Global populations have grown rapidly in recent decades, leading to ever increasing demands for shelter, resources, energy and utilities. Coupled with the worldwide need to achieve lower impact buildings and conservation of resources, the need to achieve sustainability in urban environments has never been more acute. This book critically reviews the fundamental issues and applied science, engineering and technology that will enable all cities to achieve a greater level of metropolitan sustainability, and assist nations in meeting the needs of their growing urban populations.
Part one introduces key issues related to metropolitan sustainability, including the use of both urban metabolism and benefit cost analysis. Part two focuses on urban land use and the environmental impact of the built environment. The urban heat island effect, redevelopment of brownfield sites and urban agriculture are discussed in depth, before part three goes on to explore urban air pollution and emissions control. Urban water resources, reuse and management are explored in part four, followed by a study of urban energy supply and management in part five. Solar, wind and bioenergy, the role of waste-to-energy systems in the urban infrastructure, and smart energy for cities are investigated. Finally, part six considers sustainable urban development, transport and planning.
With its distinguished editor and international team of expert contributors, Metropolitan sustainability is an essential resource for low-impact building engineers, sustainability consultants and architects, town and city planners, local/municipal authorities, and national and non-governmental bodies, and provides a thorough overview for academics of all levels in this field.
Critically reviews the fundamental issues and applied science, engineering and technology that will enable all cities to achieve a greater level of metropolitan sustainabilityWill assist nations in meeting the needs of their growing urban populationsChapters discuss urban land use, the environmental impact of the build environment, the urban heat island effect, urban air pollution and emissions control, among other topics

This volume is an introduction to inner model theory, an area of set theory which is concerned with fine structural inner models reflecting large cardinal properties of the set theoretic universe. The monograph contains a detailed presentation of general fine structure theory as well as a modern approach to the construction of small core models, namely those models containing at most one strong cardinal, together with some of their applications. The final part of the book is devoted to a new approach encompassing large inner models which admit many Woodin cardinals. The exposition is self-contained and does not assume any special prerequisities, which should make the text comprehensible not only to specialists but also to advanced students in Mathematical Logic and Set Theory.

The 3rd International Symposium on Nanotechnology in Construction (NICOM 3) follows the highly successful NICOM 1 (Paisley, UK 2003) and NICOM 2 (Bilbao, Spain 2005) Symposia. The NICOM3 symposium was held in Prague, Czech Republic from May 31 to June 2, 2009 under the auspices of the Czech Technical University in Prague. It was a cross-disciplinary event, bringing together R&D experts and users from different fields all with interest in nanotechnology and construction. The conference was aimed at:

• Understanding of internal structures of existing construction materials at nano-scale
• Modification at nano-scale of existing construction materials.
• Production and properties of nanoparticulate materials, nanotubes and novel polymers.
• Modeling and simulation of nanostructures.
• Instrumentation, techniques and metrology at nano-scale.
• Health and safety issues and environmental impacts related to nanotechnology during research, manufacture and product use. Review of current legislation.
• Societal and commercial impacts of nanotechnology in construction, their predictions and analysis.

Hydroinformatics systems are systems that combine computational hydraulic modelling with information systems (including knowledge-based systems). They are gaining rapid acceptance in the areas of environmental planning, design and management. The present book focuses exclusively on sewage systems, starting with their planning and then going on to discuss their design, operation and rehabilitation. The very experienced authors discuss business and information needs in the management of urban drainage, tools for collecting and archiving such data, and their use in modelling catchment hydrology, sewer systems hydraulics, wastewater quality, wastewater treatment plant operation, and receiving waters. The control and operation of sewer systems in real time is described, followed by a discussion of their maintenance and rehabilitation. Intelligent decision support systems for managing the urban drainage business process are presented. Audience: Researchers into sewer design, municipal engineers, planners and managers interested in an innovative approach to all aspects of the planning, design and operation of sewer systems.

Notwithstanding past achievements, flood damage continues to rise throughout the world as the magnitudes of floods increase, partly as a result of poor land management and partly by climate change, growing populations and continuing development in flood-prone areas, and the aging and deterioration of flood defences. One of the major goals of water management is the protection of society from floods. That issue is addressed here in terms of such broad issues as flood analysis, flood impact, non-structural and structural flood management measures. Non-structural measures focus on flood plain management, flood insurance, flood forecasting and warning, and emergency measures during floods. Structural measures focus on catchment management, embankments and flood reservoirs. Post-flood measures are also discussed. Future planning of flood management should be based on a clear understanding of the effectiveness interventions and their impacts on river catchment ecosystems.

