BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES DEPARTMENT MATTERS | November 18, 2019

Dear all,

As you all know, there are lots of things happening at MQ at the moment – we are certainly in a period of uncertainty and change. I encourage you to go along to the VC’s Town Hall this week (20 Nov) and the DVC-Research Town Hall meeting next week (Tuesday 26 Nov) to find out more and ask any questions you may have.

I wish all our finalists in the MQ Excellence awards for academic and professional staff the best of luck  – you are all winners! The award ceremonies are this week.

Don’t forget that this week we will be launching Dick Frankham’s latest book at a special morning tea in the Biology tearoom on Wednesday – please join us for a great celebration of this achievement.

And on Thursday we will have another special morning tea to wish our Department Manager Sharyon O’Donnell all the best – she will be on leave until March next year while she recovers from a spine operation.

Meanwhile good luck to all our exam markers and assessment graders – it will all culminate at the department exam meeting Dec 3rd followed by the end-of-year celebration! Book your holidays now!

cheers

Michelle

Save the Date

This week 18th – 22nd November

Mon 18th – Fri 22nd: Writing Boot Camp – to give HDR students a block of time to work on writing; all week; on campus (TBC).

Mon 18th: MQ Excellence Awards (Academic staff); Graduation Hall 3-5pm

Wed 20th: MQ Excellence Awards (Professional staff); The Incubator 1-3pm

Wed 20th: Book Launch Morning Tea for Frankham et al’s Latest Work; 10.30 – 12pm; 14EAR-280 (Biology Tea Room).

Thur 21st: Department morning tea to wish Sharyon well; 10.30am Biology tearoom.

Following week  25th – 29th November

Tue 26th: DVCR Weather Report 2019; 3 – 4pm; Macquarie Theatre, 21 Wally’s Walk. Register here.

Wed 27th: Department Morning Tea; 10.30 – 11am; 14EAR-280 (Biology Tea Room).

Thu 28th: AARGH: R-Users Group (RUG) Help Session; 3.30 – 5.30pm; Continuum Room (75 Talavera Road, room 3114).

Thu 28th: Biology Social Club; 5.00 – 7.00pm; Biology Courtyard.

Weekly Events

Wed: Shut up and Write Sessions; 11.00am – 12.00pm; 6WW(E8C)-212 or 14EAR(E8A)-360A.

Thu: Venture Café; 3–8pm; 58 Waterloo Road, Macquarie Park, NSW (map). Find out what is on each week here – https://venturecafesydney.org/

Fri: Writing Workshops with Prof Ken Cheng – to support HDRs and ECRs with scientific writing; 2 – 4pm; Ken’s office at 205b Culloden Road, G12.

Fri: Behaviour and Evolution Journal Club; Friday at 12:30pm (bring your lunch); 205B Culloden Rd Boardroom.

Weekly Biological Sciences seminar program is here

Future Events

Dec 3rd: Department Formal Exam Meeting followed by

Dec 3rd: End-of-Year Party; 12:30PM – 4:00PM 205B Culloden Rd (RSVP to Calli Miller).

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Dec 5th: Department Research Retreat for Academic Staff.

General News and Announcements

Congratulations –  Julianna Kadar, PhD student from The Fish Lab, has been accepted into the Homeward Bound Program – a leadership and strategy program for women in STEMM that culminates in a voyage to Antarctica in November 2020. Check out her fundraising campaign and video to learn more about the program and support and share in any way that you can. If you know of any individuals or companies that might be interested in sponsoring women in STEMM, diversity in the STEMM fields, climate action, sustainable practices and/or shark and marine research please let Julianna know! She is always looking for leads to follow up.

Email: <julianna-piroska.kadar@hdr.mq.edu.au>.

https://ignite.mq.edu.au/p/juliannasjourney/

More congratulations…

This time to Rachael Gallagher who has been promoted to Senior Lecturer in the latest promotion round – well done!

DVCR Weather Report 2019 – Professor Sakkie Pretorius, Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research) invites you to this presentation. He will provide an update on Macquarie University’s research excellence, engagement and impact in 2019. In particular, he will be sharing some insights and strategies based on Macquarie’s results from the 2018 Excellence in Research Australia and Engagement and Impact exercises.

Looking to the future, he will talk about initiatives in our research pipeline that will shape the future of research at Macquarie University.

