Proceedings of Acoustics 2011: Breaking New Ground 2-4 November 2011 Gold Coast, Australia

Welcome to the Proceedings of ACOUSTICS 2011. This volume contains papers presented at the 2011 Annual Conference of the Australian Acoustical Society that was held on the Gold Coast in November 2011. The annual conference of the Australian Acoustical Society has a long history and has developed as an important forum for the dissemination of information relating to the science and practice of acoustics in Australia.

The theme for ACOUSTICS 2011 was Breaking New Ground. This theme was chosen to provide a focus for the Conference on the substantial infrastructure development projects currently being undertaken and being planned in the Australasian region. Major infrastructure for transportation, industry and mining, present challenges in noise and vibration, whether these are in assessment, modelling or mitigation or in the need to provide appropriate legislative and regulatory frameworks. The Proceedings of ACOUSTICS 2011 do break new ground with papers reviewing recent developments and addressing the challenges and opportunities presented by the construction and operational phases of such infrastructure.

The response to the call for papers from the acoustical community was outstanding. 140 abstracts were submitted for inclusion in the technical program for the Conference. These abstracts covered a broad range of topics. The theme was well supported with papers proposed for noise associated with major infrastructure projects and construction in contexts ranging from urban through to mining projects. Many abstracts were also submitted in the other major topics for which papers were called for the conference, underwater acoustics / marine bioacoustics, railway noise and vibration and road transport. Other abstracts on more general noise and vibration were received. The abstract review committee reviewed the abstracts and authors of abstracts accepted for the conference were invited to submit full papers. The larger Technical Review Committee, which included over 50 acoustics academics and professionals, reviewed the full papers. Each paper was reviewed by two to three members of the committee. After the outcome of the reviewing process, the final technical program for the conference included 103 papers.

Five workshops were included in the technical program for the conference. These were on Wheel Rail Noise Control, Building Design for Transportation Noise, Wind Turbines and Low Frequency Noise, Sleep Disturbance and Low-Noise Road Surfaces. These workshops were ogranised to be run within the program for the conference. In addition, a Short Course entitled, "Environmental Noise Assessment" was held in conjunction with the conference.

The editors of these proceedings would like to thank all authors for their efforts in preparing of their papers. Thanks also go to the Scientific Review Committee for their assistance in reviewing the large number of papers. As these proceedings are being published prior to the Conference, we look forward to the exciting technical program to a successful ACOUSTICS 2011.

Bibliographic Information

Information for Higher Education Research Data Collection (HERDC)

The HERDC is the annual collection of statistics from Australian universities about research output and income. It is currently collected by the Department of Innovation, Industry, Science and Research.

The following information is provided for authors intending to claim their research publications as part of the HERDC.

Proof of peer review

Each of the manuscripts accepted to 'Acoustics 2011: Breaking New Ground' was reviewed by at least two members of a scientific committee comprising 42 members. The names of referees were kept anonymous from the authors. The referees reviewed the papers to ensure they were of high standard for the conference, and provided written feedback on the quality of the manuscripts. Where doubt remained after this process, the papers were reviewed by the scientific committee chairman. The referee criteria included: technical content, originality, clarity, English expression, technical significance. Papers were matched where possible to referees in the same field with similar interests and area of expertise as the authors. Authors were advised to make all changes recommended by the reviewers, or provide the editor with a technical justification for not making particular changes. The responses from authors were then reviewed by the editor.

The organising committee wishes to thank the scientific committee and the authors for their cooperation and time to enable this review process to occur.

Scientific Committee

Acoustics 2011 Organisation

Copyright Notice

The proceedings of 'Acoustics 2011: Breaking New Ground' have been reproduced from author-submitted files. The authors are solely responsible for the technical content and opinions expressed therein. The opinions expressed are not necessarily those of the Australian Acoustical Society, or the University of Adelaide.

Copyright ©2011, The Australian Acoustical Society.

Replicated in Australia

For availability of the CD-ROM of the proceedings, contact the Australian Acoustical Society http://www.acoustics.asn.au

Permission is hereby granted for any person to reproduce a fractional part of any paper herein provided that permission is obtained from its author(s) and credit is given to the author(s) and these proceedings. An author or his research sponsor may reproduce his or her paper in full, crediting these proceedings. This permission is not assignable.