Making a difference—Outcomes or ARC supported research

Making a difference Outcomes of ARC supported research 2018–19

The Australian Research Council acknowledges the Traditional Owners and custodians of Country throughout Australia and their continuing connection to land, waters and community. We pay our respects to them, their cultures and Elders past, present and future. Please note: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people should be aware that this publication may contain names and images of deceased persons. The ARC is also responsible for administering the Engagement and Impact (EI) assessment. EI assesses the engagement of researchers with research end-users and shows how universities are translating their research into economic, social, environmental, cultural and other impacts. Assessments are made by expert panels of researchers and research end-users using narrative studies and supporting quantitative indicators. THE AUSTRALIAN RESEARCH COUNCIL The Australian Research Council (ARC) is a non-corporate Commonwealth entity within the Australian Government. The ARC’s purpose is to grow knowledge and innovation for the benefit of the Australian community through funding the highest quality research, assessing the quality, engagement and impact of research and providing advice on research matters. The ARC funds research and researchers under the National Competitive Grants Program (NCGP). The NCGP consists of two elements—Discovery and Linkage. Within these elements are a range of schemes structured to provide a pathway of incentives for researchers to build the scope and scale of their work and collaborative partnerships. The majority of funding decisions under the NCGP are made on the basis of peer review. The ARC evaluates the quality of Australian university research through the Excellence in Research for Australia (ERA) program. ERA is an evaluation framework that identifies research excellence in Australian universities by comparing Australia’s research effort against international benchmarks. ERA assesses quality using a combination of indicators and expert review by research evaluation committees.

A MESSAGE FROM OUR CEO

Welcome to the third edition of the Australian Research Council (ARC) Making a Difference publication, featuring a snapshot of ARC-supported research projects that have delivered notable outcomes in 2018–19. Anyone with a natural curiosity will find the diverse research stories in this publication to be fascinating—from bull ant venom pain remedies, to a performance-based research laboratory staged at sites across the Kimberley, to a blast simulator that will test the frontiers of explosives protection—and it is with great pleasure that we share them with you. The ARC proudly supports some of the world’s greatest fundamental and applied research, and we take care in this publication to feature a sample drawn from a wide range of universities, and across a wide range of disciplines. This includes research that is pure ‘blue-sky’ knowledge creation, as well as industry-ready commercial outcomes, and a spectrum of projects that are conducted by early career researchers, through to some of Australia’s most well-known research leaders. The ARC is unique in Australia for its support of such research diversity. Australia’s innovative strength is well known overseas, and this strength is underpinned by the excellence that is found across all research disciplines and in

universities all around the country—as we know, from measuring Australian research against world-standard benchmarks in our State of Australian University Research 2018–19: ERA National Report . The impact of this research on the lives of ordinary Australians is also significant, as is illustrated in so many more stories also available to explore, drawn from our inaugural 2018 Engagement and Impact Assessment. The Australian research sector is a wonderful community to support, with new incredible stories of innovation and discovery year on year. Our lives and culture are much richer for the work of our research community, and I thank them for what they give back to us all.

ISSN (Print) 2209-6000 ISSN (Online) 2209-7414 Published: July 2019 © Commonwealth of Australia 2019

All material presented in this publication is provided under a CC Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) licence www.creativecommons.org > Licenses > by-nc-nd/4.0 with the exception of the Commonwealth Coat of Arms, the Australian Research Council (ARC) logo, images, signatures and where otherwise stated. The details of the relevant licence conditions are available on the Creative Commons website as is the full legal code for the CC Attribution BY-NC-ND 4.0 licence www.creativecommons.org > licenses > by-nc-nd 4.0 legal code. Requests and enquiries regarding this licence should be addressed to ARC Legal Services on +61 2 6287 6600. Front cover image: A scene from Cut The Sky. Image courtesy: Rob Maccoll. See story ‘Listening to Country’; page 43. Inside cover image: Stock image—Golden hour in the bush. Image courtesy: iStock.com/shells1. Back cover image: Post-fire Warrumbungle NP in 2013. Image courtesy: Fritz Geiser. See story ‘The burning question—the effect of torpor on mammals during and after bushfires’; page 45.

Professor Sue Thomas Chief Executive Officer Australian Research Council

i

ii

4 Fossil record of early humans may forget the wet 6 What a dog’s colour can tell us 7 Better understanding animal reproductive processes 8 Masquerade of galactic proportions detected by Hubble 9 Building a new bacterial ‘tree of life’ 11 The attractive power of purple plumage 12 Bizarre ‘platypus fish’ found on Australia’s original reef 13 On the dog’s trail UNDERSTANDING OUR WORLD 2

15 27 36

RESEARCH LEADERSHIP SUPPORTING INDIGENOUS RESEARCH 47 53 62 75 IMPROVING HEALTH AND WELL-BEING STRIVING FOR CULTURAL AND SOCIAL OUTCOMES

