What's On at UWA

In this workshop, we will explore methods and models for forecasting time series. Topics to be covered include seasonality and trends, exponential smoothing, ARIMA modelling, dynamic regression and state space models, as well as forecast accuracy methods and forecast evaluation techniques such as cross-validation. The workshop will involve a mixture of lectures and practical sessions using R.

Workshop participants will be assumed to be familiar with basic statistical tools such as multiple regression and maximum likelihood estimation, but no knowledge of time series or forecasting will be assumed. Some prior experience in R is desirable.

UWA Postgraduate Research students receive subsidised fees.

iVEC’s Supercomputing Team invites you to join them at iVEC@UWA for “Profiling Party IV”. The Profiling Party is from 9:00 am – 4:00 pm, but you are welcome to take part at any time during the day.

This is an opportunity to spend a day with iVEC Supercomputing team members and work on your own applications. The agenda will be defined around the issues you are encountering. Possible topics could include:

- Profiling your code — finding hotspots and bottlenecks

- Loop optimisation

- Generating and understanding compiler feedback

- Improving your HPC workflow

- Resolving batch system questions

- Getting the most from iVEC resources

If you’re interested in one-on-one interaction with the Supercomputing team to help you get more from the iVEC resources, or if you’re just beginning and not sure where to start, let us help. No issue is too small!

Space is limited!

Please contact Brian Skjerven with an idea of what you would like to work on and if possible what time you would like to attend.

John Bamberg (UWA)

will speak on

A geometric proof of Wedderburn's Theorem

at 3pm Friday 26 September in Weatherburn Lecture Theatre.

Abstract:

J. H. Maclagan-Wedderburn (1905) exploited the interplay between a finite division ring and its group of units to prove that a finite division ring is commutative (and hence a field). One of the most well-known applications of this result is that a finite projective plane is Desarguesian if and only if it is Pappian. It is perhaps not as well-known that Wedderburn's Theorem also implies the Dandelin-Galluci Theorem for finite projective 3-spaces. In joint work with Tim Penttila, the Dandelin-Galluci Theorem plays the central role in a proof of Wedderburn's Theorem, thus completing Beniamino Segre's dream of developing a proof of Wedderburn's Theorem that is truly geometric.

This course is aimed at anyone wishing to improve their survey questionnaires. This course is useful for both people new to questionnaire design and those who have experience and would like to extend their knowledge. It will be a benefit not only for people who anticipate designing a questionnaire in the future, but for those in the role of critiquing commissioned or existing research.

UWA Postgraduate Research students receive subsidised fees.

There will be refreshments before the seminar, at 2:40pm in the common room.

Cheryl Praeger (UWA)

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Simple group factorisations and applications

at 3pm Friday 3 October in Weatherburn Lecture Theatre.

Abstract:

Factorisations of the finite simple groups yield important information about their subgroup structure. Moreover, a group factorisation of the form G=AB with A, B proper subgroups, has at least two useful interpretations when studying symmetric structures, such as graphs or designs. For example, if G is a given group of automorphisms acting transitively with stabiliser B, then the factorisation G=AB reveals that A is a proper transitive subgroup. If in addition A and B have trivial intersection then the points of the graph or design may be identified with elements of A. For the second interpretation, A may be a known transitive automorphism group of a graph or design, and then factorisations G=AB (or their absence) can help to determine the full automorphism group. The lecture will survey results about simple group factorisations and how they can be used. A complete classification of simple group factorisations is as yet beyond our reach.

St George's College will throw open its doors for everyone to visit, explore and discover what life is like in the 'castle'! In conjunction with Open Gardens Australia the day will feature building and garden tours, a variety of musical performances, extensive art exhibition (including works by Jarrad Seng and John Ogburn), poetry readings, recitals of Randolph Stow works, food and beverages also available for purchase.

A live broadcast will also be held at the College of the 720 ABC James Lush program and the "Roots and Shoots" segment with Sabrina Hahn. Everyone is welcome to attend the broadcast from 8.30 am until 10.00 am.

An entry fee will be applicable from 10.00 am onwards of $8.00 per person (under 18 are free of charge). The monies raised will go towards our Scholarship Fund.

Come along and enjoy the beautiful spring day at St George's College.

Professor Terry Speed is a Senior Principal Research Scientist and lab head in the Bioinformatics Division of the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research. He is recognised as one of the world's leaders in the relatively new field of bioinformatics. He has more than 40 years of experience in statistics, specialising in the design and analysis of studies in genetics and genomics. A fellow of the Australian Academy of Sciences, Professor Speed was recently elected as a fellow of the Royal Society of London, and in 2013 he was awarded the Australian Prime Minister's Prize for Science.

