This volume considers current and future challenges for nature law and policy in Europe. Following the Fitness Check evaluation of the Birds and Habitats Directives, in 2017 the EU adopted an Action Plan for nature, people and the economy to rapidly improve the Directives' implementation and accelerate progress towards the EU's biodiversity targets for 2020. More recently, the EU has adopted a Biodiversity Strategy for 2030 and proposed an EU Nature Restoration Law. This book makes a timely contribution by examining the current state of play in light of recent and historical developments, as well as the post-2020 nature law and policy landscape. While evidence suggests that Natura 2000 and the Habitats and Birds Directives have delivered conservation benefits for wildlife in Europe, biodiversity loss continues apace. The book reviews the requirements for an effective international nature conservation system, with reference to the Birds and Habitats Directives. It examines regulatory regimes, current legal issues in the fields of site protection and species protection, the protection of areas outside Natura 2000, recent developments in the EU and the UK, including the implications of Brexit, agriculture and nature conservation, litigation, science and access to justice. Written by leading experts in the field, from a range of stakeholder groups, the volume draws on diverse experiences as well as providing interdisciplinary perspectives. This volume will be essential reading for students and scholars interested in European environmental policy and law, including lawyers, ecologists, environmental scientists, political scientists, natural resource managers, and planners. It will also be of interest to conservation practitioners, policy-makers and NGOs.

This volume looks at recent scientific knowledge and innovative techniques concerning environmental matters. The proceedings focus on topics such as hydraulic protection of territory and defence, utilization of water resources, architecture and planning of fluival/coastal landscape and much more.

- Natural scientists, social scientists and humanists to assess if (or how) we may begin to coexist harmoniously with the mosquito. - Chapters assess polarizing arguments for conserving and preserving mosquitoes, as well as for controlling and killing them, elaborating on possible consequences of both strategies. - This book provides informed answers to the dual question: could we eliminate mosquitoes, and should we? Offering insights spanning the technical to the philosophical, this is the 'go to' book for exploring humanity's many relationships with the mosquito-which becomes a journey to finding better ways to inhabit the natural world.

There continues to be a growing interest in questions relating to development and the Third World. With expansion of travel, greater media coverage and new demands from academics for a rethinking of development mechanisms, the Third World has become an area of increasing interest. This volume explores aspects of culture and development at a time of rapid global change. Contributors debate the importance of culture to development discourse and the Third World, stressing that if development is to have real meaning and value at the local level, there must be a qualitative understanding of the complexities and dynamics of everyday lives.

Advanced Calculus: Theory and Practice, Second Edition offers a text for a one- or two-semester course on advanced calculus or analysis. The text improves students' problem-solving and proof-writing skills, familiarizes them with the historical development of calculus concepts, and helps them understand the connections among different topics. The book explains how various topics in calculus may seem unrelated but have common roots. Emphasizing historical perspectives, the text gives students a glimpse into the development of calculus and its ideas from the age of Newton and Leibniz to the twentieth century. Nearly 300 examples lead to important theorems. Features of the Second Edition: Improved Organization. Chapters are reorganized to address common preferences. Enhanced Coverage of Axiomatic Systems. A section is added to include Peano's system of axioms for the set of natural numbers and their use in developing the well-known properties of the set N. Expanded and Organized Exercise Collection. There are close to 1,000 new exercises, many of them with solutions or hints. Exercises are classified based on the level of difficulty. Computation-oriented exercises are paired and solutions or hints provided for the odd-numbered questions. Enrichment Material. Historical facts and biographies of over 60 mathematicians. Illustrations. Thirty-five new illustrations are added in order to guide students through examples or proofs. About the Author: John Srdjan Petrovic is a professor at Western Michigan University.

The replacement of fossil-derived compounds by bio-based fuels and chemicals is crucial for the implementation of a sustainable bioeconomy. In this context, microorganisms are key players for biofuels' production from renewable sources. Biotechnological biofuel production processes require conversion microorganisms capable of both efficiently assimilating renewable low-cost carbon sources and diverting their metabolisms towards the specific biofuel. Exploring the wide diversity of microorganisms available on Earth will surely aid to make the production of green fuels a reality. This book gives a wide overview of different microbial-based processes for green fuels production. The book also includes techno-economic analysis and highlights strategic, commercial and environmental interests in promoting green fuels. All these facts make this book very valuable not only for the scientific community but also for biofuel companies and policy makers.

