Books on the topic 'Extreme research fields'

Over recent years, there has been a sharp increase in the various possible forms of poverty and housing vulnerability: from the total lack of shelter of the homeless to the risk of losing their home that now threatens numerous families in medium-low income brackets. At the same time, the traditional linear and standardised housing policies appear no longer adequate to address these phenomena. This book contains the results of a study entrusted by the Tuscan Regional Authority to a working group from the University of Florence and the Fondazione Giovanni Michelucci. The research explores the field of practices for self-production of housing in Italy and the world, through a critical selection of significant experiences, revealing the architectural and social creativity exploited in a large variety of collective actions. The book also contains a reconstruction of housing problems in Tuscany and an overview of alternative approaches to housing policy. The last section is devoted to the research-action on the occupation of the Luzzi, the abandoned sanatorium on the border between Florence and Sesto Fiorentino, a case that illustrates the most significant contradictions and dilemmas gravitating around the housing issue for the new poor: the problem of homeless immigrants; the difficulty of the authorities in managing problems of extreme housing poverty; the role of the associations and organisations of social mediation, and the inherent complexity of achieving a participatory approach to social and town planning research.

The purpose of the textbook is to help students to master basic concepts and research methods used in mathematical analysis. In part 2 of the proposed cycle of workshops on the following topics: analytic geometry in space; differential calculus of functions of several variables; local, conditional, global extrema of functions of several variables; multiple, curvilinear and surface integrals; elements of field theory; numerical, power series, Fourier series; applications to the analysis and solution of applied problems. These topics are studied in universities, usually in the second semester in the discipline "Mathematical analysis" or the course "Higher mathematics", "Mathematics". For the development of each topic the necessary theoretical and background material, reviewed a large number of examples with detailed analysis and solutions, the options for independent work. For self-training and quality control of the acquired knowledge in each section designed exercises and tasks with answers and guidance. It is recommended that teachers, students and graduate students studying advanced mathematics.

Recent growth in palliative care research has created a heterogeneous field that encompasses both qualitative and quantitative techniques, and descriptive as well as interventional study designs. Despite the valuable knowledge that has been produced by this research, and the promise of future important advances, its progress has been impeded by a persistent uncertainty about the ethics of these studies. For instance, there have been concerns raised about whether patients near the end of life should ever be asked to participate in research, although others have objected to this extreme position. Nevertheless, the combination of ethical and practical issues can create substantial barriers to palliative care research. This chapter discusses five ethical aspects of palliative care research that investigators and clinicians should consider in designing and conducting palliative care research. These include (1) the study’s potential benefits to future patients, (2) the study’s potential benefits to subjects, (3) the study’s risks to subjects, (4) subjects’ decision-making capacity, and (5) the voluntariness of subjects’ choices about research participation.

Abstract In the last decades, the hydrology and water management sectors have been dealing with global changes, proposing several innovative solutions. Climate changes are leading to an increase in long hot and dry periods, alternating with short and intense rainfall events. Urban areas are particularly vulnerable to these changes: rapid population growth and intense anthropic activity enhance the risk of extreme hydrological events. Several solutions have been proposed in the last years to monitor, prevent, forecast and mitigate rainfall extremes and their effects in natural and urban environments. Some questions, however, remain unsolved and new issues are challenging the hydrological community. The inter- and multi-disciplinary aims and topics discussed in the chapters of this book are organised into the following three main topics: (1) climate change and geo-hydrological risk, (2) tools and techniques for improving the comprehension of catchment hydrology and river hydraulics, and (3) sustainable use of water resources. In Focus – a book series that showcases the latest accomplishments in water research. Each book focuses on a specialist area with papers from top experts in the field. It aims to be a vehicle for in-depth understanding and inspire further conversations in the sector.

This volume contains eight survey articles by the invited speakers of the 29th British Combinatorial Conference, held at Lancaster University in July 2022. Each article provides an overview of recent developments in a current hot research topic in combinatorics. These topics span graphs and hypergraphs, Latin squares, linear programming, finite fields, extremal combinatorics, Ramsey theory, graph minors and tropical geometry. The authors are among the world's foremost researchers on their respective topics but their surveys are aimed at nonspecialist readers: they are written clearly with little prior knowledge assumed and with pointers to the wider literature. Taken together these surveys give a snapshot of the research frontier in contemporary combinatorics, making the latest developments accessible to researchers and graduate students in mathematics and theoretical computer science with an interest in combinatorics and helping them to keep abreast of the field.

The increasing complexity of modern societies has not only fostered pluralism but also warped methods of interpretation. In the field of academic research, the question of whether the pursuit of knowledge can overcome ideologies, populism, one-sided concepts, economisation etc. is extremely pertinent. This metascientific study compiles contributions from philosophy, historiography, political science, economics, journalism and law, and reveals academic research to be a field where description, interpretation and bias converge and clash.

