Effects of red earthworms (Eisenia fetida) on leachability of lead minerals in soil
By: Kavehei, Armin, Grant C. Hose, and Damian B. Gore. Environmental Pollution (2017). | Find with Google Scholar »
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Dear all,
Some great news on the research funding front – congrats to Phil Taylor and his Q-fly group, and also to Chris Reid (see details below!). Meanwhile the university is moving swiftly on its Curriculum Architecture renewal program – many of us this week have attended presentations from the VC, Chair of Academic Senate, and the Associate Dean L&T within the Faculty, and provided feedback. While this offers many opportunities and we will hopefully end up with a streamlined and easy to understand set of programs (and far fewer confused students), we are looking at a very busy second half of the year working on curriculum and program design.
Cheers,
Michelle
Save the Date
This coming week 21st – 25th May
Wed 23: Workshop – ‘The Art and Science of Getting Your Research Published’; All Day, 12WW (E7A) level 8.
Wed 23: Department Morning Tea – Property reps are coming too to answer all your questions about the new Biosciences building; 10.30am; The Hill.
Wed 23: Department Seminar – Prof. Michael Bunce, School of Plant Biology, ARC Future Fellow Trace and Environmental DNA (TrEnD) laboratory, & Australian Wildlife Forensic Services (AWFS) Department of Environment and Agriculture, Curtin University; 1.00pm – 2.00pm; Biology Tea Room.
Following week 28th May – 1st June
Wed 30: Department Morning Tea; 10.30am – 11am; Biology Tea Room..
Wed 30: Workshop – ‘Developing Your 5-year Research Plan’; 12.00 – 1.00pm, 12WW (E7A) level 8.
Wed 30: Diversity and Inclusion Lunch; 12.00 – 1.00pm, Biology Courtyard.
Wed 30: Department Seminar – Dr Iadine Chades, CSIRO; 1.00pm – 2.00pm; Biology Tea Room.
Thu 31: R Users’ Group Meeting; 3.00pm – 5.00pm; Biology Tea Room.
Coming Up
June 7-8: Department Annual HDR conference
July 24-25: Research Enrichment Program – Outlook Conference “The Future of the Human Landscape”; Incubator Building, MQU.
Department Seminar Series
Wed June 6: Department Seminar – Prof. Saul Cunningham, Fenner School, ANU; 1.00pm – 2.00pm; Biology Tea Room.
General News and Announcements
More Funding Success for the Q-fly Group – Congratulations to Phil Taylor and his Q-fly group on obtaining new $4.7m funding support from Hort Innovation for research on “Sex selection genes from Fruit Fly Species for use in SITplus.” This is fantastic news – well done to Phil and his team!
Congratulations to Chris Reid who has been awarded funding from the Hermon Slade Foundation to support the project entitled, “Individually tracking whole weaver ant colonies to decode the behavioural rules of ant self-assembly.”
Macquarie University takes out the University BioQuest Champion Identifiers Team Trophy!
This is awarded to the university team with the highest combined score from all members from correct identifications. A/Prof Jenny Donald also scored the top sighting with 975 points for the Eastern Bristlebird, which is listed as endangered under State and Commonwealth legislation. During April, the Macquarie University team participated in the University BioQuest, a competition between universities to locate and identify plants and animals on and around campus. In addition to coming first for species identifications the Macquarie University team placed 4th for submissions, with a score of 49,387! There were 27 members of the Macquarie University team. Our thanks to all who contributed, but special mention must be made to our top spotter and identifier, Banksia (aka Jenny Donald), and our other top players Josie Kirkwood and Kawsar (aka Kawsar Khan).
The Macquarie University Team: Aimee, Ashton, Banksia, Belinda Fabian, Bree, Bruno, Chris Reid, George Binns, Grubbyfingers, Jaygeeems, Jim, JosieKirkwood, Kawsar, KEMcc, KenTheReaper, Levi, Mariella, Natalie, Oceantree, Olivia, Payal, RussellCoight, Samantha555, TheRamiRocketMan, Tim Keighley, Wild, Yasmin1. (you know who you are!)
COMINGS AND GOINGS
Ariningsun Cinantya (Tya) is a new PhD student joining Biology on June 20th. She’ll be working with the Which Plant Where team after relocating from Indonesia. She is looking for a temporary accommodation around campus in Marsfield, Eastwood, Macquarie Park, etc. If you have a spare room please contact her at <cinantya@gmail.com>.
