A grid-aware emergency response model for natural disasters

Natural phenomena are essential and unavoidable planetary actions. When they occur in extreme forms they may have a disastrous impact on human life, property and the environment. Emergency management bodies mitigate, prepare for, respond to and recover from such events. Emergency response is a sum of decisions and actions taken through the collaboration and cooperation of many specialists from different disciplines. However, primary and secondary research findings suggest that there are limitations in the current information and communication technologies (leT), which affect the effectiveness and efficiency of emergency response tasks. Therefore, the focus of this research was to investigate whether the appropriate use of cutting-edge leT (such as the Grid) can improve the effectiveness and efficiency of emergency response operations for natural disasters. The approach adopted in the research involved literature reviews, case studies, face-toface structured interviews with emergency management stakeholders and leT experts, model development using Soft Systems Methodology (SSM) linked to Information Systems Development Methodologies (lSDMs), and finally, one-to-one evaluation exercises. ease studies and interviews involving two member states of the European Union were carried out to investigate current practices and to highlight the limitations that emergency management stakeholders face during response operations. SSM was used to investigate the problem area and to produce a conceptual Emergency Response Model (ERM). Further literature review and interviews suggested the Grid as the most appropriate technology to support the ERM. The linking together of the SSM findings with ISDMs - resulted in the production of a Grid-Aware Emergency Response Model (G-AERM) for natural disasters. The evaluation of the G-AERM demonstrated the applicability of Grid technology to emergency response by supporting stakeholders in monitoring, planning, controlling and managing actions within emergency situations caused by natural disasters in a far more informed way in terms of effectiveness and efficiency....EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceGBUnited Kingdo

A grid-aware emergency response model for natural disasters

Natural phenomena are essential and unavoidable planetary actions. When they occur in extreme forms they may have a disastrous impact on human life, property and the environment. Emergency management bodies mitigate, prepare for, respond to and recover from such events. Emergency response is a sum of decisions and actions taken through the collaboration and cooperation of many specialists from different disciplines. However, primary and secondary research findings suggest that there are limitations in the current information and communication technologies (leT), which affect the effectiveness and efficiency of emergency response tasks. Therefore, the focus of this research was to investigate whether the appropriate use of cutting-edge leT (such as the Grid) can improve the effectiveness and efficiency of emergency response operations for natural disasters. The approach adopted in the research involved literature reviews, case studies, face-toface structured interviews with emergency management stakeholders and leT experts, model development using Soft Systems Methodology (SSM) linked to Information Systems Development Methodologies (lSDMs), and finally, one-to-one evaluation exercises. ease studies and interviews involving two member states of the European Union were carried out to investigate current practices and to highlight the limitations that emergency management stakeholders face during response operations. SSM was used to investigate the problem area and to produce a conceptual Emergency Response Model (ERM). Further literature review and interviews suggested the Grid as the most appropriate technology to support the ERM. The linking together of the SSM findings with ISDMs - resulted in the production of a Grid-Aware Emergency Response Model (G-AERM) for natural disasters. The evaluation of the G-AERM demonstrated the applicability of Grid technology to emergency response by supporting stakeholders in monitoring, planning, controlling and managing actions within emergency situations caused by natural disasters in a far more informed way in terms of effectiveness and efficiency....EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceGBUnited Kingdo

Walking the tightrope: UN peacekeeping operations and durable peace: do they actually contribute

Contains fulltext : 47142.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Open Access)Radboud Universiteit Nijmegen, 23 maart 2006Promotores : Pauwels, A., Frerks, G.417 p

Architecture and Community Variability within the Antelope Creek Phase of the Texas Panhandle

This study is concerned with examining the causes underlying cultural variation. The rationale for examining cultural variation is to elucidate the adaptive relationship of the cultural system within its natural and social environmental contexts. Changes in the environment will engender fundamental modifications of the entire cultural system, which in preindustrial semi-sedentary cultures will be manifested by alterations in architectural, community and settlement patterns, along with other tangible aspects of the cultural system. The study focuses on delineating cultural variability of the Antelope Creek phase, a late prehistoric village manifestation on the Southern High Plains of North America. Architectural remains from 28 extensively excavated sites from an 80 kilometer segment of the Canadian River are used to delineate the range of household and community patterns within the settlement system. Artifactual, mortuary, chronometric and physical environmental information are used in conjunction with the architectural data to examine functional, social, temporal and spatial factors potentially contributing to the household and community variability. IV Many community trends not reconciled by these factors are comprehensible when the natural and social context of the larger region is considered. The present environmental conditions are marginal for dependable maize production, and paleoenvironmental reconstructions indicate that xeric conditions were intensifying throughout the duration of the manifestation. The presence of springs issuing fossil water from the Ogallala aquifer during the on-set of drought conditions underlies the development of the Antelope Creek cultural system. Intensification of drought conditions adversely affected the economic base. In an attempt to alleviate the resulting population stress, a series of buffering mechanisms were implemented in a futile attempt to maintain the Plains Village pattern. A break down in social cohesion, shifts in settlement patterns towards lateral tributaries, expansion of trade networks with adjacent groups, and the development of raiding behavior were unsuccessfully employed to retain the Antelope Creek cultural system. Ultimately these measures proved to be inadequate, and by the sixteenth century, other major alterations in settlement and subsistence patterns were required, which radically changed the cultural system. Ultimately these measures proved to be inadequate, and by the sixteenth century, other major alterations in settlement and subsistence patterns were required, which radically changed the cultural system