JOURNAL AND PROCEEDINGS OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF NEW SOUTH WALES ‘Voalime 136 Parts 3 and 4 (Nos 417-418) 2005 ISSN 0035-9173 PUBLISHED BY THE SOCIETY BUILDING H47 UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY, NSW 2006 Issued December 2005 THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF NEW SOUTH WALES OFFICE BEARERS FOR 2005-2006 Patrons His Excellency, Major General Michael Jeffery AC, CVO, MC Governor General of the Commonwealth of Australia. Her Excellency Professor Marie Bashir, AC, Governor of New South Wales. President Prof. J. Kelly, BSc Syd, PhD Reading, DSc NSW, FInstP Vice Presidents Ms K. Kelly BA (Hons) Syd Mr D.A. Craddock, BSc (Eng) NSW, Grad.Cert. Management UWS. Mr C.M. Wilmot Mr J.R. Hardie, BSc Syd, FGS, MACE. one vacancy Hon. Secretary (Gen.) Jill Rowling BE UTS, MSc Syd Hon. Secretary (Ed.) Prof. P.A. Williams, BA (Hons), PhD Macq. Hon. Treasurer Mr A.J. Buttenshaw Hon. Librarian Ms C. van der Leeuw Councillors Dr E. Baker PhD Dr R.A. Creelman Mr J. Franklin Ms M. Haire Dr M. Lake, PhD Syd A/Prof. W.A. Sewell, MB, BS, BSc Syd, PhD Melb FRCPA Ms R. Stutchbury Mr R. Woolett Southern Highlands Rep. Mr H.R. Perry, BSc. The Society originated in the year 1821 as the Philosophical Society of Australasia. Its main function is the promotion of Science by: publishing results of scientific investigations in its Journal and Proceedings; conducting monthly meetings; organising summer science schools for senior secondary school students; awarding prizes and medals; and by liason with other scientific societies. Special meetings are held for: the Pollock Memorial Lecture in Physics and Mathematics, the Liversidge Research Lecture in Chemistry, the Clarke Memorial Lecture in Geology, Zoology and Botany, and the Poggendorf Lecture in Agricultural Science. Membership, as an Ordinary, Associate or Absentee Member, is open to any person whose application is acceptable to the Society. An application must be supported by two members of the Society. Subscriptions for the Journal only are accepted. ‘The Society welcomes, from members and non-members, manuscripts of research and review articles in all branches of science, art, literature and philosophy for publication in the Journal and Proceedings. ISSN 0035-9173 Copyright The Royal Society of New South Wales does not require authors to transfer their copyright. Authors are free to re-use their paper in any of their future printed work and can post a copy of the published paper on their own web site. Enquiries relating to copyright or reproduction of an article should be directed to the author. Journal €& Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, Vol. 138, p. 61-63, 2005 ISSN 0035-9173/05/020061-3 $4.00/1 President’s Column JAK KELLY The Presidents Column for this issue is in the form of a poem for the new year. THE RHYME OF THE ANCIENT SCIENTIST It was an ancient scientist Who one day said to me ‘I see from your computer screen you model in 3D When I was young we did not hope such wonders ere to see For all we had was real, not virtual, reality.’ I really didn’t want to know I'd heard it all before From lecturers who rambled on about the days of yore, Of log tables and slide rules and such arcane devices And knew nothing of the joys of Tomographic slices. I fiddled with the format And wished he’d go away. Alas, it was an idle hope, I saw he meant to stay. ‘When I was young’, he whittered on, on reminiscence bent, ‘I hankered not for fame nor gold but to experiment.’ My teachers said ’The lad is bright And quite good at debate. You should enrol him in the law at which he’d be first rate. He’d earn a damn good living with the muscles of his jaw. No one makes money out of science, as you have heard before.’ But I was young and waterproof And had made up my mind That neither to the arts nor law was I enough inclined. I had enjoyed in argument to see opinions swayed, But what was that compared with how the universe was made. He told me about where he’d been And all the things he’d done ‘The pay was marginal’ he said, ‘But, by God, it was fun. We really were like amateurs, there to enjoy the game. It mattered less who won or lost, the science was the same.’ ‘How could you be such dilettantes? And let your science serve The evil ends of powerful men, out to control the world. We now are more responsible. We worry about things Like, will the earth be boiling hot and balanced yang and ying. 62 KELLY We are now more professional In how our labs are run And who would fund a grant if told I’m doing this for fun.’? There is nothing wrong, of course, with feelings of elation, Provided that they don’t reduce our score in the citations. ‘I read upon a gravestone once’ He smiled and looked at me, As you are now so once was I, as I am now you'll be. I hoped perhaps it might be true, when first I came in here. And at the door he paused and said ‘A Happier New Year’ PRESIDENT’S COLUMN 63 The Royal Society of NSW — 100 Years Ago JAK KELLY Extract from the Presidential Address by C.O. Burge published in the Journal and Proceedings of the Royal Society of NSW Volume XXXIX (1905) pp. 1-22 Yet, among the young men of our day what are the names of Kelvin, of Lodge, of Rayleigh, of Dewar, of others, beside that of a famous cricketer, or of the man who can kick a ball fur- ther or straighter than another? We may allow that mental culture cannot stand alone, it must be the outcome of sufficient physical training. The old maxim ‘Mens sana in corpore sano’ is ever true, but are we not overloading the lat- ter part of the prescription? The traditional Irishman is sneered at for regarding fighting as an end, and not a means, but are not the Aus- tralians earning the reputation of confounding means and ends, in an even more absurd way? The combination is as old as Plato who laid down music and gymnastics as the twin bases of education ...but the gymnastics were regarded as means only, for the double purpose of effi- ciency in war, and for the training of the body, so that it should be intellectually vigorous. The man of science is unappreciated, be- cause his gifts are unsought, and when con- ferred, are rapidly rendered commonplace by constant use, and often that use does not be- come available for some years after the invention has left the authors brain. It has been well said that the question is not whether a man has gone through the university, it is whether the university has gone through him. Training in habits of exact observation and intelligent inference is wanted, not that interest which is expressed by the observation of a man of unscientific temperament, who once spoke of a proposition in Euclid, as a happy ending to a mildly exciting plot. Not withstanding the neglect, until latterly, of science in engineering, great strides have been taken, perhaps the greatest, in recent times, have been in connection with light; mechanical contrivances and energy, through the medium of electricity; and the disposal of refuse of cities. As to light, there is the question which is more one for the anatomist than the engineer, whether the human eye is developing the power to withstand, without injury, the intense bright- ness provided by modern electrical and gas en- gineers. eh - a aii S i ; ey Leo aay, TAG HI te Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, Vol. 138, p. 65-75, 2005 ISSN 0035-9173/05/020065-11 $4.00/1 A Comparison of Seed Germination Calculation Formulae and the Associated Interpretation of Resulting Data M.A. KADER Abstract: Much experimentation concerns itself with the level and rapidity of germination, yet analyzing and interpreting results can be a difficult task due to the vague nature of some seed germination data. This paper examines a number of data analysis methods adopted in seed germination and emergence tests. What constitutes a good result in one experiment may not be the same in another and this depends, to a large extent, on the data analysis method used. A review of these methods reveals the different interpretations that can be drawn from applying different formulae. Not just the final germination percentage, its mean time or spread, but also the ‘high’ and ‘low’ germination events have an impact on the parameters calculated. This paper shows that the Germination Index (GI) is the analysis method that best describes the germination percentage/speed relationship. Germination percentage and mean time alone are not sufficient in representing a seed lot in terms of its germination activity in a given time frame. Keywords: germination data, data validity, germination speed, emergence rate INTRODUCTION The term germination in the seeds of higher plants (Angiosperms) refers to the protrusion -of a root or shoot from the seed coat, while emergence is the visible penetration of the shoot above the soil surface (Hadas and Russo 1974, Hadas 1976, Benech Arnold et al. 1991). In order that a seed can germinate, it must be placed in environmental conditions favourable to this process (Craufurd et al. 1996). Among the conditions required is an adequate supply of water, a suitable tempera- ture range and, for some seeds, light (Collis- George and Williams 1968, Levitt 1980, Long and Woodward 1998). The result is measured in terms of the extent to which seeds have ger- minated (the final germination percentage at- tained) and the speed with which the germi- nation process has ended. Frequently, though, other parameters represent significant factors from agronomic, planning or physiological per- spectives (Jones and Sanders 1987, Esechie 1994, Kader et al. 1998, Kader 1998, Kader et al., 1999, Kader, 2005). The length of time elapsed between the first seed to germinate and the last, the variation in germination speed and the timing that the ma- jority of seeds germinate all have impacts on diverse cultural operations like fertilising, har- vesting and field maturity of crops (Roberts 1981, Washitani and Saeki 1986, Kader and Jutzi 2001). ‘High’ (the time at which the ma- jority of seeds germinate) and ‘low’ (the time at which the minority of seeds germinate) (Kader et al. 1998) germination events are also impor- tant indicators of seed vigour and stress resis- tance (Kader and Jutzi 2002). These data, from an experimental standpoint, also have a sig- nificant impact on statistical analyses (Bland and Altman 1995, Legendre and Legendre 1998, Johnson 1999). A large proportion of experiments relating seed germination to time and rate calculations face difficulty in interpreting and analysing re- sults (Finch-Savage et al. 1998, Trudgill et al. 2000, Grundy et al. 2000). The methods used to evaluate seed germination and emergence are analytical or graphical (Scott et al. 1984), but germination data have several characteris- 66 KADER tics that distinguish them from other data fre- quently collected in plant research. Germina- tion is considered to be a qualitative develop- mental response of an individual seed that oc- curs at a point in time, but individual seeds within a treatment respond within different times (Harper and Benton 1966, Orchard 1977, Scott et al. 1984, Kader 1998). This leads to a situation where the final germination percent- age alone is not sufficient for reporting results due to the lack of ability to compare two sets of data (one lot of seed may have germinated well before the other, but both attained the same final germination percentage). This has been indicated as a set back in previous work relat- ing seed treatments to the germination pattern of seed lots (Timson 1965, Todd and Webster 1965, Harris and Wilson 1970, Thompson, 1974) leading to the development of a number of ger- mination measurement techniques (Heydecker 1966, Scott et al. 1984, Carberry and Campbell 1989). This review compares various methods of analysing, representing and interpreting germi- nation data. It draws comparisons between the various methods and identifies the most widely encompassing method correlating final germina- tion with time. MATERIALS AND METHODS A review of seed germination analysis methods in the literature was conducted and revealed the methods shown in Table 1 as the major param- eters used in germination studies. These germi- nation calculation methods fall broadly into the following 3 categories. 