Saving Grevillea Caleyi This Monday At Ingleside
Nature In Cities: Can Urban Planners Enhance Human Well-Being Using Biodiversity?
Floating Landcare In The Pittwater/Hawkesbury Area
Aussie Backyard Bird Count 2016
SUNDAY MORNING BIRDWATCHING with PNHA
Would you like to know more about our local birds and explore our bushland reserves? Then join us on one of our bird walks:
Our last walk of the year is at 7.30am on Sunday 27 November at Warriewood Wetlands. The summer migratory species will have arrived and the Wetlands will be home to nesting birds and birds with young. there should be plenty to see.Meet at Katoa Close, North Narrabeen.
Most walks last a couple of hours. Bring binoculars and morning tea for afterwards if you like. Contact pnhabirdwatching@gmail.com for details of each walk.
SUNDAY MORNING BIRDWATCHING with PNHA
Would you like to know more about our local birds and explore our bushland reserves? Then join us on one of our bird walks:
Our last walk of the year is at 7.30am on Sunday 27 November at Warriewood Wetlands. The summer migratory species will have arrived and the Wetlands will be home to nesting birds and birds with young. there should be plenty to see.Meet at Katoa Close, North Narrabeen.
Most walks last a couple of hours. Bring binoculars and morning tea for afterwards if you like. Contact pnhabirdwatching@gmail.com for details of each walk.
Colourful New Australian Tree Frog Leaps Into The Spotlight
30 September, 2016 AUSTRALIAN MUSEUM/UNSW
Cape York Graceful Treefrog (Litoria bella) Photo: Jodi Rowley ©
A new species of green treefrog – with distinctive orange hands, orange feet and iridescent purple inner thighs – has been discovered in northern Cape York Peninsula.
Named Litoria bella, or the Cape York Graceful Treefrog, the striking animal was identified by a team including Dr Jodi Rowley, Curator of Amphibian and Reptile Conservation Biology at the Australian Museum Research Institute and UNSW.
The small frog had previously escaped scientific scrutiny because it had been mistaken for a southern relative called the Graceful Treefrog, which is commonly heard calling after rain in Spring and Summer along the east coast of Queensland and north eastern NSW.
This species was thought to occur as far north as the top of Cape York Peninsula. However, the researchers became suspicious that more than one species was involved, due to the subtle differences between the Cape York frogs and their southern counterparts.
They decided to investigate and compared the appearances, calls and DNA of the two groups. Their study concluding that the frogs on northern Cape York Peninsula are a distinct species is published in the journal Zootaxa.
The known range of the Cape York Graceful Treefrog stretches from Moa Island in the Torres Strait, in the north, to about 20 km south of Coen on Cape York Peninsula, in the south.
The northern-most record of a Graceful Treefrog is 220 kilometres further south, in the Endeavour Valley near Cooktown.
Identification of the new species brings the total number of known frog species in Australia to 239.
“We were also surprised to discover that the new species is more closely related to similar frogs in New Guinea than to its southern relative,” says Dr Rowley, of the Centre for Ecosystem Science in the UNSW School of Biological, Earth and Environmental Sciences.
“The discovery of this little green gem of the frog world is further evidence that we have a long way to go to fully document and understand the amazing biodiversity of northern Australia.”
The team includes Keith McDonald, an Honorary Associate at Queensland Museum; Stephen Richards of the Herpetology Department at the South Australian Museum; and Greta Frankham, Manager of the Australian Centre for Wildlife Genomics in the Australian Museum Research Institute.
30 September, 2016 AUSTRALIAN MUSEUM/UNSW
Cape York Graceful Treefrog (Litoria bella) Photo: Jodi Rowley ©
A new species of green treefrog – with distinctive orange hands, orange feet and iridescent purple inner thighs – has been discovered in northern Cape York Peninsula.
Named Litoria bella, or the Cape York Graceful Treefrog, the striking animal was identified by a team including Dr Jodi Rowley, Curator of Amphibian and Reptile Conservation Biology at the Australian Museum Research Institute and UNSW.
The small frog had previously escaped scientific scrutiny because it had been mistaken for a southern relative called the Graceful Treefrog, which is commonly heard calling after rain in Spring and Summer along the east coast of Queensland and north eastern NSW.
This species was thought to occur as far north as the top of Cape York Peninsula. However, the researchers became suspicious that more than one species was involved, due to the subtle differences between the Cape York frogs and their southern counterparts.
They decided to investigate and compared the appearances, calls and DNA of the two groups. Their study concluding that the frogs on northern Cape York Peninsula are a distinct species is published in the journal Zootaxa.
The known range of the Cape York Graceful Treefrog stretches from Moa Island in the Torres Strait, in the north, to about 20 km south of Coen on Cape York Peninsula, in the south.