Grounded in the user-centered design movement, this book offers a broad consideration of how our civilization has evolved its technical infrastructure for human purpose to help us make sense of the contemporary world of information infrastructure and online existence. The author incorporates historical, cultural and aesthetic approaches to situating information and its underlying technologies across time in the collective, lived experiences of humanity. In today's digital information world, user experience is vital to the success of any product or service. Yet as the user population expands to include us all, designing for people who vary in skills, abilities, preferences and backgrounds is challenging. This book provides an integrated understanding of users, and the methods that have evolved to identify usability challenges, that can facilitate cohesive and earlier solutions. The book treats information creation and use as a core human behavior based on acts of representation and recording that humans have always practiced. It suggests that the traditional ways of studying information use, with their origins in the distinct layers of social science theories and models is limiting our understanding of what it means to be an information user and hampers our efforts at being truly user-centric in design. Instead, the book offers a way of integrating the knowledge base to support a richer view of use and users in design education and evaluation. Understanding Users is aimed at those studying or practicing user-centered design and anyone interested in learning how people might be better integrated in the design of new technologies to augment human capabilities and experiences.

Gives a holistic approach to machine learning and data science applications, from design to deployment and quality assurance, as an overarching cyclical process; Bridges machine learning and software engineering to build a shared set of best practices useful to both academia and the industry; Discusses deployment options for different types of models and data to help practitioners reason and make informed choices. Emphasizes the role of coding standards and software architecture alongside statistical rigor to implement reproducible and scalable machine learning models Key Features: A complete guide to software engineering for machine learning and data science applications, from choosing the right hardware to analysing algorithms and designing scalable architectures. Surveys the state of the art of the software and frameworks used to build and run machine learning applications, comparing and contrasting their trade-offs. Comes with a complete case study in natural language understanding which illustrates the principles and the tools covered in the book. Code available from GitHub. Provides a multi-disciplinary view of how traditional software learning practices can be integrated with the workflows of domain experts and the unique characteristics of software in which data play a central role.

This book provides a general introduction into aviation operations, covering all the relevant elements of this field and the interrelations between them.

Numerous books have been written about aviation, but most are written by and for specialists, and assume a profound understanding of the fundamentals. This textbook provides the basics for understanding these fundamentals. It explains how the commercial aviation sector is structured and how technological, economic and political forces define its development and the prosperity of its players.

Aviation operations have become an important field of expertise. Airlines, airports and aviation suppliers, the players in aviation, need expertise on how aircraft can be profitably exploited by connecting airports with the aim of adding value to society. This book covers all relevant aspects of aviation operations, including contemporary challenges, like capacity constraints and sustainability.

This textbook delivers a fundamental understanding of the commercial aviation sector at a level ideal for first-year university students and can be a tool for lecturers in developing an aviation operations curriculum. It may also be of interest to people already employed within aviation, often specialists, seeking an accurate overview of all relevant fields of operations.

An overview of the worldwide discussion of the information concept, this book presents thoughts of scholars from various disciplines including information and computer science, semiotics, system science, evolutionary theory, physics, biology, psychology, consciousness theory, sociology, and science and technology studies. The shortcomings of the old fashioned Shannon and Weaver's model of information are examined, providing insights into how research of evolutionary systems could lay the basis for a new theory of information that will bridge the gap between "hard" and "soft" sciences.

Many leisure activities involve the use of turf as a surface. Grass surfaces on golf courses, bowling clubs, cricket pitches, racetracks, and parks all require maintenance by trained personnel. International Turf Management Handbook is written by a team of international experts. It covers all aspects of turf management and in particular * the selection and establishment of grass varieties * soils, irrigation and drainage * performance testing and playing qualities * issues relating to specific playing surfaces In its depth of coverage and detailed practical advice from around the world this comprehensive handbook is destined to become the standard reference work on the subject.