1. Data analysis formulae interpreting the final germination percentage attained 2. Data analysis formulae interpreting the time taken to achieve seed lot germination 3. Data analysis formulae correlating 1 and 2 The various methods were compared for accu- racy and representation using the germination data of Kader et al. (1998, 1999) and Kader and Jutzi (2001, 2002), as well as hypothetical ger- mination data (see details below), illustrating time-based differences in the 3 different cate- gories below. 1. Accuracy of representation of germination percentage/time correlations 2. Accuracy of representation of time spread of germination 3. Accuracy of representation of the uniformity of seed lot germination The problem comes from observations from field, laboratory and growth chamber experi- ments conducted between 1993 and 2002 in- volving monocotyledons (Sorghum bicolour and Pennisetum glaucum L. R. Br) and dicotyledons (Acacia farnesiana and Acacia saligna). These two groups represent both hypogeal and epigeal germination in a field crop and tree species, re- spectively (ISTA 1993). Hypothetical data was employed where necessary (detailed in each sce- nario — see Tables 2 to 9 below). The parame- ters used to compare the germination data for representation and accuracy were as follows. . Final Germination Percentage (FGP) . Mean Germination Time (MGT) . Germination Index (GI) . Coefficient of Velocity of Germination (CVG) Germination Rate Index (GRI) . First Day of Germination (FDG) . Last Day of Germination (LDG) . Time Spread of Germination (TSG) ONATHKR WN eH The details, measurement units and calculation methods of each parameter are shown in Ta- ble 1, with a base germination period of 10 days being used and applied to 4 seed lots. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION The results of Tables 2—9 reveal a wide vari- ation between germination data based on the time spread of germination as well as its final percentage. FGP only reflects the final percent- age of germination attained and provides no pic- SEED GERMINATION CALCULATION FORMULAE 67 ture of the speed or uniformity of germination. Table 2 shows that the 4 seed lots tested all at- tained an FGP of 95%, but had varying time spreads of germination. MGT is an accurate measure of the time taken for a lot to germinate, but does not cor- relate this well with the time spread or unifor- mity of germination. It focusses instead on the day when most germination events occurred. As seen from Table 3, seed lots started germina- tion on the same day and attained the same FGP, but had varying MGT values. Table 4, on the other hand, shows the same TSG value for the 4 seed lots, a different FGP, yet the same MGT. This means that seed lots can germinate across a different spread and attain a different final germination percentage, yet have the same mean germination time. GRI calculations merely show the percent- age of germination per day, so the higher the percentage and the shorter the duration, the higher the GRI. This parameter lacks any cor- relation with the ‘high’ and ‘low’ germination days as it spreads the percentage evenly across the time spread. Table 4, shows seed lots with a CVG of 50, but GRI values ranging from 18.4 to 50.0. CVG does not focus on the final percent- age of germination, but places emphasis on the time required for reaching it. The details of time (first day, last day and time spread) are not taken into account as the time is averaged. Table 5 shows seed lots with the same FDG, LDG and TSG, but different CVG values. This means that time-based measurements, not cor- related with the FGP, are not a very useful rep- resentation of the overall seed germination ac- tivity. Starting germination and ending it at the same time is not sufficient enough to produce a uniform CVG and is therefore misleading. First day, last day and time spread of ger- mination are good measures of when the first germination event started, when the last event occurred and the time between the two, but, again, lacks any correlation to the final germi- nation attained. Tables 6, 7 and 8 highlight this. Whether the TSG is 1 or 7 days, and regardless of the FGP, seed lots could still start germina- tion and end it on similar days (i.e., same FDG and same LDG values). The GI appears to be the most comprehen- sive measurement parameter combining both germination percentage and speed (spread, du- ration and ‘high/low’ events). It magnifies the variation among seed lots in this regard with an easily compared numerical measurement. As an example, in Table 3, seed lots all attained an FGP of 95% over 3 days. The lot with 31.6% over 3 days had an MGT of 1.9 days and that with 47.5% over 2 days had an MGT of 1.5 days. This is a difference of merely 0.4 days de- spite the fact that on each occasion the second seed lot germinated 15.9% more. The GI, on the other hand emphasises this difference more clearly where the GI for the 3-day time spread is 853.2 and that for the 2-day time spread is 905.5, a difference of 52.3 units. In conclusion, the use of germination data analysis methods is prone to mis-interpretation if germination percentage, speed, spread and concentration are not taken into account in one measurement. In the context of the parame- ters tested in this investigation, it appears that the GI is the most accurate in this regard. An alternative would be to use a number of param- eters when reporting germination trial results and place these in one single formula. This will be addressed in a subsequent paper. 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A range of quartzose grains was identified among the in the AuK2 sample. Small, ir- regular quartz aggregates suggest fragmented quartzitic materials, expected from explosive blasting of metasedimentary beds during dia- treme emplacement. Rounded, polished chal- cedonic nodules resemble worn transported ma- terials, but could represent originally recycled material in the local sedimentary beds. Angu- lar fragments of crystallised quartz could come from extensive quartz veining within the local beds. APPARENT DIATREME SOURCE FOR GEM CORUNDUMS AND ZIRCONS 81 Material Description Identification Abundance Pale, dark pink, and Angular to round, flat to Corundum Common red grains equant, up to lcm. Some (XRD) ruby corroded surfaces, fusion crusts, (colour) sapphirine (?) intergrowths Grey, yellow and blue Subangular to flattened, up to Corundum Common grains 0.8mm, some corroded, some (XRD) sapphire include silk (colour) Purple, mauve and Subangular, up to 0.7mm Corundum Sparse purple-mauve grains (XRD) sapphire (colour) White, yellow, orange Anhedral to subhedral, irregular Zircon (optics) Sporadic brown and red grains to prismatic, lustrous, up to F.T. Analysis 0.6mm, some corroded or fluorescent in UV light Pink, red grains Subangular, up to 0.6mm Almandine Rare (XRD) Green, black grains Angular, some elongate, up to Sapphirine Rare 0.6mm (XRD) Brown, black flakes Flat, cleavage flakes, partly Vermiculite Sporadic altered (XRD) Dark brown crystals Subangular, elongate, up to Hastingsite Sparse 0.5mm (XRD) Dark, green grains Subangular, up to 0.7mm Enstatite Sparse (XRD) Grey green grains Irregular, some elongate, up to Diopside (XRD) Sporadic 0.9mm Black opaque grains Rounded to irregular, shiny, Spinel (optics) Sporadic partly conchoidal, up to 0.5mm Black crystal Tabular, brown coating, up to Rutile (XRD) Rare 0.8mm Black grains Shiny, red in part, up to0.5mm Hematite Rare (optics) Black grain, red core Spinel-rich? crust, 3mm across Spessartine Rare (XRD) Clear to smoky chips Angular, part conchoidal, up to Quartz (optics) © Common 0.6mm White, grey nodules Polished, rounded, up to 1cm ‘Chalcedony’ Common (optics) Red, brown grains Polished, subangular, up to ‘Jasper’ (optics) Sporadic 0.7mm Yellow, grey grains Rounded, with ragged angular Quartz (XRD) Sporadic edges, up to 0.5mm Pale green masses Irregular, rounded to elongate, Diopside-augite Sparse diffuse surface, up to 0.9mm alteration (XRD) Table 1. Mineral groups, separated from AuK2 concentrate sample (D53274). Common (>20 % grains), sporadic (10-20 %), sparse (5-10 %), rare (<5 %). 82 SUTHERLAND et al. Grns Ns(av) Ni(av) Na(av) ps(av)x10° p;(av)x10® Uppm(av) FT Age+1lo(av) Palaeocene (moderate U) group 4 310 251 100 4.922 3.922 163-283 (187) 61.74 5.6 Eocene (low U) group 7 98 71 100 0.917 1.128 31-77 (53) 39:3 7.3 Pliocene (high U) group 9 58 651 100 0.927 10.350 183-824 (484) 4.2 + 0.6 Table 2. Zircon fission track (FT) results, AuK2 site. pp (Track density from U standard glass) 1.14 x10° cm~?. Np (Total tracks counted for determining pp) 1787. Ages calculated using a zeta 87.7 + 0.8 for U3 glass. Grns, No. of grains. Ns, No. of spontaneous tracks in Na grid squares. Ni, No. of induced tracks in Na grid squares. Na, No. of grid squares counted in each grain. p, Spontaneous track density. p; Induced track density. Analyst: P.F. Green. DISCUSSION The AuK2 mineral sample provides a fuller pic- ture of diatreme mineralogy and emplacement ages in the southeastern Barrington volcanic field. The presence of ruby, sapphire and zir- con supports the prospect that diatreme and py- roclastic sources are important vehicles for the provision of these gem materials. The corundum suites in the AuK2 sample include both metamorphic and magmatic types and mark the most eastern gem site located in the Barrington field. The spread in zircon ages, with three separate groups, is a compli- cating feature. It implies multiple proximal zir- con sources here, as the zircon groups differ to those from the headwaters at Gloucester Tops. Alternatively, some zircon groups were not ther- mally reset in eruptions. Derivation of gem suites from the Gloucester Tops high country is also unlikely given a comment recorded by Arch Chubb that only ‘pulverised sapphires of vari- ous colours in the surface wash’ were found in the adjacent Kerripit River, 10 km downstream from its incision into Gloucester Tops. The zircon dating from AuK2 material sup- plements the previous comprehensive zircon and basalt dating on Barrington Tops plateau (Sutherland and Fanning 2001, Sutherland and Graham 2003, Roberts et al. 2004) and re- inforces evidence of repeated, extended vol- canic activity in this field. The youngest phase of activity (3-5 Ma) is now identified in four well-separated sites across the whole field (East Tomalla Creek, Gummi Flats, Glouces- ter Tops, Gloucester River). A southerly de- creasing age-trend in young (<12 Ma) zircon + corundum-bearing volcanic sites was pro- posed from studies extending from Childers- Proston in Queensland to Uralla-Barrington in New South Wales (Sutherland 1993). Based on this well-established young Barrington event at 4 + 1 Ma and Australian plate motion rates (7 cm/yr) since then, the present potential erup- tive source would now underlie the Wollongong- Southern Highlands region below the southern Sydney Basin. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Drs L.M. Barron, B.J. Barron and I.T. Gra- ham provided discussion on AuK sites and read the script. Sue Folwell, Australian Museum, as- sisted with script preparation. The Australian Museum funded the zircon fission track dating, while the School of Science, Food and Horti- culture, University of Western Sydney, and The Australian Museum ( R.E. Pogson) provided fa- cilities for the mineral X-ray investigation. APPARENT DIATREME SOURCE FOR GEM CORUNDUMS AND ZIRCONS 83 REFERENCES Cluff Resources Pacific NL, 2005. 2004 Annual Report, Sydney, 36pp. Galbraith, R.F., 1981. On statistical models for fission track counts. Mathematical Geology, 13, 471-488. Gleadow, A.J., Hurford, A.J. and Quaife, R.D., 1976. 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(File geological Survey New South Wales, GS 1971/541) (unpublished) Sutherland, F.L., 1993. Late thermal events based on zircon fission track ages in north- eastern New South Wales and south eastern Queensland: links to Sydney Basin seismic- ity? Australian Journal of Earth Sciences, 40, 461-470. Sutherland, F.L. and Coenraads, R.R., 1995. An unusual ruby-sapphire-sapphirine-spinel assemblage from the Tertiary Barrington vol- canic province, New South Wales, Australia. Mineralogical Magazine, 60, 623-638. Sutherland, F.L. and Fanning, C.M., 2001. Gem-bearing basaltic volcanism, Barrington, New South Wales: Cenozoic evolution, based on basalt K-Ar ages and zircon fission track dating and U-Pb isotope dating. Australian Journal of Earth Sciences, 48, 221-237. Sutherland, Lin and Graham, Ian, 2003. Geol- ogy of Barrington Tops Plateau. Its Rocks, Minerals and Gemstones, New South Wales, Australia, 56 pp. The Australian Museum Society, Sydney. Sutherland, F.L., Hoskin, P.W.O., Fanning, C.M. and Coenraads, R.R., 1998b. Models of corundum origin from alkali balsaltic ter- rains: A reappraisal. Contributions to Min- eralogy and Petrology, 133, 356-372. 84 SUTHERLAND et al. Sutherland, F.L. Schwarz, D., Jobbins, E.A., Wilkinson, J.F.G., 1974. Garnet clinopyroxen- Coenraads, R.R. and Webb, G., 1998a. Dis- ite inclusions from diatremes in the Glouces- tinctive gem corundum suites from discrete ter area, New South Wales, Australia. Con- basalt fields: a comparative study of Barring- tributions to Mineralogy and Petrology, 46, ton, Australia, and West Pailin, Cambodia 275-299. gemfields. The Journal of Gemmology, 26, 65-85. * School of Science, Food and Horticulture B.C.R.I. Campus University of Western Sydney North Parramatta, NSW. + Geoscience Australian Museum 6 College Street Sydney, NSW. (Manuscript received 16.09.2005, accepted 4.11.2005) | | | | Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, Vol. 138, p. 85—92, 2005 ISSN 0035-9173/05/020085-8 $4.00/1 Tool Culture, the Baldwin Effect and the Evolution of the Human Hand DAVID A. WELLS Abstract: Human tool culture seems to have influenced the evolution of human hand anatomy. Difficulties in establishing a causal connection centre on the fact that early ho- minin hand anatomies supportive of tool culture precede the earliest tools in the archaeologi- cal record. Various considerations suggest that the archaeological record may be misleading. Earlier tools would not be visible if they were manufactured from wood or plant material, or if they were natural objects subject to only slight modification. Moreover, the first appearance of stone tools in the record may reflect a switch in the location of home bases or butchering sites, and not the commencement of stone tool usage. Acquisition of modern human tool skills is generally via imitation. There is no strong reason to suppose that a small-brained hominin such as Australopithecus was incapable of imitation, or that members of this genus could not have been manufacturers of stone tools. It therefore seems likely that anatomical support for strong grasping and pinch grips, even as early as Australopithecus, is a specific adaptation to the cultural practice of tool usage, or perhaps to manipulative practices generally. The Baldwin Effect is a useful explanatory model. By substituting culture for individual learning, and thus reducing the costs of learning, we can use the model to predict the observed outcome, namely the genetic incorporation of bodily structures associated with tool usage, while tool usage itself continues to be cultural. Keywords: Human evolution, tool, hand, Baldwin Effect, culture INTRODUCTION The modern human hand appears remarkably well-adapted to tool use and tool making. Com- pared with our fellow primates, we have for ex- ample a long thumb, the muscles of which are well differentiated. We also possess a specific muscle, the flexor pollicis longus, which is fre- quently absent in other primates. This muscle attaches to the forearm, and allows the thumb to flex at its mid-point (Susman 1988). A pow- erful, flexible, and relatively long thumb is very useful when grasping objects firmly in order to deploy them as tools. Notice that we are asserting a link between an evolutionary outcome (hand anatomy) and a cultural practice (tool usage). At least two causal relationships can be recognized: that cer- tain hand anatomies provided a base for culture and, conversely, that culture provided an envi- ronment that favoured certain hand anatomies. This paper assumes that evidence can be found to support both causal relationships, but fo- cusses on the second. The influence of culture on bodily structure and function may be one of the distinguishing features of human evolution. Let us start with some definitions. The term tool can be used inclusively to mean any de- tached object which is employed for a useful end. Following Wynn (1994), I will use the term more narrowly to mean ‘a detached object that is controlled by the user to perform work (in the mechanical sense of transferring energy), usually as an extension of the user’s anatomy’. Thus, a carpenter’s hammer is a tool, but a bird’s nest is not. I shall use the term culture to refer to: shared patterns of behaviour which are acquired, within lifetime, from other members of the same species, usually in the context of social relationships between mutually recognized individuals. 86 WELLS TOOL CULTURE Modern human tool usage is predominantly cul- tural, as shown by the social learning needed to acquire even a moderate level of skill. In some species, however, tool usage shows little varia- tion among individuals and populations (Panger 2002), and therefore may be predominantly ge- netic in origin. In order to assert a causal role for culture, it is necessary to establish that tool usage among early hominins was also cultural. There is no direct evidence for or against this view, but it gains support from the cultural na- ture of tool usage among our nearest living rela- tives, common chimpanzees (chimps). A review of the literature reports that all chimp popula- tions subject to long-term study turn out to be tool makers and users, and that each population has its own customary tool kit (McGrew 1998). Work with the directors of the seven most long- term field studies of chimp behaviour identified a number of behaviours which were significantly present in one population, but absent in others, with no apparent ecological or genetic explana- tion. Most of these cultural behaviours involved tool usage (Whiten et. al. 1999). It is not clear whether tool culture first de- veloped in the common ancestor of chimps and humans, or developed independently in both lineages after branching speciation. The ques- tion is not fundamental because, on the reason- able assumption that both hominin and chimp tool behaviour has always been predominantly cultural, it is likely that tool usage was invented, lost and then re-invented many times over in all three lineages. EVOLUTIONARY CAUSES As a classic paper argued (Gould and Lewon- tin 1979), present utility does not establish evolutionary origin. The role played by hand anatomy in supporting modern human tool usage does not by itself establish that hand anatomy evolved as an adaptation to tool usage. In particular, hand anatomy may be an adap- tation to ancestral practices in ancestral envi- ronments, providing a fortuitous pre-adaptation which humans then exploited via tool usage. Pre-adaptation is clearly an important com- ponent of the story, as can be seen by consid- ering chimp tool usage. Unlike monkeys, which move around in trees by traversing the tops of branches or by hanging from their tails, apes (including chimps) lack tails, and move around by climbing, or by hand over hand movement (brachiation) while hanging from a branch. The hands of apes are adapted to this style of move- ment by providing a powerful grip, using four fingers pressed firmly against the palm. Chimps are also ground-dwellers as well as tree-dwellers. It seems to be happenstance that, when using or making tools, chimps have been able to ex- ploit this arboreal ape grip for a different func- tion. If this explanation works for chimps, then it presumably works at least to some degree for the earliest hominins. We too must have been ground-dwelling opportunists who took advan- tage of an anatomy originally adapted to a tree- dwelling environment. A second point in favour of pre-adaptation is that it seems to be consistent with the archae- ological record of early hominins. The earliest known tools date from 2 to 2.5 million years ago (mya). However, remains of Australopithe- cus afarensis dated to 3.2 mya show anatomical features which provide greater support for tool culture than those of modern chimps, for exam- ple a longer thumb relative to the fingers than in chimps. In general, Marzke (1997) identifies eight distinctively human features of the hand (see below), of which Australopithecus afarensis exhibited three. Perhaps anatomy did precede tool culture, at least amongst early hominins. Pre-adaptation, however, cannot be the whole story, for there are just too many dis- tinctive features of the modern human hand which too neatly support tool culture. The important question is not whether a partic- | ular hand anatomy is capable of supporting | stone tool culture, but the degree to which | hand anatomy provides ‘economical and effec- | tive’ support (Marzke 1997). TOOL CULTURE AND THE EVOLUTION OF THE HUMAN HAND 87 Stone tools can be made by striking or throwing a softer stone against a harder surface. They may also be made by placing a softer stone against a substrate, and then striking with a harder stone. Efficient production, however, is generally by striking a hard hammer stone held in one hand against a softer core held in the other hand, thereby producing flakes from the core (hard-hammer percussion). Efficient use of flakes as cutting instruments is generally by grasping the flake between the thumb and the forefinger, with or without the support of other fingers. In general, use of prehistoric stone tools places similar demands on anatomy as manufac- ture of the tools (Marzke and Marzke 2000). Certain grips are favoured by modern hu- mans who have taught themselves hard-hammer percussion, and these grips are in turn sup- ported by the following anatomical features (Marzke 1997). 