BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES DEPARTMENT MATTERS | February 26, 2021

Message from the HoD

Dear all,

It was wonderful to meet some of the incoming BPhil/MRes Yr1 students this week and share in their enthusiasm for research. At this time of change for our institution, and the sector as a whole, it is important to remind ourselves why we work and study in a University, and how what we do will have significant and lasting impact on the world.

The Academic Staff Workplace Change Proposal has now been released and I would urge to you to provide feedback, either through the online survey or through me, before the 18th March. It is still a proposal at this stage and there is scope to influence some of the mechanisms and outcomes of the process.  Please contact me if you have concerns or questions about the Change Proposal and what it means for you.

Cheers,
Nathan

Save the Date

This Coming Week

Tue 2nd March, 1-2pm: Department meeting, in-person and via Zoom (link sent in email)

General News and Announcements

Admin notices 

Research getting noticed

Emeritus Professor Andrew Beattie contributed to the article “Underestimating the Challenges of Avoiding a Ghastly Future“, which now has over 200,000 views!

Join the Department Diversity & Inclusion Committee

Seeking staff and students who want to make a difference to the Biology and MQ community to join the Dept committee or just contribute to a discussion on committee goals and activities at a planning meeting.

Email michelle.power@mq.edu.au by Feb 26 if you are keen to join or go onto a list to be notified of the first 2021 planning meeting.

Contribute to Senate Inquiry into Fisheries

Contributions to senate inquiries are a great way to increase your profile. For help with a submission, contact Grant Hose.

The fisheries quota system – submissions close 12 March 2021.
On 7 December 2020, the Senate moved that the following matter be referred to the Rural and Regional Affairs and Transport References Committee for inquiry and report by 24 June 2021.

The fisheries quota system and examining whether the current ‘managed microeconomic system’ established around a set of individual transferable quotas results in good fishing practice, with particular reference to:

• good fishing practice that is ecologically sustainable with an economic dynamic that produces good community outcomes;
• how the current quota system affects community fishers;
• whether the current system disempowers small fishers and benefits large interest groups;
• the enforceability of ecological value on the current system, and the current system’s relationship to the health of the fisheries;
• whether the current system results in good fishing practice that is ecologically sustainable and economically dynamic, and produces good community outcomes.

https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Senate/Rural_and_Regional_Affairs_and_Transport/Fisheriesquota

Honorary appointments on hold

Please be aware that the Executive Dean has decided not to approve any new Honorary Appointment requests until after both the proposed Academic Workplace Change paper (followed potentially by the Implementation Plan) has been approved and released, and FSE Strategic Planning has been finalised. 

Admin will keep staff informed when new requests are able to be sent through again.

If you have any questions please contact Kate Barry at kate.barry@mq.edu.au

Free plants in desperate need of love!

The Which Plant Where crew completed their experiments on a 30+ species of shrubs, trees and other plants. After torturing them under drought and heatwave simulations, to assess their resilience to climate change, these plants now need a good home and a garden so they can be loved again.

Please collect these (free) plants from glasshouses 3 (small pots) and 9 (large pots) in the Plant Growth Facility on a first-come first-served basis. Please liaise with the PGF’s Manager, Muhammad Masood, for any access issues.

Available species are: Acacia implexa, Castanospermum australe, Melastoma affine, Agonis flexuosa ‘Burgundy’, Lophostemon confertus, Syzygium floribundum (Waterhousea floribunda), Tristaniopsis laurina ‘Luscious’, Hymenosporum flavum, Buckinghamia celsissima, Grevillea baileyana, Hakea laurina, Calodendrum capense, Harpullia pendula, Toechima erythrocarpum, Dianella caerulea ‘Goddess’, Trachelospermum asiaticum, Ulmus parvifolia ‘Todd’, Liriope muscari, Sygizium smithii, Elaeocarpus reticulatus, Geijera parviflora, Melia azedarach, Angophora costata, Banksia marginate, Ficus macrophylla, Lagerstroemia indica, Pyrus calleryana, Quercus palustris, Ulmus parvifolia, Angophora hispida, Betula utilis, Platanus acerifolia, Prunus cerasifera, Quercus robur.

