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Head and Neck Cancer: United Kingdom National Multidisciplinary Guidelines, Sixth Edition
- Jarrod J Homer, Stuart C Winter, Elizabeth C Abbey, Hiba Aga, Reshma Agrawal, Derfel ap Dafydd, Takhar Arunjit, Patrick Axon, Eleanor Aynsley, Izhar N Bagwan, Arun Batra, Donna Begg, Jonathan M Bernstein, Guy Betts, Colin Bicknell, Brian Bisase, Grainne C Brady, Peter Brennan, Aina Brunet, Val Bryant, Linda Cantwell, Ashish Chandra, Preetha Chengot, Melvin L K Chua, Peter Clarke, Gemma Clunie, Margaret Coffey, Clare Conlon, David I Conway, Florence Cook, Matthew R Cooper, Declan Costello, Ben Cosway, Neil J A Cozens, Grant Creaney, Daljit K Gahir, Stephen Damato, Joe Davies, Katharine S Davies, Alina D Dragan, Yong Du, Mark R D Edmond, Stefano Fedele, Harriet Finze, Jason C Fleming, Bernadette H Foran, Beth Fordham, Mohammed M A S Foridi, Lesley Freeman, Katherine E Frew, Pallavi Gaitonde, Victoria Gallyer, Fraser W Gibb, Sinclair M Gore, Mark Gormley, Roganie Govender, J Greedy, Teresa Guerrero Urbano, Dorothy Gujral, David W Hamilton, John C Hardman, Kevin Harrington, Samantha Holmes, Jarrod J Homer, Deborah Howland, Gerald Humphris, Keith D Hunter, Kate Ingarfield, Richard Irving, Kristina Isand, Yatin Jain, Sachin Jauhar, Sarra Jawad, Glyndwr W Jenkins, Anastasios Kanatas, Stephen Keohane, Cyrus J Kerawala, William Keys, Emma V King, Anthony Kong, Fiona Lalloo, Kirsten Laws, Samuel C Leong, Shane Lester, Miles Levy, Ken Lingley, Gitta Madani, Navin Mani, Paolo L Matteucci, Catriona R Mayland, James McCaul, Lorna K McCaul, Pádraig McDonnell, Andrew McPartlin, Valeria Mercadante, Zoe Merchant, Radu Mihai, Mufaddal T Moonim, John Moore, Paul Nankivell, Sonali Natu, A Nelson, Pablo Nenclares, Kate Newbold, Carrie Newland, Ailsa J Nicol, Iain J Nixon, Rupert Obholzer, James T O'Hara, S Orr, Vinidh Paleri, James Palmer, Rachel S Parry, Claire Paterson, Gillian Patterson, Joanne M Patterson, Miranda Payne, L Pearson, David N Poller, Jonathan Pollock, Stephen Ross Porter, Matthew Potter, Robin J D Prestwich, Ruth Price, Mani Ragbir, Meena S Ranka, Max Robinson, Justin W G Roe, Tom Roques, Aleix Rovira, Sajid Sainuddin, I J Salmon, Ann Sandison, Andy Scarsbrook, Andrew G Schache, A Scott, Diane Sellstrom, Cherith J Semple, Jagrit Shah, Praveen Sharma, Richard J Shaw, Somiah Siddiq, Priyamal Silva, Ricard Simo, Rabin P Singh, Maria Smith, Rebekah Smith, Toby Oliver Smith, Sanjai Sood, Francis W Stafford, Neil Steven, Kay Stewart, Lisa Stoner, Steve Sweeney, Andrew Sykes, Carly L Taylor, Selvam Thavaraj, David J Thomson, Jane Thornton, Neil S Tolley, Nancy Turnbull, Sriram Vaidyanathan, Leandros Vassiliou, John Waas, Kelly Wade-McBane, Donna Wakefield, Amy Ward, Laura Warner, Laura-Jayne Watson, H Watts, Christina Wilson, Stuart C Winter, Winson Wong, Chui-Yan Yip, Kent Yip
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- Journal:
- The Journal of Laryngology & Otology / Volume 138 / Issue S1 / April 2024
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 14 March 2024, pp. S1-S224
- Print publication:
- April 2024
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Novel recruitment approaches and operational results for a statewide population Cohort for cancer research: The Healthy Oregon Project
- Zhenzhen Zhang, Autumn Shafer, Katie Johnson-Camacho, Andrew Adey, Pavana Anur, Kim A. Brown, Casey Conrad, Rachel Crist, Paige E. Farris, Christina A. Harrington, Lisa K. Marriott, Asia Mitchell, Brian O’Roak, Vanessa Serrato, C. Sue Richards, Paul T. Spellman, Jackilen Shannon
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- Journal:
- Journal of Clinical and Translational Science / Volume 8 / Issue 1 / 2024
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 19 January 2024, e32
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Background:
Cancer health research relies on large-scale cohorts to derive generalizable results for different populations. While traditional epidemiological cohorts often use costly random sampling or self-motivated, preselected groups, a shift toward health system-based cohorts has emerged. However, such cohorts depend on participants remaining within a single system. Recent consumer engagement models using smartphone-based communication, driving projects, and social media have begun to upend these paradigms.
Methods:We initiated the Healthy Oregon Project (HOP) to support basic and clinical cancer research. HOP study employs a novel, cost-effective remote recruitment approach to effectively establish a large-scale cohort for population-based studies. The recruitment leverages the unique email account, the HOP website, and social media platforms to direct smartphone users to the study app, which facilitates saliva sample collection and survey administration. Monthly newsletters further facilitate engagement and outreach to broader communities.
Results:By the end of 2022, the HOP has enrolled approximately 35,000 participants aged 18–100 years (median = 44.2 years), comprising more than 1% of the Oregon adult population. Among those who have app access, ∼87% provided consent to genetic screening. The HOP monthly email newsletters have an average open rate of 38%. Efforts continue to be made to improve survey response rates.
Conclusion:This study underscores the efficacy of remote recruitment approaches in establishing large-scale cohorts for population-based cancer studies. The implementation of the study facilitates the collection of extensive survey and biological data into a repository that can be broadly shared and supports collaborative clinical and translational research.
Ten new insights in climate science 2023
- Mercedes Bustamante, Joyashree Roy, Daniel Ospina, Ploy Achakulwisut, Anubha Aggarwal, Ana Bastos, Wendy Broadgate, Josep G. Canadell, Edward R. Carr, Deliang Chen, Helen A. Cleugh, Kristie L. Ebi, Clea Edwards, Carol Farbotko, Marcos Fernández-Martínez, Thomas L. Frölicher, Sabine Fuss, Oliver Geden, Nicolas Gruber, Luke J. Harrington, Judith Hauck, Zeke Hausfather, Sophie Hebden, Aniek Hebinck, Saleemul Huq, Matthias Huss, M. Laurice P. Jamero, Sirkku Juhola, Nilushi Kumarasinghe, Shuaib Lwasa, Bishawjit Mallick, Maria Martin, Steven McGreevy, Paula Mirazo, Aditi Mukherji, Greg Muttitt, Gregory F. Nemet, David Obura, Chukwumerije Okereke, Tom Oliver, Ben Orlove, Nadia S. Ouedraogo, Prabir K. Patra, Mark Pelling, Laura M. Pereira, Åsa Persson, Julia Pongratz, Anjal Prakash, Anja Rammig, Colin Raymond, Aaron Redman, Cristobal Reveco, Johan Rockström, Regina Rodrigues, David R. Rounce, E. Lisa F. Schipper, Peter Schlosser, Odirilwe Selomane, Gregor Semieniuk, Yunne-Jai Shin, Tasneem A. Siddiqui, Vartika Singh, Giles B. Sioen, Youba Sokona, Detlef Stammer, Norman J. Steinert, Sunhee Suk, Rowan Sutton, Lisa Thalheimer, Vikki Thompson, Gregory Trencher, Kees van der Geest, Saskia E. Werners, Thea Wübbelmann, Nico Wunderling, Jiabo Yin, Kirsten Zickfeld, Jakob Zscheischler
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- Journal:
- Global Sustainability / Volume 7 / 2024
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 01 December 2023, e19
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Non-technical summary
We identify a set of essential recent advances in climate change research with high policy relevance, across natural and social sciences: (1) looming inevitability and implications of overshooting the 1.5°C warming limit, (2) urgent need for a rapid and managed fossil fuel phase-out, (3) challenges for scaling carbon dioxide removal, (4) uncertainties regarding the future contribution of natural carbon sinks, (5) intertwinedness of the crises of biodiversity loss and climate change, (6) compound events, (7) mountain glacier loss, (8) human immobility in the face of climate risks, (9) adaptation justice, and (10) just transitions in food systems.