1. As noted above, humans have a longer thumb relative to the second finger. The thumb is able to control objects of varying sizes and shapes by moving against all four fingers. If the core is held using an ape- like power grip, i.e., without recruiting the thumb, ‘the core must be repositioned for each strike either by dropping it and retriev- ing it in a new orientation or by shifting its position with the hand holding the hammer stone.’ 2. Humans have well-developed intrinsic mus- cles of the thumb (i.e., muscles attached at both ends to bones within the hand). In hu- mans, thumb intrinsic musculature is 39% of total intrinsic hand musculature, compared with 24% in chimps. 3. As noted above, humans have a propor- tionately large flexor pollicis longus muscle. This muscle attaches to the forearm, and is frequently absent in other primates. It controls the joint at the mid-point of the thumb, allowing the thumb pad to be ori- ented towards the fingers, and the thumb to be braced against pressure by the fingers. 4. Humans have relatively large pads on the tips of the fingers and thumb. These pads are supported by broader tufts on the distal phalanges (the bones forming the top seg- ment of the fingers and thumb). The larger surface area of these pads ‘distribute pres- sure during forceful grasping’, for example when grasping a hammer stone. 5. In humans, the third metacarpal head is ori- ented towards the thumb. The metacarpus is five bones which are joined to each of the four fingers and thumb, and together pro- vide the skeletal substructure for the palm. The head of the third metacarpal bone is attached to the longest finger, and its orien- tation towards the thumb assists in grasping large objects such as stones for hammering or throwing. 6. In humans, there is marked asymmetry of the second and fifth metacarpal heads, so that the index finger and little finger are oriented towards each other when grasping a large object, once again maximizing the contact between the inner surface of the fin- gers and the surface of the object. 7. In humans, the joints between the sec- ond metacarpal and three bones in the wrist (the trapezium, trapezoid and capi- tate) are oriented so that the metacarpal can pronate (rotate palm-downwards) dur- ing strong pinch grips between the thumb and the side of the index finger. 8. In humans, the pads on the tips of the fin- gers and thumb are less mobile than the pads on the remaining finger segments. This allows a firm pinch grip using the tips, while nevertheless allowing greater cushioning and a larger sensory area in the rest of the fingers and thumb. On the basis of the evidence, it is reason- able to conclude that tool culture has been a key selective agent in the evolution of the hu- man hand. This conclusion does not commit us to any of the fallacies identified by Gould 88 WELLS and Lewontin (1979). The object of our inter- est is not a single trait considered in isolation from the rest of human anatomy, but a series of interconnected traits. The traits are almost certainly not byproducts of a different adapta- tion, and we have given due weight to the role of pre-adaptation. EARLIEST HOMININ TOOL USAGE Having reached this conclusion, we must ad- dress the difficulty mentioned above, namely that remains of Australopithecus afarensis, dated to 3.2 mya, show anatomical features supportive of tool culture, when the earliest known stone tools date only from 2 to 2.5 mya. Specifically, the following traits were identified (Marzke 1997). § A longer thumb relative to the fingers than in chimps. § Asymmetry of the second and fifth metacarpal heads, so that the index finger and little finger are oriented towards each other when grasping a large object. The joints between the second metacarpal and bones in the wrist support strong pinch grips between the thumb and the side of the index finger. In making the reasonable assumption that these traits evolved sometime after hominin sep- aration from the chimp lineage, i.e., that they were not inherited from the last common ances- tor, some explanation is required. Let us review the evidence for early tool usage. This usage probably would have in- volved wooden and bone implements, in addi- tion to stone, but the earliest available evidence is almost exclusively of stone tools. This evi- dence takes two forms. First, direct evidence comes from the form of the tools themselves, and associated remains such as the cores from which they were flaked. Secondly, indirect evi- dence is provided by microwear analysis of cut marks on animal bones thought to form the re- mains of hominin meals. Both point to 2 to 2.5 mya as the earliest known date for stone tools (Panger 2002). (Jon) Several possible explanations can be sug- gested for the absence of earlier evidence. If tools were made of other materials such as wood or plant fibre, they would leave little ev- idence, either directly in the form of tool re- mains, or indirectly in the form of cut marks. In addition, ‘found tools’ may have been em- ployed, only slightly modified for the purpose, in the manner of modern chimps. In that case, tool remains may be present but unrecogniz- able in the archaeological record. It has been suggested that Australopithecus discovered the food content of the underground storage organs of plants, such as tubers and rhizomes (Wrang- ham 2001). Amongst tool-using populations, we can imagine that pieces of wood may have been abraded against a hard substrate, and then used as digging-sticks grasped firmly with the assis- tance of a relatively long thumb. Such practices would leave little or no evidence in the archae- ological record. Another possibility is that hominins did manufacture stone tools prior to 2.5 mya. It has been argued that the earliest known tools are too sophisticated to be the first examples of their type, as they exhibit evidence of multiple flakes from a single core, some flakes have been re-touched, and the raw material for their man- ufacture has been transported throughout the landscape (Panger 2002). It has also been argued that the earliest stone tool usage may be hidden in the arche- ological record for ecological reasons. Most evi- dence of stone tools has been gathered from sites containing hundreds or even thousands of stone artifacts. Whether interpreted as home bases, butchering sites, or workshops for making tools, these sites represent a geographic concentration | over a relatively short time period. Factors in- fluencing the location of such sites would have included protection from bad weather and the availability of shade. One population living in a savanna environment might have located them | under shade trees, while a second population | living in a more arid environment might have lo- | cated them under rock outcrops. Because rock | outcrops have a much longer potential lifespan — than trees, they will support a greater concen- | TOOL CULTURE AND THE EVOLUTION OF THE HUMAN HAND 89 tration of stone tools and meal remains over time. Perhaps the emergence of manufactured stone tools in the archaeological record merely marks the first time such tools became archae- ologically visible (Brooks and Laden, cited in Panger 2002). This suggestion gains plausibil- ity from the fact that Africa’s environment was becoming more arid in the relevant time period, driven by a new ice age. It may be argued that Australopithecus had a relatively small brain, and was therefore not smart enough to have been a manufacturer and user of stone tools. This makes some assump- tions about the cognitive capacities required, which can be tested against modern evidence. Studies of tool use in the modern era indicate that two styles of cognition dominate. The first style dominates in the acquisition of skills, the second in the application of those skills to solv- ing problems. Overwhelmingly, tool skills are learned by repetitive showing and doing, rather than desk-based learning, with apprenticeship as the classical form of relationship between teacher and novice. Although the apprentice may later be able to place tasks in a hierarchy of routines and sub-routines, the tasks are ini- tially learned in sequential fashion (first job 1, then job 2, then job 3 ...then finish). The task sequences are committed to motor memory by repetition, using temporal or spatial contiguity to cue the next action in the sequence. It is a cognitive style ‘commonly encountered in any human behaviour requiring precise motor coor- dination. Instrumental musicians, for example, use much the same technique in learning com- plex passages of music. It is also the essence of most sport’ (Wynn 1994). In addition, it is close to the cognitive style which characterizes chimp tool behaviour, although for chimps the phrase ‘observing and doing’ is more appropriate than ‘showing and doing’. Subject to this qualifica- tion, the difference between humans and chimps is quantitative rather than qualitative. If the cognitive processes required to learn tool skills are simple, this is not necessarily true of the cognitive processes involved in actually using the tools, i.e., in adjusting tool behaviour to the specific challenges presented by individ- ual circumstances. Wynn (1994) argues that in this respect modern human tool usage can be an altogether more complex process, involving a sort of ‘dialogue’ between known sequences (sit- ting in motor memory) and plans for the task at hand. This will usually involve contingency planning i.e. imagining possible problems, and conceiving possible solutions, before attempt- ing the task. It should be contrasted with the mainly trial-and-error method employed by chimps, and almost certainly early hominins. The problem-solving skills of modern hu- mans do not appear to be specifically related to tool culture, but represent the application of a generalized intelligence which appears to have evolved for other reasons, possibly connected with group social complexity (Dunbar 1994). If repetitive showing and doing (or observing and doing) is the essential element in tool culture, it seems reasonable to conclude that a small- brained animal could have developed some form of stone tool manufacture and use. Recent dis- coveries in Flores indicate as much, regardless of whether we regard Homo floresiensis as an offshoot from the Homo erectus lineage, or as more directly linked to Australopithecus. In conclusion, a range of explanations is possible. At one extreme is the possibility that tool usage among the earliest hominins was no more sophisticated than the tool usage which is plausibly ascribed to our chimp-like ancestor (because we observe it among mod- ern chimps, whose ecology appears to be largely unchanged). At the other extreme, it is possi- ble that tool usage was at a level of complex- ity somewhere between chimps and the earli- est hominin tool culture for which there is ar- chaeological evidence. At the latter extreme, it is not difficult to understand why the hands of Australopithecus show some anatomical fea- tures supportive of tool culture. At the former extreme, if Australopithecus tool culture and modern chimp tool culture are very similar, we must ask ourselves why Australopithecus hand anatomies provide some support for tool cul- ture, but those of modern chimps do not. 90 Let us be clear that chimp hand evolution is not entirely unaffected by chimp manipula- tive behaviour. In typically thorough fashion, Marzke (1997) has identified features which pro- vide some support for precision grips, but it re- mains true that the chimp hand is not as well adapted for manipulation. The most likely rea- son is that the hands of chimps are required to perform multiple functions, and are there- fore subject