School of Ecosystem and Forest Sciences - Research Publications
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ItemAssessment of environmental flow scenarios using state-and-transition models(WILEY, 2018-08-01)
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ItemThe grass is greener on the other side: understanding the effects of green spaces on Twitter user sentiments(ACM Press, 2018)Green spaces are believed to improve the well-being of users in urban areas. While there are urban research exploring the emotional benefits of green spaces, these works are based on user surveys and case studies, which are typically small in scale, intrusive, time-intensive and costly. In contrast to earlier works, we utilize a non-intrusive methodology to understand green space effects at large-scale and in greater detail, via digital traces left by Twitter users. Using this methodology, we perform an empirical study on the effects of green spaces on user sentiments and emotions in Melbourne, Australia and our main findings are: (i) tweets in green spaces evoke more positive and less negative emotions, compared to those in urban areas; (ii) each season affects various emotion types differently; (iii) there are interesting changes in sentiments based on the hour, day and month that a tweet was posted; and (iv) negative sentiments are typically associated with large transport infrastructures such as train interchanges, major road junctions and railway tracks. The novelty of our study is the combination of psychological theory, alongside data collection and analysis techniques on a large-scale Twitter dataset, which overcomes the limitations of traditional methods in urban research.
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ItemNo Preview AvailableTrees provide energy saving benefits to adjacent buildings for a small water cost(Australian Sustainable Cities and Regions Network, 2011)
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ItemFurniture Production Efficiency in the Indonesian Context(International Conference on Wood Science and Technology, 2018-10-16)Most efficiency improvement strategies implemented in furniture manufacturing are data-driven methods. Due to a lack of production systems used in most Indonesian small and medium-sized furniture companies, the evaluation of production efficiency for future improvement seems rather difficult to perform. A wide range of existing evaluation tools and the varying capabilities of the companies to adapt the methods contribute to a problematic evaluation process. Research has been undertaken with the aim to develop a generic efficiency evaluation method and to prioritise a new potential metric to assess and control efficiency in furniture manufacturing. A basic production cost analysis with standardized variables has been demonstrated as a typical method to evaluate production efficiency in multi furniture companies, followed by applying a wood recovery assessment, a Pareto analysis, an X-Y matrix, and process capability analysis. The heartwood proportion of teak (Tectona grandis) has been determined as a key potential efficiency metric to control and monitor teak sawn board quality and its utilisation. Applying process capability analysis with a setting of lower specification limits to the population of teak heartwood rates produces a model to simulate optimal teak utilisation.
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ItemAchieving Long-Term Adhesion and Bondline Durability with difficult-to-bond Australian Hardwoods Species(Society of Wood Science and Technology, 2018-07-25)Australia has unique resources of native hardwoods producing a range of aesthetically and structurally attractive timbers suitable for high-strength structural applications and other products for internal and external applications. Amongst problems limiting broader hardwoods applications is their excessive susceptibility to hydrothermal movements in response to changes in the atmospheric moisture. This, in turn, produces excessive interfacial stresses between hardwood surface and glues, resulting in fast degradation of adhesion in products exposed to weathering. A range of Australian hardwood species also suffers from poor adhesion due to high bulk phenolic and surface lipophilic extractive content as well as high density. Research has been undertaken with the aim to improve the performance, durability, and designs flexibility of hardwood-based components for outdoor and indoor applications. The method relies on the application of eco-sustainable water-based formulations of functional polymer and chemical additives overcoming the impact of extractives and facilitating chemical bonding of designated connector chains to cellulose constituents. To date, results of adhesion bonding tests have demonstrated a significant increase in shear strength, wood failure, and durability compared to unmodified samples of Eucalyptus camaldulensis, Eucalyptus pilularis, and Eucalyptus regnans. The results could potentially facilitate the effective transformation of the housing and construction industry by targeting drastically increased use of hardwoods by the rapidly developing Australian prefabricated housing and construction industry.
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ItemEmergent landscapes: exploring social-ecological interdisciplinarity(School of Ecosystem and Forest Sciences, University of Melbourne, 2018)
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ItemThe Response of Silver Beet to Microwave Generated Biochar(International Microwave Po, 2017-06-23)
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ItemNo Preview AvailablePotential of wood welding for Australian Eucalypts(IUFRO, 2017)The wood welding potential of three commercial Australian hardwood species has been investigated with the aim of bringing this fast assembling technique to an efficient manufacturing process for the production of high-value wood products. Optimal linear and rotational wood welding parameters were determined for Eucalyptus saligna, Eucalyptus pilularis and Corymbia maculata and different joining methods. The optimized parameters for each selected species and welding process were determined using an adapted tensile or shear strength test. The results confirmed the importance of density in the optimization process where the grain direction proved to have a significant impact on the welded joint strength. Some other anatomical features also showed to affect the mechanical properties of the welded joints. Energy consumption measurements provided useful information while appearing as an interesting non-destructive method to assess the weldline quality. Limiting factors which could have implications for future commercial applications have also been identified as part of the present study. Overall, wood welding of Australian hardwood species could be a suitable alternative for non-structural indoor applications where gluing is usually required.
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