U.S. Latinos have made important contributions to American society, and this biographical dictionary is devoted to celebrating those contributions. All 127 men and women profiled in this work have immigrated to or been born in the United States and have made major contributions to American life and culture. Cuban Americans, Puerto Ricans, Mexican Americans, and others of Spanish, South American, Central American and Caribbean heritage—more than one-third of them women—represent 35 fields of endeavor and all 50 states. From historical figures to the newest sports champion, figure-skater Rudy Galindo, this work provides profiles of both prominent and important but less-familiar people who have made significant contributions in their fields. Many of those profiled can be found in no other biographical source. A selection of photos complements the text. All biographies have been written by experts in their ethnic fields. Those profiled range widely from distinguished scientists to sports stars, from actors to activists, from businesswomen to political personalities, from literary luminaries to labor organizers. All are potential role models for young men and women, and many have overcome extreme odds to succeed. These colorfully written, substantive biographies detail their subjects' goals, struggles, and commitments to success and to their ethnic communities. Among the 127 people profiled are: Nobel Prize-winning scientist Luis Alvarez; Treasurer of the United States Romana Acosta Bañuelos; actor/composer/activist Rubén Blades; classical dancer Fernando Bujones; baseball player José Canseco; U.S. Secretary of Education Lauro Cavazos Jr.; writer Sandra Cisneros; fashion designer Oscar de la Renta; U.S. Congressman Lincoln DÍaz-Balart; teacher Jaime Escalante; composer/singer Gloria Estefan; tennis players Gigi Fernández and Mary Joe Fernández ; playwright Mara Fornés; U.S. Men's 1996 Figure Skating Champion Rudy Galindo; physician/political activist Héctor GarcÍa; Coca-Cola CEO Roberto Goizueta; labor leader Dolores Huerta; U.S. Ambassador MarÍa-Luci Jaramillo; artist Marisol; civil-rights activist Vilma Socorro MartÍnez; businessman/politician Jorge Mas Canosa; federal judge Harold Medina; graphic artist Nicholasa Mohr; U.S. Surgeon General Antonia Novello; astronaut Ellen Ochoa; Nobel Prize-winning biochemist Severo Ochoa; TV personality Geraldo Rivera; U.S. Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen; educational psychologist George I. Sánchez; newspaper editor Roberto Suárez; women's rights activist/businesswoman MarÍa Elena Toraño-PantÍn; New York State Supreme Court Judge Edwin Torres; mystic Teresa Urrea; film producer/director Luis Valdez. For ease of use, the heading of each profile identifies ethnic group, field of endeavor, birthdate and, where appropriate, death date. Each profile concludes with a suggested reading list of books and periodical articles about the subject. An ethnic index, field of endeavor index, and a general index make research easy. This much needed reference work is essential for school and public libraries.

It is well established that extreme social adversity can lead to negative health outcomes decades after the resolution of the precipitating environmental insult. Although the underlying mechanisms through which such adversity gets “under the skin” to become biologically embedded have long been considered a black box, recent research has indicated an important mediating role for epigenetic mechanisms—molecular modifications that regulate gene activity without changing the DNA sequence. With technical and scientific developments now enabling genome-wide epigenetic studies in humans, behavioral researchers have an unprecedented opportunity to empirically map the ways in which social dynamics become epigenetically embedded, influencing downstream gene expression, health, and behavior. This chapter examines the current state of social epigenetics research and discusses the opportunities and challenges facing this emerging field.

A Practical Guide to Using Qualitative Research with Randomized Controlled Trials focuses on qualitative research, emphasizing subjectivity, flexibility, open data collection, depth, and context, and randomized controlled trials (RCTs), emphasizing objectivity, standardization, measurement, and a key goal of bias reduction. The differences between the two methodologies make their combination an interesting ‘extreme case’ of mixed methods research. The book is about how to use qualitative research when preparing for, undertaking, or implementing the results of an RCT. The focus is on a range of designs, including pilot and pragmatic RCTs. The book focuses on health research because the majority of RCTs are undertaken in this field. It is written for researchers who are undertaking or planning to undertake qualitative research with RCTs. The book may also be useful to researchers leading RCTs and graduate students. It does not explain how to do qualitative research or how to do RCTs. The book focuses on how to undertake qualitative research in the specific context of RCTs. The book is divided into three parts. Part 2 offers the practical guidance promised within the title of the book. Each chapter focuses on key steps when undertaking qualitative research in the context of RCTs: writing a proposal, selecting research questions, collecting data, analysing data, integrating qualitative and quantitative components, and publishing. Part 1 sets the scene for the practical aspects. Part 3 focuses on the human beings we work closely with during research and offers practical advice to ensure these interactions are positive and fruitful.

This article first discusses the term “authoritarian regimes” and makes a claim for studying such regimes. An overview of the young but burgeoning research on authoritarian regimes structures the field in eight thematic clusters: (1) typological efforts and regime characteristics such as coalition formation and origins, (2) institutionalist approaches, (3) state-society relations beyond formal institutions, (4) repression, (5) political economy approaches, (6) international dimensions, (7) performance, and (8) linking the concepts of regimes and states. Although this wave of research has been extremely prolific, it still remains unsystematic and disparate in various regards. It is therefore necessary for this field of research to consolidate and thereby to contribute to genuine knowledge accumulation.