In 1997 disastrous flooding running through the Czech Republic, Poland, Germany took the lives of a great number of people and caused economic damage estimated in tens of billions of dollars. Flooding of the Yangtze river in 1998 killed more than 3000 people, dislocated 230 million souls, and caused direct damage of more than $ 45 billion. Both the general public and the experts are asking what we can learn from these recent events to reduce loss of life and flood damage. The 1997 floods were dealt with by experts from the Czech Republic, Poland and Germany, who presented timely reports on combatting floods, both success stories and shortcomings. This experience is further extended by reports from experts drawn from 13 other countries, developing a broad overview of flood risk management, covering the ecosystem approach to flood management, including socioeconomic issues, flood impacts on water quality, human health, and natural ecosystems.

Urban population growth dramatically alters material and energy fluxes in the affected areas, with concomitant changes in landscape, altered fluxes of water, sediment, chemicals and pathogens and increased releases of waste heat. These changes then impact on urban ecosystems, including water resources and result in their degradation. Such circumstances make the provision of water services to urban populations even more challenging. Changing weather patterns, rising temperature and large variations in precipitation contr- ute to increased damages, caused by weather related disasters, including floods. Ones of the major contributors to increasing flood peaks are land use changes and particularl- urban development. Consequently, there is a need to look for low environmental impact land development and to manage runoff in urban areas by storm water management. Much progress in the management of urban waters has been achieved in the most - vanced jurisdictions, but much more remains to be done. In this respect the EC Water Framework Directive can provide some guidance. Urban water management issues are particularly important in the countries in transition in Central and Eastern Europe. During the last decade political, economical and social changes in the countries under transition have influenced almost every element of the public sector, including water services. There is an urgent need for exchange of information among various countries on this issue and for identification of best approaches to achieving this transition.

Successful Transformations? contrasts the recent experience of economic development in Eastern Germany and the Czech Republic. It provides a comparative up-to-date account critically assessing the transition from central planning to a free market economy. The book highlights the very different paths that these two economies have taken. Eastern Germany has been absorbed almost entirely into the political and economic framework of West Germany. In contrast the Czech Republic - which is widely acclaimed to have made the speediest transition - has from the outset adopted an independent line. The book illustrates the strengths and weaknesses of these two different paths and addresses the key question as to whether the relative success of these two economies can point to a special policy regime which might aid economic transition in other former communist countries.

Steven C. Miller directs this suburban horror film starring Jonny Weston and Gattlin Griffith. When brothers Neal (Weston) and Paulie (Griffith) join forces to get rid of a creature living under the bed, nightmare ordeals ensue.

Amorphous and Microcrystalline Silicon Solar Cells: Modeling, Materials and Device Technology provides a comprehensive overview of materials for application in thin film solar cells. It is the first book that compares experimental and computer-modeling methods, combining the state of the art in technology with the latest insights in device modeling. A wide range of experimental issues are explored, from materials and basic device physics of thin film solar cells to potential mass production facilities for solar panels. The modeling section presents an approach to integrated optical and electrical modeling of complete devices, including optical light trapping, and describes the physical materials parameters related to amorphous silicon that are crucial for successful modeling. The increasing importance of multijunction cells with different bandgap components for thin film silicon cells is reflected in a description of the latest breakthroughs acquired experimentally and by modeling. Concluding chapters describe what can be learned from combined modeling and device fabrication, indicating potential future methods of amorphous silicon solar cell optimization. This book will prove invaluable to researchers in the amorphous and microcrystalline silicon field and the physical and experimental approaches will be of interest to researchers investigating solar cells or other film devices for large area applications.

This four-part chronology presents the unfolding of the American West from 23,000 B.C.E. to A.D. 2001 Not long ago, the story of the American West was an uncomplicated tale. Its theme was "The Winning of the West," and its plot simply followed Euro-Americans as they galloped across the continent. But throughout the last two decades, historians like Scott C. Zeman have begun to examine the story and separate the myths from the facts. Today the history of the American West is about the land itself; about conquest and colonization; about migration and social change. Its heroes are not only white men, but also women and children, and peoples of African, Asian, Native American, and European descent. In this up to date chronology, readers can explore hundreds of political, social, and cultural plot points, from the arrival of the continent's first migrants more than 20,000 years ago to the Wounded Knee Massacre in 1890, and from the completion of the trans-Alaska pipeline in 1977 to the shootings at Columbine High School in 2000. Presented in four parts: The Native West (23,000 B.C.E.-A.D.1500); The Imperial West (1500-1840); The Incorporated West (1841-1932); and The Contested West (1932-2001) Sidebars offer in-depth treatment of selected topics Generously illustrated Each section opens with an overview of major events and historical trends of the period