RESEARCH STORIES, OUTCOMES AND OPPORTUNITIES
New equipment in the PGF – We have following mills available for use in the Plant Growth Facility.
- Retsch GM200 (knife mill). Ideal for homogenizing substances with a high water, oil or fat content as well as grinding dry, soft and medium-hard products.
- Retsch ZM200. Ideal for grinding, dried plant material, twigs, chemicals, foods and feeds, washing powder, plastics, fertilizers, pharmaceutical raw materials and finished products.
- Fritsch pulverisette 2. For universal grinding of soil, woody plant material, hard, medium-hard, soft, brittle, fibrous, abrasive and temperature sensitive materials (dry or in suspension) to analytical fineness.
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This equipment is housed in the Plant Growth Facility F5A433. For training and use of these mills contact Muhammad Masood. Email: <muhammad.masood@mq.edu.au>. Extension: 8217.
Participate in the Falling Walls Lab Australia 2018 – The Academy invites applications from Australian researchers, postdocs and students, entrepreneurs, engineers and innovators from all areas to attend the Falling Walls Lab Australia 2018. Deadline for applications is 5pm (AEST) Monday 28th May 2018. 20 contestants will be invited to participate in this challenge with each required to give a 3 minute presentation on their research work, business model, social idea or initiative based on the “Which walls will fall next” concept. Candidates should be research active in any field of the natural sciences, including technology, engineering and
Apply for the inaugural STEM Ambassador Program run by Science & Technology Australia (STA)
The program is aiming to create a network of capable ambassadors for STEM who will form an ongoing relationship with their local MP. The purpose is to deepen understanding of STEM and build in-principle support among Australia’s political leadership for STEM in Australia. The program will:
- Support up to 10 STEM professionals to connect with a range of Parliamentarians;
- Provide easy access to experts for Parliamentarians – experts who are based in their local electorate and who work in fields relevant to the interests of their constituents; and
- Provide professional development and training opportunities to equip participants with the knowledge and confidence to maximise the impact of their work, and the work of their colleagues.
Full information on the program is available here: https://scienceandtechnologyaustralia.org.au/stem-ambassador-program/
MQ is particularly keen to find people who live in the Parramatta electorate! Please contact Judith Dawes <judith.dawes@mq.edu.au> if you are interested.
medicine as well as social sciences and humanities. Follow this link to view more information and to apply.
LEARNING AND TEACHING
Want to Develop your Teaching Portfolio? HEA Fellowship Opportunity
Macquarie academics and professional staff can now have their education practice and experience recognised through the Higher Education Academy (HEA) Fellowship program. These Fellowships provide international recognition of personal and institutional commitment, and professionalism, in higher education. HEA fellowships also look great on promotion applications, fitting into the categories of:
Professional development and/or accreditation: Record of continuous professional development, including through internal or external accreditation schemes (e.g. Higher Education Academy).
Scholarship of Learning and Teaching: Articulation of clear personal teaching philosophy with evidence of reflection and response to a range of evaluative feedback (this needs to be addressed in the HEA application).
This year MQ is funding applications for staff, including tutors and professional staff. Due to budget cuts this funding is not guaranteed for 2019 (~$5000 per person), so if you are interested please attend an info session to register. The work involved in applications increases with each level, but there are writing workshops and opportunities to have your application reviewed before submission to help.
Contact Kath McClellan if you are interested <katherine.mcclellan@mq.edu.au>.
HDR Student Emails – Are you still using your students.mq.edu.au email? Did you know that you have a staff email? Naming profile is usually firstname.lastname@hdr.mq.edu.au Your staff email account can be accessed via Office 365. If you would prefer to keep using another email account, there are instructions here which outline how to forward all communications from your staff email account, to another email account. If you experience any issues or need help with this, please contact IT.
SEMINARS AND WORKSHOPS
Biological Sciences Weekly Seminar
Date/Time/Venue: Wednesday, 23rd May 2018, 1 – 2pm, 14EAR (E8A)-280 Biology Tearoom.