The northern-most record of a Graceful Treefrog is 220 kilometres further south, in the Endeavour Valley near Cooktown.
Identification of the new species brings the total number of known frog species in Australia to 239.
“We were also surprised to discover that the new species is more closely related to similar frogs in New Guinea than to its southern relative,” says Dr Rowley, of the Centre for Ecosystem Science in the UNSW School of Biological, Earth and Environmental Sciences.
“The discovery of this little green gem of the frog world is further evidence that we have a long way to go to fully document and understand the amazing biodiversity of northern Australia.”
The team includes Keith McDonald, an Honorary Associate at Queensland Museum; Stephen Richards of the Herpetology Department at the South Australian Museum; and Greta Frankham, Manager of the Australian Centre for Wildlife Genomics in the Australian Museum Research Institute.
Nature Conservancy Writing Prize 2017
Have Your Say On The Rocky Hill Coal Project Application
Some Birds Behave Like Human Musicians
October 6, 2016
The pied butcherbird. Credit: Image courtesy of New Jersey Institute of Technology
The tuneful behavior of some songbirds parallels that of human musicians. That's the conclusion presented in a recent paper published by an international team of researchers, among them David Rothenberg, distinguished professor of philosophy and music in NJIT's Department of Humanities. Other members of the team are from the City University of New York (CUNY), the Freie Universität Berlin and Macquarie University in Australia.
"Temporal regularity increases with repertoire complexity in the Australian pied butcherbird's song" was published online in Royal Society Open Science.
A Very Musical SpeciesThe pied butcherbird, a very musical species, provided a wealth of intriguing data for analysis by co-author Eathan Janney, a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Psychology at CUNY's Hunter College. Janney based his analysis upon years of data collected and also analyzed by violinist and biomusicologist Hollis Taylor of Macquarie University, who has previously published extremely detailed analyses of butcherbird songs. "Since pied butcherbird songs share so many commonalities with human music," Taylor writes, "this species could possibly revolutionize the way we think about the core values of music."
In the past, claims that musical principles are integral to birdsong were largely met with skepticism and dismissed as wishful thinking. However, the extensive statistical and objective analysis of the new paper demonstrates that the more complex a bird's repertoire, the better he or she is at singing in time, rhythmically interacting with other birds much more skillfully than those who know fewer songs. The accompanying video includes a sample of a butcherbird's solo song, as well as the song of another butcherbird and an Australian magpie.
Co-author Ofer Tchernichovski, professor in the Hunter College Department of Psychology, finds that the butcherbirds "balance their performance to keep it in a sweet spot between boredom and confusion." Constance Scharff, a co-author who directs the animal behavior laboratory at the Freie Universität Berlin, says "pied butcherbirds, not unlike jazz musicians, play around with their tunes, balancing repetition and variation." This finding suggests that such musical virtuosity may signify more than just the evolution of a way for birds to establish territorial dominance and facilitate mating. It may also provide evidence that musical ability in birds was a precursor to the evolution of the many dimensions of musical ability in humans.
Inclusive Multidisciplinary ResearchThe paper is the product of inclusive multidisciplinary research. It integrates input from biologists, neuroscientists, musicians and engineers, including co-author Lucas C. Parra, a member of CUNY's Department of Biomedical Engineering.
Rothenberg, who provided his unique perspective, says, "Science and music may have different criteria for truth, but sometimes their insights need to be put together to make sense of the beautiful performances we find in nature."
Rothenberg has written extensively about the bond between humans and our surrounding natural world, a world we share with myriad other creatures. An earlier paper that he co-authored, "Investigation of Musicality in Birdsong," published in Hearing Research touched upon aspects of the same topic explored in the recent Royal Society publication. Rothenberg's book Why Birds Sing is an in-depth look at the subject that challenges neuroscientists to seriously consider music as a tool to help understand birdsong.
As a musician -- he plays the clarinet and saxophone -- Rothenberg has added the dimension of music to research connecting the living sounds of the natural world to traditions of global rhythmic innovation and improvisation. His book Thousand Mile Song is about making music with whales, and Bug Music, How Insects Gave Us Rhythm and Noise offers the provocative premise that listening to cicadas, as well as other humming, clicking and thrumming insects, fostered an innate sense of musical rhythm and synchronization over the long history of human evolution.Eathan Janney, Hollis Taylor, Constance Scharff, David Rothenberg, Lucas C. Parra, Ofer Tchernichovski. Temporal regularity increases with repertoire complexity in the Australian pied butcherbird's song. Royal Society Open Science, 2016; 3 (9): 160357 DOI: 10.1098/rsos.160357
October 6, 2016
The pied butcherbird. Credit: Image courtesy of New Jersey Institute of Technology
The tuneful behavior of some songbirds parallels that of human musicians. That's the conclusion presented in a recent paper published by an international team of researchers, among them David Rothenberg, distinguished professor of philosophy and music in NJIT's Department of Humanities. Other members of the team are from the City University of New York (CUNY), the Freie Universität Berlin and Macquarie University in Australia.