If you are responsible for oak management, Managing Oak Forests in the Eastern United States is for you. It is the definitive practical guide for anyone interested in improving stewardship of eastern oak forests. Organized into three sections, the first section, "Background and Biology: Setting the Stage," helps you establish a solid understanding of the history and ecology of eastern oak ecosystems. It examines the question "Why do we manage oaks?" and looks at some of the challenges faced in oak management such as fire, wildlife management, and oak regeneration. It also provides a description and distribution of oak forests across the eastern United States and discusses the biology of oaks. The second section, "Silviculture: What Is in the Tool Box," gives you a practical understanding of how management can be implemented in eastern oak forests. It covers natural regeneration, artificial regeneration, and use of prescribed fires, competition control, and intermediate treatments. The third and final section, "Managing Oaks: How Do I Make It Work for Me?" helps you clarify your objectives and chart a course to bring about the desired outcomes for the forests you are managing. This section assists you in evaluating your progress in managing your oaks and what changes you will need to make. It provides details on management objectives for upland oaks, woodlands and savannahs, and bottomland oaks. It also gives you guidance on managing deer impacts on oak forests. The last chapter is specifically designed to help you get started.

Most applications generate large datasets, like social networking and social influence programs, smart cities applications, smart house environments, Cloud applications, public web sites, scientific experiments and simulations, data warehouse, monitoring platforms, and e-government services. Data grows rapidly, since applications produce continuously increasing volumes of both unstructured and structured data. Large-scale interconnected systems aim to aggregate and efficiently exploit the power of widely distributed resources. In this context, major solutions for scalability, mobility, reliability, fault tolerance and security are required to achieve high performance and to create a smart environment. The impact on data processing, transfer and storage is the need to re-evaluate the approaches and solutions to better answer the user needs. A variety of solutions for specific applications and platforms exist so a thorough and systematic analysis of existing solutions for data science, data analytics, methods and algorithms used in Big Data processing and storage environments is significant in designing and implementing a smart environment. Fundamental issues pertaining to smart environments (smart cities, ambient assisted leaving, smart houses, green houses, cyber physical systems, etc.) are reviewed. Most of the current efforts still do not adequately address the heterogeneity of different distributed systems, the interoperability between them, and the systems resilience. This book will primarily encompass practical approaches that promote research in all aspects of data processing, data analytics, data processing in different type of systems: Cluster Computing, Grid Computing, Peer-to-Peer, Cloud/Edge/Fog Computing, all involving elements of heterogeneity, having a large variety of tools and software to manage them. The main role of resource management techniques in this domain is to create the suitable frameworks for development of applications and deployment in smart environments, with respect to high performance. The book focuses on topics covering algorithms, architectures, management models, high performance computing techniques and large-scale distributed systems.

Containing over one hundred and sixty line drawings, maps and one hundred tables, this book explains the fundamental hydrologic principles and favoured methods of analysis. Aimed at students interested in natural resources and environmental science, spreadsheet exercises and worked examples help to develop basic problem solving skills.

Countering Cyber Sabotage: Introducing Consequence-Driven, Cyber-Informed Engineering (CCE) introduces a new methodology to help critical infrastructure owners, operators and their security practitioners make demonstrable improvements in securing their most important functions and processes. Current best practice approaches to cyber defense struggle to stop targeted attackers from creating potentially catastrophic results. From a national security perspective, it is not just the damage to the military, the economy, or essential critical infrastructure companies that is a concern. It is the cumulative, downstream effects from potential regional blackouts, military mission kills, transportation stoppages, water delivery or treatment issues, and so on. CCE is a validation that engineering first principles can be applied to the most important cybersecurity challenges and in so doing, protect organizations in ways current approaches do not. The most pressing threat is cyber-enabled sabotage, and CCE begins with the assumption that well-resourced, adaptive adversaries are already in and have been for some time, undetected and perhaps undetectable. Chapter 1 recaps the current and near-future states of digital technologies in critical infrastructure and the implications of our near-total dependence on them. Chapters 2 and 3 describe the origins of the methodology and set the stage for the more in-depth examination that follows. Chapter 4 describes how to prepare for an engagement, and chapters 5-8 address each of the four phases. The CCE phase chapters take the reader on a more granular walkthrough of the methodology with examples from the field, phase objectives, and the steps to take in each phase. Concluding chapter 9 covers training options and looks towards a future where these concepts are scaled more broadly.

