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Books > Earth & environment > Earth sciences > General
Adjustment Models in 3D Geomatics and Computational Geophysics: With MATLAB Examples, Volume Four introduces a complete package of theoretical and practical subjects in adjustment computations relating to Geomatics and geophysical applications, particularly photogrammetry, surveying, remote sensing, GIS, cartography, and geodesy. Supported by illustrating figures and solved examples with MATLAB codes, the book provides clear methods for processing 3D data for accurate and reliable results. Problems cover free net adjustment, adjustment with constraints, blunder detection, RANSAC, robust estimation, error propagation, 3D co-registration, image pose determination, and more.
In November 2015, the world powers came together in Paris with the hope of reaching an agreement on the most urgent issue of our time: climate change. While it was an historic moment that brought solutions within the realm of possibility, the obstacles to enacting real revolution were still many. Now, confronting these controversies head-on, two scholars use a series of ground-breaking arguments to frame the problem in human terms, showing us how vested interests have been able to control the conversation, tracing a line of reasoning that will break through the seemingly impenetrable barriers of political obfuscation. This watershed book evokes the battle cries of Naomi Klein and the exigency of Rachel Carson, laying the groundwork for a path to environmental salvation.
This volume contains forty-one selected full-text contributions from the Fourth European Conference on Geostatistics for Environmental Applications, geoENV IV, held in Barcelona, Spain, November 2002. The objective of the editors was to compile a set of papers from which the reader could perceive how geostatistics is applied within the environmental sciences. A few selected theoretical contributions are also included. The papers are organized in the following sections: Air pollution and satellite images, Ecology and environment, Hydrogeology, Climatology and rainfall, Oceanography, Soil science, Methodology. Applications of geostatistics vary from particle matter analysis, land cover classification, space-time ozone mapping, downscaling of precipitation, contaminant transport in the subsurface, aquifer reclamation, analysis of Iberian hare or phytoplankton abundance, coastal current patterns, to soil pollution by heavy metals or dioxins. At the back of the book nineteen posters presented at the congress are included. The combination of full texts and posters provides a picture of the tendencies that can presently be found in Europe regarding the applications of geostatistics for environmentally related problems. Audience: After four editions the geoENV Congress Series has established itself as a 'must' to all scientists working in the field of geostatistics for environmental applications. Each geoENV congress covers the developments which have occurred during the preceding two years, but always with a highly applied focus. It is precisely this focus on the applications to environmental sciences which makes the geoENV volumes unique and of great interest and practical value togeostatisticians working both in academia and in industry.
The studies in this second volume by Martin Rudwick (the first being The New Science of Geology: Studies in the Earth Science in the Age of Reform) focus on the figures of Charles Lyell and Charles Darwin. Lyell rose to be of pivotal importance in the second quarter of the 19th century because he challenged other geologists throughout Europe by probing their methods and conclusions to the limit. While adopting their goal of reconstructing the contingent history of the earth, he claimed that the physical processes observable in action in the present could explain far more about the past than was commonly believed, and that it was unnecessary to postulate occasional catastrophic events of still greater intensity. Far more controversial was Lyell's further claim that the earth and its life had always been in a stable steady state, rather than developing in a broadly linear or directional fashion. His younger friend Charles Darwin first made his name as a Lyellian geologist; Darwin's early work in geology, studied here, provided important foundations for his later and more famous research on speciation and other biological problems.
Written in an engaging and highly readable style, The Handbook of Geoscience is ideal for students, administrators, legal professionals, non-scientific professionals, and general readers with little or no science background. This handbook is a user-friendly overview of our physical, biological, and ecological environment, one that offers up-to-date coverage of the major scientific fields that form the structure of geoscience. Students who are enrolled in a geoscience course or one of its many subdisciplines will find this work an invaluable resource to support and supplement classroom instruction. The emphasis is on readability, with clear, example-driven explanations refined by more than 35 years of experience of instruction and student feedback.