"Temporal regularity increases with repertoire complexity in the Australian pied butcherbird's song" was published online in Royal Society Open Science.
A Very Musical Species
The pied butcherbird, a very musical species, provided a wealth of intriguing data for analysis by co-author Eathan Janney, a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Psychology at CUNY's Hunter College. Janney based his analysis upon years of data collected and also analyzed by violinist and biomusicologist Hollis Taylor of Macquarie University, who has previously published extremely detailed analyses of butcherbird songs. "Since pied butcherbird songs share so many commonalities with human music," Taylor writes, "this species could possibly revolutionize the way we think about the core values of music."
In the past, claims that musical principles are integral to birdsong were largely met with skepticism and dismissed as wishful thinking. However, the extensive statistical and objective analysis of the new paper demonstrates that the more complex a bird's repertoire, the better he or she is at singing in time, rhythmically interacting with other birds much more skillfully than those who know fewer songs. The accompanying video includes a sample of a butcherbird's solo song, as well as the song of another butcherbird and an Australian magpie.
Co-author Ofer Tchernichovski, professor in the Hunter College Department of Psychology, finds that the butcherbirds "balance their performance to keep it in a sweet spot between boredom and confusion." Constance Scharff, a co-author who directs the animal behavior laboratory at the Freie Universität Berlin, says "pied butcherbirds, not unlike jazz musicians, play around with their tunes, balancing repetition and variation." This finding suggests that such musical virtuosity may signify more than just the evolution of a way for birds to establish territorial dominance and facilitate mating. It may also provide evidence that musical ability in birds was a precursor to the evolution of the many dimensions of musical ability in humans.
Inclusive Multidisciplinary Research
The paper is the product of inclusive multidisciplinary research. It integrates input from biologists, neuroscientists, musicians and engineers, including co-author Lucas C. Parra, a member of CUNY's Department of Biomedical Engineering.
Rothenberg, who provided his unique perspective, says, "Science and music may have different criteria for truth, but sometimes their insights need to be put together to make sense of the beautiful performances we find in nature."
Rothenberg has written extensively about the bond between humans and our surrounding natural world, a world we share with myriad other creatures. An earlier paper that he co-authored, "Investigation of Musicality in Birdsong," published in Hearing Research touched upon aspects of the same topic explored in the recent Royal Society publication. Rothenberg's book Why Birds Sing is an in-depth look at the subject that challenges neuroscientists to seriously consider music as a tool to help understand birdsong.
As a musician -- he plays the clarinet and saxophone -- Rothenberg has added the dimension of music to research connecting the living sounds of the natural world to traditions of global rhythmic innovation and improvisation. His book Thousand Mile Song is about making music with whales, and Bug Music, How Insects Gave Us Rhythm and Noise offers the provocative premise that listening to cicadas, as well as other humming, clicking and thrumming insects, fostered an innate sense of musical rhythm and synchronization over the long history of human evolution.
Eathan Janney, Hollis Taylor, Constance Scharff, David Rothenberg, Lucas C. Parra, Ofer Tchernichovski. Temporal regularity increases with repertoire complexity in the Australian pied butcherbird's song. Royal Society Open Science, 2016; 3 (9): 160357 DOI: 10.1098/rsos.160357
Closing Submissions Acland Mine Case: Water, Air Quality And Farming At Risk
University Of Sydney Robotics Centre To Revolutionise Australian Horticulture
Wilderness Horse Riding
Katandra Sanctuary
Katandra is a sanctuary for flora and fauna where the wildflowers are their most colourful during spring but all year round there are opportunities for bird watching. The sanctuary covers 12 hectares and is situated on the Ingleside/Warriewood escarpment. Choose to follow a short walk of about 1km or the longer 2km track through rainforest remnants with creeks and fern-fringed pools. Visit: www.katandra.org
Katandra is a sanctuary for flora and fauna where the wildflowers are their most colourful during spring but all year round there are opportunities for bird watching. The sanctuary covers 12 hectares and is situated on the Ingleside/Warriewood escarpment. Choose to follow a short walk of about 1km or the longer 2km track through rainforest remnants with creeks and fern-fringed pools. Visit: www.katandra.org
Long Reef Guided Walks
Call For Heritage Council To Protect The Iconic Tarwyn Park Property
Come To The Harvest Festival On Liverpool Plains
NSW Government Seeks To Reclaim The Liverpool Plains
Breathe This In - Taste It!
