In Brief

Volume 6 Number 8 August 9 - September 12 2010

VCAM

The University of Melbourne has moved to secure the future of visual and performing arts programs at the University by endorsing the recommendations of a review of the Faculty of the VCA and Music.

The University’s response to the comprehensive May review by Dr Ziggy Switkowski followed extensive consideration by a steering committee led by the Vice-Chancellor, with input from the Faculty itself and consultation with the VCA Integration Committee.

The University endorsed the review’s recommendation that VCAM continue as a single faculty, but comprise two discrete parts to be known initially as the VCA and the Melbourne Conservatorium of Music. Each part will be led by a Director, which will be a new position reporting to the Dean.

The response also endorsed the committee’s recommendations on the future curriculum of the Faculty. These include suspending the proposed introduction of the Melbourne Model for the visual and performing arts disciplines based at the Southbank campus, pending a review of curriculum.

Research

Australian scientists have identified the behaviour of the mutant protein ‘huntingtin’ which leads to the fatal Huntington’s disease, providing potential targets to treat the disease, a University of Melbourne study reveals.

Huntington’s disease is a genetic disease with no cure, characterised by a steady decline in motor control and the dysfunction and death of brain cells. The cause of the disease has long baffled scientists.

Symptoms tend to first appear when the person is in their 30s or 40s. The most common symptom is jerky movements of the arms and legs. A person with Huntington’s disease may also have difficulties with speech, swallowing and concentration.

Using state-of-the-art technology, Dr Danny Hatters and his colleagues at the University of Melbourne’s Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at the Bio 21 Institute observed how human mutant ‘huntingtin’ proteins form into large clumps, which kill brain cells and lead to progressed Huntington’s disease.

Heads

The University of Melbourne has appointed two senior staff to help lead the Faculty of the VCA and Music, following the University’s response last week to the Switkowski review.

Associate Professor Su Baker is Director, VCA, and Professor Gary McPherson is Director, Melbourne Conservatorium.

Associate Professor Baker has been Head of the School of Art at the VCA for 10 years; she exhibits at the John Buckley Gallery and is highly regarded in research in the creative arts.

Professor McPherson has occupied senior music roles in major universities in the USA, Hong Kong and New South Wales, and has been the Melbourne University Ormond Professor of Music for the past 12 months.

The University will begin an international search for a new Dean shortly, and will aim to have the successful candidate in place by the start of 2011.  

In the meantime, Deputy Vice-Chancellor (University Affairs) Professor Warren Bebbington will be Acting Dean.

Science

Inspiring the next generation of scientists will be the focus of an innovative education initiative – a science sub-school located at the University of Melbourne, with $7million in funding announced by the Victorian Minister for Education, Ms Bronwyn Pike.

The science sub-school is a partnership between the Victorian Government, the University of Melbourne, led by the Bio21 Institute and the Melbourne Graduate School of Education, University High School and Debney Park Secondary College.

Year 11 and 12 students from University High and Debney Park Secondary College will have access to state-of-the-art facilities at the new sub-school and will gain exposure to an environment that fosters interest in science.

Professor Field Rickards, the Dean of the Melbourne Graduate School of Education, says developments in science are taking place faster than the ability of the education system to respond.

He said the purpose-built science teaching facilities will enhance science education by delivering up-to-date science curriculum and providing students with access to scientists as mentors.

Aviation

A world first model for predicting fluid flows close to surfaces will enable engineers to reduce drag in vehicles, and in turn, lead to more efficient and greener planes, cars and boats, according to a University of Melbourne study.

Research team leader and Federation Fellow Professor Ivan Marusic from the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Melbourne says skin-friction drag accounts for 50 per cent of fuel expenditure in aircraft, so even modest reductions in drag would save money and significantly reduce carbon emissions.

Professor Marusic says that when air flows over a surface, skin friction drag is created. Most of this drag is a result of the chaotic and unpredictable nature of the boundary layer – the layer immediately between the object and the airflow. Greater knowledge of how this air flows over a surface will provide engineers with more detailed information about resistance.

The findings, which were published in Science in July could also assist meteorologists in making more accurate weather predictions, and even improve a cyclist’s lap time. 

Workplaces

Professional women in their 30s are opting out of full-time work at an alarmingly high rate.

Only 38 per cent of Generation X, tertiary qualified women participating in a long-running University of Melbourne study work full-time, compared with 90 per cent of Generation X, tertiary qualified men.

The findings are among the latest to emerge from Life Patterns, Australia’s longest running study of the lives of young people.