Eating disorders (EDs) have been described as among the most difficult psychiatric disorders to treat. Intervening early appears to be associated with better prognosis, although a subgroup of 20% of individuals may develop a more severe and enduring form of illness, which is associated with higher rates of mortality. Many patients with EDs who come into contact with clinical services may have extreme ambivalence toward change, which is often observed through high treatment dropout rates and difficulties engaging in treatment. This chapter outlines cognitive remediation therapy (CRT) for eating disorders, a treatment enhancer designed to support individuals with severe and complex forms of illness. This chapter explores how CRT has been used, examines its efficacy, reflects on its place as part of an overall treatment package for patients with EDs, and finally, explores options for future research in the field.

Chinese popular culture is extremely diverse and richly complex. The 18 chapters in this reference provide the most current and comprehensive bibliographical and descriptive study of Chinese popular culture in English. The chapters, each devoted to a particular topic, are written by expert contributors who offer comprehensive surveys of research materials and discuss the most important points of critical interest. The opening chapters of the book discuss the complexity of the Chinese cultural tradition and the relationship between popular culture and Chinese civilization. The chapters that follow are devoted to particular topics that reflect key elements of Chinese popular culture, such as tea drinking, literature, and religion. The chapters generally discuss the history of the topic, review current research in the field, evaluate available reference sources and research collections, and present bibliographic information.

This two-volume encyclopedia provides the science behind such heart-pumping geophysical hazards as volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, cyclones, and floods, as well as authoritative entries on notable natural disasters around the world and the agencies that help those they impact. Natural Hazards and Disastersexplores the sometimes harsh effects of nature on human life. The set discusses the physical science behind specific types of hazards and disasters (such as blizzards and tsunamis), their impact on our lives, how damage is mitigated or prevented, recovery and reconstruction, and the current research and technology used for managing or even eliminating the hazards. Written by experts in the field, the set also explores a variety of extreme events from around the world, including the 2010–2011 Christchurch Earthquakes (New Zealand), the 2017–2018 Thomas Fire (United States), and the 2018 Kerala Floods (India). Also covered are the world's major international and nonprofit aid agencies, like the Salvation Army and Oxfam, that assist disaster victims.

This two-volume encyclopedia provides the science behind such heart-pumping geophysical hazards as volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, cyclones, and floods, as well as authoritative entries on notable natural disasters around the world and the agencies that help those they impact. Natural Hazards and Disastersexplores the sometimes harsh effects of nature on human life. The set discusses the physical science behind specific types of hazards and disasters (such as blizzards and tsunamis), their impact on our lives, how damage is mitigated or prevented, recovery and reconstruction, and the current research and technology used for managing or even eliminating the hazards. Written by experts in the field, the set also explores a variety of extreme events from around the world, including the 2010–2011 Christchurch Earthquakes (New Zealand), the 2017–2018 Thomas Fire (United States), and the 2018 Kerala Floods (India). Also covered are the world's major international and nonprofit aid agencies, like the Salvation Army and Oxfam, that assist disaster victims.

This book examines the internal organization of armed groups, particularly their human resource practices. The authors look at the rebel armed groups through the prism of a labor market theory. In the Syrian civil war, extreme Islamist groups were able to siphon fighters off from moderate groups because they had better internal organization, took better care of fighters (physically and monetarily), and experienced less internal corruption. This book is based on more than six hundred survey-interviews with local civilians and fighters on the frontline in Syria (including members of al-Nusra and Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant [ISIS]) and a dataset of human resource policies from forty armed groups based on qualitative interviews with group leaders. In addition, active and former foreign fighters with ISIS and Jubhat al-Nusra were interviewed in Syria, Turkey, Ukraine, and Central Asia (where many former ISIS foreign fighters were hiding). In search of deeper answers on ideological issues, the author also penetrated an ultra-radical sect of former ISIS fighters known as chain takfiris who had abandoned ISIS because its ideology was not religiously radical enough. The author interviewed members of this extreme sect and studied their books, lectures, forums, and closed channels on social media. The author also conducted extensive ethnographic research in 2016 and 2017 while embedded with Iraqi Special Operations Forces during the Mosul operation. This allowed her to observe the behavior of ISIS members in the field and collect valuable information from the group’s internal documentation and from fighters’ personal notebooks.

This concluding chapter looks back to Alain Corbin's seminal work, The Foul and the Fragrant, in discussing the strides made in smell studies since its publication. At the same time it returns to the themes already laid out in the previous chapters. When it first appeared some three decades ago, Corbin's study filled an important gap in our understanding of past senses. Not surprisingly, other studies followed. Most of these similarly employ a binary model when considering smells, particularly when addressing the urban industrial environment. Because of this, much research into the history of smell comprises studies of extremes, documenting primarily pleasant scents and pungent odors. The chapter calls for further scholarship on the sense of smell, noting current gaps in the field, as despite its progress in recent years olfaction still continues to be overshadowed by other senses.

Economic inequalities are among the greatest human rights challenges the world faces today due to the past four decades of neoliberal policy dominance. Globally, there are now over 2,000 billionaires, while 3.4 billion people live below the poverty line of US $5.50 per day. Many human rights scholars and practitioners read these statistics with alarm, asking what impact such extreme inequalities have on realizing human rights and what role, if any, should human rights have in challenging them? This edited volume examines these questions from multiple disciplinary perspectives, seeking to uncover the relationships between human rights and economic inequalities, and the barriers and pathways to greater economic equality and full enjoyment of human rights for all. The volume is a unique contribution to the emerging literature on human rights and economic inequality, as it is interdisciplinary, global in reach and extends to several under-researched areas in the field.