Have Your Say On Increased Coal Production At The Mandalong Southern Extension Project
Have Your Say On Modifications To The Bengalla Continuation Project
Have Your Say On The Springvale Mine Water Treatment Project
Have Your Say Invincible Coal Mine - Southern Extension Modification
Upper Namoi Valley FMP
Community Housing Providers To Manage Social Housing
6th October, 2016: NSW Government Dept. of Family & Community Services
Delivering better outcomes for tenants and the community is the focus of reform which will see social housing in four areas of NSW managed by Community Housing Providers (CHPs).
Minister for Social Housing Brad Hazzard said Family and Community Services (FACS) would transfer, on a long leasehold basis, management of approximately 18,000 properties to the community sector to ensure a better experience for tenants in social housing.
The NSW Government is committed to increase community housing’s management of social housing under its Future Directions reforms of social housing. Today’s reforms deliver on a 2009 COAG agreement by NSW to transfer up to 35 per cent of social housing to community housing providers. Currently 19 per cent of social housing in NSW is managed by CHPs.
Minister for Social Housing Brad Hazzard said the reform aims to improve services for tenants and ensure more money comes in, to provide supports for social housing tenants.
“Already more than 28,000 social housing homes are managed by community housing and tenants report very high satisfaction with the level of services offered by community providers,” Mr Hazzard said.
“Community housing has shown it is innovative and can help vulnerable tenants to achieve positive outcomes such as securing employment and education.
“Tenants’ lease length and lease conditions will remain the same, their income after rent will remain the same and FACS will keep tenants fully informed as their areas transition to community housing providers.
“It’s also estimated an extra $1 billion will come in over the next 20 years as the Commonwealth supports tenants with rent assistance, which will allow community providers to give more supports to vulnerable people.
“Currently tenants in state government managed housing get no additional funds from the Commonwealth.”
Legislation will be introduced to achieve better outcomes for tenants.
There are 82 CHPs in NSW and they will be able to bid to manage portfolios of properties in four areas across the State in: the Shoalhaven, Northern Sydney, Mid North Coast and Hunter New England (excluding Newcastle and Lake Macquarie LGAs). The procurement process is expected to commence in early 2017.
The Aboriginal Housing Office will undertake a separate procurement process to select Aboriginal community housing providers in these locations to manage Aboriginal Housing Office owned properties.
As areas transfer to the community housing providers, approximately 190 Government housing jobs will go. FACS is consulting with the Public Service Association and staff will be given the opportunity to take up jobs in the expanded community housing sector.
“This is a landmark opportunity for not-for-profit community housing providers to grow and diversify and help more people in need,” Mr Hazzard said.
International Prize For Quantum Computing Leader
October 4, 2016 By Deborah Smith - UNSW
Scientia Professor Michelle Simmons. Image: Britta Campion/News Corp
For her pioneering research in quantum physics, UNSW Scientia Professor Michelle Simmons has been honoured with a €100,000 international L’Oréal-UNESCO For Women in Science Award.
Professor Simmons, Director of the ARC Centre of Excellence for Quantum Computation and Communication Technology, CQC2T, is one of five eminent female researchers from around the world named overnight as 2017 L’Oréal-UNESCO laureates in the Physical Sciences.
She is the winner of the Asia-Pacific region, “for her pioneering contributions to quantum and atomic electronics, constructing atomic transistors en route to quantum computers”.
The five women, representing Africa and the Arab States, Asia-Pacific, Europe, Latin America, and North America, will receive their awards and prize money worth $146,000 at a ceremony to be held in Paris in March next year.
Professor Simmons’ team is the only one in the world that can make atomically precise devices in silicon. They have produced the world’s first single-atom transistor as well as the narrowest conducting wires ever made in silicon, just four atoms of phosphorus wide and one atom high.
“Trying to control nature at its very smallest scale is such an exciting and rewarding field to be in,” says Professor Simmons, of the UNSW School of Physics.
“This has been my passion for many years and has such tremendous potential. I am honoured by this recognition and hope it inspires others.”
As director of CQC2T, she heads a team of more than 180 researchers across six Australian universities, including UNSW. Centre scientists and engineers are leading the international race to build the world’s first quantum computer in silicon, and hope to produce a 10-qubit circuit within five years.
The federal government has contributed $25 million over five years towards a consortium to develop and commercialise this ground-breaking quantum computing research through its National Innovation and Science Agenda. The grant complements $25 million from UNSW and $10 million each from the Commonwealth Bank of Australia and Telstra.
In September, the Australian Research Council also extended funding to CQC2T as a Centre of Excellence for the next seven years, with a grant of $34 million from the federal government and $103 million in cash and in-kind support from participating organisations.