Although upwards of 50,000 environmental assessments (EAs) are prepared annually-compared to some 500 environmental impact statements (EISs)-the focus of U.S. National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) regulations is on defining requirements for preparing EISs. Written by Charles Eccleston and J. Peyton Doub, who have established themselves among the top environmental experts in the world, Preparing NEPA Environmental Assessments: A User's Guide to Best Professional Practices fills the need for an authoritative and comprehensive guide on how to prepare EAs. Bridging the regulatory gap, this book identifies relevant EIS regulatory requirements that can be logically interpreted to also apply to EAs. It compiles and synthesizes information scattered throughout NEPA's regulations, executive orders, and guidance documents, and incorporates case law to provide additional clarification. The authors also draw on the professional experiences and best professional practices (BPP) of NEPA practitioners. From the fundamentals to more advanced topics, the book presents a consistent methodology to help beginners, students, and professionals manage, analyze, and write legally sufficient EAs. It addresses dilemmas that have traditionally plagued preparation of EAs, provides BPPs, tools, and approaches for resolving problems, and introduces methods for streamlining the EA process. Building on Eccleston's previous guide to EAs, Effective Environmental Assessments: How to Manage and Prepare NEPA Assessments (2001), this book reflects the rapid changes in government policy over the past ten years. An indispensable source of practical information, it provides readers with step-by-step direction and best practices for preparing defensible EAs.
Since the advent of agriculture approximately 12,000 years ago, human activity has created a unique set of ecosystems. However, the recent development of world markets, rapid technological advances, and other changes to farming practices have led to hugely increased pressures on farm habitats and organisms. Global human populations are rising and diets are becoming ever more complicated, leading to unrelenting requirements for increased levels of food production. Natural biotopes are becoming increasingly fragmented as agricultural activities expand around them. "Agroecosystems" now occur from the tropics to subarctic environments and comprise systems as varied as annual crops, perennial grasslands, orchards, and agroforestry systems. They presently cover almost 40% of the terrestrial land surface and significantly shape landscapes at a global scale. This key addition to the OUP Biology of Habitats Series provides a novel perspective on agroecosystems, summarising our current understanding of the basic and applied aspects of these important and complex habitats, whilst focusing on environmental concerns in the context of global change. The Biology of Agroecosystemsis is for both senior undergraduate and graduate students taking courses in agroecology, farmland ecology, conservation, and agriculture as well as the many professional ecologists, conservation biologists, and land managers requiring a concise overview of agroecology.
Tile-based mapping systems have grown to become the dominant form of mapping system with the rise of Web-based mapping tools. The origin of this book is a desire to collect all our discoveries, techniques, and best practices for creating a til- mapping system into one combined volume. The intent of this text is to provide a comprehensive guide to the theory behind creating a tiled-map system as well as a practical guide to create a concrete implementation. Stennis Space Center, MS John Sample May 2010 Elias Ioup vii Acknowledgements The authors would like to thank the Naval Research Laboratory's Base Program, program element number 0602435N, for sponsoring this research. Additionally, the following people provided technical assistance without which this book would not have been possible: Perry Beason, Frank McCreedy, Norm Schoenhardt, Brett Hode, Bruce Lin, Annie Holladay, Juliette Ioup, and Hillary Mesick. ix Contents 1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 1. 1 Background of Web-Based Mapping Applications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 1. 2 Properties of tile-based mapping systems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 1. 3 Book Organization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 2 Logical Tile Schemes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 2. 1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 2. 2 Global Logical Tile Scheme . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 2. 3 Blue Marble Example . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 2. 4 Mercator-Based Schema . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 2. 5 Variable Start Tile Schemes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 2. 6 Standardized Schema . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 3 Tiled Mapping Clients . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17 3. 1 Tile Calculation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17 3. 1. 1 Discrete Map Scales . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 3. 1. 2 Continuous Map Scales . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 3. 2 Tile Retrieval . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22 3. 2. 1 Local Tile Storage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Did you know your irises are lying to you and all human eyes are actually brown? Want to know the absolute worst way to die, according to science? Did you know that a smoking psychedelic toad milk could alleviate depression for up to four weeks? 117 Things You Should F*#king Know About Your World tells you the answers to these questions and many more weird and wonderful facts about the universe. Split into the site's different subject areas of environment, technology, space, health and medicine, plants and animals, physics and chemistry, this is the ultimate science book. With 25 million social media followers, I F*#king Love Science is the world's favourite source of science on the web. From missing nuclear weapons and Facebook secret files to the world's smallest computer and why you should wrap your car keys in tinfoil, this is the book that only the world's leading source of crazy-but-true stories could produce.
