Future Thames : applied geoscience for decision-making in London and the Thames Basin

The Thames Basin is the UK’s principal aquifer. It encompasses London, which is Europe’s largest megacity, and has an extensive coastal zone. It presents a unique conjunction of geological, hydrogeological, environmental, and socio-economic factors that are intrinsically linked by the effects of environmental change. The British Geological Survey (BGS) is responding to this challenge through its FutureThames initiative. FutureThames aims to initiate, facilitate and support interdisciplinary and collaborative geoscience research in an attempt to understand the effects of environmental change in the Thames Basin. Such collaboration will assist in providing ‘real world’ responses to different ‘what if’ scenarios, such as “What will happen to groundwater if a new housing estate is built here?” Or “How will sea-level rise affect my property?” Six key environmental challenges have been identified to provide a framework to focus our research activities in the region

GeoSocial: exploring the usefulness of social media mining in the applied natural geohazard sciences

Obtaining real-time information about a geohazard event as it unfolds, such as a flood or earthquake, used to be largely limited to the professional media. Nowadays, obtaining news stories from social media (e.g. Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Flickr etc.), directly as they unfold, is becoming the ‘norm’ for many in society. The Haitian Earthquake in January 2010 and the Great East Japan Earthquake in March 2011, provided some of the first natural hazard examples, to really demonstrate the power of social media over traditional news sources for obtaining, live information from which people and authorities could gain situational awareness

The use of social media in natural hazard early warning systems

This short knowledge paper describes some of the ways social media has been used in the context of natural hazard early warning to aid decision making and enable people to communicate and access information

Deficiency in clonogenic endometrial mesenchymal stem cells in obese women with reproductive failure – a pilot study

The mechanisms of obesity associated reproductive complications remain poorly understood. Endometrial mesenchymal stem-cells are critical for cyclic renewal and uterine function. Recently, W5C5+ cells, with high clonogenicity, capable of producing endometrial stroma in vivo, have been described. We sought to investigate the abundance and cloning efficiency of W5C5+ and W5C5− endometrial cells in relation to Body Mass Index, age and reproductive outcome. Design W5C5+ and W5C5− cells were purified from mid-luteal endometrial biopsies (n = 54) by magnetic bead separation and subjected to in vitro colony-forming assays. Results First trimester pregnancy losses were significantly higher in obese subjects (n = 12) compared to overweight (n = 20) and subjects with normal Body Mass Index (n = 22) (P0.05). Conclusions Our observations suggest that the regenerative capacity and plasticity of the endometrium of obese women is suboptimal, which in turn may account for the increased risk of reproductive complications associated with obesity

Mapping the Aurora using social media: new scientific data for nowcasting and forecasting space weather?

“How far south will the aurora borealis be seen?” is a common question asked when a geomagnetic storm forecast is issued. It is not a straightforward answer; and current projections based, for example, on Kp do not always match sighting reports received after a display. Citizen science – engaging the general public to aid scientific research - may be one way of tackling this issue. By using social media, such as Twitter, a new source of data can be mined for scientific analysis. We present a new interactive web application to gather relevant tweets about the aurora and display these on a map. This tool has been created in JavaScript using the Twitter API and a customised application template from ESRI. We use both active and passive means to gather data. We actively encourage users to tweet using a known hashtag (#BGSaurora) with their location in a prescribed format. This will geo-locate the tweet and place a marker on the map reporting the sighting. We can also passively search tweets for more general hashtags such as #aurora or #northernlights. If these are geo-tagged they again can be mapped. Other relevant data layers, such as cloud cover and geomagnetic activity levels, can also be displayed. We present the aurora sightings map and discuss the benefits of it both as an application to engage the general public, helping them to see when and where aurora are visible, and as a potential tool for gathering useful data for scientific analysis. If a better indicator of geomagnetic activity levels relevant for aurora viewing can be determined from these then this in turn will improve future predictions for aurora enthusiasts

Exploring community-level landslide risk reduction strategies in the Global South

