Cause and effect: new mechanisms of particles formation in thunderstorms. This project aims to identify meaningful and specific indicators for predicting particle formation and alteration during thunderstorms. How thunderstorms develop is well-understood. However, identifying meaningful and specific indicators for predicting particle alteration during a thunderstorm is still not clear. This project will practically contribute to the evidence of the impact of air particulates, thereby having dire ....Cause and effect: new mechanisms of particles formation in thunderstorms. This project aims to identify meaningful and specific indicators for predicting particle formation and alteration during thunderstorms. How thunderstorms develop is well-understood. However, identifying meaningful and specific indicators for predicting particle alteration during a thunderstorm is still not clear. This project will practically contribute to the evidence of the impact of air particulates, thereby having direct implications for meteorological, and air pollution policy in Australia and worldwide. This project will allow researchers to understand the impact of these factors on the escalation of the causative effects, and to find a way to prevent unnecessary fatal outcomes.Read moreRead less
Extracting energy from air: mechanism of a bacterial hydrogenase. The atmosphere has recently been shown to be a key source of energy for diverse soil bacteria. Bacteria use complex enzymes, namely Huc-type hydrogenases, to harvest atmospheric hydrogen directly from air to support growth and survival. However, little is known about how Huc functions within and outside cells. By synergising expertise in microbiology, biochemistry, and chemistry, we will resolve the mechanism, assembly, and integr ....Extracting energy from air: mechanism of a bacterial hydrogenase. The atmosphere has recently been shown to be a key source of energy for diverse soil bacteria. Bacteria use complex enzymes, namely Huc-type hydrogenases, to harvest atmospheric hydrogen directly from air to support growth and survival. However, little is known about how Huc functions within and outside cells. By synergising expertise in microbiology, biochemistry, and chemistry, we will resolve the mechanism, assembly, and integration of Huc, including the basis of its remarkably high affinity and oxygen insensitivity compared to previously studied hydrogenases. This project will enable biotechnological applications, as the first study of an enzyme that extracts energy from air, and has broad ecological and biogeochemical implications.Read moreRead less
Precipitation in shallow convection over the Southern Ocean. This project aims to quantify the amount of precipitation over the Southern Ocean and identify the key dynamical and microphysical processes that lead to its development. Large uncertainties exist in the frequency and intensity of precipitation, which limits the ability to model the coupled Southern Ocean climate system. Observations from the RV Investigator, an Australian marine research vessel, have revealed heavy precipitation event ....Precipitation in shallow convection over the Southern Ocean. This project aims to quantify the amount of precipitation over the Southern Ocean and identify the key dynamical and microphysical processes that lead to its development. Large uncertainties exist in the frequency and intensity of precipitation, which limits the ability to model the coupled Southern Ocean climate system. Observations from the RV Investigator, an Australian marine research vessel, have revealed heavy precipitation events within the shallow convection commonly found between fronts that have not been captured by either satellite observations or numerical models. This project will improve weather forecasts, including precipitation, and climate projections over the Southern Ocean and the adjoining Antarctic and the southern part of Australia.Read moreRead less
Local climate changes caused by large bushfire burnt areas. This project aims to quantify the impact on local climate produced by large burnt areas after extreme bushfires. This project expects to generate new knowledge on these previously unexplored fire-scar induced changes to local climate. It will extend an innovative approach that combines satellite based earth observation with very high resolution regional climate modelling to quantify the impacts on land-atmosphere feedbacks and local cli ....Local climate changes caused by large bushfire burnt areas. This project aims to quantify the impact on local climate produced by large burnt areas after extreme bushfires. This project expects to generate new knowledge on these previously unexplored fire-scar induced changes to local climate. It will extend an innovative approach that combines satellite based earth observation with very high resolution regional climate modelling to quantify the impacts on land-atmosphere feedbacks and local climate. Expected outcomes of this project include enhanced methods to quantify local climate changes after extreme fires and their effect on vegetation recovery. This should provide significant benefits to the planning for, and management of, vegetation recovery after extreme fires.Read moreRead less
DEVELOPMENT OF A NOVEL BIOMATERIAL FOR BONE TISSUE ENGINEERING. Tissue engineering of bone is emerging as a viable therapy for treating large defects in load-bearing bone. We wish to develop methods for combining novel heparan sulphate molecules (known to deliver growth factors to cell surfaces and thereby cause changes in bone cell phenotype) with load-bearing, macro-porous, biodegradable mineral/polymer biomaterials. Through the study of release profiles, protein adsorption and cell responses ....DEVELOPMENT OF A NOVEL BIOMATERIAL FOR BONE TISSUE ENGINEERING. Tissue engineering of bone is emerging as a viable therapy for treating large defects in load-bearing bone. We wish to develop methods for combining novel heparan sulphate molecules (known to deliver growth factors to cell surfaces and thereby cause changes in bone cell phenotype) with load-bearing, macro-porous, biodegradable mineral/polymer biomaterials. Through the study of release profiles, protein adsorption and cell responses to these derivatised biomaterials, a novel approach to bone replacement materials can be developed.Read moreRead less
Role of modulating water wave groups in enhancing air-water fluxes. This project aims to investigate the importance of the group structure and breaking of wind-generated waves of various scales in the air-water exchange of mass, momentum and energy. This project expects to generate new understanding in the area of air-water exchanges using an innovative approach based on direct numerical simulation of wind over unsteady water wave groups for a wide range of wind speed and wave steepness conditi ....Role of modulating water wave groups in enhancing air-water fluxes. This project aims to investigate the importance of the group structure and breaking of wind-generated waves of various scales in the air-water exchange of mass, momentum and energy. This project expects to generate new understanding in the area of air-water exchanges using an innovative approach based on direct numerical simulation of wind over unsteady water wave groups for a wide range of wind speed and wave steepness conditions.