Professor Simmons has previously been awarded two Australian Research Council Federation Fellowships and currently holds a Laureate Fellowship.
She has won both the Australian Academy of Science’s Pawsey Medal (2005) and Thomas Ranken Lyle Medal (2015) for outstanding research in physics. She was named NSW Scientist of the Year in 2012, and in 2015 she was awarded the Eureka Prize for Leadership in Science.
Earlier this year she was awarded a prestigious international Foresight Institute Feynman Prize in Nanotechnology, named in honour of the late Nobel Prize winning American physicist Richard Feynman.
In 2014, she had the rare distinction for an Australian researcher of becoming an elected member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. She is also Editor-in-Chief of the first Nature Partner Journal based in Australia, npj Quantum Information.
Through its For Women in Science program, the L’Oréal Foundation, in partnership with the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organisation, UNESCO, supports women researchers and rewards excellence in scientific fields where women remain under-represented.
The program also helps motivate girls in high school to pursue scientific careers.
On 27 October, UNSW Science will host a Girls in Science Forum where more than 180 school students will hear from the three Australian winners of the $25,000 L’Oréal-UNESCO For Women in Science Fellowships.
The school students will also tour science laboratories and carry out a variety of hands-on experiments.
The five 2017 L’Oréal-UNESCO international laureates were selected from international nominees by an independent international jury of 12 prominent scientists presided over by Professor Christian Amatore, a member of the French Academy of Sciences.
Read more about Professor Simmons' work in Research@ UNSW in 15 women changing our world.
Strength Of Earth's Outer Shell Can Be Measured, Weak Spots Pinpointed
A composite image of a topographical map covers portions of Nevada and Utah and the corresponding magnetotelluric image reveals where magma upwelling and weak spots in the crust correlate to topographical features on the surface. Credit: Image by Lijun Liu
October 3, 2016
An advanced imaging technique used to map Earth's outer shell also can provide a measure of strength, finding weak spots and magma upwellings that could point to volcanic or earthquake activity, according to a new study by geologists at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and the University of Adelaide in Australia.
The researchers developed a method for measuring strength and finding weak spots in the lithosphere, the outer layers of earth that include the crust and the outer mantle -- the molten rock lurking just under the surface that can well up and create volcanoes. The researchers found that calculating lithosphere strength using magnetotelluric imaging maps of the southwestern United States can more accurately describe the rough terrain and volcanic and seismic activity observed on the surface than can standard geologic models.
The study by U. of I. geology professor Lijun Liu and Adelaide professor Derrick Hasterok is reported in the journal Science.
"According to plate tectonics, the standard theory of earth science, the lithosphere is supposed to be rigid. But we know that is not the case," Liu said. "We know that a lot of places like the western U.S. have frequent fault-slip earthquakes and very rough surface topography, and are tectonically active. In this paper, we propose a new way to describe the mechanical properties of Earth's lithosphere."
Magnetotelluric imaging is a high-resolution mapping technique that the National Science Foundation has used to scan the lithosphere beneath much of the U.S. It provides information about the electrical conductivity of the lithosphere, which Liu and Hasterok were able to use to calculate strength and its variations from place to place.
"The same factors that affect electrical conductivity -- temperature, water content and the presence of molten material -- also affect the viscosity or strength. The hotter, wetter or more molten, the weaker the structure," Liu said.
The detailed models produced using the MT imaging data of the southwestern U.S. more accurately portrayed surface structures at a scale of less than 100 kilometers, Liu said, which is important because features like volcanoes and faults are localized phenomena that are harder to predict using larger-scale models. The models depicted upwellings in the mantle and peaks in the topography that correlated to features in the terrain and active volcanoes.
The researchers believe that analyzing lithosphere strength using MT images now being collected around the world can open new avenues of understanding the dynamic mechanisms of the Earth and its seismic activity.
"This method will aid our understanding of the processes that cause earthquakes and volcanic activity," Hasterok said. "We'll be able to see why earthquakes and volcanoes have occurred in the past and look for places where they might potentially happen in the future."
L. Liu, D. Hasterok. High-resolution lithosphere viscosity and dynamics revealed by magnetotelluric imaging. Science, 2016; 353 (6307): 1515 DOI: 10.1126/science.aaf6542
Have Your Say On A Mixed Use Development At Barangaroo South
29.09.2016: Departmental Media Release - Department of Planning and Environment
Three separate proposals by Lend Lease Pty Ltd for residential buildings at 51A Hickson Road, Barangaroo will be on exhibition from today for community consultation.
The Department of Planning and Environment is keen to hear the community’s views on the proposals, which seek to construct three residential buildings of 72, 60 and 29 storeys.