Happy planting!

Plant of the Week: Christmas Bells, Blandfordia spp.

Plant of the week – Christmas Bells – Blandfordia

The first Plant of the Week story for the year, together with accompanying photographs, is courtesy of Bill Chapman from Port Macquarie where there has been a magnificent display over the Christmas and New Year holidays.
It would be logical to assume that the bright yellow and red flowers of Christmas Bells would attract birds, and they do, but in fact it is worker ants, Iridomyrmex sp., that facilitate the self-pollination of Christmas Bell flowers.

Job opportunity with CSIRO: Research Scientist or Engineer – Carbon & Vegetation Modelling

https://jobs.csiro.au/job/Canberra%2C-ACT-CSOF-Job/715571500

Location: Canberra or Melbourne preferred (other locations may be considered)
Salary: AU$98k – AU$132k plus up to 15.4% superannuation

Closes 14 March 2021, 11:00pm AEDT

NSW Herbarium is looking for volunteers

The National Herbarium of New South Wales is imaging its collection ahead of its move to the Australian Botanical Garden, Mt Annan in 2021. This is the first project of this scale to happen in the Southern Hemisphere.

The Herbarium needs help in the digitising process!

By volunteering you will have the opportunity to see our incredible collection up close and meet expert plant scientists. There is one session per day running from 9:30am – 1:00pm.

If you would like to help and gain valuable experience, please contact Melissa Wong on melissa.wong@rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au with your availability and contact details.

Medical Teaching & Learning library resource trial: ClinicalKey Student

Elsevier has enabled Macquarie University the use of their ClinicalKey Student education platform, at no cost, until the end of June 2021. You will need to register for or use an existing Elsevier Login and Password.
ClinicalKey Student supports staff and students by enhancing the teaching and learning experience with tools tailored to develop and assess medical knowledge. Staff can build and assign assessments that supplement their curriculum. It contains:
– Over 200 textbooks covering 40 medical specialties, including Gray’s Anatomy for Students and Medical Physiology
– Over 850 associated videos ranging from practical demonstrations of anatomical dissections to instructional clinical examination examples
– Over 85,000 images previously only available with each print title purchased, but now fully unlocked and discoverable for visual learning
– Over 1,500 quick access summaries distilling complex medical conditions into easy-to-understand synopses

Feedback on the content and functionality of the platform can be submitted here and is very much appreciated: https://it-mqu.formstack.com/forms/trial_database_evaluation

Animalesque City: Radical visions about human – animal cohabitation. A call for short movies – closes 15th March

What is an Animalesque City? We challenge you to express an activist and radical viewpoint through a short movie about the (future) relationships between humans and animal species in times of rapidly expanding urbanisation; to envision emergent societies in which multispecies citizens exist in symbiosis.

The Animalesque Visiting School Competition invites students and professionals from all over the world to participate in the production of visionary scripts about the future agency of animals in the design and construction of urban environments. We are welcoming all kinds of creative film works, including those with limited technological resources. The medium of film enables the transmission of narratives and fiction in a critical and engaging way. Together, the selected submissions will express visionary animalesque realities, constructed from different global perspectives and seen through a multiplicity of lenses.

• Criteria for submission: Participation is open to students and professionals from all fields in any location around the world, and all formats are allowed.
• Duration: The movie should be between two and five minutes.
• Genre: Fiction, documentary, animation and experimental film are permitted. All creative formats are valid.
• Content: Narrative and engagement potential will be considered. Does the movie trigger curiosity and excitement?
• Framing of context: How is the proposed scenario dealing with time, culture and place? There are no limits here, so think big.
• Reference to cultural interspecies relationships: Myths, legends, rituals and tales can narrate our intrinsic relationships with animals
• Addressing current and future urgent topics: for example loss of biodiversity, climate change and sprawling urbanization.