WHEN – Tuesday, 26 November, 2019, 3.00 pm – 4.00 pm.

WHERE -Macquarie Theatre – 21 Wally’s Walk.

RSVP – Friday, 22 November, 2019.

REGISTER NOW

Teaching in Vertebrate Physiology 2020

The department is seeking applications for sessional teaching in Advanced Physiology in S1. This includes convening, lectures, pracs and assessment grading. Please send an expression of interest and a short CV to fse.biol-hod@mq.edu.au by 9 December 2019.

International University Staff Appeal to End Police Violence on University Campuses in Hong Kong – You may be aware of the escalating unrest in Hong Kong, however you may not be aware that the violence has now entered university campuses; at CUHK over 1000 bullets and tear gas have been used.

Please consider signing the letter from international academics calling for police to not infiltrate and bring violence into university campuses.
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSehVEvi5T0HllCRSIWAKQ5ygXbh2GnWE_2BpOtJIPoyJikOew/viewform?fbclid=IwAR39LPimhLeBV6iYiMhZRQryJLM4VdARNXRLJExR92Zor_3pTCJ14T0HsEo

Plant of the Week -click the thumbnails for larger images-

This week, Everlasting Daisy.

The Golden Everlasting Daisy,  Xerochrysum bracteatum which occurs in all states and territories of Australia,  was introduced to England as a garden plant in 1791. Now we see a great range of different flower colours
as a result of plant breeding in Germany from 1851.

Lunchtime Litter Collection – The days may be cooler, but they’re also clear and sunny. Lunchtime is a great time to go for a walk and get some vitamin D! It’s also a great time to join the Biology Litter Collection competition! The next event will be Tuesday 10th December, 1pm. Meet in the Biology courtyard, bring a bucket or bag if you can.

We’ll be holding events throughout the rest of the year, every few weeks. At each event you go out to collect litter, between 1 and 1:30pm. Collections will be assessed at the end of each collection and gold stars awarded accordingly. Event results are tallied at the end of the year with a prize for the best collector.

Event dates: Tues 10th December.

OPPORTUNITIES

Volunteers Wanted – The National Herbarium of NSW is imaging its 1.4 million specimens ahead of its move to the Australian Botanical Garden, Mt Annan in April 2021. This is the first project of this scale to happen in the Southern Hemisphere.

And they NEED YOUR HELP!

By volunteering you will have the opportunity to see their incredible collection up close and meet expert plant scientists. There are two sessions per weekday (morning and afternoon). Each session runs for three hours.

If you would like to help and gain valuable experience, please contact Floret Meredith <floret.meredith@bgcp.nsw.gov.au> with your availability.

Research on Plant-Pollinator Relationships – opportunities for involvement as student, volunteer or collaborator, with field trips scheduled to Port Macquarie during Nov/Dec 2019 and Jan 2020. If interested, please contact Professor Graham Pyke at <Graham.Pyke@mq.edu.au>.

For more details, please consult this word document

eFLOWER Summer School Down Under – Royal Botanic Garden Sydney and UNSW, Australia; 1-10 April 2020.
Applications are now open for the eFLOWER Summer School Down Under to be held at the Royal Botanic Garden Sydney and the University of New South Wales (Australia) from 1 to 10 April 2020. The goal of the eFLOWER Summer School Down Under will be to deliver high-quality training in the modern comparative methods used to study plant macroevolution, while at the same time offering the students the opportunity to contribute to future targets of the eFLOWER project.

For all details about this event, please see the RBG’s webpage: https://www.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/eflowerdownunder.

SEMINARS AND WORKSHOPS

AARGH: R-Users Group (RUG) Help Session – Do you have a problem with data analysis? You might want to give R a go which is a fantastic analytical and plotting tool. For all your R-related queries, drop by the ‘Ask An R Geek for Help’ (aaRgh) session where you can get one-on-one assistance. Or just come by, have some tea, and work on your code. For more details, visit https://github.com/mqRusers.

Date: November 28th, 2019. Time: 3:30 PM to 5:30 PM. Venue: Continuum Room (75 Talavera Road, room 3114). There will be snacks and beverages (BYO mug).