This book offers a sustained, interdisciplinary examination of taste. It addresses a range of topics that have been at the heart of lively debates in philosophy of language, linguistics, metaphysics, aesthetics, and experimental philosophy. Our everyday lives are suffused with discussions about taste. We are quick to offer familiar platitudes about taste, but we struggle when facing the questions that matter-what taste is, how it is related to subjectivity, what distinguishes good from bad taste, why it is valuable to make and evaluate judgments about matters of taste, and what, exactly, we mean in speaking about these matters. The essays in this volume open up new, intersecting lines of research about these questions that cross traditional disciplinary boundaries. They address the notion of aesthetic taste; connections between taste and the natures of truth, disagreement, assertion, belief, retraction, linguistic context-sensitivity, and the semantics/pragmatics interface; experimental inquiry about taste; and metaphysical questions underlying ongoing discussions about taste. Perspectives on Taste will be of interest to researchers and advanced students working in aesthetics, philosophy of language, linguistics, metaphysics, and experimental philosophy.

Mass incarceration is one of the most pressing ethical and political issues of our time. In this volume, philosophers join activists and those incarcerated on death row to grapple with contemporary U.S. punishment practices and draw out critiques around questions of power, identity, justice, and ethical responsibility. This work takes shape against a backdrop of disturbing trends: The United States incarcerates more of its own citizens than any other country in the world. A disproportionate number of these prisoners are people of color, and, today, a black man has a greater chance of going to prison than to college. The United States is the only Western democracy to retain the death penalty, even after decades of scholarship, statistics, and even legal decisions have depicted a deeply flawed system structured by racism and class oppression. Motivated by a conviction that mass incarceration and state execution are among the most important ethical and political problems of our time, the contributors to this volume come together from a diverse range of backgrounds to analyze, critique, and envision alternatives to the injustices of the U.S. prison system, with recourse to deconstruction, phenomenology, critical race theory, feminism, queer theory, and disability studies. They engage with the hyper-incarceration of people of color, the incomplete abolition of slavery, the exploitation of prisoners as workers and as "raw material" for the prison industrial complex, the intensive confinement of prisoners in supermax units, and the complexities of capital punishment in an age of abolition. The resulting collection contributes to a growing intellectual and political resistance to the apparent inevitability of incarceration and state execution as responses to crime and to social inequalities. It addresses both philosophers and activists who seek intellectual resources to contest the injustices of punishment in the United States.

The Key to Fully Understanding the Basics of a 3D World Prominently used in games, movies, and on television, 3D graphics are tools of creation used to enhance how material and light come together to manipulate objects in 3D space. A game-changer written for the non-technical mind, Essential Skills for 3D Modeling, Rendering, and Animation examines the complexities of 3D computer-generated art, and outlines the basics of how things work and are used in 3D. This text describes the three cornerstones of 3D-modeling, rendering, and animation; focuses on common elements; and provides a full understanding of the foundational concepts involved. Detailing the skills and knowledge needed to become an accomplished 3D artist, it includes step-by-step instruction with ample examples, and allows absolute beginners to move at their own pace. Master Anything You Are Tasked to Model The author incorporates historical information-presenting a contextual understanding of the various techniques and methodologies in their historical place. Each chapter builds on the fundamentals of 3D computer graphics and augments skills based on the concepts, enabling the student to learn both theory and application simultaneously. The book highlights two basic geometry types, polygons and NURBS surfaces, showing the student basic modeling techniques with both. While more techniques are available, an artist can cover any model by grasping these basic techniques. Supplies examples that are specifically taken from Autodesk Maya Contains exercises that are meant to be used in conjunction with the training videos on the website Includes a documented history of computer graphics Essential Skills for 3D Modeling, Rendering, and Animation offers a fundamental understanding of the mechanics of 3D graphics to modelers, animators, texture artists, render artists, game developers, and production artists, as well as educators teaching an undergrad or tech course in 3D animation.

Examines the impact of the Czechoslovak and East German uranium industries on local politics and on societies, particularly in the decade or so after the end of the Second World War. The Erzgebirge - the Ore Mountains - on the border of Czechoslovakia and East Germany of the time, was the oldest uranium mine in the world, whose important resources were badly needed for Stalin's atomic bomb. This book contains an introduction that discusses the silver-mining industries in the Erzgebirge region, the history of experiments in physics on the instability of matter, and on the increasing demand for uranium beginning in the middle of the 19th century. The book outlines the fate of this mining region in the Cold War period, including the various political pressures and medical problems its inhabitants came under. The two industries are compared at the peak of their production and at the top of their strategic importance for Stalin. The highly secret "state within a state" is examined in the two countries. In addition, the analysis of the uranium issue helps the reader to see the origins of the Cold War in a different perspective.