Speaker: Prof. Michael Bunce, School of Plant Biology, ARC Future Fellow Trace and Environmental DNA (TrEnD) laboratory, & Australian Wildlife Forensic Services (AWFS) Department of Environment and Agriculture, Curtin University. Title: Environmental DNA (eDNA) in space and time – a lens into the potential of metabarcoding to profile biota both past and present. More information at https://goto.mq.edu.au/biologyseminar2018-abstracts
MolSci Weekly Seminar
Date/Time/Venue: Tuesday, 22nd May 2018, 1 – 2pm, 4WW (F7B) 422 APAF seminar room. Speaker: Dr Adam Martin, School of Chemistry, UNSW. Title: Peptide hydrogels: From structure to function. For more information visit – https://goto.mq.edu.au/6s
MolSci Special Seminar
Date/Time/Venue: Thursday, 24th May 2018, 12 – 1pm, 4WW (F7B) 422 APAF seminar room. Speaker: Professor Kirill Alexandrov, Institute for Molecular Bioscience, Australian Institute of Bioengineering and Nanotechnology, University of Queensland. Title: sing in vitro translation systems to synthesise peptides and proteins with unnatural amino acids. For more information visit – https://goto.mq.edu.au/6k
New Complimentary Webinar from Science: The rise of agritech: How green technology can enable more earth-friendly agriculture.
You are invited to hear our panel of experts on May 23, 2018, in this live, online educational seminar. For more information and complimentary registration visit: webinar.sciencemag.org
Date: Wednesday, May 23, 2018 Time:12 noon Eastern, 9 a.m. Pacific, 5 p.m. UK, 6 p.m. Central Europe Duration: 1 hour, Register Now!
Call for Abstracts and Registration Now Open – The Macquarie Neurodegeneration Meeting is an inaugural event hosted by the Centre for Motor Neuron Disease Research, Macquarie University. The aim of this event is for Australian neuroscientists to showcase their research and to stimulate conversation and foster collaboration to develop treatments for diseases including motor neuron disease, Alzheimer’s disease, frontal temporal dementia, Parkinson’s disease and other degenerative brain disorders. We have assembled a program which will feature several keynote speakers.
APR Intern: Australian Postgraduate Research Internship – The Industry Connection
Date: Wednesday, 23rd May, 2018. Time: 1 – 2pm. Speaker: Edwina Buckle, Business Development. Venue: 4WW (F7B) 422 APAF seminar room.
Seminar Content: To improve the translation of Australia’s high-quality research sector into economic and social benefits for the nation, the Department of Education and Training has identified the need for a substantial national research internship program. In 2017 the Australian Postgraduate Research Internship program (APR) Intern received $28.2million in Australian government funding to create a truly national initiative available to all universities and industry sectors. APR Intern is working at the nexus between industry and academia, connecting PhD students, and their academic mentors, with industry partners through 3-5 month, tightly focused research projects. Both industry and academia are set to benefit, businesses will access specialist research expertise through the PhD and academic mentor team, while students gain invaluable experience in an industry setting.
About APR Intern: Australian Postgraduate Research (APR) Intern, is the only national all sector – all discipline internship program placing PhD students into industry. A not-for-profit program, APR.Intern is driving innovation and accelerating women in STEM through short-term industry and university research collaborations.
Sap Flow Technology Workshop – A workshop in July on sap flow technology is being organised for research applications on woody plant species. The workshop will be convened by Dr Michael Forster (Edaphic Scientific & University of Queensland). He will cover the essential theory on sap flow (9am-12pm) complemented by hands-on activities on the installation, operation and maintenance of sap flow systems and data analysis (1-4pm). If you, your students or colleagues are interested, please fill this poll (https://doodle.com/poll/g7hr7ebaa9dyb472 ) indicating your available dates or email Dr Alessandro Ossola <alessandro.ossola@mq.edu.au> for more info.