to strongly conflicting selection pressures. Chimp hands are used to support three functions, arboreal climbing and swinging, manipulative activities such as food handling and tool usage, and terrestrial knuckle-walking (chimps use the backs of their fingers to sup- port themselves while travelling on the ground). Hominins, by contrast, had already adopted a bipedal posture by the time of Australopithecus. There is a venerable argument that walking on two legs ‘frees the hands’ for manual activities. This argument has in the past been used to sup- port what we can now see is a mistaken notion, that bipedal locomotion is necessarily associ- ated with tool usage. If re-phrased, however, it does seem to have an element of truth. Perhaps the semi-arboreal existence of Australopithecus resulted in a hand more fully open to the se- lective pressures of manipulation and tool us- age, by removing knuckle-walking as a compet- ing pressure, and reducing the pressure in favour of arboreal climbing. If this semi-arboreal exis- tence was sufficient to produce an evolutionary novelty, namely bipedal locomotion, then why not a shift in hand anatomy? It is also possible that tool culture was in- significant prior to 2—2.5 mya. Australopithecus hand anatomy may be an adaptation to manip- ulative practices generally, and may therefore provide a pre-adaptation to tool usage exploited by subsequent species in the hominin lineage. WELLS would not alter the central thesis of this paper, namely that culture has been a selective agent in human evolution. AN EVOLUTIONARY MECHANISM If tool culture has been a key selective agent in the evolution of the human hand, by what mechanism did natural selection occur? A use- ful model is the Baldwin Effect, which may be explained as follows. Imagine a species whose members must individually learn a certain task in order to survive in their environment. Indi- vidual learning has costs. It may be danger- ous not to perform the task to a high stan- dard immediately (e.g., flight for birds), learn- ing may be distracting and so make predation more likely, and it consumes time and energy which would otherwise be available for other es- sential tasks such as looking for food. Over gen- erations, individuals with some genetic predis- position for the task are likely to enjoy greater reproductive success. Eventually, genetic pre- disposition becomes full genetic assimilation, so that what originally had to be individually learned from scratch becomes part of the ge- netic endowment of the species. This may ap- ply both to behaviour, i.e., the task performance itself, and any bodily processes and structures associated with the behaviour. Now imagine that the task is cultural in ori- gin, for example being learned by imitating oth- ers, rather than individually from scratch. Im- itation consumes less time and effort, and re duces the costs of learning. It is in this respect | a form of free-loading. The Baldwin Effect can still be expected to operate, but it is now more — likely to work on the bodily processes and struc- tures associated with the behaviour, rather than | the behaviour itself. Over evolutionary time, | humans have become more efficient absorbers | and practitioners of tool culture, because our | hands (and no doubt other parts of our bod- | For example, practices such as breaking nuts or smashing bones for marrow may account for the anatomical features in question (Marzke 1998). However such practices are likely to have been as cultural as tool usage. Perhaps our subject should be manipulative culture more broadly rather than tool culture specifically, but this ies, including our brains) have evolved to pro- | vide more efficient support for the behaviour in- | volved. The behaviour itself, however, has re- mained cultural. TOOL CULTURE AND THE EVOLUTION OF THE HUMAN HAND 91 The Baldwin Effect presupposes that indi- vidual organisms must learn a task in order to survive, i.e., it assumes a significant degree of compulsion. Before flight became instinctive, immature birds had to learn to fly because adult member of their species had adopted flight as a ‘way of life’. Applying the Baldwin Effect to tool culture also assumes a significant degree of compulsion. There is no direct evidence that tool culture was a compulsory ‘way of life’ for early hominins, but we can reason backwards from contemporary human culture. Cultures define the methods to be used in subsistence tasks, but social relationships en- force the use of those methods. Enforcement can work in different ways, sometimes by the ex- plicit use of force, but more often by implicit as- sumption. Let us imagine a band of scavengers of the genus Homo, which happens upon a re- cent kill. The band might quickly organize itself to ward off competing scavengers, and to remove as much flesh as possible from the carcass be- fore the return of the predator responsible for the kill. These tasks might have been at least partly accomplished with the help of stone cut- ting tools to remove flesh, as well as weapons, ‘which for this purpose can be considered tools because they are used forcefully to transfer en- ergy (e.g., wooden clubs or spears to ward off other scavengers). In our imaginary scenario, the enforcement of technique is largely implicit. The group ha- bitually has tools and weapons with it, in the expectation of using them. It is passing through this location at least in part in expectation of finding a fresh kill. Its adaptation to its en- vironment requires group members to be pro- ficient with tools, alternative approaches being effectively ruled out. Some individuals may be more proficient at consuming flesh rapidly at the site of the kill, like the competing scav- engers, but we can imagine that explicit group prohibition prevents them. Our imaginary sce- nario of enforced tool usage specifically men- tions the Homo genus. While some have con- trasted Homo as an ‘obligate’ tool user with Australopithecus as merely a ‘facultative’ tool user (Tobias 1994), it is difficult to assess the validity of such distinctions. It may be that ho- minin tool culture developed very gradually and unevenly, out of step with the relatively sudden branching speciations which seem to have oc- curred in the hominin lineage. CONCLUSION Pre-adaptation plays a major role in any evo- lutionary explanation of human hand anatomy. We have inherited five digits from our verte- brate ancestry. 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Hand of Paranthropus ro- bustus from Member 1, Swartkrans: fossil ev- idence for tool behavior. Science, 240, 781— 784. David A. Wells 112 Pentecost Avenue, Turramurra NSW 2074 email: dawells@optusnet.com.au Tobias, P.V., 1994. The evolution of early ho- minids. In T. Ingold (Ed.), Companion Ency- clopaedia of Anthropology, pp. 33-78. Rout- ledge. Whiten, A., Goodall, J., McGrew, W.C., Nishida, T., Reynolds, V., Sugiyama, Y., Tutin, C.E.G., Wrangham, R.W. and Boesch, C., 1999. Cultures in chimpanzees. Nature, 399, 682-685. Wrangham, R.W., 2001. Out of the pan, into the fire: how our ancestors’ evolution de- pended on what they ate. In F.B.M. de Waal (Ed.), Tree of Origin: What Primate Behav- zor Can Tell Us About Human Social Evolu- tion, pp. 119-144. Harvard University Press. Wynn, T., 1994. Tools and tool behaviour, In T. Ingold (Ed.), Companion Encyclopaedia of Anthropology, pp. 133-161. Routledge. (Manuscript received 20.10.2005, accepted 18.11.2005) Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, Vol. 138, p. 93-98, 2005 | ISSN 0035-9173/05/020093-6 $4.00/1 Biocosmology: a New Science of the Big Picture CHARLEY LINEWEAVER Summary of a Lecture to the Royal Society of New South Wales University of Sydney, 4*® May 2005. Abstract: Abstract: It is argued that a cross-disciplinary approach is required if we want to understand how life forms evolved from non-life forms. The new science of cosmobiology is described as a big picture form of astrobiology and an explanation given of how its focus on the expansion and the chemical evolution of the Universe can give us the broadest context for understanding other life that may exist in the Universe. Keywords: Cosmobiology, astrobiology, evolution, life. The opposability of your thumb clasping this paper testifies to your arboreal past. Your thumb is made of water, protein and bone, tes- tifying to your status as a terrestrial life form. Water protein and bone are made of hydrogen, oxygen, carbon, nitrogen and calcium, which are in turn made up of protons, neutrons and electrons. Thus, to understand how your thumb came to be, we need to know how sub-atomic particles came together to form atoms, how atoms came together to form molecules, how molecules evolved into life forms and how life forms evolved into creatures that climbed trees and grasped things. We need to know at least the basics of physics, astronomy, chemistry, bi- ology and evolution. No one of these sciences can give us a satisfying picture of the origin and evolution of thumbs, for a thumb (just like every other part of the Universe) has a 14 billion year history and contains no boundaries where its physics ends and its chemistry begins, or where its chemistry ends and its biology begins. Despite this natural undividedness of all parts of the Universe, universities are parti- tioned into physics, chemistry and biology de- partments full of specialists. This intellectual balkanization has a price. It encourages the sep- aration of the Universe into living things stud- ied by biological scientists and non-living things studied by physical scientists. It fosters the pre- tense that there is a sharp division between the two that should not be crossed. This assumed division thwarts the understanding of the many fundamental connections that exist between the living and the non-living parts of the Universe and it undermines our ability to understand the origin of life and the important transition from non-living to living things. It is beginning to be recognized that to ad- dress the issue of the origin of life and whether we are alone in the Universe, the strong tradi- tional boundary between the life sciences and physical sciences will have to come down. As it does, astrobiologists enthusiastically clamor over the fallen walls — erstwhile reductionis- tic researchers embracing a more synthetic ap- proach. Astrobiology is a synthesis of astron- omy and biology. An even broader and more synthetic approach to the study of the origin of life in the Universe is a combination of cosmol- ogy and biology: biocosmology. I believe bio- cosmology will give us many important insights as we struggle to produce a big picture under- standing of how we (and our thumbs) came to exist in the Universe. Biocosmology focuses on the cosmic evolu- tion of the Universe on the largest spatial and temporal scales. It is a science that studies how the evolution of non-living things created the in- gredients and the conditions for the emergence of life. As astronomers study the details of star formation, cosmologists put star formation in context by studying the evolution of star for- mation since the Big Bang. Biocosmology tries 94 to identify the cosmic processes which over time have allowed biological creatures like ourselves to come into existence. One such cosmic process is the expansion and cooling of the Universe, as plotted in Figure 1. Life as we know it is based on molecules; clumps of atoms that froze out of the cooling Universe when its temperature of the universe fell below molecular binding