The texts collected in this volume are the result of research in the field of the pressing issues of phenomenology as a “formal,” i.e., genetic-constitutional, investigation of the sense in the scientific and philosophical dialogue to which it aspires from the beginning with Edmund Husserl. The hope of the editors is to offer the reader a textbook of quality and relevance, and perhaps a particular input to challenge and find what is given by revealing itself and/or oneself. The range of topics is very wide [...]. The choice of topics itself is extremely interesting; it makes phenomenology, broadly conceived, and its tradition, as well as its present day, a lively and passionate subject. Piotr Mróz

This timely, comprehensive analysis of the latest advances in group processes research shows how cutting edge technologies, such as laboratory experiments, simulations, and complex systems combine with the rigor of cumulative research programs to change the way we see the social world. Group processes researchers study society scientifically, and have used sociological theory to build scientific, cumulative knowledge about the social world. Over the last 20 years, they have been extremely successful in advancing this knowledge through the reciprocal interplay of theory and experiment. The synthesis of such knowledge—uniting theory, simulation, and experiment—provides substantive explanations for social phenomena and predictions about events in complex social systems. This volume explores aspects of this synthesis from the perspective of group processes research. Providing deep analyses of methodological issues related to the synthesis of the theories, simulations, and experiments of group processes research, the authors also offer empirical examples of various studies that have been conducted. They investigate the ways in which theoretical research programs coordinate theory and empirical research in sociology to produce scientific progress and how computer simulations have evolved into an important component of theoretical research programs. This illustration of the relationships between theory construction and the method of theory verification advances our understanding of the field and may lead to a radical shift in the methodology and substance of modern social science.

As the guidelines of human attitudes and behavior, the values are extremely important for individuals and for the society. All major societal flaws (violence, war, aggression, criminal, delinquency, lawlessness, corruption, ecological devastation, terrorism, totalitarianism, exploitation, misery, poverty, hunger, starvation, ignorance, fanaticism and others) are result of behavior that is as odd with basic human values. Thus, a value-congruent behavior is a necessary condition for stable and successful society and the strengthening of value-aligned behavior is a planetary task. Psychological research convincingly demonstrated that the values represent and occupy a great field of attitudes and beliefs, one of the three great domains of the psychological trilogy (personality; attitudes, beliefs and values; cognitive abilities). In psychology, we need a clear and elaborated theoretical explanation of values. A comprehensive theoretical model of values (CTV) was therefore developed in last decades. It comprises all important aspects of the values: the structure, hierarchical organization, development, cross-cultural validity and differences, connections to other important psychological and behavioral domains and the role of values in our life. The knowledge of values is necessary, yet it is not enough in order to cope with all risks of individual and societal welfare. Another requirement is therefore crucial, namely the abovementioned alignment of values and behavior. Values that are not accomplished or realized in our behavior are useless. Thus, the research of value–behavior relations is extremely important in psychology. It is one of essential pillars in the scientific basis of a stable society and has therefore tremendous practical consequences. It also brings us closer to the perennial question connected with the role of values in our life: does the behavior that is aligned and congruent with values make us happier or not. Thus, the final part of my lecture will be focused on the empirical answers to that question. And, as research results are proving, the life and behavior which are congruent with the values factually correlate with the happiness and general wellbeing.

This book describes the choices open to farming families in the Sahelian village of Kala, in central Mali. Life in this drought-prone region is harsh and full of risk to health, crops, and livestock, yet there are also opportunities open to the hard-working, audacious and lucky, bringing considerable returns if the timing is right. Three inter-related themes underlie the analysis of production and investment decisions faced by households; the role of risk, the long timeframe within which decisions are made, and the close links between economic performance and household size and organisation. Climatic variability and demographic uncertainty lie at the heart of domestic structures; the extreme vulnerability faced by single individuals means people cluster in large kin-based groups, pooling risks and providing protection. The very limited development of labour markets means that households rely almost entirely on their own members for their workforce, and generating the capital needed for investing in ploughs, wells, carts and livestock must stem from a good year’s grain surplus and migration earnings. Based on field-research over the period 1980-82, this study illustrates a successful response to making ends meet in a land abundant region, despite high risks of drought. A follow-up study of this village was published in 2020: Land, Investment, and Migration. Thirty-five years of village life in Mali (OUP).

Caves and other subterranean habitats with their often strange (even bizarre) inhabitants have long been objects of fascination, curiosity, and debate. The question of how such organisms have evolved, and the relative roles of natural selection and genetic drift, has engaged subterranean biologists for decades. Indeed, these studies continue to inform the general theory of adaptation and evolution. Subterranean ecosystems generally exhibit little or no primary productivity and, as extreme ecosystems, provide general insights into ecosystem function. The Biology of Caves and other Subterranean Habitats offers a concise but comprehensive introduction to cave ecology and evolution. Whilst there is an emphasis on biological processes occurring in these unique environments, conservation and management aspects are also considered. The monograph includes a global range of examples from more than 25 countries, and case studies from both caves and non-cave subterranean habitats; it also provides a clear explanation of specialized terms used by speleologists. This accessible text will appeal to researchers new to the field and to the many professional ecologists and conservation practitioners requiring a concise but authoritative overview. Its engaging style will also make it suitable for undergraduate and graduate students taking courses in cave and subterranean biology. Its more than 650 references, 150 of which are new since the first edition, provide many entry points to the research literature.