Includes case studies illustrating the business processes that underlines the use of big data and health analytics to improve healthcare delivery Discusses AI based smart paradigms for reliable predictions of infectious disease dynamics which can help or prevent disease transmission Highlights the different aspects of using extended reality for diverse healthcare applications and aggregates the current state of research Offers intelligent models of the smart recommender system for personal well-being services and computer-aided drug discovery and design methods Presents novel innovative techniques for extracting user social behavior known as sentiment analysis for healthcare related purposes

Waste Management is one of the key problems of modern society due to the ever-expanding volume and complexity of discarded domestic and industrial waste. Society is increasingly aware of the need to establish better practices and safer solutions for waste disposal. This requires further investigation into disposal methods and recycling as well as new technologies to monitor landfills, industrial mining wastes and chemical and nuclear repositories. This creates a need for more research on current disposal methods such as landfills, incineration, chemical and effluent treatment, as well as recycling, clean technologies, waste monitoring, public and corporate awareness and general education. Unfortunately, many of the policies adopted in the past were aimed at short term solutions without due regard to the long term implications on health and the environment, leading in many cases to the need to take difficult and expensive remedial action. The desired direction of Waste Management is towards sustainable strategies. The approach that has emerged as the most promising has been called 4Rs, where reduction, reuse, recycling and recovery are seen as the best actions. This largely decreases the volume of waste that needs final disposal. Recovery refers to the establishment of two new classifications, those of Secondary Raw Materials (SRM) and of Refuse Derived Fuel (RDF). They both relate to useful products obtained from waste and make a shift from the mere recycle or reuse - mostly seen as a way to reduce dumping - to the valuable employment of such matter within the production cycle. Another aspect of this revolution is happening subtly and gradually by people buying waste; particularly eWaste and some types of plastic, the so-called technical waste. This is happening due to the strong demand and high price of certain new materials and the possibility of sorting out waste in developing regions of the world. As a result, a market in Secondary Raw Materials (SRM) has developed. Covering various areas under the topic of Waste management, this volume contains a selection of papers presented at the 10th International Conference on Waste Management and the Environment.

This text explains what constitutes good practice in applying environmental assessment as an environmental management tool. A wide range of case studies are employed to demonstrate how the different methods, techniques and disciplines of environmental assessment can be used. The authors address the key concepts for environmental assessment procedures: methods for using E.A.; techniques for impact prediction and evaluation; environmental risk assessment; EA consultation and participation; project management; environmental statement review and post-project analysis; and strategic environmental assessment.
Worldwide case studies include: gas pipelines, hydroelectric power plants, gold mining, river crossings, waste-to-energy plants and gravel extraction in England, Scotland, Ireland, Canada, the USA, Venezuela, the Netherlands, Iceland, Zambia, Zimbabwe, South Africa and Ghana. ** Environmental assessment is a vital environmental management tool which is able to identify, predict and evaluate the potential biological, physical, social and health effects effects of a project on its surrounding environment.

Reviews of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology attempts to provide concise, critical reviews of timely advances, philosophy and significant areas of accomplished or needed endeavor in the total field of xenobiotics, in any segment of the environment, as well as toxicological implications.

Challenges and Recent Advances in Sustainable Oil and Gas Recovery and Transportation delivers a critical tool for today’s petroleum and reservoir engineers to learn the latest research in EOR and solutions toward more SDG-supported practices. Packed with methods and case studies, the reference starts with the latest advances such as EOR with polymers and EOR with CCS. Advances in shale recovery and methane production are also covered before layering on sustainability methods on critical topics such as oilfield produced water. Supported by a diverse group of contributors, this book gives engineers a go-to source for the future of oil and gas. The oil and gas industry are utilizing enhanced oil recovery (EOR) methods frequently, but the industry is also tasked with making more sustainable decisions in their future operations.

In every area of life, traditional, centralized party politics has been failing and the seeds of a new form of political life are being sown. This is true in housing, health, education, consumption and transport, where public policy is attracting increasing criticism. In an age of social alienation and urban despondency, "Richer Futures" is a timely response to the growing interest in community-based, self-help action. It introduces new forms of communication and decision-making and sets out a programme for a sustainable politics.Contributions from some of the best-known thinkers and writers on contemporary urban, cultural and social policy (and campaigns) in Britain today pay tribute to the ideas and industrious activities of the influential writer and commentator Colin Ward. This uplifting collection of essays looks forward to a new politics of self-management and environmentally aware and sustainable lifestyles.

In this thoroughly updated third edition, the authors provide a series of carefully designed and tested field and laboratory exercises that represent the full scope of limnology. In using the text, students will gain a solid foundation in this complex, multidisciplinary field of ecology as they explore the physical, chemical, and biological characteristics of standing and running waters. The book illustrates accepted standard methods as well as modern metabolic and experimental approaches and their research applications. Each exercise is preceded by an introductory section and concludes with questions for students as well as suggestions for further reading. As a textbook, this is a highly structured, concise presentation with a research-oriented approach that openly invites active participation by students.

