Real-time forecasts of flood hazard and impact: some UK experiences

Major UK floods over the last decade have motivated significant technological and scientific advances in operational flood forecasting and warning. New joint forecasting centres between the national hydrological and meteorological operating agencies have been formed that issue a daily, national Flood Guidance Statement (FGS) to the emergency response community. The FGS is based on a Flood Risk Matrix approach that is a function of potential impact severity and likelihood. It has driven an increased demand for robust, accurate and timely forecast and alert information on fluvial and surface water flooding along with impact assessments. The Grid-to-Grid (G2G) distributed hydrological model has been employed across Britain at a 1km resolution to support the FGS. Novel methods for linking dynamic gridded estimates of river flow and surface runoff with more detailed offline flood risk maps have been developed to obtain real-time probabilistic forecasts of potential impacts, leading to operational trials. Examples of the national-scale G2G application are provided along with case studies of forecast flood impact from (i) an operational Surface Water Flooding (SWF) trial during the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games, (ii) SWF developments under the Natural Hazards Partnership over England & Wales, and (iii) fluvial applications in Scotland

Combining cognitive training and transcranial direct current stimulation in older adults

Registered Report with Stage 1 in principle acceptance at Nature Human Behaviou

Real-time forecasts of flood hazard and impact: some UK experiences

Major UK floods over the last decade have motivated significant technological and scientific advances in operational flood forecasting and warning. New joint forecasting centres between the national hydrological and meteorological operating agencies have been formed that issue a daily, national Flood Guidance Statement (FGS) to the emergency response community. The FGS is based on a Flood Risk Matrix approach that is a function of potential impact severity and likelihood. It has driven an increased demand for robust, accurate and timely forecast and alert information on fluvial and surface water flooding along with impact assessments. The Grid-to-Grid (G2G) distributed hydrological model has been employed across Britain at a 1km resolution to support the FGS. Novel methods for linking dynamic gridded estimates of river flow and surface runoff with more detailed offline flood risk maps have been developed to obtain real-time probabilistic forecasts of potential impacts, leading to operational trials. Examples of the national-scale G2G application are provided along with case studies of forecast flood impact from (i) an operational Surface Water Flooding (SWF) trial during the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games, (ii) SWF developments under the Natural Hazards Partnership over England & Wales, and (iii) fluvial applications in Scotland

Evidence against benefits from cognitive training and transcranial direct current stimulation in healthy older adults

Cognitive training and brain stimulation show promise for ameliorating age-related neurocognitive decline. However, evidence for this is controversial. In a Registered Report, we investigated the effects of these interventions, where 133 older adults were allocated to four groups (left prefrontal cortex anodal transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) with decision-making training, and three control groups) and trained over 5 days. They completed a task/questionnaire battery pre- and post-training, and at 1- and 3-month follow-ups.\ua0COMT\ua0and\ua0BDNF\ua0Val/Met polymorphisms were also assessed. Contrary to work in younger adults, there was evidence against tDCS-induced training enhancement on the decision-making task. Moreover, there was evidence against transfer of training gains to untrained tasks or everyday function measures at any post-intervention time points. As indicated by exploratory work, individual differences may have influenced outcomes. But, overall, the current decision-making training and tDCS protocol appears unlikely to lead to benefits for older adults

Application of the G2G Model to the Maarkebeek Catchment. Next-Generation tools m.b.t. hydrometrie, hydrologie en hydraulica in het operationeel waterbeheer. Fase 1: analyse. Perceel 1: De Maarkebeek

The aim of the research reported here is to configure the Grid-to-Grid (G2G) distributed hydrological model developed by CEH to a case-study catchment in Belgium, the Maarkebeek, using spatial datasets on landscape properties, and to assess its utility for application across Flanders for a range of water management functions. The report begins with an overview of the G2G model by way of background. Next, the Maarkebeek catchment is discussed in relation to the G2G model and data availability. This discussion embraces the hydrometric network data and spatial data support in static (e.g. terrain, land-cover, soil properties) and dynamic (e.g. radar rainfall) forms. The configuration and calibration of the G2G model at 1km model is discussed and results on performance summarised for both outlet and internal river gauging stations, including use of a form of “PDM” baseline reference for the outlet station. The assessment of G2G at 1 km scale is next extended to explore its performance when configured at sub-1 km scales (500, 250, 100 and 50 m resolutions). The project required CEH to consider new processes currently not represented in G2G that could have significance in a Flemish context. Section 6 considers inclusion of infiltration-excess runoff and the effects of frozen ground and reports on the resulting changes in model performance. The potential improvement in forecast accuracy through use of data assimilation of daily soil moisture estimates derived via remote-sensing (ASCAT: Advanced SCATterometer)is discussed in Section 7. Finally, a concluding Section 8 provides an overview of the report, its conclusion and a consideration of its findings in relation to the wider goals of the "Next generation tools for hydrometrics, hydrology and hydraulics in operational water management" project