These will provide 775 new apartments, of which 39 apartments will be for key worker housing in the 29 storey building.
Each of the buildings will provide retail space and will include underground car spaces, storage and rubbish facilities.
A spokesperson for the Department of Planning and Environment said the local community always has an opportunity to share their views.
“Community consultation is an integral part of the planning process and the applicant will have to respond to the feedback we receive,” the spokesperson said.
“This feedback is taken into consideration as part of the assessment.
“It’s easy to participate by going online and we encourage everyone to take a look and have their say.”
To make a submission or view the Environmental Impact Statement (EIS), visit www.majorprojects.planning.nsw.gov.au.
Barangaroo South
Residential Building R4A EIS Exhibition
Barangaroo South
Residential Building R4B EIS Exhibition
Barangaroo South
Submissions can be made from Thursday 29 September until Monday 14 November 2016.
Written submissions can also be made to:
Department of Planning and Environment
Attn: Director – Key Sites Assessments
GPO Box 39
Sydney NSW 2001
The application and EIS are also available to view in person at:
Department of Planning and Environment:
Information Centre, 23-33 Bridge Street, Sydney, until 30 September 2016
Information Centre, 320 Pitt Street, Sydney, from 4 October 2016
City of Sydney Council: Town Hall House, Level 2, 456 Kent Street, Sydney.
Monash Research Discovery Aids Fight To Reduce Post-Stroke Infection Deaths
04 October 2016: MU stroke research
Dr Connie Wong, Monash School of Clinical Sciences
Monash University research has found that gut bacteria are the culprit in deadly post-stroke infections such as pneumonia, heralding a new approach to stroke patient management.
Stroke is one of Australia’s biggest killers affecting one in six people, with the condition killing more women than breast cancer and more men than prostate cancer. In addition to brain injury, bacterial pneumonia infections are common in stroke patients, often leading to death.
Monash research has found gut bacteria are the major cause of post-stroke infections, with bacteria able to take advantage of a stroke patient’s weakened immune system to travel through the body causing infection.
Published in the prestigious Nature Medicine journal, the research was led by Dr Connie Wong from the Centre for Inflammatory Diseases, School of Clinical Sciences at Monash Health.
Dr Wong said the research explained why current treatments in fighting post-stroke infections were ineffective and provided stroke doctors with evidence that antibiotics were unhelpful.
“We’ve known for a long time that stroke patients are highly susceptible to infections but we didn’t really understand why,” Dr Wong said.
“Our research has shown for the first time that stroke compromises the immune system, enabling bacteria to take an opportunistic journey from the gut into other organs, including the lungs.
“We’ve shown that stroke injury can cause cellular changes which lead to barrier dysfunctions in the gut. This allows gut bacteria to spread throughout the body.
“This is a huge concern when the gut bacteria are antibiotic-resistant, and especially when they get into other organs such as the lungs, which can lead to pneumonia and other dangerous infections,” Dr Wong said.
Head of Stroke at Monash Health, Associate Professor Henry Ma, said the research had the potential to change clinical practice in managing stroke patients.
“We know that patients are susceptible to infection after a stroke, but this particular pathway for infection is not something we’d seen before. We often prescribe antibiotics for patients after a stroke but sometimes this is not effective at preventing or treating infection.”
Dr Wong said our hugely diverse gut bacteria outnumbered our own cells ten-to-one, and had 100 times more genes than the human genome and contained many pathogens.
“Usually our immune system keeps these gut bacteria under control. However a shock to the system, such as in a stroke, can compromise immunity, enabling bacteria to travel from the gut into organs including the lungs, liver and spleen,” Dr Wong said.
This discovery may change the management of stroke patients, reducing the use of unnecessary and ineffective antibiotics.
This pivotal research has been supported by the Australian Research Council (ARC), National Heart Foundation and the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC).
Breast Density Matters In Detection Of Breast Cancer
Associate Professor Wendy Ingman looking at the white and bright regions on a mammogram. Breast density is shown as white and bright regions -- but so too are potential tumors. Credit: The Hospital Research Foundation
October 4, 2016: University of Adelaide
Almost 8% of women have extremely high breast density, which can make it harder for health professionals to detect breast cancer on a screening mammogram. These women are also more likely to develop breast cancer in the future.
This is the warning from a new Australian alliance of breast cancer researchers, who are working together to raise awareness of the issue in the hopes of improving cancer diagnosis and health outcomes for women.
The group, called INFORMD (INformation FORum on MammographicDensity), comprises leading Australian breast cancer researchers from the Universities of Adelaide, Melbourne, Western Australia, Queensland University of Technology and the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre in Victoria.