Easy to read and to use, this A-to-Z mini-encyclopedia covers the most important medical innovations of the last 200 years. Medical innovation is an extremely important topic—and one to which relatively little study has been devoted. This volume is designed to introduce readers to the history and development of key advances in the science and practice of medicine. It explores issues in medical history and provides perspective on contemporary scientific research and innovation. It also provides a backdrop against which to evaluate current headlines, such as the discoveries of live samples of smallpox virus in an unused storage room at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and incidents of bubonic plague in China and Colorado. Although the entries in this single-volume resource describe how each innovation works, this is not intended as a technical text. Instead, the focus is on the context in which each innovation was developed and on its lasting importance in the field of medicine. Through these fascinating accounts, readers will be able to trace the evolution and legacy of key innovations and to see how other sectors of society—such as industry and the military—have affected and been affected by advances in the field of medicine.

Militarization is defined as a process that fundamentally changes society and all types of relations in it, the formal and institutional as well as the informal and the intimate. In a militarized society, women and men are often affected differently. At its most extreme, militarization results in the disappearance of civil, civilianized space, leaving the civilians with no choice but to live in symbiosis with the military and its war-making. Since the mid-1980s, there has been a steady flow of feminist literature specifically exploring questions on gender and militarization in various disciplines, including International Relations (IR), as well as men and masculinity. The debate between modernists and postmodernists in feminist research of the 1990s questioned the universalizing effects of using the term “woman.” Postmodernists argued that the field should be broadened by introducing the concept of gender and investigating how different structures intersect in creating socioeconomic power relations between women, as well as between women and men, on a global scale. Another strand of thinking implies that it is the gender order of male superiority and female inferiority that drives militarization and war. Some studies on gendered militarization have advanced the idea of a military organization that is democratic, but still has the option of using violent means to defend or to threaten. The question that remains is: in an era dominated by the “War on Terror” and its global ontology of security/insecurity, how we begin to fight militarization without becoming militarized ourselves.

Abstract Almost all languages have some grammatical means for the linguistic categorization of nouns. Well-known systems such as the lexical numeral classifiers of South-East Asia, on the one hand, and the highly grammaticalized gender agreement classes of Indo-European languages, on the other, are the extremes of a contiuum. They can have a similar semantic basis, and one can develop from the other. Classifiers come in different morphological forms; they can be free nouns, clitics, or affixes. Some languages combine several varieties of classifiers. Different types of classifiers show varying correlations with other grammatical categories. In addition, they differ in their semantics, in the way they develop, and in the way they become obsolescent and disappear. These parameters are the basis for the typology of classifiers presented here. This book is almost certainly the most substantial cross-linguistic account of classifiers ever published. Its range of exemplification includes major and minor languages from every continent (several from the author's own fieldwork). The work combines original research with innovative analysis and will interest typologists, those working in the field of morphosyntactic variation and lexical semantics, and exponents of formal theories who wish to explain the range of linguistic diversity found in natural language.

Félix Guattari’s Schizoanalytic Ecology argues that Guattari’s ecosophy, which it regards as a ‘schizoanalytic ecology’ or ‘schizoecology’ for short, is the most consistent conceptual spine of Guattari’s oeuvre. Engaging with the whole spectrum and range of Guattari’s, as well as Guattari and Deleuze’s works, it maintains that underneath Guattari’s staccato style, his hectic speeds and his conceptual acrobatics, lie a number of insistent questions and demands. How to make life on this planet better, more liveable, more in tune with and adequate to the planet’s functioning? How to do this without false romanticism or nostalgia? At the conceptual centre of the book lies the first comprehensive and in-depth analysis and explication of the diagrammatic meta-model that Guattari develops in his book Schizoanalytic Cartographies, his magnum opus and conceptual legacy. It is here that Guattari develops, in an extremely formalized manner, the schizoecological complementarity of what he calls ‘the given’ (the world) and of ‘the giving’ (the world’s creatures). After considering the implications of schizoecology for the fields of literature, the visual arts, architecture, and research, this book, which is the companion volume to Gilles Deleuze’s Luminous Philosophy, culminates in readings of Guattari’s explicitly ecological texts The Three Ecologies and Chaosmosis.

Increasingly, people travel and communicate across borders. Yet, we still know little about the overall structure of this transnational world. Is it really a fully globalized world in which everything is linked, as popular catchphrases like “global village” suggest? Through a sweeping comparative analysis of eight types of mobility and communication among countries worldwide—from migration and tourism to Facebook friendships and phone calls—this book demonstrates that our behavior is actually regionalized, not globalized. The book shows that transnational activity within world regions is not so much the outcome of political, cultural, or economic factors, but is driven primarily by geographic distance. It explains that the spatial structure of transnational human activity follows a simple mathematical function, the power law, a pattern that also fits the movements of many other animal species on the planet. Moreover, this pattern remained extremely stable during the five decades studied—1960 to 2010. Unveiling proximity-induced regionalism as a major feature of planet-scale networks of transnational human activity, the book provides a crucial corrective to several fields of research. Revealing why a truly global society is unlikely to emerge, the book highlights the essential role of interaction beyond borders on a planet that remains spatially fragmented.