Expected outcomes of this project include generating fundamental knowledge of the unresolved physics and new parameterisations for air-water exchange rates. This will deliver more accurate and more comprehensive forecast models for weather, inland and ocean waterways, and numerous industrial processes.Read moreRead less
The dynamics of turbulent entrainment in sheared convective boundary layers. This project aims to develop general laws to enable the accurate prediction of boundary layer entrainment processes. This will be significant in a wide range of environmental and engineering applications. In particular, the current lack of understanding of this area is a major source of uncertainty in the latest generation of global climate models.
The impact of India-Asia tectonics on climate. This interdisciplinary project aims to determine the controls of tectonics on global climate in the last 50 million years. A combination of tectonics, paleogeography, climate modelling and high-performance computing will be applied to test systematically outstanding issues in the reconstruction of the Indo-Asia region and their landmass/seaways configurations and topography, which have bedevilled previous models of paleoclimate evolution. The propos ....The impact of India-Asia tectonics on climate. This interdisciplinary project aims to determine the controls of tectonics on global climate in the last 50 million years. A combination of tectonics, paleogeography, climate modelling and high-performance computing will be applied to test systematically outstanding issues in the reconstruction of the Indo-Asia region and their landmass/seaways configurations and topography, which have bedevilled previous models of paleoclimate evolution. The proposal expects to generate novel knowledge in the area at the boundary between tectonics, paleoclimate modelling and present-day climate. This provides significant benefits to the interpretation of tectonics–climate coupling as current drivers of climate evolution.Read moreRead less
Surface Chemistry meets Cell Biology: Molecular Level Control of Surface Architecture for Cell Adhesion and Migration. Biotechnological applications such as tissue engineering, bone supports, implantable materials, cell assays and biosensors all require detailed knowledge of how cells interact with their environment. The proposed research aims to provide this knowledge by developing unique modified surfaces to investigate white blood cell migration and adhesion. Additional expected outcome will ....Surface Chemistry meets Cell Biology: Molecular Level Control of Surface Architecture for Cell Adhesion and Migration. Biotechnological applications such as tissue engineering, bone supports, implantable materials, cell assays and biosensors all require detailed knowledge of how cells interact with their environment. The proposed research aims to provide this knowledge by developing unique modified surfaces to investigate white blood cell migration and adhesion. Additional expected outcome will contribute to our understanding of the many fundamental cellular processes such as cell growth, differentiation and cell death as well as the molecular basis of diseases such as inflammation, cancer, cardiovascular diseases and wound healing. This research program will establish Australia as a leading force in this new research field.Read moreRead less
Australia's variable rainfall - how dry or wet can it really get? Australia’s rainfall is extremely variable, which means existing weather records are too short to calculate the true risk posed by droughts and floods. This project aims to quantify how naturally variable the rainfall coming from the Indo-Pacific mid-latitudes is, allowing recent rainfall extremes and future projections to be assessed in a long-term context. This project expects to produce new estimates of atmospheric moisture bud ....Australia's variable rainfall - how dry or wet can it really get? Australia’s rainfall is extremely variable, which means existing weather records are too short to calculate the true risk posed by droughts and floods. This project aims to quantify how naturally variable the rainfall coming from the Indo-Pacific mid-latitudes is, allowing recent rainfall extremes and future projections to be assessed in a long-term context. This project expects to produce new estimates of atmospheric moisture budgets between Australia and Antarctica based on a novel, 1000-year length reconstruction of moisture-bearing southern Indian Ocean storms. This new information is critically needed by water managers so that they can properly calculate (and ultimately prepare for) the worst of Australia’s rainfall-related risks.Read moreRead less