The External RNA Control Consortium (ERCC) developed a set of 92 synthetic polyadenylated RNA standards that mimic natural eukaryotic mRNA. The standards are designed to have a wide range of lengths (250-2,000 nucleotides) and GC-contents (5-51%). The ERCC standards can be spiked into RNA at various concentrations prior to the library preparation step and serve as negative and positive controls in RNA-Seq. Ambion commercialises spike-in control mixes, ERCC ExFold RNA Spike-in Control Mix 1 and 2, each containing the same set of 92 standards, but at different concentrations. We investigate the use of the ERCC spike-in controls for two main purposes: (a) Quality assessment/quality control (QA/QC) of RNA-Seq data and benchmarking of normalisation and differential expression (DE) methods, and (b) Direct inclusion in between-sample normalisation procedures. We have two RNA-seq data sets which make use of the ERCC controls: a local one concerning treated and untreated zebrafish tissue, and some of the SEQC samples. A variety of normalisation methods will be compared, both using and not using the ERCC controls. One of the methods we discuss is a variant on our recently published RUV-2 method, which uses SVD on negative controls.

This event is free and no RSVP required.

A public lecture by Terry Speed, Professor of Bioinformatics, Walter & Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research.

Scientists have now mapped the human genome - the next frontier is understanding human epigenomes; the ‘instructions’ which tell the DNA whether to make skin cells or blood cells or other body parts. Apart from a few exceptions, the DNA sequence of an organism is the same whatever cell is considered. So why are the blood, nerve, skin and muscle cells so different and what mechanism is employed to create this difference? The answer lies in epigenetics. If we compare the genome sequence to text, the epigenome is the punctuation and shows how the DNA should be read. Advances in DNA sequencing in the last five years have allowed large amounts of DNA sequence data to be compiled. For every single reference human genome, there will be literally hundreds of reference epigenomes, and their analysis could occupy biologists, bioinformaticians and biostatisticians for some time to come.

This lecture is presented by the Australian Mathematical Sciences Institute, The Statistical Society of Australia and the UWA Institute of Advanced Studies.

Professor Speed will be touring the Australia as the 2014 AMSI-SSAI Lecturer.

Cost: Free, but RSVP required via http://www.ias.uwa.edu.au/lectures/speed

Gabriel Verret (UWA)

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Vertex-transitive graphs with large automorphism groups: a potpourri

at 3pm Friday 10 October in Weatherburn Lecture Theatre.

Abstract:

I would like to understand connected vertex-transitive graphs which have "large" automorphism groups (with respect to their order and valency). I'll discuss a few approaches that have been used successfully to approach this problem as well as some new potential directions.

Martin Liebeck (Imperial College)

will speak on

Magic words

at 3pm Friday 17 October in Weatherburn Lecture Theatre.

Abstract:

A word map on a group G is a map sending (g_1,...,g_k) to w(g_1,...,g_k), where w is a fixed word in k variables. For example, the commutator map and power maps are word maps. I shall discuss various questions about word maps, such as surjectivity and distribution of values, with particular emphasis on simple groups.

Missed out on the Postgrad & Honours Expo? Come along to the Business School foyer between 1pm and 2pm to meet staff from faculties across UWA. Have your questions about postgraduate studies answered and grab some free pizza!

FREE PIZZA! Missed out on the Postgrad & Honours Expo? Don't worry. 9 faculties come together in a mini expo in the Business School foyer to promote postgraduate and honours courses. We're here to answer any questions you may have.

Guang Rao (UWA)

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Self-complementary vertex-transitive graphs

at 3pm Friday 24 October in Weatherburn Lecture Theatre.

Abstract:

A graph is self-complementary if the graph and its complement are isomorphic. In this talk I will present the main results from my PhD project.

Presenter: Associate Professor Peter McEvoy

Associate Professor Peter McEvoy completed his masters in clinical psychology and PhD in the School of Psychology at UWA in 2004, after which he worked as a clinical psychologist and service co-ordinator at the Anxiety Disorders Unit, St Vincent’s Hospital, Sydney for four years. After he returned to Perth in 2008 he worked as a senior clinical psychologist and research co-ordinator in the anxiety and depression program at the Centre for Clinical Interventions (CCI) for six years. Over the last decade he has personally run around 80 therapeutic groups for various anxiety and affective disorders whilst maintaining an individual caseload and squeezing in research projects where possible. In February 2014 Peter commenced a teaching and research position in the School of Psychology and Speech Pathology at Curtin University, although he maintains an ongoing consultancy with CCI. Peter teaches the adult psychopathology and psychotherapy units in the clinical Masters program, he has published around 50 journal articles and book chapters in the areas of mental disorders and their treatment, and he has served on the editorial board of the Journal of Anxiety Disorders since 2008.

