Physical and Environmental Geography Commons^™

Uniformity In Place-Making: How A Focus On Image And Tradition Can Restrict Personal Expression And Repress Queer Identities, Julia Funk

Environmental Studies Senior Seminar Projects

This study looked at the University of Richmond campus, a campus built in a collegiate gothic style of and comprised of uniform buildings and highly managed landscaping. Specifically, it surveyed queer students at UR to ask about their experiences and feelings being on the UR campus. The survey found that a majority of the 44 surveyed students felt pressure to be or act straight, felt there was a lack of queer visibility on campus, felt most uncomfortable in the settings such as the Business School and Greek Life locations and most comfortable in personal housing. Overall, students liked how the …

Typing Tornadoes By Storm Mode In The Southeast United States, Marisa R. Karpinski

LSU Master's Theses

Existing work has noted three major, radar-derived, storm modes associated with tornadoes: supercell, quasi-linear convective systems, and tropical systems. I examine the long-term frequency and seasonality of each storm mode between 1996 and 2017 in the Southeast United States. The Southeast is chosen as a focus for this work due to its well-known and unique combination of tornado vulnerability and exposure. Expanding our knowledge of the radar presentation of tornado-producing thunderstorms in this region could assist in the operational interpretation of these events. In this study, a climatology of F/EF1+ tornadoes (1996 - 2017) is generated for the study area …

Using (Gis) In Exploiting The Running Rainwater In The Interior Parts Of The Basin Of Wadi Gaza - Hebron, Mohammad Burqan

Journal of the Arab American University مجلة الجامعة العربية الامريكية للبحوث

The study aimed at using GIS technology to study the characteristics of the best sites for the construction of dams in the inner basins of Hebron Governorate, which intersect with the Wadi Gaza basin. The study used natural and human standards in selecting the best sites for the construction of dams. The analysis of topographic surfaces was done using a set of integrated GIS software programs, such as (ArcGIS 10.1) and its extension (Arc Hydro 2.0) and “Google Earth” to derive some morphometric variables.

The study showed that the amount of water that is expected to be stored in the …

Flood Mortality In Se Asia: Can Palaeo-Historical Information Help Save Lives?, Alan D. Ziegler, H. S. Lim, Robert J. Wasson, Fiona Williamson

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Asia is one of the world's most flood-prone regions by many metrics: high flood magnitudes, frequency, severity; the number countries affected, the area of inundation; the number of people at risk; and importantly, flood-related fatalities (AIR, 2014; Luo, Maddoks, Iceland, Ward, & Winsemius, 2015; Table 1). We explore the idea that flood-related mortality from river over-bank flows in the SE Asian region could be reduced by incorporating evidence from the past to foster a better understanding of the realm of plausible flood regimes, and hopefully guide improved flood hazard management practices in the future (Lebel, Manuta, & Garden, 2011).

Odu Researchers' Future Flood Maps Inform Virginia's Coastal Resilience Master Planning Process, News @ Odu

News Items

No abstract provided.

The Use Of Green Pond Conglomerate As Building Stone In Morris County, New Jersey, Gregory A. Pope

Department of Earth and Environmental Studies Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Green Pond Conglomerate (GPC) is a maroon colored quartzite with white quartz pebbles, a classic “puddingstone”. GPC derives from a NW-SW-trending sliver of Paleozoic sediments, the “Green Pond Outlier”, surrounded by older metamorphic and igneous rocks of Morris and Passaic Counties. Buildings, retaining walls, field fences, and monuments incorporate the durable and attractive stone, in a distinct geographic area of Morris County. Several instances of structures completely constructed or faced with GPC occur in and around Morristown, limited to affluent houses and one prominent church. In these cases, GPC stones were dressed and faced, a labor-intensive effort. Elsewhere in the …

Agate Fossil Beds National Monument, Paleontological Resources Management Plan (Public Version), Scott Kottkamp, Vincent L. Santucci, Justin S. Tweet, Jessica De Smet, Ellen Stark

United States National Park Service: Publications

Executive Summary

Since Agate Springs Ranch was founded by James H. Cook in 1887, exquisite examples of transitional Miocene mammalian fauna have been found along this stretch of the Niobrara River valley. Collectively these paleontological discoveries, along with the existing archeological and historical Native American collection, were the basis for establishing Agate Fossil Beds National Monument (AGFO) as a unit of the National Park System (NPS). The fossil remains from the Harrison and Anderson Ranch formations span a short, but important, time period within the Miocene Epoch. AGFO has provided science with an intimate look into North American mammalian evolution …