Research Enrichment Program – Outlook Conference
July 24-25, Incubator Building, Macquarie University – “The Future of the Human Landscape”
The Outlook Conference (Research Enrichment Program Outlook Flyer) will bring together leading thinkers in diverse disciplines, spanning molecules to landscapes, and from scientific, historical and social viewpoints. Speakers at 2018 Outlook conference include Professor Tim Flannery (Writer and Social Commentator), Professor Angela Moles (UNSW), Associate Professor Greg Downey (MQ) and Professor Rob Brooks (UNSW). The objective of Outlook is to immerse participants in the frontiers of adjacent, and more distant disciplines. Speakers will present their vision for humanity’s future. These talks will not recount personal research findings, but will be future-scoping exercises. Our goal is to identify promising areas for high level trans-disciplinary collaboration, for novel applications, and to expose postgraduate students and early career researchers to different ways of thinking. REP Outlook is free and open to all. Please register for REP Outlook here: http://www.cvent.com/d/ngq17l
The Art and Science of Getting Your Research Published – Wednesday 23rd May (all day) level 8, E7A Organised by Michael Gillings and Haidee Kruger. This workshop is an introduction to research authorship and communication. In addition to Postgraduate students, academics and postdocs are most welcome to attend. Click here <https://hdrworkshops.mq.edu.au/registration/new/15405?year=2018> to register for ‘The Art and Science of getting your research published.’
Developing Your 5-year Research Plan – Wednesday 30 May (12-1pm), level 8 E7A – Delivered by Andrew Barron. Hitting any mid- and long-term research and career goals is impossible if you don’t know what they are. This seminar discusses how you can identify what you want to do, and how you can plan to give yourself the greatest chance of hitting your targets. No need to register, simply turn-up. Please bring a pen and some paper with you.
aaRgh (ask an R geek for help) – Second Thursday of every month 3 – 4pm, Biology Tearoom – 14EAR (E8A) 280. Frustrated? Having an R-related problem? We will also run regular afternoon tea sessions where you can get one-on-one help, or just introduce yourself and chat. Snacks provided!
Writing Workshops – Running weekly for most of the year: Fridays 2-4pm in room E8B 111. Convened by Ken Cheng.
These writing workshops are meant for HDR students and early-career researchers. In these face-to-face encounters, writing at any stage of any genre is welcome, from first draft to final polish, from empirical paper to literature review to popular news story. Ken envisages personal feedback linked perhaps with rounds of revisions on selected passages during the session. The aim is not just to get stuff written, but to write everything well. Those interested in attending a session should email Ken Cheng <ken.cheng@mq.edu.au> by Wednesday 12:00-noon, preferably with a draft attached of what they are working on and some indication of what they especially need help with.
ADMIN THINGS
Administration Staffing Updates – Minor changes to admin staff will result in reduced staff availability as of April, so please make an effort to plan your admin needs and avoid potential delays to your request. Adyen De Courcey – On Leave for 3 months. Jacqui Smith – joining us on the front desk. For any administration enquiries please email <fse.bio-adm@mq.edu.au> as this is seen by all administrative staff. The most appropriate person will reply to your email.
PURE Training – The PURE system is used to manage researcher profiles, outputs including publications, funding applications, awards, projects and reports. Do you feel like you could use some more PURE training? Please register your interest via an email to <jenny.ghabache@mq.edu.au>.
OUTREACH ACTIVITIES – Have you participated in an activity for Biology recently? Don’t forget to fill in the super-quick form here – ACCESS OUTREACH FORM HERE
Photo Competition – May 2018 – Enter to win a $100 Gift Card this month!
This month’s theme is COLOUR! Your images could be used on our Department website, this newsletter, on our social media and in other biology publications. A lucky person’s name will be drawn each month, and they will receive a $100 Gift Card! Criteria: you must provide caption information including details of what/where/who(names of people)/date & you must have taken all photos & the image was taken in the last five years. Please follow the dropbox file request link to submit your images. Submission close: 30 MAY 2018 You can enter as many photos as you like – one entry to the draw for each good photo, good luck!
Location-W (Fauna Park) Admin Support – Monday, Wednesday & Friday from 10am – 1pm in W19F
Deliveries – You will notice that we have placed a red “transfer Box” in W19F, put anything in this box that needs to be delivered to the E8 area location. We also have a red “Transfer Box” in E8B Level 2 location, which is for goods to betaken to the W location. These boxes will be emptied every Monday, Wednesday and Friday at 10am. Deliveries from the main “MQ” store will be delivered daily. Any questions please contact Sharyon O’Donnell.
Building Name Changes – Cheat Sheet – If you are trying to identify buildings on campus with new names or old names, please use this link to convert them from old to new or vice versa.
Correct Method for Submitting to Department Matters
Department Matters submissions now have their own email address. Please send all future submissions to the newsletter to <fse.bionewsletter@mq.edu.au>!