When China and Russia established a strategic partnership in 1996, both nations declared that they would further develop military cooperation in various fields. Tsai examines the course of this military cooperation to reveal the nature of the military ties with the hopes of determining whether these two traditional adversaries have put aside historical legacies and mutual mistrust to create a full-fledged military partnership. After analyzing the motives and concerns of both powers, Tsai concludes that, while progress has been made in reducing military tensions in border regions, the level of trust has not increased substantially. The nature of these ties remains extremely fragile. Among Western analysts, there has been concern that a closer partnership might adversely affect U.S. interests in the region. China and Russia have developed cooperation in certain areas, such as arms transfers and military-technical cooperation, and these achievements have successfully reduced political tension. However, reciprocal threats against each other's territories and China's increasing ambitions and capacity to act as a great military power in the region could eventually become a major source of friction. Based on research in both Chinese and Russian, this study offers a comprehensive analysis on the development of and limits to this military cooperation.

Invertebrates have proven to be extremely useful models for gaining insights into the neural and molecular mechanisms of sensory processing, motor control, and higher functions, such as feeding behavior, learning and memory, navigation, and social behavior. Their enormous contribution to neuroscience is due, in part, to the relative simplicity of invertebrate nervous systems and, in part, to the large cells found in some invertebrates, like mollusks. Because of the organizms’ cell size, individual neurons can be surgically removed and assayed for expression of membrane channels, levels of second messengers, protein phosphorylation, and RNA and protein synthesis. Moreover, peptides and nucleotides can be injected into individual neurons. Other invertebrate systems such as Drosophila and Caenorhabditis elegans are ideal models for genetic approaches to the exploration of neuronal function and the neuronal bases of behavior. The Oxford Handbook of Invertebrate Neurobiology reviews neurobiological phenomena, including motor pattern generation, mechanisms of synaptic transmission, and learning and memory, as well as circadian rhythms, development, regeneration, and reproduction. Species-specific behaviors are covered in chapters on the control of swimming in annelids, crustacea, and mollusks; locomotion in hexapods; and camouflage in cephalopods. A unique feature of the handbook is the coverage of social behavior and intentionality in invertebrates. These developments are contextualized in a chapter summarizing past contributions of invertebrate research as well as areas for future studies that will continue to advance the field.

Direct experience, scientific reports, and international media coverage make clear that the breadth, severity, and multiple consequences from climate change are far-reaching and increasing. Like many places globally, the northeastern United States is already experiencing climate change, including one of the world’s highest rates of ocean warming, reduced durations of winter ice cover on lakes, a marked increase in the frequency of extreme precipitation events, and climate-mediated ecological disruptions of invasive species. Given current and projected changes in ecosystems, communities, and economies, it is essential to find ways to anticipate and reduce vulnerabilities to change and, at the same time, promote sustainable economic development and human well-being.The emerging field of sustainability science offers a promising conceptual and analytic framework for accelerating progress towards sustainable development. Sustainability science aims to be use-inspired and to connect basic and applied knowledge with solutions for societal benefit. This approach draws from diverse disciplines, theories, and methods organized around the broad goal of maintaining and improving life support systems, ecosystem health, and human well-being. Partners in New England have been using sustainability science as a framework for stakeholder-engaged, interdisciplinary research that has generated use-inspired knowledge and multiple solutions for more than a decade. Sustainability science has helped produce a landscape-scale approach to wetland conservation; emergency response plans for invasive species that threaten livelihoods and cultures; decision support tools for improved water quality management and public health for beach use and shellfish consumption; and the development of robust partnership networks across disciplines and institutions. Understanding and reducing vulnerability to climate change is a central motivating factor in this portfolio of projects because linking knowledge about social-ecological systems with effective policy action requires a holistic view that addresses complex intersecting stressors.One common theme in these varied efforts is the way that communication fundamentally shapes collaborative research and social, technical, and policy outcomes from sustainability science. Communication as a discipline has, for more than two thousand years, sought to understand how environments and symbols shape human life, forms of social organization, and collective decision making. The result is a body of scholarship and practical techniques that are diverse and well adapted to meet the complexity of contemporary sustainability challenges. The complexity of the issues that sustainability science aspires to solve requires diversity and flexibility to be able to adapt approaches to the specific needs of a situation. Long-term, cross-scale, and multi-institutional sustainability science collaborations show that communication research and practice can help build communities and networks, and advance technical and policy solutions to confront the challenges of climate change and promote sustainability now and in future.

