The Australian naturalistic driving study: innovation in road safety research and policy. A revolutionary new approach, the naturalistic driving study, will investigate what people actually do when they drive, in normal and safety-critical situations. It will provide Australia with answers to some intractable, high priority, road safety problems that cannot be answered using current methods, thereby saving hundreds of lives.
Linkage Infrastructure, Equipment And Facilities - Grant ID: LE130100050
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$570,000.00
Summary
Integrated facility for recording driver and road user behaviour. The integrated facility will be used to record and analyse data on driver and road user behaviour, in normal and safety-critical situations, for thousands of Australian drivers. The data yielded will be used to develop new and improved countermeasures for reducing road deaths and serious injuries on Australian roads.
How climate-resilient are our temperate fisheries species? This project assesses the resilience of our temperate fisheries species to climate change. Using natural warming hotspots and volcanic CO2 vents we study populations of fisheries species that are already pre-adapted to future climate, and therefore could act as key populations for replenishment of future fisheries stocks. An innovative and interdisciplinary approach combines the ecology, genetics, behaviour, and physiology of fisheries s ....How climate-resilient are our temperate fisheries species? This project assesses the resilience of our temperate fisheries species to climate change. Using natural warming hotspots and volcanic CO2 vents we study populations of fisheries species that are already pre-adapted to future climate, and therefore could act as key populations for replenishment of future fisheries stocks. An innovative and interdisciplinary approach combines the ecology, genetics, behaviour, and physiology of fisheries species to evaluate their climate resilience. An advanced food web model will be developed to forecast changes to fisheries production in a future world. This provides a much-improved forecast of climate adaptation and managing future biodiversity and fisheries species through resilient genes and populations.Read moreRead less
A process model of visual working memory. This project aims to develop a process model of encoding of items into memory. Working memory is central to almost all cognitive functions, but little is known about short-term memory for visual information. Progress in this area is slow because of a focus on models that do not specify the processes underlying memory, and no model explains the processes that would limit the number of items the memory can hold to four. A process model is expected to addre ....A process model of visual working memory. This project aims to develop a process model of encoding of items into memory. Working memory is central to almost all cognitive functions, but little is known about short-term memory for visual information. Progress in this area is slow because of a focus on models that do not specify the processes underlying memory, and no model explains the processes that would limit the number of items the memory can hold to four. A process model is expected to address fundamental issues in visual working memory.Read moreRead less
Australian tropical rainforests in the face of climate change. This project aims to investigate the roles of increasing atmospheric water stress and rising carbon dioxide in driving changes in tree performance and species composition in Australian tropical rainforests. Forest census plots indicate increasing tree mortality, but the mechanisms through which this is occurring are unknown. Experiments will be conducted to unravel the underlying physiological processes. Community-level behavior will ....Australian tropical rainforests in the face of climate change. This project aims to investigate the roles of increasing atmospheric water stress and rising carbon dioxide in driving changes in tree performance and species composition in Australian tropical rainforests. Forest census plots indicate increasing tree mortality, but the mechanisms through which this is occurring are unknown. Experiments will be conducted to unravel the underlying physiological processes. Community-level behavior will be investigated with flux tower and remotely sensed data. The project expects to generate new knowledge of how Australian tropical rainforests are responding to climate change. The expected outcome is an enhanced capacity to understand and manage a highly valued component of the Australian forest estate.Read moreRead less
Single and dual process models of recognition memory: Reconciliation of behavioural, electrophysiological, and neuroimaging data. Advanced brain scanning technologies are increasingly used to study human memory. As well as being important for our basic understanding of memory, they also tell us how memory is affected by normal development, ageing, disease, and injury. Unfortunately, because these technologies are so new, a gap has opened up between our psychological understanding of memory and t ....Single and dual process models of recognition memory: Reconciliation of behavioural, electrophysiological, and neuroimaging data. Advanced brain scanning technologies are increasingly used to study human memory. As well as being important for our basic understanding of memory, they also tell us how memory is affected by normal development, ageing, disease, and injury. Unfortunately, because these technologies are so new, a gap has opened up between our psychological understanding of memory and the physiological events measured by the scanning technologies. This has created a problem for how we should interpret the results that are found. The present project aims to close this gap by applying new research methodologies and theoretical insights based on our previous research.Read moreRead less
Illuminating the evolutionary history of Australia’s most iconic animals. This project aims to pinpoint the nature and timing of key steps in macropod history and to test how these link with major climatic and biotic changes. Macropods (kangaroos and relatives) are widely considered the marsupial equivalents to hoofed mammals on other continents, but we have a weaker understanding of how their evolution was shaped by environmental change. This project will combine palaeontology, anatomy and gene ....Illuminating the evolutionary history of Australia’s most iconic animals. This project aims to pinpoint the nature and timing of key steps in macropod history and to test how these link with major climatic and biotic changes. Macropods (kangaroos and relatives) are widely considered the marsupial equivalents to hoofed mammals on other continents, but we have a weaker understanding of how their evolution was shaped by environmental change. This project will combine palaeontology, anatomy and genetics to address questions such as how and why ancestral macropods descended from the trees and evolved bipedal hopping, and the upper size limits of the kangaroo “body plan”. This should improve our understanding of the long-term effects of climate change on marsupials, and provide a test of key placental-based evolutionary models.Read moreRead less
ARC Australia-New Zealand Research Network for Vegetation Function. Plant species vary widely in quantitative functional traits, and in their relations to climate, soils and geography. Global generalizations are emerging. Vegetation Function network will reach from plant function into genomics and crop breeding, into palaeoecology and vegetation history, into landscape management for carbon, water and salinity outcomes, into forecasting future ecosystems under global change, and into phylogeny, ....ARC Australia-New Zealand Research Network for Vegetation Function. Plant species vary widely in quantitative functional traits, and in their relations to climate, soils and geography. Global generalizations are emerging. Vegetation Function network will reach from plant function into genomics and crop breeding, into palaeoecology and vegetation history, into landscape management for carbon, water and salinity outcomes, into forecasting future ecosystems under global change, and into phylogeny, ecoinformatics and evolutionary theory. Across this span, working groups will target nine identified opportunities for breakthrough research. Each research target needs input from two or more disciplines. Together, the nine targets link across disciplines, as a network that spans from genomic to planetary scales.Read moreRead less
Occupational injury prevention in high temperature environments. This project aims to explore the contribution of heat as a risk factor in work-related illness and injury. Approximately 600 000 Australians experience a work-related illness or injury each year. Hot weather may directly or indirectly lead to accidents, but heat as a risk factor has not been systematically explored, and is particularly relevant in a warming climate. This project aims to improve safety and productivity in Australian ....Occupational injury prevention in high temperature environments. This project aims to explore the contribution of heat as a risk factor in work-related illness and injury. Approximately 600 000 Australians experience a work-related illness or injury each year. Hot weather may directly or indirectly lead to accidents, but heat as a risk factor has not been systematically explored, and is particularly relevant in a warming climate. This project aims to improve safety and productivity in Australian industry by generating new evidence and predictive models to inform injury prevention policy and guidance, and facilitating the development of practical, targeted resources. This project expects to add to the body of knowledge regarding workers’ health and safety and to be of benefit to industry and subpopulations at risk.Read moreRead less
Investigation of recognition memory in behavioural, electrophysiological, and functional neuro-imaging domains using state-trace analysis. This project utilises a novel methodology to investigate human recognition memory across three separate domains - behavioural, electrophysiological and functional neuro-imaging. The aim is to determine how these three aspects of memory are related and if they can be united by a single theory.