Search results for "Security studies"

Structuring Humanitarian Supply Chain Knowledge Through a Meta-Modeling Approach

2017

To develop decision support systems (DSS) that improve humanitarian supply chain (HSC) performance, there is a need for methods that support on field data gathering and knowledge structure. We propose a meta-model to structure the knowledge of HSC and to obtain a shared vision of the HSC. It has been developed to provide a framework to class gathered data by connecting it to HSC concepts. The meta-model includes four packages, defining the collaborative ecosystem (context, actors, objectives, and behavior). The concepts gathered during our field research experiences, added to the HSC core literature, have permitted to build the HSC meta-model layer. Models built from this meta-model can be …

Long-range & Self-powered IoT Devices for Agriculture & Aquaponics Based on Multi-hop Topology

2019

This article presents the prototype design and testing of a long-range, self-powered IoT devices for use in precision agriculture and aquaponics. The devices are designed using the ultra-low power nRF52840 microcontroller with Bluetooth 5 support and ambient energy harvesting. A power of 942µW is harvested in an indoor environment. The devices are therefore suitable for both indoor and outdoor use, as natural sunlight will provide far more energy compared to artificial indoor lights. A line-of-sight range of up to 1.8km is achieved with the use of coded transmissions. However, the coverage area and range can be extended significantly by deploying the devices in multi-hop network topology. T…

New Alliances in Post-Brexit Europe: Does the New Hanseatic League Revive Nordic Political Cooperation?

2020

As Brexit removes the Nordic countries’ most powerful ally from the EU, what does this imply for their approach to European affairs? The literature on small states within the EU suggests that they can counterbalance limited bargaining capacities by entering two types of alliances: strategic partnerships with bigger member states and institutionalised cooperation on a regional basis. Against this backdrop we ask whether, by significantly raising the costs of non-cooperation for Nordic governments, the Brexit referendum has triggered a revival of Nordic political cooperation. We scrutinise this conjecture by analysing Nordic strategies of coalition-building on EU financial and budgetary polic…

2016

Climate change is a major challenge for sustainable development, impacting human health, wellbeing, security, and livelihoods. While the post-2015 development agenda sets out action on climate change as one of the Sustainable Development Goals, there is little provision on how this can be achieved in tandem with the desired economic progress and the required improvements in health and wellbeing. This paper examines synergies and tensions between the goals addressing climate change and economic progress. We identify reductionist approaches in economics, such as ‘externalities’, reliance on the metric of the Gross Domestic Product, positive discount rates, and short-term profit targets as som…

Seismic Behavior of Lisbon Mixed Masonry-RC Buildings With Historical Value: A Contribution for the Practical Assessment

2018

The fact that linear analysis is still the most used procedure in the design engineering offices, studies which addresses issues associated to the estimation of the structural behavior factor values are relevant. In this study, the behavior factor of a particular type of mixed masonry-reinforced concrete buildings in Lisbon is estimated. The typology chosen in this study represents 30% of building stock in Lisbon; these buildings were built between 1930 and 1960 and thus were designed without considering the seismic-design requirements proposed in current codes. The evaluation of the behavior factors was based on the use of nonlinear static analyses, performed in the form of the sensitivity…

The powers of masculinization in humanitarian storytelling: the case of the surgeon María Gómez Álvarez in the Varsovia Hospital (Toulouse, 1944–1950)

2020

This contribution is focused on analysing the power of 'masculinization' through which traditional humanitarian storytelling has been shaped. Strongly marked by a patriarchal vision, humanitarian accounts have traditionally hidden the work of women while stressing that performed by men, who appeared represented as true protagonists and, even, as heroes. In particular, this article analyses the professional career of a Spanish female surgeon named Maria Gomez (1914-1975) between 1944 and 1950, when she worked in a small charitable hospital based in Toulouse (France) for improving the health-care conditions of Spanish Republican refugees. Known as Hospital Varsovia or as Walter B. Cannon Memo…

Adding the Mureş River Basin (Transylvania, Romania) to the List of Hotspots with High Contamination with Pharmaceuticals

2020

Background: The Mureș River Basin is a long-term heavily polluted watershed, in a situation of climate changes with increasing water flow and related decreasing dilution capacity. Here, a mixture of emerging pollutants such as pharmaceuticals were targeted to reveal potential risks regarding the natural lotic ecosystems. Due to the continuous discharge into the environment, pharmaceuticals are gaining persistent organic pollutant characteristics and are considered emerging pollutants. Based on the hazard quotient, this research highlights the dangerous concentrations of carbamazepine, ibuprofen, furosemide, and enalapril in river water. Results: High levels of four pharmaceutical compounds …

Party Positions on Differentiated European Integration in the Nordic Countries: Growing Together, Growing Apart?

2020

The Nordic countries constitute an interesting laboratory for the study of differentiated European Integration. Even though Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden share some historical, cultural, socio-economic and political characteristics, all those countries have ultimately opted for a different kind of relationship with the EU. Whereas Finland, a member of the Eurozone since its inception in 1999, has been considered to be part of the Union’s ‘inner core’ for quite some time, Iceland and Norway, in contrast, have opted to remain outside the EU albeit closely associated via the European Economic Area Agreement. The variation of relationships has also been reflected in Nordic parti…

Biosorption of nickel (II) and zinc (II) from aqueous solutions by the biomass of yeast Yarrowia lipolytica

2017

Abstract This study examined the biosorption process of Ni(II) and Zn(II) from an aqueous solution by dead biomass of Yarrowia lipolytica. Optimum biosorption conditions were determined as a function of pH, biomass dosage, contact time, and temperature. The biosorbent was characterized by FTIR, which indicated the participation of hydroxyl, carboxyl, amide and amine groups in the process of binding the metal ions. The results showed that the biosorption processes of both metal ions closely followed pseudo-second order kinetics. The equilibrium data of Ni(II) and Zn(II) ions at 20, 30 and 40°C fitted the Langmuir and Freundlich isotherm models. Langmuir isotherm provided a better fit to the …

Dynamics of copper and zinc sedimentation in a lagooning system receiving landfill leachate.

2013

9 pages; International audience; This study characterises the sediment dredged from a lagooning system composed of a settling pond and three lagoons that receive leachates from a municipal solid waste (MSW) landfill in France. Organic carbon, carbonate, iron oxyhydroxides, copper (Cu) and zinc (Zn) concentrations were measured in the sediment collected from upstream to downstream in the lagooning system. In order to complete our investigation of sedimentation mechanisms, leachates were sampled in both dry (spring) and wet (winter) seasonal conditions. Precipitation of calcite and amorphous Fe-oxyhydroxides and sedimentation of organic matter occurred in the settling pond. Since different di…