Technical summaryThe Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Assessment Reports provides the scientific foundation for international climate negotiations and constitutes an unmatched resource for researchers. However, the assessment cycles take multiple years. As a contribution to cross- and interdisciplinary understanding of climate change across diverse research communities, we have streamlined an annual process to identify and synthesize significant research advances. We collected input from experts on various fields using an online questionnaire and prioritized a set of 10 key research insights with high policy relevance. This year, we focus on: (1) the looming overshoot of the 1.5°C warming limit, (2) the urgency of fossil fuel phase-out, (3) challenges to scale-up carbon dioxide removal, (4) uncertainties regarding future natural carbon sinks, (5) the need for joint governance of biodiversity loss and climate change, (6) advances in understanding compound events, (7) accelerated mountain glacier loss, (8) human immobility amidst climate risks, (9) adaptation justice, and (10) just transitions in food systems. We present a succinct account of these insights, reflect on their policy implications, and offer an integrated set of policy-relevant messages. This science synthesis and science communication effort is also the basis for a policy report contributing to elevate climate science every year in time for the United Nations Climate Change Conference.
Social media summaryWe highlight recent and policy-relevant advances in climate change research – with input from more than 200 experts.
Development of a 51-hospital Chicagoland regional antibiogram and comparison to local hospital and national surveillance data
- David A. Butler, Mark Biagi, Vikas Gupta, Sarah Wieczorkiewicz, Lisa Young, Ursula Patel, Sandy Naegele, Maressa Santarossa, Amanda Harrington, Mike Postelnick, Mira Suseno, Alyssa Christensen, Julie Giddens, Tim Murrey, Amy Hanson, Sharon Sam, Natasha Pettit, Larry Danziger, Eric Wenzler
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- Journal:
- Infection Control & Hospital Epidemiology / Volume 41 / Issue 12 / December 2020
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 04 September 2020, pp. 1409-1418
- Print publication:
- December 2020
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Objective:
To develop a regional antibiogram within the Chicagoland metropolitan area and to compare regional susceptibilities against individual hospitals within the area and national surveillance data.
Design:Multicenter retrospective analysis of antimicrobial susceptibility data from 2017 and comparison to local institutions and national surveillance data.
Setting and participants:The analysis included 51 hospitals from the Chicago–Naperville–Elgin Metropolitan Statistical Area within the state of Illinois. Overall, 18 individual collaborator hospitals provided antibiograms for analysis, and data from 33 hospitals were provided in aggregate by the Becton Dickinson Insights Research Database.
Methods:All available antibiogram data from calendar year 2017 were combined to generate the regional antibiogram. The final Chicagoland antibiogram was then compared internally to collaborators and externally to national surveillance data to assess its applicability and utility.
Results:In total, 167,394 gram-positive, gram-negative, fungal, and mycobacterial isolates were collated to create a composite regional antibiogram. The regional data represented the local institutions well, with 96% of the collaborating institutions falling within ±2 standard deviations of the regional mean. The regional antibiogram was able to include 4–5-fold more gram-positive and -negative species with ≥30 isolates than the median reported by local institutions. Against national surveillance data, 18.6% of assessed pathogen–antibiotic combinations crossed prespecified clinical thresholds for disparity in susceptibility rates, with notable trends for resistant gram-positive and gram-negative bacteria.
