelands in Queensland, Australia. We show that the optimal designs depend very much on the choice of utility function, varying from space filling to clustered designs and mixtures of these, but given the utility function, designs are relatively robust to the type of response variable. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Incursions by exotic tephritids continue to threaten Australia. Host suitability for a specific tephritid is ranked by the number of adults which can emerge from one kg of fruit or the Host Reproduction Number (HRN). Bactrocera dorsalis has previously invaded northern Australia but was eradicated. However, Bactrocera dorsalis remains the largest exotic threat and is likely to invade through northern Australia but B. tryoni and other tephritids are already well established. One question is what hosts would likely provide the best early warning for an exotic incursion. Here, the HRN for 40 hosts for Bactrocera dorsalis and B. tryoni were established from the scientific literature. The reproductive advantages of one species over the other were calculated by dividing the higher HRN by the lower HRN. The fruits with the highest reproductive advantage (> 30) favouring B. dorsalis were soursop, mango and capsicum. The reproductive advantage estimate was compared to surveillance data collected during B. dorsalis eradication in north Queensland from 1995 to 1997. Mangoes and capsicum were among the mostly commonly infested hosts. Capsicums provided the second highest number of samples and would seem ideal candidates as sentinel plants for current surveillance programs. Some inconsistencies are identified and discussed. The HRN and reproductive advantage may have the potential to identify hosts and industries for early warning exotic fruit fly surveillance, better-targeted eradication programs and risk assessments for imports/exports. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Understanding the frequency and causes of extreme events is crucial for environmental, social and economic protection and planning. In Australia this was never more apparent than January 2011 when widespread flooding across Queensland, New South Wales (NSW), and Victoria resulted in the loss of human lives and devastating impacts to infrastructure and local economies. However, understanding the interplay between the geomorphology of catchments and their hydrology remains poorly developed in floodplain planning guidelines. This paper seeks to explain spatial patterns of flood inundation in terms of downstream variations in channel morphometry; and to discuss the significance of these findings within the context of improving flood risk avoidance strategies and environmental outcomes for urban streams. A prominent characteristic of streams draining catchments in the Lockyer Valley south east Queensland and the Illawarra region of NSW, for example, are well developed macrochannels that have formed in mid-catchment zones. Detailed hydraulic modeling using HEC-RAS, HEC-GeoRAS and ArcGIS indicates that these macrochannels are scaled to accommodate high magnitude floods by operating as ‘bankfull’ channels during such events. In south east Queensland, locations where macrochannels debouch onto unconfined low gradient floodplains appear especially vulnerable to catastrophic flooding because of the efficient delivery and minimal attenuation of flood peaks generated in headwater catchments. Macrochannels and associated landforms can be clearly distinguished and mapped on fine-scale digital elevation models, offering the opportunity to integrate analyses of fluvial landforms and channel processes into hydraulic modeling studies, and ultimately, flood-risk avoidance strategies. Such an approach has the potential to improve on traditional flood risk avoidance methods that are focused primarily on design-flood heights by enabling the interpretation of hydraulic modeling outputs in the context of fluvial landforms that exert a significant control on flood behaviour. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a novel approach to real time automatic flood control in a managed river network that is subject to uncertain inflows. The proposed approach uses multiple models to represent inflows ranging from low to high flow. Optimal model selection is achieved in a minimum mean square error sense using a bank of Kalman filters to identify the most likely inflow characteristic. There are no a-priori probabilities assigned to the individual models. Model Predictive Control is used for water level controller design. Our Adaptive Multi Model Predictive Control (AMMPC) method is proposed as an alternative to existing techniques that also use multiple inflow models but with a-priori inflow model probabilities, either weighted or equally likely. The performance of the approach is demonstrated using a simulated river-reservoir model as well as using data collected at the Wivenhoe Dam during the 2011 floods in Queensland, Australia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Growing urbanisation causes pressures on many environmental assets such as groundwater systems, waterways, atmosphere, ecosystems and others. To manage and mitigate the negative effects of these pressures, environmental programs are typically launched, which comprise of eligible projects in different affected locations. The implementation of individual projects has a cost. However, due to budget constraints, most frequently not all suggested projects can be implemented which makes necessary to choose a subset. In this paper, we use a cost utility approach and a subsequent combinatorial optimisation based on metaheuristics to determine a project portfolio which returns a maximum aggregated utility while keeping the budget constraint. To ensure that the mutual exclusiveness of projects at one particular site is guaranteed, we further developed the employed metaheuristics. We apply this approach within a waterway health program in a river catchment in Brisbane, Australia, and compare its results to a commonly used selection process that does not involve combinatorial optimisation. We find that the use of combinatorial optimisation leads to a considerable improvement of the selection process and can help to more effectively allocate environmental expenditure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous research on remote nineteenth-and early twentieth-century Indigenous missions in northern and central Australia