"We've grown concerned that Australian women are not aware of the significance of breast density in the diagnosis and prevention of breast cancer," says INFORMD spokesperson and THRF Breast Cancer Research Fellow, Associate Professor Wendy Ingman from the University of Adelaide's Robinson Research Institute, and Lead Researcher, Breast Biology and Cancer Unit, Basil Hetzel Institute for Translational Health Research.
Dense breasts have less fatty tissue and more non-fatty tissue, such as more glands that make and drain milk, compared to breasts that aren't dense.
Almost 8% of women aged between 40-74 years have extremely dense breasts. It is estimated that women with extremely high breast density have a four-to-six-fold increased risk of breast cancer compared to women with very low density.
"Breast cancer is more likely to develop in women with dense breast tissue, but not many women know if they have dense breast tissue. We believe it's important to inform women about breast density so they can make the right choices for their health," Associate Professor Ingman says.
On a mammogram, breast density is shown as white and bright regions. But unfortunately, potential tumors are also shown as white and bright on a mammogram.
"With the technology currently available, it is harder to see tumors in breasts with denser tissue on a mammogram. The danger is that these women are at risk of having tumors missed at the time of screening," Associate Professor Ingman says.
As yet, no single method or tool for measuring breast density has been agreed upon within the medical and medical technology communities. However, the researchers say breast density cannot be assessed based simply on how breasts feel during a self-exam or a doctor's physical exam.
Associate Professor Ingman says that although dense breast tissue is a risk factor for breast cancer, not all women with dense breasts will develop breast cancer.
Dr Alessandra Muntoni, Director of Research Investment, National Breast Cancer Foundation, says: "More details on the association of breast density with breast cancer are emerging as researchers learn more about this complex disease. In addition to funding research in this area, it is important to ensure that knowledge is shared with women so they can make more informed decisions in future."
"Our ultimate aim is to save women's lives," says Associate Professor Ingman. "We hope to do this by increasing prevention and early detection of breast cancer, and by increasing the understanding and better utilization of breast cancer screening in Australia, to lower the impact of this disease."
The INFORMD alliance believes that women with dense breasts should in the future be able to make informed decisions about how to manage their breast cancer risk. The researchers have identified these key actions required to achieve this aim:
• Development of evidence-based guidelines for general practitioners (GPs) and other health professionals so they can assist women to make informed decisions. • Implementation of improved methods for quantifying breast density, and improved methods of predicting which women are most likely to develop breast cancer in the future. This is so breast density can be reported to all women attending screening programs, along with evidence-based recommendations for their management.
What can women do now?
• Mammography remains the gold standard for breast cancer screening. In Australia, the researchers encourage women to use the opportunity to have free regular mammograms through BreastScreen services across the nation.
• Women can have their breast density assessed through a mammogram, which can be arranged through their GP.
• Supplementary screening methods, including ultrasound and MRI, are available for women to be used in addition to mammography. However, it is important that women consider the costs, both emotional and financial, and the risk of false positive results associated with these other technologies.
• Be breast aware. All women, regardless of age, can be familiar with their breasts and check them regularly. Any changes should be reported to their doctor.
The INFORMD alliance has established a new website to help keep women up to date on new information about breast density and breast cancer.More information can be found at: INFORMD.org.au
Materials provided by University of Adelaide.
Saturn’s Moon Dione Harbors A Subsurface Ocean
Representation of the interior of Enceladus with icy crust, ocean and solid core. ROB researchers think that Dione may also have a subsurface ocean. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute
October 5, 2016: Royal Observatory of Belgium
A subsurface ocean lies deep within Saturn's moon Dione, according to new data from the Cassini mission to Saturn. Two other moons of Saturn, Titan and Enceladus, are already known to hide global oceans beneath their icy crusts, but a new study suggests an ocean exists on Dione as well.
In this study, researchers of the Royal Observatory of Belgium show gravity data from recent Cassini flybys can be explained if Dione's crust floats on an ocean located 100 kilometers below the surface. The ocean is several tens of kilometers deep and surrounds a large rocky core. Seen from within, Dione is very similar to its smaller but more famous neighbor Enceladus, whose south polar region spurts huge jets of water vapor into space. Dione seems to be quiet now, but its broken surface bears witness of a more tumultuous past. The study is published online this week in Geophysical Research Letters.
The authors modeled the icy shells of Enceladus and Dione as global icebergs immersed in water, where each surface ice peak is supported by a large underwater keel. Scientists have used this approach in the past but previous results have predicted a very thick crust for Enceladus and no ocean at all for Dione. "As an additional principle, we assumed that the icy crust can stand only the minimum amount of tension or compression necessary to maintain surface landforms," said Mikael Beuthe, lead author of the new study. "More stress would break the crust down to pieces."