energies (Figure 1). Thus, the expansion and cooling of the Universe has been the most basic prerequisite for the ori- gin of molecules and molecular life. However, life cannot be made out of the cooling hydrogen and helium produced in the Big Bang. Many generations of massive stars had to form and die before the ashes of nuclear fusion accumu- lated to contain enough oxygen, carbon, nitro- gen, sulfur and phosphorus to produce watery environments and allow the chemical evolution of carbon molecules into hydrocarbons, carbo- hydrates and life. Four elements make up more than 99% of the atoms in terrestrial life: hydrogen, oxygen, carbon and nitrogen. Add seven more elements to this mix (S, P, Cl, Na, Mg, K and Ca) and we have more than 99.99% of the atoms in ter- restrial life. Of all these ingredients, only hy- drogen was made in the Big Bang; the rest were produced in the hot fusing cauldrons of mas- sive stars all over the Universe. Their ubiquity ensures that the ingredients for life are present throughout the Cosmos. Water is one of the most essential ingredi- ents for life and is one of the most abundant molecules in the universe. In fact, water is the most common triatomic molecule in the Uni- verse. This makes sense since hydrogen is by far the most common element in the Universe and, after the inert noble gas helium, oxygen comes next in abundance. To be useful to life, H2O must be a liquid, not ice or steam. To remain a liquid on the surface of a terrestrial planet, the planet should be orbiting a star in the circumstellar habitable zone. There are many reasons to believe that terrestrial planets, broadly defined, in hab- LINEWEAVER itable zones are ubiquitous in the Universe (Lineweaver et al. 2003). For example, plan- ets are formed in accretion disks and accretion disks are necessary ingredients in our best mod- els of star formation. The latest observations and simulations are consistent with the possi- bility that rocky planets orbit the majority of stars. Even if we accept that terrestrial planets are common, in order for life to emerge and evolve into something interesting, millions or even bil- lions of years in a clement stable aqueous envi- ronment may be required. Supernovae are the required suppliers of O, C, N, S and P but if they explode nearby they can also extinguish life. Thus, there may be a Galactic Habitable Zone close enough to the debris of supernovae to enjoy a complex chemistry but far enough away from supernovae to enjoy a clement en- vironment for the perhaps billions of years re- quired for the biological evolution of interesting organisms (Lineweaver et al. 2004). From the aqueous environment sketched in Figure 2, life emerged on Earth about 4 billion years ago and branched into the three domains shown at the top of Figure 2 and in Figure 3: Eubacteria, Archaea and Eukarya. We have many ideas about how life got started but none of them are compelling or complete. However, recent progress in molecular biology and genet- ics has allowed us to trace out the evolutionary tree of life on Earth, showing how all life forms are related to each other (Figure 3). We do not know if such a tree of life exists on other terrestrial planets. However, we can — use this tree to make better guesses about what forms of life we should expect elsewhere. For example, life forms at the root of this tree are | the common ancestors of all life on Earth. They are simpler and less quirky than the life forms they evolved into and these simpler organisms | therefore may be more representative of what | we should expect to find at the base of alien | | / trees of life. That is to say, as far as predicting | aliens goes, the smart money is on hyperther- | mophilic bacteria, not vertebrates. / BIOCOSMOLOGY 95 no free energy oe Pe Cosmic Microwave Background Hydrogen, Stars, IGM 10° ¥} 15 o 10 Z oO > a ee a a oO $s 10 — 10 > a po o = 3 a =] protons neutrons S 5 e 10 oO nuclei om 10° 10> ion io - 19° ° 10° io i Time after Big Bang (sec) NOW Figure 1. The most important thing one needs to know about cosmology is that the Universe used to be very hot and has been cooling down since its beginning. The sloping line labeled CMB is the temperature of the Cosmic Microwave Background, which is the temperature of the Universe. The molecules, atoms and subatomic particles that we now take for granted have not always existed. As the hot Big Bang cooled, matter came into existence probably about 10~** seconds after the Big Bang. At a thousandth of a second after the Big Bang the quark-gluon plasma cooled and condensed into protons and neutrons. Within three minutes these particles had condensed into light nuclei. As the Universe continued to cool, atoms formed for the first time and as the atoms cooled below the binding energy of molecules, molecules were able to form. If the Big Bang had produced oxygen, water would have been able to form then, but water had to wait until stars formed and produced oxygen (see Lineweaver and Schwartzman 2004 for details). 96 LINEWEAVER Plants Fungi Animals Cyanobacteria Gram-positive ; ee) " Sulfolobus Methanogens Halophiles Athi thy Figure 2. The history of the Universe since the big bang is summarized in this cartoon. The hot | Big Bang (bottom) produced hydrogen and helium (H and He). Clouds of H and He gravitationally collapsed to form stars of various masses. The massive stars exploded after a few million years and | spewed into interstellar space the ashes from the nuclei that had fused in their cores. After eight billion years of such reprocessing and accumulation, our Sun formed five billion years ago from a | gravitationally collapsing cloud of molecular hydrogen contaminated by oxygen, carbon, nitrogen | and other heavy elements. The Earth formed from this contamination in the accretion disk around | the young Sun. As the Earth accreted, water was deposited on its surface by comets and water vapour outgassed from hot rocks, just as volcanoes do today. BIOCOSMOLOGY 97 - a) Bacteria 3 ; rium marine Gp. 1 low femp ~ Gp} Gp 3, OW tarp, I2 “tow temp | do Lv "Og w fem, Archaea el Zea 0.1 changes per site Cryptomonas eee ken a : cr. & Figure 3. Phylogenetic tree of life on Earth based on 16S rRNA sequences. Life started as a hyperthermophilic eubacteria or Archaea and branched out (see Lineweaver and Schwartzman 2004 for details). Maximal growth temperatures have been used to assign a grey scale to the branches and thus to construct this biological thermometer on billion year time scales (see Pace 1997 for details concerning the construction of this tree). 98 LINEWEAVER Consider the two biocosmological facts (1) terrestrial biogenesis occurred rapidly and life formed on Earth soon after it was able to, and (2) terrestrial planets are not made of anything unique; life forms and planet Earth are made of the most common elements available in the Universe. These facts suggest that life may be common on terrestrial planets throughout the Universe (see Lineweaver & Davis 2002 for de- tails). Combining our knowledge of the cooling of the Universe and of the formation of stars and planets, and of the composition of those planets and the earliest forms of life on Earth is one ex- ample of how biocosmology brings together the study of life forms and cosmic processes to help us understand how we fit into the Universe and how we compare to other life forms that may inhabit the Universe. REFERENCES Lineweaver, C.H., 2001. An estimate of the age distribution of terrestrial planets in the Uni- verse: quantifying metallicity as a selection effect. Icarus, 151, 307-313 (also available at http://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0012399). Lineweaver, C.H. and Davis, T.M., 2002. Does the rapid appearance of life on Earth sug- gest that life is common in the Universe? Astrobiology, 2, 293-304 (also available at http://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0205014). Lineweaver, C.H., Grether, D. and Hidas, M.., 2003. How common are Earths? How com- mon are Jupiters? In Bioastronomy 2002: Life Among the Stars (R. Norris and F. Stoot- man, Eds), Astronomical Society of the Pa- cific, [AU Symposium, 213, 41—44. Lineweaver, C.H., Fenner, Y. and Gibson, B.., 2004. The Galactic Habitable Zone and the age distribution of complex life in the Milky Way. Science, 303, 59-62. Lineweaver, C.H. and Schwartzman, D., 2004. Cosmic thermobiology: thermal constraints on the origin and evolution of life. In Ori- gins: Genesis, Evolution and Biodiversity of Microbial Life in the Universe (J. Seckbach, Ed.) Vol. 6 of a series on Cellular Origin and Life in Extreme Habitats, pp. 233- 248. Kluwer Academic Press (also available at http://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0305214). Pace, N.R., 1997. A molecular view of microbial diversity and the biosphere. Science, 276, 734-740. Charley Lineweaver Planetary Science Institute, Australian National University, Canberra ACT 0200. (Manuscript received 30.07.2005, accepted 18.11.2005) | | Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, Vol. 138, p. 99-99, 2005 | ISSN 0035-9173/05/020099-1 $4.00/1 Thesis Abstract: Pulse Transit Time as a Tool in the Diagnosis of Paediatric Sleep-Related Breathing Disorders FOO JONG YONG ABDIEL Abstract of a Thesis submitted for Doctor of Philosophy University of Queensland, July 2005 Sleep related breathing disorders in child- hood are increasingly recognised as contribu- tors to morbidity as well as suboptimal physical, mental and social development. The associated cost in social and economic terms is clearly sig- nificant. Detection and diagnosis of such dis- orders can be costly and technically difficult. Multi-parameter monitoring like polysomnog- raphy is expensive and inappropriate for mass screening or investigations remote from tertiary centres. A simple and non-invasive cardiovascular approach termed pulse transit time (PTT) is useful in determining the status of upper air- ways during sleep. This approach employs the measurement of the time delay in the -« rterial pulse pressure wave from the aortic valve of the heart to a peripheral site. PTT has shown promise to provide quantify inspiratory effort in adults with sleep disordered breathing (SDB) and can then be an effective monitoring tool in children. Initial investigations explore the parameters that can confound the PTT mea- Dr Foo Jong Yong Abdiel surements of a child. This work provides an estimate of the expected PTT ranges from in- fancy to childhood. Thereafter, overnight PTT recordings were performed in conjunction with PSG studies to corroborate evidence for its ca- pability in paediatric respiratory studies. The results show that PTT has the ability to iden- tify abnormal respiratory events during sleep. Furthermore, the use of PTT can differentiate the nature of respiratory events as obstructive or central. Technological considerations to im- prove the robustness of PTT measure to be used not only in cardiorespiratory but also cardiovas- cular studies on children were also illustrated. Preliminary findings obtained here suggest that the properties of PTT show promise as a predic- tor for obstructive sleep apnoea. There is a need to bridge the gap of providing quality SDB diag- nosis and yet accommodating requirements for a robust screening measure. PTT has demon- strated its suitability and utility as a measure to play a role in the investigation and monitoring of treatment in this area. Centre Manager, Biomedical Engineering Research Centre, Nanyang Technological University 50 Nanyang