Transferability of regional climate models over different climatic domains

Includes abstract.Includes bibliographical references (p. 119-144).In the continuing quest to improve climate model predictions to meet the increasing demand for knowledge on the regional effects of global climate change, it is pertinent to increase our understanding of how the underlying processes of climate are represented in the models we use to make these predictions. Concerted efforts in model evaluations and intercomparison have provided numerous insights into various model biases which plague current state-of-the-art regional climate models (RCMs). Model evaluation and assessment is crucial to model development and understanding how physical processes are represented in models is necessary for improving model parameterizations. This thesis explored model transferability as a new approach for systematic process-based intercomparison of RCMs. It investigated an untested transferability hypothesis which states that “for non-monsoon regions experiencing weak synoptic scale forcing, the height of the cloud base is correlated with the daytime surface fluxes”. An initial transferability experiment was conducted over Cabauw, the Netherlands (51.97°N, 4.93°E) to assess the models’ skill in resolving the diurnal and seasonal cycles and to investigate the simulated connections between surface and hydrometeorological variables over a non-monsoon station. The ability of models to resolve these cycles correctly is a good metric of their predictive capabilities. The data used for the study comprises three-hourly surface observations for the period October 2002 – December 2004 from the Coordinated Enhanced Observing Period (CEOP) measuring campaigns of the Global Energy and Water Cycle Experiment (GEWEX) and three-year simulations (2002 -2004) from five RCMs (CLM, GEMLAM, MRCC, RCA3 and RSM). In simulating seasonal and diurnal cycles of CBH and surface variables, the European models (CLM and RCA3) demonstrate a clear home advantage over the North American models (GEMLAM, MRCC and RSM). Principal component analysis revealed that the models couple the cloud base height with surface fluxes as in observations and that this coupling is not sensitive to changes in wind speed. This study found that summer daytime loadings gave the strongest couplings of variables. Three major processes were identified over Cabauw. First and most dominant is the surface energy process which couples sensible and latent heat with net radiation. The second process is thermodynamic, coupling temperature and surface moisture (specific humidity), and the third is a dynamic process which couples pressure and wind speed. A model intercomparison was then carried out across the six midlatitude domains to test the validity of the Cabauw findings. In observations, CBH is well coupled with the surface fluxes over Cabauw, Bondville, Lamont and BERMS, but coupled only with temperature over Lindenberg and Tongyu. All the models (except GEMLAM) simulated a good coupling with surface fluxes at all stations. In GEMLAM, there is no coupling between CBH and surface fluxes at any station. In less homogenous domains of the study, a very slight decrease in the strength of coupling is seen in most of the models, under strong large scale forcing. This would suggest that the coupling between cloud base height and surface fluxes in the models is possibly more influenced by radiative forcing than by synoptic controls. This second study confirmed the findings at Cabauw that the simulated cloud base is correlated with surface energy fluxes and the sign of the correlations in the models is as in observations. This finding is important for the modeling community as it establishes the fact that the models are actually simulating the direction of influence of surface fluxes and possibly, soil water variability, on cloud processes

Parent-Subsidiary Relational Factors and Their Influence on Foreign Subsidiary Sell-Offs

This study investigates the influence of a range of firm- and country- level factors on parent firms’ sell-off of their foreign subsidiaries. These identified firm- and country-level factors are conceptualised as parent-subsidiary relational factors because they affect the relationships between parent firms’ and their subsidiaries. Additionally, the study investigates whether the influence of these factors differs between manufacturing and non-manufacturing parent firms. While previous studies have shown the importance of factors that impact parent-subsidiary relationships on parent firms’ divestment decisions, knowledge about the influence of these firm- and country-level factors on the parent-subsidiary relationships towards foreign subsidiary sell-offs is limited or underdeveloped. As a result, this brought about the need for this study to investigate these factors and their influence on the sell-off of foreign subsidiaries. Data were collected using multiple secondary sources. Two database packages from the Bureau van Dijk were used – the Zephyr database was used to identify multinational firms that completed their foreign subsidiary sell-offs within the study period, and the Osiris database was used to gather information relating to the parent firms and their subsidiaries in terms of size, industry, location/geography, profitability/turnover and age. Other sources used included a publication from the British Council on countries and their official languages, the World Development Indicators from the World Bank for host country growth, and the Euler Hermes 2016 publication for country risk factors. Based on the datasets, the study used a quantitative approach with the logistic regression analysis to analyse the obtained data. The results indicate that firm-level factors such as subsidiary size and profitability, in addition to country-level factors such as language commonality and geographical linkage positively influenced the sell-off of foreign subsidiaries, regardless of the parent firms’ industry affiliations. The results also indicate that the host country growth has a negative influence on the sell-off of foreign subsidiaries in manufacturing parent firms but not in their non-manufacturing counterparts and that the symmetrical linkage has a negative influence on foreign subsidiary sell-offs in non-manufacturing parent firms but not in their manufacturing counterparts. Additionally, the subsidiary’s age was found not to have any influence on the sell-off of foreign subsidiaries, regardless of the parent firms’ industry affiliations. This study contributes to the existing body of knowledge on foreign subsidiary sell-offs with the conceptual frameworks that explicitly captures parent-subsidiary relationships with the conceptualisation and measurement of these firm- and country-level factors as parent-subsidiary relational factors. The study also contributes to the debate on whether and to what extent these firm- and country-level factors influence parent firms’ on the sell-off of their foreign subsidiaries, and the significant differences in the influence towards foreign subsidiary sell-offs based on the parent or multinational firms’ core industry affiliations