1. Describes algorithms and methodologies for on-board image processing with FPGA chips. 2. Migrates the traditional on-ground computing to on-board operation and the image processing is implemented on-board, not on-ground. 3. Introduces for the first time many key technologies and methods for onboard image processing. 4. Emphasis the recent progress in image processing by using onboard FPGA chips. 5.Includes case studies from the author’s extensive research and experience on the topic.
A comprehensive resource on airborne synthetic aperture radar (SAR) systems, Airborne Circulatory Polarized SAR explains the theory, system design, hardware and software, and applications of airborne circularly polarized SAR in environmental monitoring and other uses. Readers learn how to build the hardware and software of circularly polarized SAR, the antenna system, and how to generate point target responses and images using the range doppler algorithm (RDA) from raw signal data. The book discusses applications and analyzing techniques using a circularly polarized SAR system and image processing. Images and MATLAB codes are provided to help professionals and researchers with their applications and future studies. Features 1. Provides the theory of circularly polarized wave and polarimetry related to system design, scattering analysis, polarimetric SAR, and applications in microwave remote sensing. 2. Explains the real radio frequency (RF) system and the original antenna, including circuit explanation and know-how of measurement technique to adjust to the required parameter in system design. 3. Discusses the technique of ground test and flight mission to calibrate and validate the performance of airborne circularly polarized SAR. 4. Highlights image signal processing with MATLAB codes and how to obtain a single look complex (SLC) image for further applications. 5. Includes several applications of airborne circularly polarized SAR from international leading experts. This book is beneficial to professionals, researchers, academics, and graduate students from disciplines such as Electronic Engineering; Radar Systems; Aerospace Engineering; Signal Processing; Image Processing; Environmental Remote Sensing.
Ecological research is becoming increasingly quantitative, yet students often opt out of courses in mathematics and statistics, unwittingly limiting their ability to carry out research in the future. This textbook provides a practical introduction to quantitative ecology for students and practitioners who have realised that they need this opportunity. The text is addressed to readers who haven't used mathematics since school, who were perhaps more confused than enlightened by their undergraduate lectures in statistics and who have never used a computer for much more than word processing and data entry. From this starting point, it slowly but surely instils an understanding of mathematics, statistics and programming, sufficient for initiating research in ecology. The book's practical value is enhanced by extensive use of biological examples and the computer language R for graphics, programming and data analysis. Key Features: Provides a complete introduction to mathematics statistics and computing for ecologists.Presents a wealth of ecological examples demonstrating the applied relevance of abstract mathematical concepts, showing how a little technique can go a long way in answering interesting ecological questions.Covers elementary topics, including the rules of algebra, logarithms, geometry, calculus, descriptive statistics, probability, hypothesis testing and linear regression.Explores more advanced topics including fractals, non-linear dynamical systems, likelihood and Bayesian estimation, generalised linear, mixed and additive models, and multivariate statistics.R boxes provide step-by-step recipes for implementing the graphical and numerical techniques outlined in each section. "How to be a Quantitative Ecologist" provides a comprehensive introduction to mathematics, statistics and computing and is the ideal textbook for late undergraduate and postgraduate courses in environmental biology. "With a book like this, there is no excuse for people to be
afraid of maths, and to be ignorant of what it can do."
The number of Earth observation satellites launched in recent years is growing exponentially, along with the datasets they gather from free-to-access and commercial providers. The second edition of Practical Handbook of Remote Sensing is updated with new explanations and practical examples using the Copernicus satellite data and new versions of the open-source software. A new chapter and new applications have also been added. Thoroughly revised, the handbook continues to be a practical "how-to" remote sensing guide for those who want to use the technology, understand what is available, how to access it, and answer questions about our planet, but do not necessarily want to become scientific experts.
