Research Projects
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Effectiveness of exercise intervention on improving psychological effects in prostate cancer patients (Old ID 22378)
This study aims to detemine whether implementing an exercise program for localised prostate cancer patients at the Townsville Cancer Centre will be an effective tool in reducing the side effects of treatment and improving mental health.
Differentiated care for improved health systems efficiency and health outcomes in Zambia (Efficient Health) (Old ID 22391)
Over the last decade, successful roll out of antiretroviral theraph (ART) for HIV infected individuals in Zambia has resulted in over 600,000 adults and children accessing treatment. However, continued scale-up of treatment services is severely straining already overburdened health centres and hospitals. Working with the Government of the Republic of Zambia, this project will conduct formative and operations research to build a body of evidence on the needs for preferences perceptions and feasibility of further decentralised, community-based ART services.
Effects of Ketogenic diet on transgenic animal models of schizophrenia (Old ID 22396)
The aim of this collaboration to take advantage of the converging interest of our laboratory and the laboratory of Prof. van den Buuse in preclinical animal models to develop better treatment for schizophrenia. I would like to extend my work by including new, otherwise unavailable, transgenic animal models and sophisticated behavioural analysis techniques to further develop ketogenic diet as a completely novel treatment modality for schizophrenia.
Environmental Water Knowledge and Research: Vegetation theme (Old ID 22787)
The Environmental Water Knowledge and Research Project is a five year, $10 million project to improve the science available to support environmental water management, and thereby contribute to achieving the Murray-Darling Basin Plan objectives.
Applying new technologies to enhance biosecurity and cattle quality. (Old ID 23456)
The vast natural environment of Northern Australia feeds the cattle industry; however, biosecurity threats have negatively impacted this. Conventional management of such threats such as weeds are not suited to such broad, harsh landscapes. The project will use an Internet of Things network with low-cost environmental sensors, drone mapping and big data analytics to develop and test data-driven, strategic pest management programs - ultimately improving both cattle industry and natural assets.
Technology Identification to Optimize Malaria Vector Surveillance (Old ID 23637)
The proposed investment will undertake an analysis of vector surveillance in priority elimination programs against recommended surveillance practices. This analysis will include evaluations of data, programmatic capacity and technical attributes of the surveillance systems currently in use by NMCPs of selected countries. This assessment will identify gaps/limitations and constraints that impede present surveillance programs from achieving the implementation of best practices.
Northern Australia Health Service Delivery Situation Analysis (Old ID 26543)
This project will identify key challenges and opportunities facing the northern Australian health service delivery sector and explore potential developmental scenarios and/or identify the most strategic research projects and development priorities for further investment. This will include but not be limited to infrastructure, clinical issues, policy, new models of care, investment, knowledge, training and human capital gaps and the research or alternative solutions to address them. This report will provide recommendations in all key areas identified to provide a better environment for growth and development on the northern Australian health service delivery sector.
Blue carbon and cane land restoration methods development (Old ID 26857)
The Project seeks to advance the development of a blue carbon methodology under the Australian government’s emissions reduction fund, by undertaking a project to restore tidal connectivity and wetlands in a selected catchment. The Project team will collect baseline data (GHG emissions, carbon storage, water quality and biodiversity) to inform the blue carbon methodology and undertake post-restoration assessments to quantify carbon and co-benefits arising from the restoration. The Project also seeks to undertake terrestrial restoration on a small section of low productivity farmland, to quantify whether there is a business case for land use change to carbon farming in an intensive farming environment. The Project will then support the farmer/s within the Project boundary to transition to best management practice agriculture, and to quantify whether this transition satisfactorily offsets land taken out of production for the i) wetland restoration and ii) terrestrial revegetation undertaken.
Reef Restoration and Adaptation –Regulatory and Policy Environment (Old ID 27114)
The existing regulatory and policy frameworks have originally been designed as part of the conventional approach to reef management. As such, they are not entirely fit for purpose to address unconventional technological interventions for reef restoration and adaptation. These interventions, given their innovative and emerging nature, challenge existing regulatory frameworks to address novel risks and impacts and make decisions based on information with relatively high levels of uncertainty. Critical to the feasibility and viability of RRAP R&D programs is, therefore, an enabling regulatory environment that can effectively and timely assess the range of risks and impacts associated with unconventional reef restoration and adaptation interventions. In this context, the objectives of this project are to: (i) Investigate the capacity of the existing regulatory and policy frameworks to address R&D and deployment of RRAP interventions (ii) Scope which interventions are permitted and under what conditions (e.g., scale, location and timing) with the aim to inform the R&D programs (iii) Help enhance the capacity of the regulatory system to assess the range of risks and impacts associated with R&D and deployment of interventions
Research capacity building for control of neglected tropical diseases: A path for sustainable societies on the tropics (Old ID 27483)
The international community has pledged through the Sustainable Development Goals to eliminate neglected tropical diseases (NTDs) by 2030. NTDs are distributed in several regions in the world, including Oceania and The Americas, and are estimated to affect close to 2 billion people. Guatemala and Queensland, Australia share similar ecological and tropical environments that enhances their susceptibility to epidemics caused by NTDs, particularly considering the effect of climate change. The Universidad del Valle de Guatemala (UVG) and James Cook University (JCU) will conduct a project to build NTDs data analysis capacity and support the efforts of early and middle career researchers to conduct collaborative research in Australia and Guatemala. The project consists of a mixture of online workshops and online research meetings.