Conclusions:Developing an accurate, reliable regional antibiogram is feasible, even in one of the largest metropolitan areas in the United States. The biogram is useful in assessing susceptibilities to less commonly encountered organisms and providing clinicians a more accurate representation of local antimicrobial resistance rates compared to national surveillance databases.
List of Editors, Contributors, and Editorial Assistants
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- By Marie-Claire Cordonier Segger, Sébastien Jodoin, Dennis C. M. Byron, Riane Eisler, Matthew Gillett, Maja Göpel, Alexandra R. Harrington, Jarrod Hebpurn, Fannie Lafontaine, Lisa J. Laplante, Frédéric Mégret, Salim A. Nakhjavani, Roger O’Keefe, Ken Roberts, Pubudu Sachithanandan, Charles Séguin, Gerry Simpson, Alain-Guy Tachou Sipowo, Hannah Cochrane, Geraint Edwards, Katherine Lofts, Megan McKee, Nathalie Senst
- Edited by Sébastien Jodoin, Yale University, Connecticut, Marie-Claire Cordonier Segger
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- Book:
- Sustainable Development, International Criminal Justice, and Treaty Implementation
- Published online:
- 05 June 2013
- Print publication:
- 24 June 2013, pp xi-xvi
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Chapter 8 - Toward a Sustainable and Resilient Future
- from Section III
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- By Karen O'Brien, Mark Pelling, Anand Patwardhan, Stephane Hallegatte, Andrew Maskrey, Taikan Oki, Úrsula Oswald-Spring, Thomas Wilbanks, Pius Zebhe Yanda, Carlo Giupponi, Nobuo Mimura, Frans Berkhout, Reinette Biggs, Hans Günter Brauch, Katrina Brown, Carl Folke, Lisa Harrington, Howard Kunreuther, Carmen Lacambra, Robin Leichenko, Reinhard Mechler, Claudia Pahl-Wostl, Valentin Przyluski, David Satterthwaite, Frank Sperling, Linda Sygna, Thomas Tanner, Petra Tschakert, Kirsten Ulsrud, Vincent Viguié
- Edited by Christopher B. Field, Vicente Barros, Thomas F. Stocker, Qin Dahe
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- Book:
- Managing the Risks of Extreme Events and Disasters to Advance Climate Change Adaptation
- Published online:
- 05 August 2012
- Print publication:
- 28 May 2012, pp 437-486
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Summary
Executive Summary
Actions that range from incremental steps to transformational changes are essential for reducing risk from weather and climate extremes (high agreement, robust evidence). [8.6, 8.7] Incremental steps aim to improve efficiency within existing technological, governance, and value systems, whereas transformation may involve alterations of fundamental attributes of those systems. The balance between incremental and transformational approaches depends on evolving risk profiles and underlying social and ecological conditions. Disaster risk, climate change impacts, and capacity to cope and adapt are unevenly distributed. Vulnerability is often concentrated in poorer countries or groups, although the wealthy can also be vulnerable to extreme events. Where vulnerability is high and adaptive capacity relatively low, changes in extreme climate and weather events can make it difficult for systems to adapt sustainably without transformational changes. Such transformations, where they are required, are facilitated through increased emphasis on adaptive management, learning, innovation, and leadership.
Evidence indicates that disaster risk management and adaptation policy can be integrated, reinforcing, and supportive – but this requires careful coordination that reaches across domains of policy and practice (high agreement, medium evidence). [8.2, 8.3, 8.5, 8.7] Including disaster risk management in resilient and sustainable development pathways is facilitated through integrated, systemic approaches that enhance capacity to cope with, adapt to, and shape unfolding processes of change, while taking into consideration multiple stressors, different prioritized values, and competing policy goals.