The aim of this report is to provide insight into community-based methods, approaches, and actions for reducing risk to landslides. More specifically, it presents a broad overview of recent studies on landslide risk reduction at community level, exploring the various landslide risk reduction measures recommended and/or implemented, and discusses the challenges and opportunities for the implementation of these measures. The report draws on a wide range of applications investigating distinct case studies in different areas around the Globe, as well as more general studies on equitable resilience (how communities are really engaged) and landslide risk management within the context of Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) in the Global South's vulnerable communities. The documented strategies are analysed from the perspectives of scale of intervention, their timing and sustainability, and the resources required for their implementation. The review suggests that there is no one-size fits all solution for community-based landslide risk reduction. The integration of local knowledge into landslide risk reduction practices is context-specific and varies both in relation to the time of implementation (ex-ante or ex-post disaster) and historically, due to the dynamic nature of communities’ structure and functioning. Its contribution to resilience (including coping and adaptation capacity) depends on the interaction with other types of knowledge (e.g., science based) and the general institutional setting (legal and governmental framework). Moreover, the scale of organisation and action, from individual to household and community level, influences the impact and long-term sustainability of mitigation measures. Nevertheless, overcoming barriers of knowledge, trusts, resources, and power at local level could enhance co-development and collaboration between communities and governmental and non-governmental organisation, communities Landslide risk reduction cannot be addressed in isolation. Whilst our research focused on a single hazard approach, some DRR measures are shared across hazards, suggesting there is scope for cross-fertilisation and learning between communities affected by different hazards (e.g., volcanic, flooding, mass-movements, etc.). Indeed, this would prompt all actors involved to change their perspective and management of risk towards a systemic, integrated, holistic approach, as they work together to build greater resilience to likely future disasters

Examining the influence of settlement morphology and separation zones policies on the availability of shallow coal resources in the United Kingdom

In 2013, demand for coal in the UK was 60 million tonnes. Of this, 12.7 million tonnes (21%) came from indigenous sources; the majority of which was from surface mining (8.6 million tonnes). Many planning applications for surface mining of coal and the coal extraction that follows, are often a source of conflict with the communities who live within shallow coalfield areas. Policies which enforce a gap, or ‘separation zone’, between communities and surface coal mining operations exist in Wales and Scotland, but do not exist in England. This paper examines the effect of applying separation zones on the availability of shallow coal resources within two study areas; one within the South Wales Coalfield, the other within the Midlands Coalfield (comprising the Yorkshire, Nottinghamshire and North Derbyshire Coalfield areas). Density profiles and a shape-index algorithm are used to compare and contrast settlement morphology (i.e. shape or footprint) and distribution to determine whether they have a bearing on the areal extent of any potential separation zone applied. The implications on the availability of shallow coal resources of applying different separation zone distances around settlements within these two areas are explored. Results reveal that although the settlement morphology is important in determining the area of the separation zone, and has greatest influence in the South Wales Coalfield, the area of coal resource sterilised by the application of separation zones is greatest in the Midlands Coalfield due to it having a higher proportion of urban development situated on the surface extent of the shallow coal resource

Mobile phone technologies for disaster risk reduction

The explosion of increasingly sophisticated mobile phone technologies can usefully be harnessed by disaster risk reduction (DRR) as a means of enhancing inclusivity and local relevance of knowledge production and resilience building. However, much new technology is designed on an ad hoc basis without considering user needs – especially mobile applications (apps), which often terminate at the proof-of-concept stage. Here, we examine best practice by marshalling learnings from 45 workers representing 20 organisations working globally across the disaster risk management (DRM) lifecycle, including physical and social science, NGOs, technological developers, and (inter)governmental regulatory bodies. We present a series of generalisable and scalable guidelines that are novel in being independent of any specific natural hazard or development setting, designed to maximise the positive societal impact of exploiting mobile technologies. Specifically, the local context, dynamics, and needs must be carefully interrogated a priori, while any product should ideally be co-developed with local stakeholders through a user-centered design approach