This publication contains studies conducted by authors from several European countries that have cooperated with each other for many years in the field of human rights. The fruit of this cooperation are numerous conferences and publications in various languages. What is most important, however, is the exchange of experiences and opinions on understanding and application of individual human rights from the perspective of the experiences of societies living in the European cultural circle, and at the same time functioning in different historical and geographical conditions. This publication is an attempt to look at human rights from the perspective of the dynamic progress that is connected with the development of ICT tools. It is not only about digitization or automation of human work, but above all about creating a virtual society, in which artificial intelligence plays an important role. A significant part of human activity, especially interpersonal communication, takes place with the use of social media. Moreover, individual contact with public authorities are being gradually replaced by intelligent computer programs. In the United States, there is already an IT system, which adjudicates in minor misdemeanor cases. Modern researches in IT sector aim to build programs that allow to support human thinking through recommendation algorithms or suggesting automatically learned solutions, and even aim at autonomous decision-making. This last level of shifting responsibility for decisions to artificial intelligence is assessed extremely positive by many people, but also brings many fears. A virtual society built with the use of artificial intelligence changes the perception of many human rights, such as the right to good name, the right to freely express one’s opinion, the right to property, the right to state or national identity. Hence this publication contains various opinions on the artificial intelligence and its role in the functioning of society and importance for the life of an individual. The added value of this publication is the fact that it contains balanced views and assessments of authors from various European countries and academic societies conducting research on digital reality. This publication will certainly allow the reader to form his or her own opinion on human rights in the context of artificial intelligence.

The Tibetan Plateau (TP) is the largest and highest plateau on Earth. Due to its elevation, it receives much more downward shortwave radiation than other areas, which results in very strong diurnal and seasonal changes of the surface energy components and other meteorological variables, such as surface temperature and the convective atmospheric boundary layer. With such unique land process conditions on a distinct geomorphic unit, the TP has been identified as having the strongest land/atmosphere interactions in the mid-latitudes.Three major TP land/atmosphere interaction issues are presented in this article: (1) Scientists have long been aware of the role of the TP in atmospheric circulation. The view that the TP’s thermal and dynamic forcing drives the Asian monsoon has been prevalent in the literature for decades. In addition to the TP’s topographic effect, diagnostic and modeling studies have shown that the TP provides a huge, elevated heat source to the middle troposphere, and that the sensible heat pump plays a major role in the regional climate and in the formation of the Asian monsoon. Recent modeling studies, however, suggest that the south and west slopes of the Himalayas produce a strong monsoon by insulating warm and moist tropical air from the cold and dry extratropics, so the TP heat source cannot be considered as a factor for driving the Indian monsoon. The climate models’ shortcomings have been speculated to cause the discrepancies/controversies in the modeling results in this aspect. (2) The TP snow cover and Asian monsoon relationship is considered as another hot topic in TP land/atmosphere interaction studies and was proposed as early as 1884. Using ground measurements and remote sensing data available since the 1970s, a number of studies have confirmed the empirical relationship between TP snow cover and the Asian monsoon, albeit sometimes with different signs. Sensitivity studies using numerical modeling have also demonstrated the effects of snow on the monsoon but were normally tested with specified extreme snow cover conditions. There are also controversies regarding the possible mechanisms through which snow affects the monsoon. Currently, snow is no longer a factor in the statistic prediction model for the Indian monsoon prediction in the Indian Meteorological Department. These controversial issues indicate the necessity of having measurements that are more comprehensive over the TP to better understand the nature of the TP land/atmosphere interactions and evaluate the model-produced results. (3) The TP is one of the major areas in China greatly affected by land degradation due to both natural processes and anthropogenic activities. Preliminary modeling studies have been conducted to assess its possible impact on climate and regional hydrology. Assessments using global and regional models with more realistic TP land degradation data are imperative.Due to high elevation and harsh climate conditions, measurements over the TP used to be sparse. Fortunately, since the 1990s, state-of-the-art observational long-term station networks in the TP and neighboring regions have been established. Four large field experiments since 1996, among many observational activities, are presented in this article. These experiments should greatly help further research on TP land/atmosphere interactions.