Drive, Research Techno Plaza 6th Storey, Xfrontiers Block, Singapore 637553 email: Jong@ntu.edu.sg (Manuscript received 21.11.2005, accepted 21.11.2005) Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, Vol. 138, p. 100-101, 2005 ISSN 0035-9173/05/0200100-2 $4.00/1 Thesis Abstract: Characterisation of Blood Dendritic Cells in Patients with Cancer ALBERTO PINZON-CHARRY Abstract of a Thesis submitted for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy The School of Medicine, University of Queensland Dendritic cells (DC) are the key antigen- presenting cells (APC). They play a critical role in initiating specific cellular and humoral im- mune responses and have been implicated in the defective function of the immune system during cancer progression. Despite the well- demonstrated role of DC in modulating anti- tumour immunity, only a few studies have in- vestigated the systemic effect of cancer on in vivo circulating DC populations. In the present study, the effects of cancer on the immune sys- tem were assessed focusing on how it affects the function of different populations encompassed within the blood DC compartment. The study of the function of cells within the blood DC compartment (as opposed to in vitro generated DC) was chosen despite the fact that it implies significant technical constraints, because they represent the bona fide DC populations. More- over, blood DC are in their natural state of dif- ferentiation and free from the influence of exoge- nous cytokines thus, reflecting more directly the natural biology of systemic immune responses OCCUITINg 2n VIVO. Given that tumours have been demonstrated to produce a plethora of immunosuppressive factors that exert systemic effects on immune cell function affecting DC, the first stage of this research aimed at reviewing current evidence on the effects of tumours on DC biology. Re- ports describing the role of tumour-derived fac- tors in the induction of DC dysfunction are ex- amined and discussed in view of the current knowledge to suggest that tumour-induced al- teration of DC differentiation, maturation and longevity is one of the crucial mechanisms for tumour-induced immune suppression in cancer. Therefore, the next stage of the research pro- gram investigates the effects of tumours on the frequency and phenotype of circulating DC. To evaluate this, blood DC counts, phenotype and subset distribution were monitored in a cohort of patients with early (Stage I/II, n=95) and advanced (Stage III/IV, n=21) breast cancer showing evidence that the blood DC compart- ment can be compromised by disease progres- sion. Blood DC numbers were consistently re- duced in patients with advanced disease sug- gesting a diminished availability of DC precur- sors in patients with more systemic disease. Moreover, a prolonged period of reduced DC counts extending over 48 weeks after tumor re- section was documented in patients with early disease. Finally, the blood DC compartment in patients with advanced disease revealed an alteration in (i) the distribution of myeloid (CD11ctDC) and plasmacytoid (CD123"'DC) subtypes as well as (ii) reduced expression of molecules essential for optimal co-stimulation and antigen presentation to T-cells. The next stage of research further explores the nature of these alterations. It is demon- strated that the reduction in myeloid and plas- macytoid DC counts is associated with the ac- cumulation of a previously undefined popula- tion of HLA-DRtCD11c~CD123~ cells lack- ing markers for most mature hematopoietic lin- eages (HLA-DRt immature cells, DRTIC) in — a cohort of patients with breast (n=120) and prostate (n=10) cancer as well as malignant glioma (n=6). In order to study their functional | phenotype, DRTIC from cancer patients were | purified and side-by-side comparisons were per- formed with their DC counterparts. Light and electron microscopy revealed that | DRTIC are small cells with poorly developed | organelles and condensed chromatin in the nu- | | f cleus, suggesting immaturity. Phenotypic char- | acterisation showed heterogeneity with variable expression of antigens ascribed to the DC, early | Moreover, in — contrast to DC, DRTIC exhibit limited capac- | B-cell and progenitor lineages. ity to capture antigen eliciting reduced prolif- eration and IFN-y secretion by allo-reactive T- cells. Finally, increased numbers of these cells correlate with disease status and tumour pro- gression. This is exemplified by the fact that patients with advanced breast cancer demon- strate a significantly larger number of DRTIC in the circulation than patients with early disease, and also, the observation that in patients with fully-resected malignant glioma, the proportion of DRtIC in blood is increased when clinical evaluation indicates tumour progression. The fourth phase of this study evaluates whether DRTIC could have an impact on the nature of the immune response. For this pur- pose, DRTIC and DC were co-purified and their function thoroughly assessed including capac- ity to capture and present antigens as well as the nature of the T-cell responses generated. In contrast to DC, DRTtIC exhibited a lim- ited response to inflammatory cytokines (TNF- a IL-1, IL-6 and PGE») or ligands for toll-like receptor (TLR) 4 (Lypopolysaccharide, LPS), TLR3 (viral double-stranded RNA, poly I:C) and TLR9 (bacterial DNA, CpG oligodeoxynu- cleotide; CpG ODN) in terms of phenotypic maturation (CD40, CD80, CD83, CD86 and HLA-DR) or cytokine secretion (TNF-a IL-10 and IL-12). In addition, in all the systems tested (antigen uptake, allogeneic T-cell pro- liferation, CTL-elicitation, MHC-II-restricted antigen presentation and cross-presentation), DRTIC were significantly less efficient than DC. DR‘IC induced poor Thl (IFN-y, TNF-a and IL-2) and preferentially induced Th2 bias (IL-4) in activated T-cells. Interestingly, DRTIC ex- hibited marked resistance to the pro-apoptotic effect of tumour-derived supernatants and ex- hibited substantial migratory capacity to in- flammatory cytokines in vitro. Finally, ways to differentiate and optimize the function of Alberto Pinzon-Charry 101 DR‘IC as antigen presenting cells were inves- tigated. It was found that despite the poor responsiveness to inflammatory or pathogen- derived factors, CD40 stimulation induced phe- notypic maturation and secretion of bio-active IL-12, in turn, generating more efficient T-cell activation. Finally, the implications of the aforemen- tioned findings in relation to tumour-induced immune suppression, DC-based immune mon- itoring as well as DC-based immunotherapeutic strategies for cancer are discussed. The rele- vant data are presented to support the notion that disease progression in cancer patients can have significant effects on the blood DC com- partment. Indeed, the evidence gathered here indicate that immature cells (DRTIC) that ac- cumulate in patients with cancer can contribute to immune suppression by means of inefficient antigen presentation, displacement of DC pop- ulations and/or generation of inadequate im- mune responses. It is also suggested that given the remarkable differences in functional capac- ity and responsiveness between DRTIC and DC, the evaluation of blood DC broadly de- fined as Lin" HLA-DR cells is to be carefully assessed, particularly in patients with cancer, where DRTIC represent a significant propor- tion of this compartment. More importantly, this study identifies an approach (CD40 stim- ulation) able to activate and differentiate these cells in vitro, thus generating more efficient T- cell responses. The finding that CD40 ligation not only boosts the antigen-presenting cell func- tion of DC but also DRTIC, substantiates the utilization of ex vivo conditioned APC to cor- rect the unbalanced immunologic performance in cancer and may prove to be crucial in im- proving the efficacy of DC-based immunothera- pies for cancer. Queensland Institute of Medical Research, Molecular Immunology Laboratory Bancroft Centre/L, Royal Brisbane Hospital Post Office Brisbane 4029 AUSTRALIA E-mail: albertoP@qimr.edu.au (Manuscript received 18.10.2005, accepted 18.10.2005) Journal & Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales, Vol. 138, p. 103-106, 2005 ISSN 0035-9173/05/0200103-4 $4.00/1 Biographical Memoir Hugo Messerle 1925 — 2002 Professor Hugo K. Messerle FTSE, BEE (Hons), MEngSc, PhD, DSc. Prof. Hugo Messerle died on September 16, 2004, after some years of declining health. He had a remarkable life story. Hugo Messerle was born in Palestine in 1925, his parents being members of the small religious group called “The Temple Society”. “The Tem- ple Society”, led by Pastor Hoffmann, was a group that broke away from the State Evan- gelical Lutheran Church of Stuttgart in Ger- many, in the 1850’s. Other members of this society migrated to Russia and also to USA. Hugo’s father, a cabinet maker, was born in the Caucasus’s in Russia of this group. The Tem- plers group in Palestine, (unconnected with the Knights Templars of the Crusades) maintained their own German language, schools, culture and traditions, but nevertheless had good re- lations with the surrounding Arab and Jewish population. After the first world war, Pales- tine became a Mandate of the British govern- ment. In 1941, after the outbreak of the sec- ond world war, the British became concerned, with the advance of Rommel in North Africa, that this large German group would undermine the security of Palestine for the British. The German settlements were then surrounded by armed guards and became internment camps. Furthermore over 600 Templers, together with other Germans, were deported from Palestine on the large British boat, the QE I. Hugo and his parents were put on this boat, not knowing where they were going. It was only after their departure that they found out that they were destined for Australia, where they were interned for 5 years at Tatura, a small town in northern Victoria. The Templers were treated very well by the Australian guards, despite many in these intern- ment camps expressing understandable sympa- thy for the German cause. Classes were organ- ised for the children in the camps, and Hugo did these courses and a full examination for uni- versity matriculation. However, these courses were nearly all in German, and were designed for matriculation at German universities, facil- itated through Berlin by the Red Cross. After the war was over and the treatment of the Jew- ish population within Germany became public knowledge, there were very strong anti-german feelings particularly from the Jewish population within Palestine. As a consequence the Tem- pler community remaining within Palestine, be- came untenable as a coherent German group and there was little possibility of the Templers in Australia returning to Palestine. However, the new German government validated the ma- triculation exam that had been passed by Hugo and three others in the internment camp. Fur- 104 thermore, after significant difficulties, the Uni- versity of Melbourne also accepted these exams as matriculation for Melbourne university, and Hugo was able to enrol and study at the Uni- versity of Melbourne. He graduated with first class honours in Electrical Engineering and also obtained a Masters in Engineering Science and a Doctor of Science degree from the University of Melbourne and a PhD degree from the Uni- versity of Sydney. It is remarkable that from such beginnings, as an internee confined for 5 years for the protec- tion of Australian society, Hugo went on to be- come a leading