39 Restoring biodiversity to rehabilitated mines 40 3D imaging reveals leaf complexity 41 Warming microbes may shrink Southern Ocean carbon sink 42 Restoring fish habitat to improve sustainability of fisheries 44 Freezing polar oceans—a great place for fish species formation 45 The burning question—the effect of torpor on mammals during and after bushfires ADVANCING ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE AND MANAGEMENT

COLLABORATION AND GENERATING ECONOMIC IMPACTS

DEVELOPING INNOVATIVE TECHNOLOGIES

16 Droughts and bushfires predicted from space months in advance 18 Ceramic particles confer fire-resistance to lightweight cladding 19 Emergency lights connect devices for smart buildings 20 Fresher, longer lasting baby spinach 23 Having a blast 24 A new Motif for cognitive tests 25 Magnetic polymers improve tainted wine

55 Support needed in Australia’s growing craft economy 56 Lifting millions from poverty by increasing access to basic financial services 57 The staggered pathways to Australia 58 The Prosecution Project 59 Translating an ancient Manichean papyrus manuscript 61 New approaches to copyright

48 Listening to Country 50 Creative prison writing program provides voice for Indigenous men 51 Studying Aboriginal stone-walled fish traps in the Gulf of Carpentaria

76 Mentoring the next generation of mathematicians 79 Leadership in many languages

64 Diamond coating brings bone-bling to biomedical implants 65 Sex differences in hormone exposure linked to anxiety 67 Scientists determine the chemistry of moist eyes 68 The Australian Cancer Atlas 69 Bull ant venom could actually kill pain 70 X-ray triggering nano-bubbles to target cancer 72 Getting people up to speed 73 Breakthrough blood sample for pregnant women

29 Optical microchip brings us closer to quantum computing 30 New extremely sensitive ‘ultra-ultrasound’ 31 New citizen science app for storm hunters 32 Autonomous robotic systems to maintain global infrastructure 33 Putting the quantum into battery 35 First untethered Australian autonomous underwater vehicle dives under Antarctic ice shelf

iii CONTENTS

1

UNDERSTANDING OUR WORLD Fossil record of early humans may forget the wet What a dog’s colour can tell us Better understanding animal reproductive processes Masquerade of galactic proportions detected by Hubble Building a new bacterial ‘tree of life’ 4 6 7 8

9 11 12

The attractive power of purple plumage Bizarre ‘platypus fish’ found on Australia’s original reef On the dog’s trail

13

2

3

Beautiful background of the starry sky, colorful nebula, star light, shine. Credit: iStock.com/MARIIA VASILEVA

FOSSIL RECORD OF EARLY HUMANS MAY FORGET THE WET A research team based at La Trobe University and The University of Melbourne has conducted a ten-year study into gaps in the fossil record of early humans from the so-called ‘Cradle of Humankind’ caves in South Africa. The team—which includes Dr Robyn Pickering, ARC Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA) recipient, Professor Andy Herries, supported through the ARC Future Fellowships scheme, and ARC Australian Laureate Fellowship recipient, Professor Jon Woodhead—has discovered that the fossil record is biased towards periods of drier climate, suggesting there might be significant holes in our understanding of the evolution of early humans. The caves in which the fossils are found have significantly eroded over the years, and the expected age range of the fossils makes dating the fossils difficult. In recent years, one method that has shown to be successful is the uranium-lead dating of the flowstone (a calcium carbonate cave formation that grows during wet periods) that occurs in layers between fossil-rich cave sediment. The researchers found that flowstones formed in multiple caves in the region at the same time, allowing the various sequences to be directly correlated for the first time. Moreover, the work suggests that periods when fossils were deposited in the caves were biased towards drier periods when flowstone was not forming. The research team included 10 scientists from Australia, South Africa and the US and received additional support through the ARC’s Discovery Projects scheme.

Uranium-lead dating revealed that the fossils in these caves date to six narrow time-windows between 3.2 and 1.3 million years ago.

The deroofed Drimolen Palaeocave deposits in South Africa from which flowstones were dated. In South Africa, such caves have yielded the remains of our early ancestors between 3.1 and 1.3 million years ago. Credit: Professor Andy I.R. Herries.

UNDERSTANDING OUR WORLD 4

5 UNDERSTANDING OUR WORLD

Chocolate-coloured Labrador retrievers have, on average, 10% shorter lives than black or yellow Labradors, according to a study of veterinary records.

WHAT A DOG’S COLOUR CAN TELL US

BETTER UNDERSTANDING ANIMAL REPRODUCTIVE PROCESSES ARC-supported researchers from The University of Western Australia have found that some fish species are highly selective when it comes to choosing the father of their offspring. ARC Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA) recipient, Dr Clelia Gasparini, and Associate Professor Jon Evans, have discovered that female Poecilia reticulata (guppy) fish may mate with several males—like many other species—but they also exercise great control over which males will ultimately be successful in fathering their offspring. The researchers found that females can affect reproductive outcomes and fertilise their eggs by differentially using sperm from different males— speculating that the females may be controlling the way it is stored in their body after mating, as a way of sorting the ‘best’ from the ‘worst’. The researchers say that the study provided a clear demonstration that female guppies have subtle but powerful control over what happens at the gamete (reproductive cells) level after mating. This research may have implications for our understanding of reproductive processes and evolutionary mechanisms across a range of animal species, and may have important applications to the fields of assisted reproductive technologies and fertility research.

