Smart green infrastructure in a smart city – the case study of ecosystem services evaluation in Krakow based on i-Tree Evo software

It is a common perception that urban greenery does not bring any rational benefits, while profits from real estates are obvious. Therefore, the cities green infrastructure (urban forests, parks, trees, lawns, meadows, etc.) are constantly threatened with housing and development. However, urban greenery plays a substantial role in improving the quality of urbanites’ life, which is particularly significant in terms of predicted 70% urbanization rate by 2050. Healthy and well managed city green infrastructure can improve air quality, remove particulate matters (PM) and CO2 sequestrate carbon, cool down temperature or protect against winds. These functions of vegetation are known as ecosystem services (ES). Recognizing the value of ES provided by green infrastructure is crucial for urban planning and management in terms of assuring sustainable urban development. In our study we used the i-Tree Eco (USDA Forest Service) software, which quantifies vegetation structure, environmental effects and values of ES. The i-Tree Eco model is based on air pollution and local meteorological data along with the field data from inventory of city vegetation. Requiring easy to collect (e.g. based on LiDAR 3D point clouds) input data and having user-friendly interface, the i-Tree Eco has a potential of becoming a very useful tool for planners and managers in their everyday work. In this paper we present a case study of ES evaluation for the “Krakowski Park” in Krakow (582 trees on 4.77 hectares, with domination of Fraxinus excelsior, Ulmus laevis and Betula pendula). For the analysed 2015 year, the Krakowski Park trees stored in total 441.59 t of carbon, removed 184 kg of air pollutants and contributed to 220 m3 of avoided runoff. Total value of ecosystem services provided by the Krakowski Park in year 2015 was EUR 5.096 (EUR 8.76 tree/year). In our further work we intend to expand the ES evaluation on other green areas in Krakow and on a wider range of ES

Numerical simulations of dwarf galaxy merger trees

We investigate the evolution of dwarf galaxies using N -body/SPH simulations that incorporate their formation histories through merger trees constructed using the ex- tended Press-Schechter formalism. The simulations are computationally cheap and have high spatial resolution. We compare the properties of galaxies with equal final mass but with different merger histories with each other and with those of observed dwarf spheroidals and irregulars. We show that the merger history influences many observable dwarf galaxy proper- ties. We identify two extreme cases that make this influence stand out most clearly: (i) merger trees with one massive progenitor that grows through relatively few mergers and (ii) merger trees with many small progenitors that merge only quite late. At a fixed halo mass, a type (i) tree tends to produce galaxies with larger stellar masses, larger half-light radii, lower central surface brightness, and since fewer potentially an- gular momentum cancelling mergers are required to build up the final galaxy, a higher specific angular momentum, compared with a type (ii) tree. We do not perform full-fledged cosmological simulations and therefore cannot hope to reproduce all observed properties of dwarf galaxies. However, we show that the simulated dwarfs are not unsimilar to real ones.Comment: 19 pages, 17 figures, 3 table

Benchmarking Australia's Urban Tree Canopy: An i-Tree assessment, Final Report

This report aims to provide 139 Local Governments in urban and semi urban environments across Australia with an estimate of land surface cover. This study is part of the 202020 Vision, funded by Horticulture Limited Australia, in working towards a 20% increase in the level of green space in Local Government Areas (LGAs) across the country. View/download http://202020vision.com.au/media/7141/benchmarking_australias_urban_tree_canopy.pd

Ecological study of Barrett Domain, New Plymouth

An ecological survey of Barrett Domain (New Plymouth) was conducted by the Environmental Research Institute, University of Waikato, for the New Plymouth District Council. The main ecological features of the domain were mapped and described, preliminary ecological impact assessments of domain upgrades were conducted, and recommendations made for the future management of the site. Barrett Domain encompasses a regionally significant wetland habitat (Barrett Lake), several hectares of remnant semi-coastal forest and areas of well-established planted native species. Wetland vegetation around Barrett Lake comprised reedland (kuta, raupo) and flaxland, and the lake provides refuge to a number of indigenous water birds. Semi-coastal forest at the site was dominated by tawa, kohekohe and pukatea, with a diverse range of understory and epiphyte species. Planted natives included a significant kauri grove, and patches of pohutukawa and puriri. Swamp forest to the west of the lake comprised mature pukatea and swamp maire, and if acquired in the land transfer, the ecological value of the domain would be greatly enhanced. Four permanent i-Tree vegetation monitoring plots and a National Wetland Monitoring plot were established at the domain and should be re-measured at 5 yearly intervals. Any ecological impacts associated with the construction of a path around the perimeter of Barrett Lake could be offset by restoration planting at the southern lake margin. Management recommendations include: • Restoration planting with appropriate native species at the southern lake margin and several other key areas within the domain. • Removing/monitoring exotic species, including the gorse and grey willow on the lake margin, and wandering Jew and climbing asparagus in the forest remnants. • Fencing (stock proofing) the swamp forest at the west of the lake once it is acquired. • Continuing with pest control and monitoring. • Obtaining new interpretive signage

Partition complexes, duality and integral tree representations

We show that the poset of non-trivial partitions of 1,2,...,n has a fundamental homology class with coefficients in a Lie superalgebra. Homological duality then rapidly yields a range of known results concerning the integral representations of the symmetric groups S_n and S_{n+1} on the homology and cohomology of this partially-ordered set.Comment: Published by Algebraic and Geometric Topology at http://www.maths.warwick.ac.uk/agt/AGTVol4/agt-4-41.abs.htm

Perturbative Renormalization of Lattice Bilinear Quark Operators

Our aim is to compute the lower moments of the unpolarized and polarized deep-inelastic structure functions of the nucleon on the lattice. The theoretical basis of the calculation is the operator product expansion. To construct operators with the appropriate continuum behavior out of the bare lattice operators one must absorb the effects of momentum scales far greater than any physical scale into a renormalization of the operators. In this work we compute the renormalization constants of all bilinear quark operators of leading twist and spin up to four. The calculation is done for Wilson fermions and in the quenched approximation where dynamical quark loops are neglected.Comment: 28 pages, uuencoded Z-compressed postscript file. Also available from http://www.desy.de/pub/preprints/desy/199