According to the new study, Enceladus' ocean is much closer to the surface, especially near the south pole where geysers erupt through a few kilometers of crust. These findings agree well with the discovery last year by Cassini that Enceladus undergoes large back-and-forth oscillations, called libration, during its orbit. Enceladus' libration would be much smaller if its crust was thicker. As for Dione, the new study finds it harbors a deep ocean between its crust and core. "Like Enceladus, Dione librates but below the detection level of Cassini,'' said Antony Trinh, co-author of the new study. "A future orbiter hopping around Saturn's moons could test this prediction."
Dione's ocean has probably survived for the whole history of the moon, and thus offers a long-lived habitable zone for microbial life. "The contact between the ocean and the rocky core is crucial," said Attilio Rivoldini, co-author of the study. "Rock-water interactions provide key nutrients and a source of energy, both being essential ingredients for life." The ocean of Dione seems to be too deep for easy access, but Enceladus as well as Jupiter's moon Europa are generous enough to eject water samples in space, ready to be picked up by a passing spacecraft.
The club of "ocean worlds" -- icy moons or planets with subsurface oceans in common parlance -- gains new members with each new mission to the outer solar system. Three ocean worlds orbit Jupiter, three orbit Saturn and Pluto could also belong to the club, according to recent observations of the New Horizons spacecraft. The approach to modeling planetary bodies used in this study is a promising tool to study these worlds if we can measure their shape and gravity field, according to Mikael Beuthe. "Future missions will visit Jupiter's moons, but we should also explore Uranus' and Neptune's systems," he said.
Mikael Beuthe, Attilio Rivoldini, Antony Trinh. Enceladus' and Dione's floating ice shells supported by minimum stress isostasy.Geophysical Research Letters, 2016; DOI: 10.1002/2016GL070650
Honorary Doctorate Awarded To Former PM John Howard
30 September 2016: University of Sydney
Former PM and alumnus of the University, John Howard, receives a Doctor of Letters (honoris causa).
For his leadership on gun law reform, foreign relations and economic policy, former Prime Minister John Howard OM AC accepted an honorary degree from the University of Sydney today.
Chancellor Belinda Hutchinson, former Prime Minister John Howard and Vice-Chancellor and Principal Dr Michael Spence.
“Mr Howard is a great example of an alumnus of the University who has shown outstanding leadership for and on behalf of our nation,” said Chancellor of the University of Sydney, Belinda Hutchinson AM.
“He remained true to his principles over the reform of gun control laws, and today we have a firearms law system that is the envy of the world. His strong economic policy and his diplomatic skill also left a lasting legacy for Australia.”
Honorary degrees are awarded to individuals who have made an outstanding contribution to the wider community or achieved exceptional academic or creative excellence. Mr Howard will receive a Doctor of Letters (honoris causa).
Mr Howard graduated from the University of Sydney with a Bachelor of Laws in 1961.
Early in his first term as Prime Minister and in response to the Port Arthur massacre, Mr Howard introduced a proposal for uniform gun laws throughout Australia, limiting the availability of firearms and incorporating a federally funded buy-back scheme. This decisive action, which was highly unpopular in sections of Prime Minister Howard’s political support base, is now seen throughout the world as one of the most successful examples of a gun-control system.
Over the course of his four terms in office, Mr Howard made a number of important contributions to Australian foreign affairs including his skilful response to the East Timor crisis in 1999, the restoration of relations with Indonesia and the development of a strong trade and pragmatic relationship with China.
The Howard Government established a reputation for strong economic policy, including the reformation of the Australian tax system through the introduction of the Goods and Services Tax, which broadened the country’s tax base.
“I congratulate Mr Howard on his doctorate and the many achievements it commemorates. I am delighted to welcome Mr Howard into the eminent company of the many alumni and community members who have been honoured in this way,” said Dr Michael Spence, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Sydney.
“I am very touched that the University has conferred this special honour on me. I remain most grateful for the education I received at the University,” said Mr Howard.
Chancellor Belinda Hutchinson, former Prime Minister John Howard, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and Vice-Chancellor Dr Michael Spence.
Speaking at an event after the ceremony the Prime Minister, Malcolm Turnbull commented:
“It’s an honour to be asked to pay tribute to a man that I admire so much, and wonderful to be back on the campus of the University that gave us both… such a great springboard into the world. We are always in debt to this University.”
He observed that Mr Howard “was instrumental in bringing back a style and a substance of government that is absolutely crucial to our continued success and prosperity.”
Since the first official honorary degree was awarded by the University in 1952, several former Australian prime ministers have been recognised with the accolade, including Robert Menzies, Gough Whitlam, Stanley Bruce and William Hughes.