Outcomes:

• Mentoring with Jury members and a lecture series in early 2021
• Exhibition of selected winning movies in Berlin and London in 2021

Submission deadline: 15 March, 2pm CET (midnight in Sydney)

Announcement of results: 31 March

​Registration and Fees: Submissions can either be made individually or as a team, with a maximum of three members. The registration fee is £25 per person (the fee for a team of three is therefore £75),

Scholarships are available. If you wish to apply, please send a strong 200 words statement of interest in participating in the competition to the Visiting School Office.

More info here: https://www.animalesquecity.com/

Australian Council of Deans in Science – up to $20,000 for Learning & Teaching projects

ACDS is offering funding for small (<$10,000) or large (<$20,000) projects advancing learning and teaching in science and mathematics in Australian Universities, in the following priority areas:
Teaching delivery and assessment post pandemic
Improving employability outcomes of science graduates
Innovative science curriculum design at course or program level

See ACDS website for guidelines and the application form. Applications close 30th March 2021 – but you should allow time to get endorsement from the Executive Dean.

David Syme Research Prize – applications open

Nominations are invited for the 2020 David Syme Research Prize. The Australia-wide prize recognises the best original research in Biology, Physics, Chemistry or Geology produced in Australia during the past two years (1 January 2019 – 31 December 2020).

Value: $9,000 (approx.)
Closing date: 28 April 2021
Full details and the nomination form are available at: https://scienceunimelb.smartygrants.com.au/syme

The prize is made by nomination only. Senior members of the academic or research community such as co-authors or co-researchers, or heads of department are invited to nominate eligible colleagues. Self-nominations are not accepted.
Researchers associated with any Australian university or without university connections are eligible for nomination, noting the following:

• Must NOT have attained the position of Professor (or equivalent seniority) by the time the award is made;
• Must have spent the equivalent of at least 5 full years of the last 7 in Australia.

The award is made on the basis of the research quality within the discipline and its likely impact and value in the industrial and commercial interests of Australia.

Enquiries should be directed to: science-awards@unimelb.edu.au

HDR Supervision website update: https://staff.mq.edu.au/research/hdr-supervision

The following information can now be found on the website:

Supervision Toolkit: the toolkit provides supervisors with information and resources for assisting their candidate throughout their candidature.
Supervision Enhancement: the Supervision Enhancement webpages includes information about mandatory Supervision training and professional development opportunities. Further updates will be made to these pages in due course.
System Support: this webpage provides information about, and instructions for, the various systems used to support HDR candidature.

Changes to Candidature has also moved; shows which forms are needed for everything HDR: https://students.mq.edu.au/study/hdr/managing-candidature/changes 

Forms processing – send to below, NOT directly to Nathan, etc.

For timely processing of forms, e.g. enrolment, leave, etc.:
PhD: send pdfs to fse.bio-adm@mq.edu.au – Julian will arrange signature and send it on.
MRes: send to fse.biomres@mq.edu.au – Ajay or Matt Kosnik will sign and send on.

Australian Wildlife Society Scholarships and Research Grants

AWS is offering grants ($1500) to postgraduate students; see flyer below and Research Grants application link. Applicants must be Society members (free).

AWS is also offering students of UNSW, UTS, or WSU scholarships of $5000 for wildlife ecology research; see flyer below and Wildlife Ecology Scholarship application link.

Applications are due 31st May 2021.

COVID-19 Scholarships with MQ’s Australian Institute of Health Innovation

AIHI is offering five domestic scholarships for PhD projects studying Covid-19 and health system crisis planning. AIHI is seeking high calibre candidates with pioneering ideas – not limited to only health and medical researchers. Anyone with the suitable prerequisites and a curiosity about how healthcare may be transformed into the future is welcome. https://www.mq.edu.au/research/phd-and-research-degrees/scholarships/scholarship-search/data/covid-19-and-future-crisis-preparedness-in-healthcare 

Applications close 28 Feb 2021

Have You Participated in an Activity for Biology Recently? Don’t forget to fill in the super-quick form here – ACCESS OUTREACH FORM HERE

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Call out for Social Media Content

 

We are looking to feature a different student each week on the Biology Social Media accounts. If you would like to share your research or fieldwork with the public, please send photos and a short blurb about your work to Jenny Ghabache: <jenny.ghabache@mq.edu.au>

 

 

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