point to their often tenuous existence and the complex nature of engagements between Christian Missionaries and Indigenous people. This paper explores the contribution and significance of Indigenous production of wild foods in the context of one such settlement located at Weipa on Cape York Peninsula, north eastern Australia. It is premised on the assertion that investigation of the economies of these often remote settlements has the potential to reveal much about the character of cross-cultural engagements within the context of early mission settlements. Many remote missions had a far from secure economic basis and were sometimes unable to produce the consistent food supplies that were central to their proselytizing efforts. In this paper it is suggested that Indigenous-produced wild foods were of significant importance to the mission on a day-to-day basis in terms of their dietary contribution (particularly in terms of protein sources) and were also important to Indigenous people from a social and cultural perspective. We develop this argument through the case study of culturally modified trees that resulted from the collection of wild honey. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using the data collected as part of a Quality of Life (QoL) survey in the Brisbane-South East Queensland region (SEQ) of Australia, this paper examines differences in satisfaction levels between downshifters and non-downshifters, and identifies socio-economic predictors of the downshifting phenomenon. Almost 30% of survey respondents are classified as downshifters. Multivariate Analysis of Covariance reveals significant differences between downshifters and non-downshifters in a number of life-satisfaction domains, although the degree to which they were satisfied with their life before downshifting is unknown. Analysis of Covariance shows that downshifters reported a significantly lower level of satisfaction than non-downshifters, especially with respect to satisfaction with the amount of money available to them, independence or freedom, and employment. Multivariate logistic regression analysis reveals that post-secondary education and employment were positively associated with downshifting, while age was significantly associated with downshifting. It is argued that if downshifting is associated with lower levels of satisfaction, intervention may be required to initiate programs to engage downshifters more fully in the workforce by facilitating more flexible work arrangements and an improved working environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ammonia is an important water quality variable, which in excess, can be detrimental to waterways and their ecosystems. In the Ecosystem Health Monitoring Program in South-east Queensland ammonia is monitored monthly, however, often more than 50% of the ammonia observations in Moreton Bay are below detection limit, making it difficult to draw useful inferences. In this paper a clipped Gaussian random field is used to spatially model and map the probability of detectable concentration of ammonia. The methodology is applied to the Moreton Bay samples collected in February 2005. The results suggest that for this month the oceanic impacted areas have higher probability of detectable ammonia concentration than the areas closer to the main sources of anthropogenic inputs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the conflict in interest between teaching experiments and professional learning when they are combined in a research project. The study reported in this paper is the fourth year of a five year longitudinal study on the introduction of early algebraic concepts. The ten teacher participants are from five state primary schools in middle class areas in Brisbane, Queensland. The findings from this investigation suggest that potentially many conflicts exist between the interest of a teaching experiment and that of professional learning. Some of these conflicts can be overcome, others can be minimised by restructuring, but some are fundamentally inherent when the methodologies are combined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Positive behaviour for learning (PBL) was introduced to the state education sector in Queensland in the early 2000s in an effort to move schools away from use of punitive disciplinary practices towards a positive and supportive approach to student behaviour. Although around half of state schools in Queensland have received training to implement PBL, as yet no studies into the outcomes of PBL implementation in that state have been conducted. In the October, 2019 edition of Interchange an article by Paul and Cindy-lou Bleakley claimed to demonstrate a link between the widespread adoption of PBL and increasing rates of suspensions in Queensland state schools. In our article, we refute this claim and respond to several errors and misconceptions in the paper by Bleakley and Bleakley. First, we counter the claim that PBL takes a punitive approach to student behaviour and point out the ways in which PBL has been misconstrued. Next, we discuss flaws in the methodology used to assert a causal relationship between increasing rates of suspension and the introduction of PBL. To conclude, we reject the assertion that PBL replaced restorative justice as the preferred model of behaviour support in Queensland and argue that a restorative justice approach is not incompatible with implementation of PBL [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: There were approximately 34,000 prisoners incarcerated in Australian correctional centres as of 2014. The most common offence type for these prisoners was 'acts intended to cause injury', comprising 18 % of the total offences. Of the various risk factors for violent offending and incarceration identified in international research, trauma - either single events or ongoing; and substance abuse - which is commonly associated with violent behaviour across many cultures, are major contributors. Method: This paper analyses qualitative data from 11 in-depth interviews with inmates from a high security male correctional centre in QLD, Australia. The aim of the study was to explore risk factors for violence and incarceration for men from far north Queensland. Results: A common trajectory to violent offending and incarceration was identified for these prisoners, including: childhood/adolescent trauma; a lack of support or treatment for trauma experiences; substance