Also, please see the following to correctly format your additions, and keep them rolling in!
You may have noticed that we try to keep all the articles to the same format for the Department Matters, however, rest assured, they do NOT all turn up in this format! To help keep your Department Matters looking as good as possible, when sending in additions to the Newsletter, please try to keep these formatting guidelines in mind.
- Please write in third person. The information is coming from the Newsletter, not directly from you.
- Do not use fancy text formatting. Bold heading, normal text, and only italics or bold to highlight. No font size changes will make it through, sorry.
- If sending via email, set your email output to basic. HTML output will add all sort of formatting that will have to be removed before your article can go into the newsletter.
Keeping to these guidelines will streamline your article’s addition to the newsletter. Thank you.
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SUSTAINABILITY
Worm Castings and Juice Available for Your Home Garden – In the Biology courtyard (next to the fern bed) are our wonderful worm farms. This week we harvested some of the worm castings and emptied off the worm juice – which is a bit of a slurry. This stuff is full of nutrients and great mixed into the garden. The juice should be diluted approx 10:1, and the solids can make around 20% of the soils volume (more for vegie gardens). Please help yourself – BYO container.
Sustainability Survey – Surveys have been emailed, and hard copies are in place outside the Biology tearoom, and in the E8C ground floor foyer. Please help this department become more sustainable by having your say on what you think the priorities are. Write a post it note, place a tick, or email Samantha Newton <samantha.newton@mq.edu.au> with your feedback.
BLOGS AND OTHER THINGS OF INTEREST
Plant of the Week!
This week – Rhapis excelsa – the Lady Palm – has been successfully cultivated for aeons – so much so that no-one is really sure of its origins. The most likely scenario is that it was collected originally in south-eastern China, and plants were later taken to Japan as ornamentals, and subsequently to Europe.
“Someone put this nice pardalote nestbox up in my tree. I’ve found it very comfortable!”
Photo: David Edgecome
2018 Nikon Small World Competition – Entries for both Small World competitions can be uploaded directly to the MicroscopyU servers at the following URL: https://nikonsmallworld.magnet.fsu.edu/
New Publications
Abiotic and biotic predictors of macroecological patterns in bird and butterfly coloration
By: Dalrymple, Rhiannon L., Habacuc Flores‐Moreno, Darrell J. Kemp, Thomas E. White, Shawn W. Laffan, Frank A. Hemmings, Timothy D. Hitchcock, and Angela T. Moles. Ecological Monographs. | Find with Google Scholar »Relationship between brain plasticity, learning and foraging performance in honey bees
By: Cabirol, Amélie, Alex J. Cope, Andrew B. Barron, and Jean-Marc Devaud. PloS one 13, no. 4 (2018): e0196749. | Find with Google Scholar »How does a widespread reef coral maintain a population in an isolated environment?
By: Precoda, Kristin, Andrew H. Baird, Alisha Madsen, Toni Mizerek, Brigitte Sommer, Sheena N. Su, and Joshua S. Madin. Marine Ecology Progress Series 594 (2018): 85-94. | Find with Google Scholar »Behavioural divergence during biological invasions: a study of cane toads (Rhinella marina) from contrasting environments in Hawai’i
By: Gruber, Jodie, Gregory Brown, Martin J. Whiting, and Richard Shine. Royal Society Open Science 5, no. 4 (2018): 180197. | Find with Google Scholar »Epigenetic and genetic variation among three separate introductions of the house sparrow (Passer domesticus) into Australia
By: Sheldon, E. L., A. Schrey, S. C. Andrew, A. Ragsdale, and S. C. Griffith. Open Science 5, no. 4 (2018): 172185. | Find with Google Scholar »Sociality in Lizards
By: Whiting, M., and Geoffrey M. While. (2017). | Find with Google Scholar »In the Media
Vanessa Pirotta was mentioned on ABC Radio Perth
Vanessa Pirotta from the Department of Biological Sciences was mentioned on ABC Radio Perth regarding the FameLab finals which she won for her research into collecting whale blow samples using drones. See page 5 of the report.
Lizzy Lowe contributed to an article in The Conversation
Dr Lizzy Lowe from the Department of Biological Sciences contributed the article ‘The secret agents protecting our crops and gardens’ to The Conversation.