The possible role of local air pollution in climate change in West Africa

The climate of West Africa is characterized by a sensitive monsoon system that is associated with marked natural precipitation variability. This region has been and is projected to be subject to substantial global and regional-scale changes including greenhouse-gas-induced warming and sea-level rise, land-use and land-cover change, and substantial biomass burning. We argue that more attention should be paid to rapidly increasing air pollution over the explosively growing cities of West Africa, as experiences from other regions suggest that this can alter regional climate through the influences of aerosols on clouds and radiation, and will also affect human health and food security. We need better observations and models to quantify the magnitude and characteristics of these impacts

SPARC 2019 Fake news & home truths : Salford postgraduate annual research conference book of abstracts

Welcome to the Book of Abstracts for the 2019 SPARC conference. This year we not only celebrate the work of our PGRs but also our first ever Doctoral School Best Supervisor awards, which makes this year’s conference extra special. Once again we have received a tremendous contribution from our postgraduate research community; with over 90 presenters, the conference truly showcases a vibrant, innovative and collaborative PGR community at Salford. These abstracts provide a taster of the inspiring, relevant and impactful research in progress, and provide delegates with a reference point for networking and initiating critical debate. Find an abstract that interests you, and say “Hello” to the author. Who knows what might result from your conversation? With such wide-ranging topics being showcased, we encourage you to take up this great opportunity to engage with researchers working in different subject areas from your own. To meet global challenges, high impact research needs interdisciplinary collaboration. This is recognised and rewarded by all major research funders. Engaging with the work of others and forging collaborations across subject areas is an essential skill for the next generation of researchers. Even better, our free ice cream van means that you can have those conversations while enjoying a refreshing ice lolly

Badgers (Meles meles) as reservoirs of vector-borne infections in the UK

In recent years, there has been an increased incidence and changing distribution of a number of vector-borne diseases, and the temperate regions are not an exception. Whilst Eurasian badgers (Meles meles) are known to host a wide range of pathogens, information on haemoparasites of badgers, their role as reservoirs of vector-borne infections, and whether ticks parasitizing these badgers pose any risk to animal or human health is limited. Whole badger blood samples collected at Woodchester Park in Gloucestershire, Southwest England and from around Northeast England, and ticks parasitizing these badgers, were analysed with a battery of assays targeting the DNA of Babesia spp., Anaplasma phagocytophilum, Rickettsia, Borrelia and Trypanosoma spp. While badgers were found to be heavily infected with Babesia spp. (98.9% of blood samples from Gloucestershire and 100% from NE England), no A. phagocytophilum or Rickettsia spp. were detected. Whereas rates of infections with Trypanosoma spp. in badgers from Gloucestershire have been previously determined in another study, no Trypanosomes were found in badgers from Northeast England. As for ticks, the DNA of Babesia spp., A. phagocytophilum, Rickettsia helvetica, Borrelia garinii, Borrelia valaisiana, and Borrelia afzelii were detected in questing ticks at Woodchester Park; only Babesia spp. were found in ticks removed from badgers in NE England. All Babesiae found in badgers were identical to each other and to those found in I. canisuga from NE England and questing I. ricinus from Gloucestershire, and closely related to Babesia annae (Babesia vulpes) associated with foxes. Furthermore, there was an evidence of chronic Babesia infections among badgers, and possibly of vertical transmission. Phylogenetic trees based on the analysis of two genetic markers, namely the 18S rRNA and B-tubulin genes, demonstrate the relatedness of Babesia spp. detected in this study to other known species of Babesia

Impact of future climate change on malaria in West Africa

Understanding the regional impact of future climate change is one of the major global challenges of this century. This study investigated possible effects of climate change on malaria in West Africa in the near future (2006–2035) and the far future (2036–2065) under two representative concentration pathway (RCP) scenarios (RCP4.5 and RCP8.5), compared to an observed evaluation period (1981–2010). Projected rainfall and temperature were obtained from the coordinated regional downscaling experiment (CORDEX) simulations of the Rossby Centre Regional Atmospheric regional climate model (RCA4). The malaria model used is the Liverpool malaria model (LMM), a dynamical malaria model driven by daily time series of rainfall and temperature obtained from the CORDEX data. Our results highlight the unimodal shape of the malaria prevalence distribution, and the seasonal malaria transmission contrast is closely linked to the latitudinal variation of the rainfall. Projections showed that the mean annual malaria prevalence would decrease in both climatological periods under both RCPs but with a larger magnitude of decreasing under the RCP8.5. We found that the mean malaria prevalence for the reference period is greater than the projected prevalence for 6 of the 8 downscaled GCMs. The study enhances understanding of how malaria is impacted under RCP4.5 and RCP8.5 emission scenarios. These results indicate that the southern area of West Africa is at most risk of epidemics, and the malaria control programs need extra effort and help to make the best use of available resources by stakeholders.The CORDEX project.http://link.springer.com/journal/704am2023Geography, Geoinformatics and MeteorologySchool of Health Systems and Public Health (SHSPH)UP Centre for Sustainable Malaria Control (UP CSMC