abuse to mask the pain; and a 'brain snap' precipitating a violent offence. Conclusion: Further research is required into factors leading to violent offending and incarceration generally. In particular early detection and intervention for trauma victims is imperative in order to reduce exposure to such a harmful trajectory from trauma to incarceration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides new insights into the food security performance of long and short food chains, through an analysis of the resilience of such chains during the severe weather events that occurred in the Australian State of Queensland in early 2011. Widespread flooding cut roads and highways, isolated towns, and resulted in the deaths of people and animals. Farmlands were inundated and there were food shortages in many towns. We found clear evidence that the supermarket-based (long) food chain delivery system experienced significant difficulties in supplying food to flood-affected towns. In contrast, more localized (short) food supply chains-which relied upon supply from growers in peri-urban areas and community-based food initiatives-remained largely intact, and provided food at a time when the supermarkets were limited in their ability to respond to consumer demand. However, on closer examination of food distribution during flooding in the regional city of Rockhampton and in the State capital, Brisbane, the demarcation of success between 'long' and 'short' food chains became blurred. Both types of food supply chains shared some key resilience characteristics in responding to crisis but diverged in other important ways. We argue that conceptualizing food chains in terms of key elements of resilience-scale, diversity, flexibility and cohesion-may be more fruitful than the short-long dichotomy alone. This approach is particularly useful when prioritizing food security as the basis for evaluating food system sustainability in a context of predicted increases in extreme weather events and future climate change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes the development of a methodology that can be used for determining the spatial and temporal distribution of additional water volumes required to meet a defined groundwater target, such as an historical peizometric surface. The methodology is demonstrated on a case study concerned with mitigating declining groundwater levels in an alluvial aquifer intensively used for agriculture in the Lockyer Valley, Queensland, Australia. The proposed mitigation measure is the importing of large volumes of purified recycled water (PRW) from a large scale indirect potable reuse scheme into the aquifer system. The developed methodology employs both a groundwater flow model together with linear uncertainty analysis. Therefore for the case study, a distributed parameter numerical groundwater flow model was developed for the Lockyer valley alluvial aquifer system using MODFLOW, calibrated to observed groundwater levels, and further constrained by estimates of diffuse and river recharge from water balance studies. The model was used to simulate groundwater levels in the aquifer over a 20-year period. Optimal spatial and temporal distribution of volumes of imported water required to mitigate declining groundwater levels over that period were then estimated, using a modified version of the MODFLOW General Head Boundary (GHB) package. Uncertainty in the predicted import volumes was estimated using linear bayesian analysis principles. The relative worth of data from each observation bore within the groundwater monitoring network was also assessed in terms of the extent to which predictions of import water volumes were made more reliable when furnished with that data. Application of the methodology to the Lockyer alluvial aquifer system illustrated the suitability of the developed methodology for estimating the additional water volumes required for managed aquifer recharge or groundwater substitution schemes in similarly over-exploited aquifers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A recent paper inferred that all seagrass in Cairns Harbour, tropical north-eastern Australia, had undergone 'complete and catastrophic loss' as a result of tropical cyclone Yasi in 2011. While we agree with the concern expressed, we would like to correct the suggestion that the declines were the result of a single climatic event and that all seagrass in Cairns Harbour were lost. Recent survey data and trend analysis from an on-ground monitoring program show that seagrasses in Cairns Harbour do remain, albeit at low levels, and the decline in seagrasses occurred over several years with cyclone Yasi having little additional impact. We have conducted annual on-ground surveys of seagrass distribution and the above-ground meadow biomass in Cairns Harbour and Trinity Inlet since 2001. This has shown a declining trend in biomass since a peak in 2004 and in area since it peaked in 2007. In 2012, seagrass area and above-ground biomass were significantly below the long-term (12 year) average but seagrass was still present. Declines were associated with regional impacts on coastal seagrasses from multiple years of above-average rainfall and severe storm and cyclone activity, similar to other nearby seagrass areas, and not as a result of a single event. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

From October 2014 to February 2019, local authorities in Townsville, North Queensland, Australia continually introduced Wolbachia-infected mosquitoes to control seasonal outbreaks of dengue infection. In this study, we develop a mathematical modelling framework to estimate the effectiveness of this intervention as well as the relative dengue transmission rates of Wolbachia-infected and wild-type mosquitoes. We find that the transmission rate of Wolbachia-infected mosquitoes is reduced approximately by a factor of 20 relative to the uninfected wild-type population. In addition, the Townsville Wolbachia release program led to a 65% reduction in predicted dengue incidence during the release period and over 95% reduction in the 24 months that followed. Finally, to investigate the potential impact of other Wolbachia release programs, we use our estimates of relative transmissibility to calculate the relationship between the reproductive number of dengue and the proportion of Wolbachia-infected mosquitoes in the vector population. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]