If you’re unable to attend a help session and would like some help from the MQ R user group community – try posting your problem on our Talkyard page! This follows a stack-exchange format and anyone can post questions and answers – all questions across all platforms are permitted as long as they’re about data/stats.
Sign up and follow the discussion here:  https://mq-data-advice.talkyard.net

Calling all ecologists, geographers or remote-sensing researchers to attend the x-sensing conference in November!
When: Workshop, 22th Nov – 26th Nov; Conference 27th – 29th Nov

Where: National Marine Science Centre, Coffs Harbour

What: The ‘cross-sensing’ conference aims to unite scientists from diverse fields with industry professionals and experts in artificial intelligence. The week-long meeting is divided into two parts: a 2-day training workshop and a 3-day cross-disciplinary conference centred on a hack day.
Although the meeting has a technical focus, many of the tutorials and the hack-day are designed to appeal to non-coders too. We have some specialists from NVIDIA coming to teach us about their point-and-click machine learning software, which they say can be used by anyone. There will be plenty of technical expertise at the conference and hack-day, but we also need researchers who bring challenges and domain knowledge to define projects.
For more information, please visit http://x-sensing.net or get in touch with Dr Cormac Purcell <cormac.purcell@mq.edu.au>.

Shut Up and Write Sessions – every Wednesday 11am. It’s pretty simple, we shut up… and we write. Using the pomodoro technique we’ll meet at 11am to write, stop 25 minutes in for a 10 min break, then settle down again for another 25 minutes of writing. You’ll be amazed how productive you can be. More details on the concept here: https://thesiswhisperer.com/shut-up-and-write/

Room will be either 6WW(E8C)-212 or 14EAR(E8A)-360A, email <lizzy.lowe@mq.edu.au> to confirm or with any questions.

All welcome!

Venture Café – Want to know more about innovation, and how to achieve it? Come along to the Venture Cafe, Thursday, 3pm – 8pm, 58 Waterloo Road, Macquarie Park, NSW (map). Find out what is on each week here – https://venturecafesydney.org/

This week: 3.00pm: Cleantech Innovation; 3.30pm: Interactive: Play the Polynize Innovation Boardgame; 4.30pm: Info Session: EngerLab’s Scaleup Program; 5.00pm: Interactive: Play the Polynize Innovation Boardgame!; 5.00pm: Workshop: Applying the Future-Fit Business Benchmark; 6.30pm: Interactive: Play the Polynize Innovation Boardgame!; 7.00pm: Fireside Chat: Australia, a Global Cleantech Sandbox; 7.30pm: Live from Venture Cafe Tokyo – Realities of Energy Markets.

Wildlife at the Watering Hole – 3rd Tuesday of each month, 6:30pm @ Botany View Hotel, King St Newtown!

Events from AINSE (The Australian Institue of Nuclear Science and Engineering)

ANSTO Industry Foundations Scholarship – Applications now open (deadline 22 November 2019). More information ANSTO’s website.

International Youth Nuclear Congress (IYNC) 2020 (8-13 March 2020) – Call for Abstracts now open (deadline 15 November 2019). More information IYNC2020 website.

32nd Australian Colloid and Surface Science Student Conference (28-31 January 2020) – Call for Abstracts now open (deadline 15 November 2019). More information on the conference website.

Australian X-ray Analytical Association (AXAA) 2020 Conference & Exhibition (29 April – 1 May 2020) – Call for Abstracts now open (deadline 29 November 2019). For more information, please visit the conference website.

HDR NEWS AND OPPORTUNITIES

Writing Boot Camp – Date/Time: Monday 18th- Friday 22nd November; all week. Venue: on campus (TBC). Suitable for: HDR students who have already completed analysis for a manuscript/chapter, and have discussed with the supervisor the intended direction of the work, and have a target journal in mind.

This boot camp is designed to give you a block of time to work on writing. Help (including from your peers) will be available on writing structure, but this is NOT an introduction to writing, NOR will there be help with analysis. The idea is that you arrive with an idea for the manuscript and the analyses done, and that you will write the whole first draft in the week of the Boot Camp.

Space be available for ~12 students, so if you are interested and committed, please contact Simon: <simon.griffith@mq.edu.au>. Some meals will be provided.

Research Enrichment Program (REP) Workshop Series – The Department now has a fully fledged research enrichment program for 2019 – you can find out about upcoming workshops here (click on this PDF). All HDR students are encouraged to attend several of these workshops each year to develop their skills and track record for the post-PhD world. Supervisors please encourage your students!