There is among many nations a growing awareness that the arts and culture have an important role to play in forming the image that nations hold of themselves and that they convey in the international arena. At the same time, increased pressure on the public purse, new trade environments, and the revolution in communications technology are forcing the reexamination of cultural policy objectives and strategies for achieving those objectives in countries throughout the world. This book, based on the research and expertise of practitioners and scholars in the field of cultural policy, provides a broadly based cross-cultural analysis of policy in two countries with very different cultural traditions. The authors move beyond cultural boundaries to define 'art' and 'culture, ' explore the role of cultural policies in a nation's cultural development, and evaluate policy effectiveness and relevance. Case studies of organizations in art, music, dance, and drama, in both the United States and Japan, examine the elements that contribute to effective arts management and policy-making. Arts managers, cultural policy-makers, researchers, practitioners, and educators will find this an excellent resource that provides valuable teaching materials in the field of cultural policy and facilitates cross-cultural learning about arts management

Character rigging is the method with which you create a system for animating a character. A rig is represented by two primary mechanics: the skeleton, consisting of hierarchical rotations to drive the motions, and a skin, or method of deforming the geometry that makes up the character model. Essential Skills in Character Rigging is a beginner's guide to learning and understanding the essential aspects of character setup, evaluation, skeletal construction, and deformation. Borrowing from the author's extensive experience in the field, it presents the primary theories, constructs, and objectives for constructing a basic rig from the ground up, just as it would be done in a professional studio. The book explains the basic elements of hierarchies, skeletons, kinematics, deformation, skinning, and creating relationships between nodes. It gives hands-on experience with taking a completed character model and setting it up with a skeleton with kinematics and soft-skin deformation. It also gives specific instructions on using inverse kinematics systems, and how to set up the essential mechanics of a human rig with these systems. All of these lessons are conducted using a simplistic, conversational style that keeps technical and mathematical jargon to a minimum. The book also includes video tutorials corresponding to specific modules. Essential Skills in Character Rigging takes aspiring character artists through the vital components in the process of taking a 3D character model and turning it into an animatable rig that is ready for production in film or games. It identifies the universal fundamentals at work behind character rigging, and the practical complexities of the process are broken down into simple steps that are easy to comprehend and execute.

This title was first published in 2001. The cardiovascular system serves to carry essential compounds to the tissues and to remove metabolic by-products. It also plays an important role in maintaining homeostasis, and functions directly or indirectly in the regulation of body temperature, oxygen supply, nutrient distribution, water and electrolyte balance, and endocrine activity. Consisting of a pump, connecting tubes, exchange membranes and blood, this system is governed by a diverse and complex array of regulatory mechanisms, encompassing central neural, autonomic, endocrine, paracrine, and autocrine control. Drugs used in the treatment of cardiovascular disease are disseminated widely in western industrialized countries. In the US alone, nearly $18 billion was spent on drugs for the treatment of cardiovascular disease and stroke in 1999. This Handbook contains records for all the major drugs that directly affect the cardiovascular system. Monographs are provided for over 1900 cardiovascular agents. For each main entry, the following information is provided: the chemical name and a list of proprietary names and synonyms; the Chemical Abstracts Service (CAS) Registry Number; the European Inventory of Existing Commercial Chemical Substances (EINECS) number; and the Merck Index (12th edition) number. The physical properties of each compound are described and the known biological activity and indicated applications are presented. The structure of each compound is provided, together with a summary of the acute toxicity data associated with it, and the manufacturers and suppliers of the drug are also given. Indexes, including a master index of names and synonyms, are appended.

The Key to Fully Understanding the Basics of a 3D World Prominently used in games, movies, and on television, 3D graphics are tools of creation used to enhance how material and light come together to manipulate objects in 3D space. A game-changer written for the non-technical mind, Essential Skills for 3D Modeling, Rendering, and Animation examines the complexities of 3D computer-generated art, and outlines the basics of how things work and are used in 3D. This text describes the three cornerstones of 3D modeling, rendering, and animation; focuses on common elements; and provides a full understanding of the foundational concepts involved. Detailing the skills and knowledge needed to become an accomplished 3D artist, it includes step-by-step instruction with ample examples, and allows absolute beginners to move at their own pace. Master Anything You Are Tasked to Model The author incorporates historical information presenting a contextual understanding of the various techniques and methodologies in their historical place. Each chapter builds on the fundamentals of 3D computer graphics and augments skills based on the concepts, enabling the student to learn both theory and application simultaneously. The book highlights two basic geometry types, polygons and NURBS surfaces, showing the student basic modeling techniques with both. While more techniques are available, an artist can cover any model by grasping these basic techniques. Supplies examples that are specifically taken from Autodesk Maya Contains exercises that are meant to be used in conjunction with the training videos on the website Includes a documented history of computer graphics Essential Skills for 3D Modeling, Rendering, and Animation offers a fundamental understanding of the mechanics of 3D graphics to modelers, anima