Urban Crime Mapping And Analysis Using Gis, Alina Ristea, Michael Leitner

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Snow-Albedo Feedback In Northern Alaska: How Vegetation Influences Snowmelt, Lucas C. Reckhaus

Theses and Dissertations

This paper investigates how the snow-albedo feedback mechanism of the arctic is changing in response to rising climate temperatures. Specifically, the interplay of vegetation and snowmelt, and how these two variables can be correlated. This has the potential to refine climate modelling of the spring transition season. Research was conducted at the ecoregion scale in northern Alaska from 2000 to 2020. Each ecoregion is defined by distinct topographic and ecological conditions, allowing for meaningful contrast between the patterns of spring albedo transition across surface conditions and vegetation types. The five most northerly ecoregions of Alaska are chosen as they encompass …

Geology, Soils And Climate Of The Margaret River Wine Region, Peter J. Tille, Angela Stuart-Street, Peter S. Gardiner

All other publications

This report is an extract from the broader description and analysis of the Geology, soils and climate of Western Australia's wine regions. It expands on the brief descriptions in the second edition of 'Viticulture' (Coombe & Dry 2004) concerning the soils and landscapes of Western Australia’s main wine growing regions. We have tailored this report extract to the specific needs of the Margaret River wine region. It contains local soil names and soil-landscape zones and systems maps.

The wine industry recognises the importance of giving customers an understanding of the vines’ environment and how that may influence wine character …

Impacts Of The Degraded Alpine Swamp Meadow On Tensile Strength Of Riverbank: A Case Study Of The Upper Yellow River, Peng Gao, Haili Zhu, Zhiwei Li, Jiangtao Fu, Guorong Li, Yabin Liu, Xilai Li, Xiasong Hu

Geography and the Environment - All Scholarship

In the meandering riverbank of the Upper Yellow River (UYR), the native alpine swamp meadow (AS) has continuously degenerated into an alpine meadow (AM) due to climate change and intensified grazing. Its implication on river morphology is still not well known. This study examined this effect by in situ measurings of (1) physical properties of roots and their distribution in the soil-root mixture of the upper bank layer, and (2) the tensile strength in terms of excavating tests for triggering cantilever collapses of AS and AM riverbanks. The results showed that the root number in AS was significantly greater than …

Analysis Of Interdunal Wetlands And Ecosystem Dynamics Using Uas And Obia In Ludington State Park, Michigan, Claire Gilbert

Masters Theses

The Great Lakes sand dunes are the world's largest freshwater dune complex. There is a functional relationship between coastal wetlands and freshwater sand dune, referred to as interdunal wetlands. Interdunal wetland systems are highly dynamic and change dramatically seasonally and annually. Using geographic information systems (GIS) and unoccupied aerial systems (UAS), this thesis project is focused on understanding the spatial distribution of sparse and dense vegetation, and abiotic influence such as distance to coast, slope, and aspect influence interdunal wetland stability within a Great Lakes shoreline dune system. Object-based image analysis (OBIA) classification results extracted meaningful vegetation densities of growth …

Southwest Pacific Tropical Cyclone Frequency And Intensity Related To Observed And Modeled Geophysical And Aerosol Variables, Rupsa Bhowmick

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

The dissertation focuses on western region of Southwest Pacific Ocean (SWPO)

basin (135E - 180, and 5S - 35S) tropical cyclone (TC) climatology using observed

and modeled data. The classification-based machine learning approach

identifies the synoptic geophysical and aerosol environment favorable or unfavorable

for TC intensification and intensity change prior to landfall incorporating

observational and satellite data. A multiple poisson regression model with varying

temporal monthly lags was used to build a relationship between the number of

monthly TC days with basin wide average dust aerosol optical depth (AOD), sea

surface temperature (SST), and upper ocean temperature (UOT). This idea …

Survivorship Of The Reintroduced Kihansi Spray Toads Nectophrynoides Asperginis In A Soft Release Experiment At The Kihansi Gorge, Tanzania, Flora John Magige, Nassoro Mohamed

Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences

The Kihansi Spray Toad (KST) Nectophrynoides asperginis is endemic to the unique wetland habitat surrounding the Kihansi Falls, Tanzania, with which it was associated. The species was declared extinct in the wild in 2009 by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), following the loss of its unique habitat due to the diversion of the Kihansi River for hydropower production. This study is an initial attempt to determine the survivorship and possible sources of mortality of newborn and adult KSTs placed in cages in their original habitat in the Upper Spray Wetland (USW) and Lower Spray Wetland (LSW) areas. …