Australian academic, a research scientist with an international reputation, and was head of the Department of Electrical En- gineering at the University of Sydney for al- most 20 Years. This career has three compo- nents, his many research publications, his influ- ence as head of a university department, and his research contribution in the field of Magneto- hydrodynamic power generation. Hugo’s first major publication was the book “Dynamic Circuit Theory”, published by Perg- amon press in 1965. This 656 page book is not only about circuit theory, but has mate- rial on electric machines, induction motors, con- trol theory and transformers. It is packed with mathematics. When I borrowed this book from the CSIRO library where I work, I noted that the borrower’s card was crammed full of names of people who borrowed the book. Many of the diagrams in this book were drawn in Indian ink by Renate, his wife. A second book of Hugo’s is “Finergy Conversion Statics”, published in 1969. In a recent Google search, I found that Hugo has written a third book, published only af- ter his retirement, on Hugo’s research specialty “Magneto-hydrodynamic Electrical Power Gen- eration”. I was surprised that Hugo had not proudly shown a copy of this book to me on any of my visits to his home after his retirement. Hugo was not that type of person. Renate had to make quite a search of his office, just to find a copy of the book. Of course, Prof. Messerle has many papers published in scientific journals and International Conference Proceedings, for BIOGRAPHICAL MEMOIR example on plasma interactions with electrodes, stability theory of MHD “Disk” generators and circuit interruption. He also wrote papers on more general subjects such as “Restructuring Tertiary Education in Australia” . Hugo Messerle was Head of the Department of Electrical Engineering at the University of Sydney for almost 20 years. Prof. Messerle calmly shouldered the onerous and stressful du- ties of Head of Department such as allocating teaching duties among staff members, recom- mending particular staff for promotion, organ- ising new courses within the department and representing the department on numerous uni- versity committees. Hugo was quiet, not au- tocratic, had an admirable emotional stability, and was an effective leader who had the consid- eration of his staff at heart. Hugo also made sig- nificant general contributions to university and public life: he was founder and chairman of the Committee on Sustainable Development of the Academy of Technological Sciences and Engi- neering. He was the founding Director of the Electrical Engineering Foundation at the Uni- versity of Sydney, Director of the Board of the Warren Centre, Chairman of the Computer Re- search Board and set up the International Lia- son Group on Engineering Education. He was also a member of the International Current Zero Club. He was awarded the Medal of the Aus- tralasian Association of Engineering, the Cen- tenary Medal of the IEEE of USA and also a Centenary Medal of Australia. Finally we come to Hugo’s contributions to his research field of magneto hydrodynamic power generation. Australian electric power is largely generated from the burning of coal to make steam. The possibility of doubling the ef- ficiency of generating electric power from coal, using magneto hydrodynamics, has been inves- — tigated by large research groups in USA, Eu- — rope, USSR and Japan for many years. Hugo championed this research and had his own re- search group in this area at the University of © Sydney, doing both theoretical work and also | experimental investigations at the old White Bay Power station. Hugo participated in con- BIOGRAPHICAL MEMOIR ferences and meetings overseas in this field, and also invited many research leaders such as Prof Eustis from Stanford, USA, Prof Shelkov from Moscow, Russia, Prof. Shioda from Japan and Prof. Rosa from USA, to visit Australia. Prof. Messerle was elected Chairman of the UNESCO International Liason Group for MHD Power Generation for many years, an unusual honour for an Australian for a committee with mem- bership from US, Europe, Russia and Japan. The concept of MHD power generation involves plasma moving at supersonic velocities in a magnetic field, with the possibility of doubling the efficiency of generating power. It now ap- pears unlikely that this concept will be used, one reason being that “dirt”, present in all coal, condenses at the electrodes of the MHD duct as slag. Either the slag is conducting, in which case the electrodes are shorted out, or the slag is an insulator, in which case no current flows to the electrodes. Several months ago, at an International Plasma Conference in Japan, the Plenary Lec- turer described current plans for a manned space mission to Mars. The method of propul- sion of this vehicle is to be through the use of plasmas moving at super-sonic velocities in a magnetic field from super conducting mag- nets. This technology involving high temper- ature plasmas, is essentially the same as MHD technology on which Prof Messerle spent much of his life. Thus instead of this technology being used, as was Hugo’s aim, to convert mechanical John J. Lowke CSIRO Industrial Physics, Sydney 11.11.2004 105 forces into electric power, it may be used the other way around, to convert electrical power to mechanical forces, to propel mankind to Mars! Prof Messerle also made a remarkable con- tribution to the Uniting Church in Australia, where for almost 20 years he was chairman of the Continuing Education Committee of this church. This committee established administra- tive systems and means whereby members of the clergy of the Uniting Church could participate in continuing education throughout their pro- fessional lives to enrich their contributions to the Church and society. As a lay person of the church, this was a very distinctive contribution of Prof. Messerle. Some years ago, while reminiscing to a friend about his early life, Hugo said “I landed in Aus- tralia speaking only German, with a small suit- case in one hand and a violin in the other”. Now Hugo has left us. He leaves his wife, Renate, to whom he was married for 49 years, two daugh- ters, Karin and Barbara, both of whom have PhD degrees and both of whom have husbands with PhD degrees, one being a Federation Fel- low at ANU. Both daughters have two children. Hugo also leaves a legacy of almost 20 years as Head of Department of Electrical Engineering at the University of Sydney, and many research papers including three textbooks. He was a man of integrity, scholarship, and dedicated zeal in the pursuit of his research goal of improved effi- ciency of electric power generation, through the use of magnetohydrodynamics. 106 BIOGRAPHICAL MEMOIR SEZ Ss aS KS The photograph shows, Prof Hugo Messerle, Brian Campbell, then a Senior Lecturer in Electri- cal Engineering at the University of Sydney (Hugo’s principal lifelong supporter of research in magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) research), and Prof Woitek Brzowski from Poland, who was an internationally renowned scientist in MHD who was visiting the School of Electrical Engineering at the University of Sydney as part of a collaborative research program. The three men in the photograph are in front of the experimental MHD duct built at White Bay Power Station in Sydney as part of Prof Messerle’s experimental research program in MHD, 1979-1985. CONTENTS Vol. 138 Parts 1 and 2 KELLY, JAK President’s Column KELLY, KARINA A Hundred Years after Einstein’s Extraordinary Year HORA, HEINRICH Ideal Energy Source by Mark Oliphant’s Beam Fusion MOYAL, A The Rev. W.B. Clarke and his Scientific Correspondents ABSTRACTS OF THESES CATLEY, B.E. Workplace Violence Ltd. PETRICH, C. Growth, Structure, and Desalination of Refreezing Cracks in Sea Ice POLLARD, J. A Software Engineering Approach to the Integration of Computer Technology into Mathematics Education SALKELD, D.J. The Ecology of a Host-Parasite Relationship: Haemogregarines & the Eastern Water Skink, Eulamprus quoyii. ANNUAL REPORT OF COUNCIL FOR THE YEAR ENDED 31° MARCH 2005 FINANCIAL REPORT 2004 Vol. 138 Parts 3 and 4 KELLY, JAK President’s Column KELLY, JAK 100 Years Ago KADER, M.A. A Comparison of Seed Germination Calculation Formulae and the Associated Interpretation of Resulting Data 13 31 39 40 41 42 43 51 61 63 65 SUTHERLAND, F.L., COLCHESTER, D.M., WEBB, G.B. An Apparent Diatreme Source for Gem Corundums and Zircons, Gloucester River, New South Wales Th WELLS, DAVID. A. Tool Culture, the Baldwin Effect and the Evolution of the Human Hand 85 LINEWEAVER, C. Biocosmology: a New Science of the Big Picture 93 ABSTRACTS OF THESES ABDIEL, F. J-Y. Pulse Transit Time as a Tool in the Diagnosis of Paediatric 99 Sleep-Related Breath ing Disorders PINZON-CHARRY, A. Characterisation of Blood Dendritic Cells in Patients with 100 Cancer BIOGRAPHICAL MEMOIR Hugo Messerle : 103 JOURNAL AND PROCEEDINGS OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF NEW SOUTH WALES Volume 138 Parts 1-4 (Nos 415-418) 2005 ISSN 0035-9173 PUBLISHED BY THE SOCIETY BUILDING H47 UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY, NSW 2006 Issued December 2005 THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF NEW SOUTH WALES OFFICE BEARERS FOR 2005-2006 Patrons His Excellency, Major General Michael Jeffery AC, CVO, MC Governor General of the Commonwealth of Australia. Her Excellency Professor Marie Bashir, AC, Governor of New South Wales. President Prof. J. Kelly, BSc Syd, PhD Reading, DSc NSW, FInstP Vice Presidents Ms K. Kelly BA (Hons) Syd Mr D.A. Craddock, BSc (Eng) NSW, Grad.Cert. Management UWS. Mr C.M. Wilmot Mr J.R. Hardie, BSc Syd, FGS, MACE. one vacancy Hon. Secretary (Gen.) Jill Rowling BE UTS, MSc Syd Hon. Secretary (Ed.) Prof. P.A. Williams, BA (Hons), PhD Macq. Hon. Treasurer Mr A.J. Buttenshaw Hon. Librarian Ms C. van der Leeuw Councillors Dr E. Baker PhD Dr R.A. Creelman Mr J. Franklin Ms M. Haire Dr M. Lake, PhD Syd A/Prof. W.A. Sewell, MB, BS, BSc Syd, PhD Melb FRCPA Ms R. Stutchbury Mr R. Woolett Southern Highlands Rep. Mr H.R. Perry, BSc. The Society originated in the year 1821 as the Philosophical Society of Australasia. 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REPRINTS An author who is a member of the Society will receive a number of reprints of their paper free. Authors who are not a members of the Society may purchase reprints. a SMITHSONIAN INSTITU LT 3 9088 900 convents ‘ill Vol. 138 Parts 3 and 4 KELLY, JAK President’s Column | 61 KELLY, JAK ; 100 Years Ago 63 KADER, M.A. A Comparison of Seed Germination Calculation Formulae and the Associated Interpretation of Resulting Data 65 SUTHERLAND, F.L., COLCHESTER, D.M., WEBB, G.B. An Apparent Diatreme Source for Gem Corundums and Zircons, Gloucester River, New South Wales a WELLS, DAVID. A. Tool Culture, the Baldwin Effect and the Evolution of the Human Hand 85 LINEWEAVER, C. Biocosmology: a New Science of the Big Picture 93 ABSTRACTS OF THESES ABDIEL, F. J-Y. Pulse Transit Time as a Tool in the Diagnosis of Paediatric 99 Sleep-Related Breath ing Disorders PINZON-CHARRY, A. Characterisation of Blood Dendritic Cells in Patients with 100 Cancer BIOGRAPHICAL MEMOIR Hugo Messerle 103 ADDRESS Royal Society of New South Wales, Building H47 University of Sydney NSW 2006, Australia http: //nsw.royalsoc.org.au DATE OF PUBLICATION December 2005 Erratum The last issue of the Journal had a correct Volume number but incorrect issue numbers. Volume 138 Parts 1 and 2 should be Nos 415—416 and not 407—408.