The Dictionary of Geophysics, Astrophysics, and Astronomy provides a lexicon of terminology covering fields such as astronomy, astrophysics, cosmology, relativity, geophysics, meteorology, Newtonian physics, and oceanography. Authors and editors often assume - incorrectly - that readers are familiar with all the terms in professional literature. With over 4,000 definitions and 50 contributing authors, this unique comprehensive dictionary helps scientists to use terminology correctly and to understand papers, articles, and books in which physics-related terms appear.
Reservoir management is fundamental to the efficient and responsible means of extracting hydrocarbons, and maximising the economic benefit to the operator, licence holders and central government. All stakeholders have a social responsibility to protect the local population and environment. The process of managing an oil or gas reservoir begins after discovery and continues through appraisal, development, production and abandonment; there is cost associated with each phase and a series of decision gates should be in place to ensure that an economic benefit exists before progress is made. To correctly establish potential value at each stage it is necessary to acquire and analyse data from the subsurface, the planned surface facilities and the contractual obligations to the end-user of the hydrocarbons produced. This is especially true of any improved recovery methods proposed or plans to extend field life. To achieve all the above requires a multi-skilled team of professionals working together with a clear set of objectives and associated rewards. The team's make-up will change over time, as different skills are required, as will the management of the team, with geoscientists, engineers and commercial analysts needed to address the issues as they arise. This book is designed as a guide for non-specialists involved in the process of reservoir management, which is often treated as a task for reservoir engineers alone: it is a task for all the disciplines involved in turning a exploration success into a commercial asset. Most explorers earn their bonus based on the initial estimates of in-place hydrocarbons, regardless of the ultimate cost of production; the explorers have usually moved on to a new basin before the first oil or gas is produced! This book is not a deeply academic tome, rather the description of a process enlivened by a number of stories and case studies from the author's forty years of experience in the oil-patch.
Practical and Theoretical Geoarchaeology, Second Edition, provides an invaluable and vastly updated overview of geoarchaeology and how it can be used effectively in the study of archaeological sites and contexts. Taking a pragmatic and functional approach, this book presents: a fundamental, broad-based perspective of the essentials of modern geoarchaeology in order to demonstrate the breadth of the approaches and the depth of the problems that it can tackle. the rapid advances made in the area in recent years, but also gives the reader a firm grasp of conventional approaches. covers traditional topics with the emphasis on landscapes, as well as anthropogenic deposits and site formation processes and their investigation. provides guidelines for the presentation of field and laboratory methods and the reporting of geoarchaeological results. essential reading for archaeology undergraduate and graduate students, practicing archaeologists and geoscientists who need to understand and apply geoarchaeological methodologies, and help foster the dialog among diverse researchers investigating archaeological sites. Practical and Theoretical Geoarchaeology, Second Edition, is an ideal resource for undergraduate and graduate students in archaeology, and a great practical reference for practicing archaeologists and geoscientists who need to understand and apply geoarchaeological methodologies internationally.
The book describes the structure, composition and evolution of the Earth, the main geological processes occurring on it, and how some crucial environmental matters that are amply debated in the media (e.g. pollution, greenhouse effect) can be fully understood by placing them in the holistic context of the system Earth as a whole. It provides basic information on a series of key geological issues, from the structure and composition of the Earth to the large-scale processes that characterize our planet, such as rock alteration and sedimentation, magmatism, geomagnetism, seismicity, plate tectonics, cyclical migration of chemical elements through various Earth reservoirs (Geochemical Cycles), and evolution of the planet from Hadean to present. It intends to reach a wide readership, which is interested in our planet and wish to have a general and comprehensive view of its origin, evolution and activity. Potential readership includes undergraduate and advanced undergraduate students in Geology and other scientific disciplines, and any moderately- to well-educated people interested in the surrounding world and eager to gain a basic knowledge of the Earth and to reach an integrated view of how our planet is working.