The aim of the paper was to determine the influence of root systems of chosen tree species found in the Polish Flysch Carpathians on the increase of soil shear strength (root cohesion) in terms of slope stability. The paper's goal was achieved through comprehensive tests on root systems of eight relatively common in the Polish Flysch Carpathians tree species. The tests that were carried out included field work, laboratory work and analytical calculations. As part of the field work, the root area ratio (A IA) of the roots was determined using the method of profiling the walls of the trench at a distance of about 1.0 m from the tree trunk. The width of the. trenches was about 1.0 m, and their depth depended on the ground conditions and ranged from 0.6 to 1.0 m below the ground level. After preparing the walls of the trench, the profile was divided into vertical layers with a height of 0.1 m, within which root diameters were measured. Roots with diameters from 1 to 10 mm were taken into consideration in root area ratio calculations in accordance with the generally accepted methodology for this type of tests. These measurements were made in Biegnik (silver fir), Ropica Polska (silver birch, black locust) and Szymbark (silver birch, European beech, European hornbeam, silver fir, sycamore maple, Scots pine, European spruce) located near Gorlice (The Low Beskids) in areas with unplanned forest management. In case of each tested tree species the samples of roots were taken, transported to the laboratory and then saturated with water for at least one day. Before testing the samples were obtained from the water and stretched in a. tensile testing machine in order to determine their tensile strength and flexibility. In general, over 2200 root samples were tested. The results of tests on root area ratio of root systems and their tensile strength were used to determine the value of increase in shear strength of the soils, called root cohesion. To this purpose a classic Wu-Waldron calculation model was used as well as two types of bundle models, the so called static model (Fiber Bundle Model — FIRM, FBM2, FBM3) and the deformation model (Root Bundle Model— RBM1, RBM2, mRBM1) that differ in terms of the assumptions concerning the way the tensile force is distributed to the roots as well as the range of parameters taken into account during calculations. The stability analysis of 8 landslides in forest areas of Cicikowicleie and Wignickie Foothills was a form of verification of relevance of the obtained calculation results. The results of tests on root area ratio in the profile showed that, as expected, the number of roots in the soil profile and their ApIA values are very variable. It was shown that the values of the root area ratio of the tested tree species with a diameter 1-10 ram are a maximum of 0.8% close to the surface of the ground and they decrease along with the depth reaching the values at least one order of magnitude lower than close to the surface at the depth 0.5-1.0 m below the ground level. Average values of the root area ratio within the soil profile were from 0.05 to 0.13% adequately for Scots pine and European beech. The measured values of the root area ratio are relatively low in relation to the values of this parameter given in literature, which is probably connected with great cohesiveness of the soils and the fact that there were a lot of rock fragments in the soil, where the tests were carried out. Calculation results of the Gale-Grigal function indicate that a distribution of roots in the soil profile is similar for the tested species, apart from the silver fir from Bie§nik and European hornbeam. Considering the number of roots, their distribution in the soil profile and the root area ratio it appears that — considering slope stability — the root systems of European beech and black locust are the most optimal, which coincides with tests results given in literature. The results of tensile strength tests showed that the roots of the tested tree species have different tensile strength. The roots of European beech and European hornbeam had high tensile strength, whereas the roots of conifers and silver birch in deciduous trees — low. The analysis of test results also showed that the roots of the studied tree species are characterized by high variability of mechanical properties. The values Of shear strength increase are mainly related to the number and size (diameter) of the roots in the soil profile as well as their tensile strength and pullout resistance, although they can also result from the used calculation method (calculation model). The tests showed that the distribution of roots in the soil and their tensile strength are characterized by large variability, which allows the conclusion that using typical geotechnical calculations, which take into consideration the role of root systems is exposed to a high risk of overestimating their influence on the soil reinforcement. hence, while determining or assuming the increase in shear strength of soil reinforced with roots (root cohesion) for design calculations, a conservative (careful) approach that includes the most unfavourable values of this parameter should be used. Tests showed that the values of shear strength increase of the soil reinforced with roots calculated using Wu-Waldron model in extreme cases are three times higher than the values calculated using bundle models. In general, the most conservative calculation results of the shear strength increase were obtained using deformation bundle models: RBM2 (RBMw) or mRBM1. RBM2 model considers the variability of strength characteristics of soils described by Weibull survival function and in most cases gives the lowest values of the shear strength increase, which usually constitute 50% of the values of shear strength increase determined using classic Wu-Waldron model. Whereas the second model (mRBM1.) considers averaged values of roots strength parameters as well as the possibility that two main mechanism of destruction of a root bundle - rupture and pulling out - can occur at the same. time. The values of shear strength increase calculated using this model were the lowest in case of beech and hornbeam roots, which had high tensile strength. It indicates that in the surface part of the profile (down to 0.2 m below the ground level), primarily in case of deciduous trees, the main mechanism of failure of the root bundle will be pulling out. However, this model requires the knowledge of a much greater number of geometrical parameters of roots and geotechnical parameters of soil, and additionally it is very sensitive to input data. Therefore, it seems practical to use the RBM2 model to assess the influence of roots on the soil shear strength increase, and in order to obtain safe results of calculations in the surface part of the profile, the Weibull shape coefficient equal to 1.0 can be assumed. On the other hand, the Wu-Waldron model can be used for the initial assessment of the shear strength increase of soil reinforced with roots in the situation, where the deformation properties of the root system and its interaction with the soil are not considered, although the values of the shear strength increase calculated using this model should be corrected and reduced by half. Test results indicate that in terms of slope stability the root systems of beech and hornbeam have the most favourable properties - their maximum effect of soil reinforcement in the profile to the depth of 0.5 m does not usually exceed 30 kPa, and to the depth of 1 m - 20 kPa. The root systems of conifers have the least impact on the slope reinforcement, usually increasing the soil shear strength by less than 5 kPa. These values coincide to a large extent with the range of shear strength increase obtained from the direct shear test as well as results of stability analysis given in literature and carried out as part of this work. The analysis of the literature indicates that the methods of measuring tree's root systems as well as their interpretation are very different, which often limits the possibilities of comparing test results. This indicates the need to systematize this type of tests and for this purpose a root distribution model (RDM) can be used, which can be integrated with any deformation bundle model (RBM). A combination of these two calculation models allows the range of soil reinforcement around trees to be determined and this information might be used in practice, while planning bioengineering procedures in areas exposed to surface mass movements. The functionality of this solution can be increased by considering the dynamics of plant develop¬ment in the calculations. This, however, requires conducting this type of research in order to obtain more data.