Long-Term Ndvi And Recent Vegetation Cover Profiles Of Major Offshore Island Nesting Sites Of Sea Turtles In Saudi Waters Of The Northern Arabian Gulf, Rommel H. Maneja, Jeffrey D. Miller, Wenzhao Li, Hesham El-Askary, Ace Vincent B. Flandez, Joshua J. Dagoy, Joselito Francis A. Alcaria, Abdullajid U. Basali, Khaled A. Al-Abdulkader, Ronald A. Loughland, Mohamed A. Qurban

Mathematics, Physics, and Computer Science Faculty Articles and Research

Vegetation is an important ecological component of offshore islands in the Arabian Gulf (AG), which maintains long-term resilience of these islands. This is achieved by influencing sediment retention and moisture acquisition via condensation during periods of high humidity and by providing a variety of microhabitats for island fauna. The resilience of offshore islands’ ecosystems in the Saudi waters is important because they host the largest number of nesting hawksbill and green turtles in the AG. This study defines the characteristics and the long-term trends in vegetation cover of the offshore islands used by sea turtles as nesting grounds in the …

Rfia: An R Package For Estimation Of Forest Attributes With The Us Forest Inventory And Analysis Database, Hunter Stanke, Andrew O. Finley, Aaron S. Weed, Brian F. Walters, Grant M. Domke

United States National Park Service: Publications

Forest Inventory and Analysis (FIA) is a US Department of Agriculture Forest Service program that aims to monitor changes in forests across the US. FIA hosts one of the largest ecological datasets in the world, though its complexity limits access for many potential users. rFIA is an R package designed to simplify the estimation of forest attributes using data collected by the FIA Program. Specifically, rFIA improves access to the spatiotemporal estimation capacity of the FIA Database via space–time indexed summaries of forest variables within user-defined population boundaries (e.g., geographic, temporal, biophysical). The package implements multiple design-based estimators, and has …

Diversity Rhetoric And Practice: A Critical Examination Of “Diversity” In Graduate Education, Tellisia M. Williams

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The purpose of this research is to investigate the built environment, educational policy, place making, and personalized lived experiences of doctoral students of color in “diverse” academic spaces. I critically examine the linkages and gaps in institutional policies of diversity and inclusion in relation to the narratives of doctoral students of color enrolled at the Urban Public University (pseudonym). I use qualitative methodology of Environmental Autobiography to capture the narratives. My dissertation demonstrates the importance of Critical Race Theory (CRT) by prioritizing the embodied knowledge making and experiences of people of color. This work challenges dominant ideologies of diversity and …

Summer Average Urban-Rural Surface Temperature Differences Do Not Indicate The Need For Urban Heat Reduction, Alberto Martilli, Matthias Roth, Winston T. L. Chow, Et Al

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

This is a comment to the paper "Magnitude of urban heat islands largely explained by climate and population" by Manoli et al. (2019, Nature 573 p. 55-60; https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-019-1512-9)

How Globalization, Sustainability, And Human Impacts Are Affecting Two Major Mexican Cities: Mexico City And Guadalajara, Cristina Sedano

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Mexico is one of the richest countries in the world, not in terms of economic stability but in terms of natural resources, culture, and atmosphere. When people think of Mexico, they usually think of the high-tension relationship with the United States, their neighboring country to the North. Although there are many diverse historical and present-day characteristics of Mexico, most associate the county with the high levels of crime due to narco and cartels, the high levels of poverty in regional areas, and to some just a party destination. Unbeknownst to many is the thousands year old culture that is passed …

Using Historical Maps For Contaminated Site Identification And Prediction, And Environmental Justice Implications: A Case Study In Grand Rapids, Michigan, Dana Heusinkveld

Masters Theses

As the production of synthetic chemicals has grown in the past centuries to increase production, lower costs, and generally make our lives more convenient, detecting and understanding the environmental impacts of these compounds has lagged significantly behind their mass production and wide-spread use. To combat this trend, sources of these contaminants, especially those that have been removed from the landscape, need to be quickly identified to make mitigation and remediation efforts more effective. In this study, historical Sanborn maps are used to extract and digitize historical site/land use in Grand Rapids during the early 1900s through the practical application of …