PhD Students: got a grant? Dept. will co-fund up to $1500 – The Department would like to encourage students to seek external sources of funding, and has a small budget with which to support successful candidates.New limits from 2019:PhD students ONLY: Dept. will match up to $1500 of external (non-MQ) funding ONCE during the student’s candidature.

If you have received a grant (student as chief investigator) and wish to request co-funding, please forward a copy of the award letter to <sharyon.odonnell@mq.edu.au> and <wenjing.wang@mq.edu.au>.

Are You a HDR Student? Need Help with Writing? HDR Mentors in collaboration with HDR Learning Skills is running another round of Peer Writing Assistance (PWA) for the rest of the year! This program is designed to support MRES and HDR candidates in managing thesis writing and research-related concerns. All peer writing assistants have undergone training for their role and are current PhD candidates at Macquarie.
The PWA program is based on the principle of collaborative learning in which a more experienced research student helps you develop stronger academic and research skills. Peer Writing Assistants are not teachers. Rather, they are trained to function as a ‘friendly audience’ or ‘fresh pair of eyes’ to help you gain new perspectives on your writing or research ideas.
Registrations are now open for individual consultation bookings. If you are interested, please go to book in for a 45-minute session with a PWA here.

And:

Writing Workshops – Convened by Ken Cheng, running weekly for most of the year: Fridays 2-4pm in Ken’s office at 205b Culloden Road, G12.
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

Department Meeting (Nov) 2019 – PowerPoint slides.

The Department’s Annual Report 2018 is now published and available here. It is packed full of news and events and showcases our people and achievements for the year. A cracker of a read! It will be available on the website very soon, so please pass on to your networks, colleagues and friends.

Need to Contact the Biology Admin Team via Email? Please send your email to <fse.bio-adm@mq.edu.au> or drop in and see us. The old google group (sci.bio-adm) email no longer works, if you have this email as a remembered address please delete.

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

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.

THIS AND THAT

Free to a Good Home from the Downing Herbarium – If anyone is in need of a small trolley (see photos) and/or oil heater (photo), please feel free to collect from the Downing Herbarium. Items are no longer needed in the herbarium. Contact Karen Marais <karen.marais@mq.edu.au> or call x8231 for more info.</karen.marais@mq.edu.au>

Weekly Fruit and Harvest Hub – The fruit you’ve been eating in department gatherings has been coming from Harvest Hub for the last few years. Harvest Hub has now closed and moved to a new arrangement called Box Divvy. The new arrangement doesn’t suit us so we will trial a few different fruit providers over the next couple of months. If you have any feedback on what you like and what you don’t, please email your comments to <samantha.newton@mq.edu.au>.

Box Divvy – You might be interested in signing up to Box Divvy for your home fruit and veg orders. https://www.boxdivvy.com/

What is Box Divvy? Harvest Hub has worked closely with NSW Health, Western Sydney Diabetes Alliance and various councils to re-develop Harvest Hub into an ordering platform that provides fresh, local produce that is easy to access anywhere, affordable to anyone regardless of income, and is easy to use.

The Benefits

• Reduce your food bill by 40% compared with regular retail
• Same quality produce and range as Harvest Hub, but even fresher as direct
• Growers are getting paid a fair price for their produce: 65c in every dollar you spend goes back to the farmers and food producers, and they get paid on order. (Supermarkets pay around 35c in the dollar, and usually pay after 30-60 days).
• A growing range of grocery products, and next year: dairy, sustainable seafood and meat
• Minimal packaging
• A 90% reduction in carbon emissions compared with supermarkets

How Does It Work? Box Divvy is a box-sharing App – everything that is supplied to the Hub is in wholesale-size quantities to the Hub to share but it’s shared through the App between those members wanting that particular item: a 10kg box of tomatoes or cucumbers; Groceries are about to change in the way they are sold so it will be a total minimum spend for the whole Hub – you can pick and choose with these.

Correct Method for Submitting to Department Matters

Department Matters submissions now have their own email address. Please send all your news items for 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.

1. Please write in third person. The information is coming from the Newsletter, not directly from you.
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Keeping to these guidelines will streamline your article’s addition to the newsletter. Thank you.

Have You Missed Out on an Issue of Department Matters? Back issues can be found at this newsletter archive link for your reading pleasure.

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