Five top doctoral theses honoured

Five top doctoral theses honoured

The Vice-Chancellor’s prize for the five best doctoral theses at the University of Auckland in 2014 has gone to PhD students in the Faculties of Science, Medical and Health Sciences, Education and Engineering.

The prizes are awarded to the five most exceptional theses successfully examined each year. Criteria include the demonstrable significance of each thesis in its field, the originality and excellence of the research, exceptional academic and intellectual achievement, and timely completion.

Nineteen nominations were received from the faculties for the five prizes, out of a total of 389 doctoral degrees successfully awarded.

Congratulations to the winners (listed alphabetically) who are:

Jason Busby (School of Biological Sciences, Faculty of Science). Thesis on ‘ Structural studies of the Yersinia entomophaga toxin complex’. Jason’s research involved looking at a natural insecticide produced by a New Zealand soil bacterium. This insecticide is a complex of several proteins, and Jason’s goal was to determine the structure of these proteins so we can better understand how they work. He did this through a technique called X-ray crystallography, which allows us to see the structure of molecules in atomic detail. One of the most significant discoveries he made was the structure of two of the components, which together form a hollow egg-like shell that encapsulates the toxic part of the insecticide. This was the first time that anything like this had been seen, and it has answered a lot of our questions about these proteins. This unexpected result also has implications in other areas, as there are other proteins that probably have the same "shell" but rather than encapsulating and delivering a toxin, they deliver a signaling peptide that controls cell development.

Rachael Parke (School of Nursing, Faculty of Medical and Health Sciences). Thesis on ‘High Flow Nasal Oxygen Therapy in Patients after Cardiac Surgery’. This thesis describes a programme of research undertaken to investigate the effect of nasal high flow oxygen therapy on patients after cardiac surgery. This involved undertaking a study to evaluate a new scoring system for atelectasis on chest x-ray; an observational to describe the pressures generated over the whole of the respiratory cycle when nasal high flow is used; a randomised controlled trial of 340 patients undergoing cardiac surgery to assess effect of nasal high flow on oxygenation post-operatively and a multi-centre point prevalence study to describe current practices of oxygen therapy in non-intubated patients in 40 intensive cares in New Zealand and Australia. This thesis has resulted in five first author publications in anaesthetic, respiratory, nursing and crucial care peer reviewed publications and presentations at leading international conferences in respiratory and critical care medicine. The thesis is also being used by the Centre for Professional Development as a model for developing supervisors and as an example for other schools with students pursuing a PhD with publication.

Rae Si‘ilata (School of Curriculum and Pedagogy, Faculty of Education). Thesis on Va‘a Tele: Pasifika learners riding the success wave on linguistically and culturally responsive pedagogies’.
This thesis explored the reasons for Pasifika learner success in English-medium classrooms, and the particular actions that teachers, leaders and facilitators enacted in enabling these learners to connect the languages, literacy practices and experiences of their homes with the valued knowledge and literacy practices of school. The research was set within a national literacy professional development project which schools joined voluntarily with the goal of raising student achievement in English literacy. The practices of five ‘effective’ teachers were examined in order to devise, with support from the research literature, dimensions of effective literacy practice specific to Pasifika learners. The same dimensions were used to investigate the practices of another five teachers who wanted to improve their practice, in order to understand how relevant changes could be made. From this work, the Va‘a Tele Framework (the ocean-voyaging double-hulled canoe of Pasifika peoples) was developed as a metaphor for Pasifika learner success.

Christy Wang (School of Chemical Sciences, Faculty of Science). Thesis on ‘Extending Traditional Organopalladium Chemistry in the Total Synthesis of Heteroaromatic Natural Products’. The total synthesis of a natural product, put very simply, describes the chemical creation of a molecule found only in nature. The driving force behind such a process is not only the underlining medicinal potential of these molecules, but also their fascinating structures which inspire the discovery of new chemical reactions and methods. Christy’s doctoral research focused on the total syntheses of two natural products named terreusinone and schischkiniin. The former is a complex molecule produced by marine fungi that exhibits UV-protecting activity, in other words a natural sunscreen, and the latter a molecule isolated from thistle seeds possessing an unprecedented structural arrangement and presenting a new class of anti-cancer agents. At the end of the journey, Christy succeeded in recreating terreusinone and tackled the unprecedented motif present in schischkiniin. In the pursuits of both, she developed a number of new robust methods using organopalladium chemistry, illustrating the far-reaching benefits of total synthesis.

Libo Yan (Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Faculty of Engineering). Thesis on ‘Design and characterization of natural flax fibre reinforced polymer tube encased coir fibre reinforced concrete composite structure’. Libo’s thesis provided a comprehensive understanding of design and characterization of a novel steel-free composite structure by incorporating natural fibres as reinforcement. The composite structure is composed of an outer natural fibre reinforced polymer tube and a natural fibre reinforced concrete core. The pre-fabricated tube serves as permanent formwork for fresh concrete and also protects the concrete core from possible outer aggressive environments. In addition, as confinement of concrete core, the tube increases concrete strength and ductility. Natural fibres within concrete are used to reduce concrete cracks and modify failure mode of concrete to be ductile. The results formed an important base for future application of natural fibres and natural fibre reinforced polymer composites in civil engineering. The new composite structure will make a great contribution to the future environmentally friendly building structures with lower carbon footprint.

The University acknowledges the extremely high standard of all nominations received. To be nominated for these prizes is in itself an achievement, so congratulations also to the following nominees:

Matthew Barrett
Auckland Bioengineering Institute

Emma Blomkamp
School of Social Sciences, Faculty of Arts

Angela Cruz
Department of Marketing, Faculty of Business and Economics

Rae de Lisle
School of Music, NICAI

Paul Drury
School of Medical Sciences, Faculty of Medical and Health Sciences

Tom Finlayson
School of Cultures, Languages and Linguistics, Faculty of Arts

Abhishek Gupta
Department of Engineering Science, Faculty of Engineering

Stefanie Hittmeyer
Department of Mathematics, Faculty of Science

Francis Hunter
School of Medical Sciences, Faculty of Medical and Health Sciences

Marcelo Mendes De Souza
School of Cultures, Languages and Linguistics, Faculty of Arts

Ian Milne
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering

Sally Prebble
School of Psychology, Faculty of Science

Chez Viall
School of Medicine, Faculty of Medical and Health Sciences

Jessie Wu
Department of Computer Science, Faculty of Science

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