Title: Targeting transdiagnostic processes and using imagery to optimise clinical outcomes from cognitive behaviour group therapy for anxiety disorders

Abstract

Cognitive behavioural interventions are highly efficacious and effective for emotional disorders, and yet a significant proportion of patients fail to achieve full remission of their symptoms after gold-standard treatments. A significant minority of patients in clinical practice also find exposure-based techniques highly distressing, leading to high attrition rates in real world practice. Evidence-based clinical innovations are required to further improve engagement with, and the potency of, existing treatments. This presentation will describe two parallel programs of research being conducted at the Centre for Clinical Interventions to meet these aims. The first research program involves an intervention targeting a key transdiagnostic factor known to contribute to multiple emotional disorders, namely, repetitive negative thinking (RNT). A 6-week, transdiagnostic metacognitive group treatment for RNT will be described and initial outcomes will be reported. The second research program involves modifying the mode within which cognitive therapy is applied to potentiate greater emotional change. A new, innovative imagery-enhanced 12-week group program for social anxiety disorder will be described and outcomes will be reported. Both of these programs have demonstrated high retention rates, huge effect sizes (ds >2.0), and an improvement compared to gold standard treatments reported in the literature in terms of efficiency and effectiveness.

Critical aspects of structure and function of the cell nucleus are often inaccessible to wide field and confocal imaging. Higher order chromatin structures, subnuclear bodies, repair foci etc., cannot be imaged in detail without applying 'super-resolution' techniques. A new approach to imaging chromatin in situ has become possible by exploiting photoconversion of UV-excited DNA dyes Hoechst 33258, DAPI, and Vybrant® DyeCycle™ Violet. Single Molecule Localization Microscopy (SMLM) is based on using two wavelengths of light - one for regeneration of the pool of the blinking form of the dye, and the other for excitation, or just one high intensity excitation light to transfer the dye between the emitting and non-emitting states. SMLM enables optical isolation and localization of high numbers of DNA-bound molecules, usually in excess of 106 in one cell nucleus. This approach yields images of DNA density with the resolution several times better than conventional optical microscopy, reaching 40 - 50 nm in the specimen plane, and offers several important advantages over the previously described imaging methods, including an ability to record images using a single wavelength excitation of a relatively low intensity, and a higher density of single molecule signals than in previous studies. High resolution images (SMLM, dSTORM, SIM) of chromatin based on phototonversion of UV-excited DNA dyes were combined with images representing scheduled and unscheduled DNA replication (EdU, click reaction), histone H2AX phosphorylation (marking DNA double strand breaks), and XRCC1 repair factor (single strand breaks) in order to study the mechanisms of induction of DNA damage and repair.

UWA Staff Sports Fun Day is a day on campus for staff and postgraduate students to get together and participate in sport and activity. This year's theme is Brazil - be loud, be colourful and join in - up to 1000 participants expected throughout the day.

Get Involved: Contact your Team Coordinator now!

Contacts: Phone: 6488 2281 Web: uwa.edu.au/sportsday Email: [email protected]

Michael Giudici (UWA)

will speak on

Commuting graphs

at 3pm Friday 7 November in Mathematics Lecture Room 1.

Abstract:

Given a group G, the commuting graph of G is the graph with vertices the noncentral elements of G, and two vertices are adjacent if and only if they commute. Commuting graphs of other algebraic structures can be defined similarly. Commuting graphs of groups have received a lot of attention in recent years. I will discuss some recent results about the structure of such graphs, and in particular their diameter and which graphs can be the commuting graphs of groups and other algebraic structures.

R is a free and extremely powerful language and software environment for statistical computing, data analysis, and graphics. The course is designed for those who have no experience with R, but have a basic understanding of statistics. The course will include: Introduction to R: How to install R on your computer; basic R commands, how to use and understand the R help pages. Data: Reading in data and data manipulation; summarising data; basic statistical analysis and fitting linear models. Graphics and output: Basic plotting commands and how to customise your plots; how to export your plots and output in a user-friendly format. Functions: Writing simple functions and flow control structures.

The ECM Safety Launch forms part of a greater initiative which has been running over the last 12 months and aims to raise awareness of new and changing government regulations within the WA Work and Health Safety Act.

Meet our three new key safety members who will be involved in facilitating the safety policy changes.

All ECM Researchers, Academics, HDR students and Professional members of staff are encouraged to attend to hear our Dean, John Dell launch this initiative.

Morning Tea will be served from 10:00 am

Eric Swartz (UWA)

will speak on

Antiflag-transitive generalized quadrangles

at 3pm Friday 14 November in Mathematics Lecture Room 1.

Abstract:

A generalized quadrangle is a point-line incidence geometry Q such that (1) any two points lie on at most one line, and (2) given a line l and a point P not incident with l, P is collinear with a unique point of l. An antiflag of a generalized quadrangle is a non-incident point-line pair (P, l), and we say that the generalized quadrangle Q is antiflag-transitive if the group of collineations (automorphisms that send points to points and lines to lines) is transitive on the set of all antiflags. We prove that if a finite, thick generalized quadrangle Q is antiflag-transitive, then Q is one of the following: the unique generalized quadrangle of order (3,5), a classical generalized quadrangle, or a dual of one of these. This is joint work with John Bamberg and Cai-Heng Li.