There is growing concern over the conservation and management of European wet grasslands. The maintenance of the European wet grassland landscape, including floodplain meadows and coastal grazing marshes or pastures, through traditional low-intensity farming has conserved a habit supporting internationally important plant and animal communities, including many rare species. However, land use changes such as flood defence, land drainage, agricultural intensification and neglect have caused a considerable reduction in the extent and biodiversity of European wet grasslands. The international importance of the habitat for biodiversity conservation has recently been recognised with its inclusion in the European Union Habitats and Species Directive and the Convention on Biological Diversity fostered by the United Nations. This volume thoroughly examines European perspectives of wet grassland ecology in order to encourage an integrated approach to contemporary issues. Important topics covered include the status of wet grasslands in Europe, their biodiversity (plants, invertebrates and birds), hydrology and management (especially for conservation objectives), and the restoration of this threatened habitat. It combines prescriptive, analytical and reviewing contributions, including case studies from across Europe. As such, this book will appeal equally to academic institutions and professional practitioners.

SRv6 Network Programming, beginning with the challenges for Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) network development, describes the background, roadmap design, and implementation of Segment Routing over IPv6 (SRv6), as well as the application of this technology in traditional and emerging services. The book begins with the development of IP technologies by focusing on the problems encountered during MPLS and IPv6 network development, giving readers insights into the problems tackled by SRv6 and the value of SRv6. It then goes on to explain SRv6 fundamentals, including SRv6 packet header design, the packet forwarding process, protocol extensions such as Interior Gateway Protocol (IGP), Border Gateway Protocol (BGP), and Path Computation Element Protocol (PCEP) extensions, and how SRv6 supports existing traffic engineering (TE), virtual private networks (VPN), and reliability requirements. Next, SRv6 network deployment is introduced, covering the evolution paths from existing networks to SRv6 networks, SRv6 network deployment processes, involved O&M technologies, and emerging 5G and cloud services supported by SRv6. Bit Index Explicit Replication IPv6 encapsulation (BIERv6), an SRv6 multicast technology, is then introduced as an important supplement to SRv6 unicast technology. The book concludes with a summary of the current status of the SRv6 industry and provides an outlook for new SRv6-based technologies. SRv6 Network Programming: Ushering in a New Era of IP Networks collects the research results of Huawei SRv6 experts and reflects the latest development direction of SRv6. With rich, clear, practical, and easy-to-understand content, the volume is intended for network planning engineers, technical support engineers and network administrators who need a grasp of the most cutting-edge IP network technology. It is also intended for communications network researchers in scientific research institutions and universities. Authors: Zhenbin Li is the Chief Protocol Expert of Huawei and member of the IETF IAB, responsible for IP protocol research and standards promotion at Huawei. Zhibo Hu is a Senior Huawei Expert in SR and IGP, responsible for SR and IGP planning and innovation. Cheng Li is a Huawei Senior Pre-research Engineer and IP standards representative, responsible for Huawei's SRv6 research and standardization.

In aquatic ecosystems, the oligochaetes are often a major component of the community. Their relevance in sediment quality assessment is largely related to their benthic and detritivorous life habit. In this book, we aim to present the state of the art of Pollution Biology using oligochaete worms in laboratory and field studies. Future research will require the combination of a variety of methodological approaches and the integration of the resulting information, avoiding fragmented and often conflicting visions of the relationships of the species with their environment. Current approaches to ecotoxicology and bioaccumulation using ecological risk assessment provide the opportunity to relate community studies with probability of effects. This book addresses three main themes: Ecological and Field Studies using the composition and structure of oligochaete communities, Toxicology and Laboratory Studies, and Bioaccumulation and Trophic Transfer Studies. Two appendices list values of toxicological parameters (LC50, EC50) and several bioaccumulation variables (bioaccumulation factors, biological half-life, toxicokinetic coefficients, and critical body residues) for different oligochaete species. Additional information is provided on Methodological Issues and on the Taxonomy of several oligochaete families, with information on the most recent taxonomic debates. Each chapter includes a critical view, based on the authors experience, of a number of current issues which have been raised in the literature.