ARC-funded researcher, Professor Paul McGreevy, and his research team at The University of Sydney, in collaboration with the Royal Veterinary College (UK), has revealed that the life expectancy of increasingly popular chocolate Labrador retrievers is much lower Kingdom-based Labrador retrievers of all colours shows chocolate Labradors also have a higher incidence of ear infections and skin disease. Part of the ARC Linkage Infrastructure, Equipment and Facilities (LIEF) scheme-supported VetCompass™ Programme, which collects and analyses demographic and clinical information on dogs in Australia, the research is being replicated in Australia, where Labrador retrievers are the most popular breed than their black or yellow counterparts. The study of more than 33,000 United of pet dog. The LIEF funding has united all of the nation’s veterinary schools on a single project for the first time. The research found that the prevalence of pyo-traumatic dermatitis (a skin condition) in black dogs was 1.1%, in yellow dogs it was 1.6%, and this figure rose to 4% in chocolate-coloured dogs. Meanwhile, otitis externa (an ear infection) was found in 12.8% of black dogs, 17% of yellow dogs and 23.4% of chocolate-coloured dogs. Professor McGreevy said the relationship between coat colour and disease came as a surprise to researchers and that the study confirms the dangers of breeding for colour if health is not monitored at the same time. The findings point to previously unknown genetic connections between coat colour and disease in dogs, which warrant further investigation.

The study has shown not only that sexual selection can continue after mating, but that the females can control this process.

UNDERSTANDING OUR WORLD 6

UNDERSTANDING OUR WORLD 7

Aquarium fish guppies, male. Credit: iStock.com/Georgy_Golovin.

Professor Paul McGreevy and his Labrador retriever, Bundy. Credit: Cath Muscat.

The new taxonomic tree presents a standardised model, and is being greeted with excitement by the scientific community. Taxonomy is the process of classifying living things by arranging them in a hierarchy of related organisms. This technique has allowed the fixing of many bacterial misclassifications, and making the evolutionary timelines between bacterial groups consistent. For instance, the genus Clostridium , historically a ‘dumping ground’ for classifying rod-shaped bacteria that produce spores inside their cells, has been reclassified into 121 separate genus groups across 29 different families. BUILDING A NEW BACTERIAL ‘TREE OF LIFE’ Bacterial classification has been given a complete makeover by a team of researchers led by ARC Australian Laureate Fellow, Professor Philip Hugenholtz, based at The University of Queensland, using an evolutionary tree based on genome sequences. The study relied on a technique called metagenomics, where bacterial genomes are obtained straight from environmental samples, to create a more complete picture of the structure of the bacterial kingdom. Due to advances in sequencing technology, entire genetic blueprints of hundreds of thousands of bacteria are now obtainable, including bacteria that have not yet been grown in the lab.

MASQUERADE OF GALACTIC PROPORTIONS DETECTED BY HUBBLE

ARC-funded researchers using the Hubble Space Telescope have discovered that nearby reddish galaxies have been ‘pretending’ to be much more distant than they really are, and were distorting astronomical calculations of galaxy populations in the early universe. Ultra-bright galaxies in the early universe are now likely to be less common than initially thought, the team at The University of Melbourne node of the ARC Centre of Excellence for All Sky Astrophysics in 3 Dimensions has found. The researchers used Hubble to observe two galaxies thought to be so distant that we see them more than 13 billion years back in time when the universe was young. The new observations showed that the brightest known galaxy candidate in the early universe turned out to be much closer to us after all—with profound implications for models of how galaxies formed when the universe was in its infancy. The good news is that these observations strengthened the evidence that the other bright galaxy in the same image is truly an object in the infancy of the universe. This implies that while not quite as common as previously thought, galaxies containing billions of stars were already present at such early times. These sources will be characterized in greater detail by next-generation telescopes that Australian astronomers will use, such as the James Webb Space Telescope and the Giant Magellan Telescope.

Random patches of sky viewed through Hubble’s Wide Field Camera more than 100 times built a rich >Page 1 Page 2-3 Page 4-5 Page 6-7 Page 8-9 Page 10-11 Page 12-13 Page 14-15 Page 16-17 Page 18-19 Page 20-21 Page 22-23 Page 24-25 Page 26-27 Page 28-29 Page 30-31 Page 32-33 Page 34-35 Page 36-37 Page 38-39 Page 40-41 Page 42-43 Page 44-45 Page 46-47 Page 48-49 Page 50-51 Page 52-53 Page 54-55 Page 56-57 Page 58-59 Page 60-61 Page 62-63 Page 64-65 Page 66-67 Page 68-69 Page 70-71 Page 72-73 Page 74-75 Page 76-77 Page 78-79 Page 80-81 Page 82-83 Page 84-85 Page 86

Made with FlippingBook - professional solution for displaying marketing and sales documents online