Antarctica is no longer a 'pole apart'. From a scientific perspective, the Antarctic ice sheet, ocean and climate systems are intimately linked with the global climate and are now seen to be of international significance for understanding climate change. From an economic perspective, the Antarctic is perceived to have great potential as a source of marine resources although the extent of speculated mineral and hydrocarbon resources is unknown. From a conservation perspective, the continent of Antarctica represents the ideal image of unspoiled wilderness. Antarctic Environments and Resources is an accessible and timely new geography of the Antarctic which examines the differing and sometimes conflicting interests in the great southern continent, the Southern Ocean and the subantarctic islands against a background of the physical and natural systems of the region and their interactions. It charts the development of human involvement in the area, focusing on the exploitation of resources from early sealing to modern fisheries, tourism and science, and it assesses the consequent impacts on the natural environment. The text also reviews the emerging framework for future environmental management developed under the Antarctic Treaty System. This is an ideal text for undergraduates studying glacial geomorphology, environmental management, polar regions and the Antarctic.
For advanced undergraduate and beginning graduate students in
atmospheric, oceanic, and climate science, Atmosphere, Ocean and
Climate Dynamics is an introductory textbook on the circulations of
the atmosphere and ocean and their interaction, with an emphasis on
global scales. It will give students a good grasp of what the
atmosphere and oceans look like on the large-scale and why they
look that way. The role of the oceans in climate and paleoclimate
is also discussed. The combination of observations, theory and
accompanying illustrative laboratory experiments sets this text
apart by making it accessible to students with no prior training in
meteorology or oceanography.
The development of numerical methods, together with the advent of fast digital computers, have facilitated the application of integral equations in geophysical modelling. This is also due to the successful derivation of integral equations that are applicable to the modelling of complex structures and efficient numerical algorithms for their solution. The purpose of this work is to give the principles by which boundary value problems describing geophysical models can be converted into integral equations. "Geophysical Interpretation and Integral Equations" introduces Fredholm integral equations that are well suited to the numerical solution of boundary value problems representing the electrical, magnetic, electromagnetic and seismic models of geophysics. These methods form a most efficient class of techniques for the numerical modelling of geophysical phenomena. The geophysical methods are briefly described, their mathematical expressions are given in the form of boundary value problems and, by applying the Green's functions, these boundary value problems are then converted into integral equations that can then be solved by standard numerical methematics. The end results are integral formulae and integral equations that form the theoretical framework for model calculations associated with practical geophysical interpretation. The approach is physical rather than mathematical, ie the physical phenomenon is represented by the integral formulae explained in detail, with the mathematical analysis confined to a minimum. Numerical algorithms for solving the integral equations are discussed in connection with some illustrative examples involving numerical modelling results. This work seeks to provide a reference source for all geophysicists and engineers concerned with geophysical phenomenon.
As a well balanced and fully illustrated introductory text, this book provides a comprehensive overview of the physical, technological and social components of natural disaster. The main disaster-producing agents are reviewed systematically in terms of geophysical processes and effects, monitoring, mitigation and warning. The relationship between disasters and society is examined with respect to a wide variety of themes, including damage assessment and prevention, hazard mapping, emergency preparedness, the provision of shelter and the nature of reconstruction. Medical emergencies and the epidemiology of disasters are described, and refugee management and aid to the Third World are discussed. A chapter is devoted to the sociology, psychology, economics and history of disasters. In many parts of the world the toll of death, injury, damage and deprivation caused by natural disasters is becoming increasingly serious. Major earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, droughts, floods and other similar catastrophes are often followed by large relief operations characterized by substantial involvement of the international community. The years 1990-2000 have therefore been designated by the United N
With the rapid development of Chinese urbanization in the 21st century, "urban diseases" become more serious, mainly manifested in water environmental pollution, urban flooding, water shortage, and deterioration of water ecology. It is necessary to establish a modern rainwater management system, scientifically solve the problem of excess urban rainwater and to improve water environment quality. Improvement of water environment quality is conducive to the ecological function of a sponge city. Sponge city construction has contributed to control non-point source pollution. Sponge systems cause the stagnation and purification of rainwater runoff, which is an important guarantee for water environment quality. This monograph summarizes theories and practices of the integrated water environment treatment in Chongqing, a typical representative mountainous city in the Three Gorges Reservoir Region. Based on the mountainous terrain and unique water environment characteristics in the Three Gorges Reservoir Region, the monograph analyzes measures and difficulties in the basin water environment integrated treatment. Moreover, the monograph makes suggestions for risk management amid drainage systems during the COVID-19 epidemic.
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