Earth Observation in Support of the City Biodiversity Index

CITYGREEN, 2012

A Model for Assessing Biodiversity Conservation in Cities: the singapore Index on Cities' Biodiversity Cities and Biodiversity Conservation Despite occupying only two percent of the earth's surface, cities consume about 75

Urbanization, Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services: Challenges and Opportunities, 2013

Capturing the status and trends of biodiversity and ecosystem services in urban landscapes represents an important part of understanding whether a metropolitan area is developing along a sustainable trajectory or not. However, this task also represents unique challenges for policy makers and scientists alike, challenges that lie at both the methodological (scaling, boundaries, defi nitions) and institutional levels (integrating biodiversity and ecosystems with social and economic goals). In this chapter we report on the experiences from municipalities in several countries where the newly developed City Biodiversity Index (CBI) has been applied and tested. The purpose here is not to compare or rank different municipalities but rather to deepen our understanding of the science underlying the

Urban Ecosystems, 2013

In this era of rapidly urbanising human populations, urban practitioners are under increasing pressure to create resilient and sustainable cities and towns. Urban ecologists currently have a unique opportunity to apply solid, evidence-based research to help create biodiversity-rich and sustainable cities and towns for the future. Unfortunately, there is currently a mismatch between the questions planners, designers and decision-makers are asking urban ecologists that would allow them to improve the biodiversity outcomes in urban areas, and the questions urban ecologists must ask to contribute to the development and application of the science of urban ecology. For a number of reasons, urban ecologists over the past 25 years have primarily focused on describing the patterns of biodiversity in cities and towns using broad, aggregate predictor variables (e.g., distance to city center, landuse, percent cover of impermeable surfaces and vegetation, etc.). We refer to these results as 'low-hanging fruit'. If the discipline of urban ecology is going to provide the necessary information to inform actions to preserve and enhance urban biodiversity, we need to move beyond place-based research, and work towards the development of confirmed generalizations regarding the relationship between the structure and function of urban ecosystems and biodiversity. We propose three essential strategies for achieving this refined understanding: 1) defining the study window to place the study into a broader global context, 2) collecting and using more explicit question-driven measures of the urban condition in order to improve our understanding of urban ecological drivers, as well as recording more detailed ecological responses to provide insights into the ecological mechanisms underlying an observed response, and 3) expanding studies to include multiple cities, regions and countries. These strategies will help to expedite the ability of urban ecology to contribute to the creation of biodiversity-rich, healthy, resilient cities and towns.

Müller/Urban Biodiversity and Design, 2010

Climate change, loss of biodiversity and the growth of an increasingly urban world population are main challenges of this century. With two-thirds of a considerably larger world population predicted to be living in urban areas by 2050, we argue that urban biodiversity, that means the biodiversity within towns and cities, will play an important role by holding the global loss of biodiversity. As a consequence, the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) must promote the engagement of cities and local authorities in future.

2012

An annotated version of the publication with complete references is also available from the website. Users may download, reuse, reprint, modify, distribute, and/or copy text, figures, graphs and photos from Cities and Biodiversity Outlook, so long as the original source is credited. The designations employed and the presentation of material in Cities and Biodiversity Outlook do not imply the expression of any opinion whatsoever on the part of the Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity concerning the legal status of any country, territory, city or area or of its authorities, or concerning the delimitation of its frontiers or boundaries.

To develop committed and competent technologists in electronics and communication engineering to be on par with global standards coupled with cultivating the innovations and ethical values.

2023

Teorías del Barroco, 2004

Resumen Se trata por medio de un desplazamiento de perspectiva analizar el concepto de barroco y su resurgencia en la postmodernidad. Como Janus, el barroco depende de lo clásico para transgredirlo y he allí una de sus máscaras. Dicho recorrido como deriva interpretativa nos conduce hacer barroco en el barroco; no podemos fijarlo a una figura perenne, ni tampoco es suficiente ubicarlo en un período histórico como también es insuficiente convertirlo en un artificio o como un hecho natural. Palabras clave: barroco, postmodernidad. TEORIAS OF THE BAROQUE Summary It is by means of a perspective displacement to analyze the concept of Baroque and their resurgencia in the postmodernidad. As Janus, the Baroque depends on the classic thing to transgress it and there is one of its masks there. This journey as interpretive drift drives us to make Baroque in the Baroque, we cannot fix it to a perennial figure, neither neither it is enough to locate it in a historical period as well as it is insufficient to transform it into an artifice or as a natural fact. Words key: Baroque, postmodernidad Quisiera llamar la atención y la difidencia del destinatario de las Teorías del Barroco, acerca de las reducciones, simplificaciones, disyunciones y dilataciones que la temática nos suscita. Esta insinuación suspicaz y reactiva, donde relucen ciertos vestigios paranoides, tan sólo desea otorgarle al barroco y a sus nuevas manifestaciones, la expresión activa y dialógica que le han restado y le han detraído en los distintos ensayos de su definición. Se trata pues, de restituirle su polisemia, descargar la culpabilidad dromedaria de su significante en una unidad explosiva y simbiótica de lógicas que lo investigan, que a la vez se nutren unas de otras, se complementan, se concurren, se parasitan mutuamente,

Cadernos do GPOSSHE On-line, 2019

2010

Due to their physical and chemical properties, mortars made with lime are considered to be more compatible with historic fabrics than those made with artificial cements. This paper explores the mechanical properties of clay brick masonry bound with hydraulic limes of different strengths, and hydrated calcium lime (CL90-s) with no hydraulic properties. Masonry wallettes built with a CL90-s mortar and two natural limes of hydraulic strengths 3.5 and 5 MPa (NHL 3.5 and NHL 5) respectively were tested for compressive and flexural strength. The strength of the bond between the mortar and the brick was also measured. The paper concludes that CL mortar masonry displays a plastic behaviour in compression while the mechanical behaviour of the HL mortar masonry is of a brittle nature, with wallettes splitting along the centre, cracks above and below the vertical joints and spalling of brick and mortar. It also concludes that neither the rate of late strength gain of masonry, nor its ultimate compressive strength or its bond strength are determined by the mortar nature, thus a mortar of low hydraulic strength can provide stronger masonry than an emminetly hydraulic mortar. The paper agrees with previous authors on that the masonry's compressive strength is more sensitive to the brick-mortar bond strength than to the compressive strength of the mortar. Finally, the paper demonstrates that the NHL-mortar compressive strength increases at a higher rate, and reaches higher final values than that of the NHLmasonry whereas, in contrast, the CL90-s mortar is weaker in compression than the CL90-s mortar masonry.