9 - Rapid Vulnerability Assessments of exposures, sensitivities, and adaptive capacities of the HERO study sites
- from Part IV
- Edited by Brent Yarnal, Pennsylvania State University, Colin Polsky, Clark University, Massachusetts, James O'Brien, Kingston University, London
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- Book:
- Sustainable Communities on a Sustainable Planet
- Published online:
- 06 January 2010
- Print publication:
- 24 September 2009, pp 175-208
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Summary
Introduction
Vulnerability is a concept that captures the dynamic interactions between complex human systems and complex environmental systems. Thus, a vulnerability assessment that produces a static view of human–environment interactions (i.e., by examining one place at one time) will likely provide only limited – and potentially misleading – insight into how the coupled system works. Of course, such static pictures are common in this research domain because it is challenging to establish the temporal evolution of vulnerability (i.e., one place or many places over time). Especially in the context of having limited resources to conduct a vulnerability assessment, a solution to this challenge is to ignore variations over time in favor of examining variations over geographic space (i.e., many places at one time; see Mendelsohn et al. 1994; Carbone 1995; Polsky 2004). We argue that executing a many-places-at-one-time approach requires that all the places adopt a common research protocol; to our knowledge such a networked vulnerability assessment has yet to be reported in the literature. In this chapter, we report results from our effort to examine vulnerabilities – using a rapidly executable and commonly executed methodology – in four distinct study sites in the United States.
As explained in Chapter 1, the HERO project sought to develop infrastructure for studying and monitoring human–environment interactions at individual sites and to enable cross-site comparisons and generalizations. To test how well these concepts and tools work in practice, the project addressed the question, “How does land-use change influence vulnerability to droughts and floods?
13 - Fossil water and agriculture in southwestern Kansas
- from Part V
- Edited by Brent Yarnal, Pennsylvania State University, Colin Polsky, Clark University, Massachusetts, James O'Brien, Kingston University, London
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- Book:
- Sustainable Communities on a Sustainable Planet
- Published online:
- 06 January 2010
- Print publication:
- 24 September 2009, pp 269-291
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Summary
Introduction
Among the four areas investigated as part of the HERO project, semi-arid southwestern Kansas is the most reliant on agriculture. This region faces far different issues with respect to land-use/land-cover change, vulnerability to environmental stress (including hydroclimatic variability and change), and sustainability than do densely settled areas and those locales with low economic reliance on agriculture. In both this region and other non-urban parts of the country, populations in many rural counties and small towns are declining, adjustments to economic globalization are taking place, and fluctuations in forcing by coupled human and natural systems are continuing to affect agricultural success. Changes faced by farming regions also vary among those places with generally sufficient rainfall to grow most important crops, those that receive little rain and lack supplemental sources of water, those reliant on renewable surface water sources, and those reliant on declining groundwater sources. Much of southwestern Kansas is reliant on declining groundwater resources, but some areas lack sufficient ground and/or surface water for use in farming.
The name High Plains–Ogallala (HPO-)HERO recognizes this agricultural region's physical identity and its reliance on the Ogallala and other aquifers. Over the last 30 years, the research site has developed a rich literature that connects the people and land of southwestern Kansas (e.g., Worster 1979; Warren et al. 1982; Reisner 1986; Sherow 1990; Kromm and White 1992, 2001; White 1994; White and Kromm 1995; Opie 2000; Bloomquist et al. 2002; Harrington et al. 2003; Broadway and Stull 2006).
10 - Evaluating vulnerability assessments of the HERO study sites
- from Part IV
- Edited by Brent Yarnal, Pennsylvania State University, Colin Polsky, Clark University, Massachusetts, James O'Brien, Kingston University, London
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- Book:
- Sustainable Communities on a Sustainable Planet
- Published online:
- 06 January 2010
- Print publication:
- 24 September 2009, pp 209-228
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Summary
Introduction
As described in preceding chapters, one of the overarching HERO research activities was to establish a set of methodological protocols for vulnerability assessments. Within the methodological research plan were two principal activities, as introduced in Chapter 8: the development and testing of a Rapid Vulnerability Assessment methodology, and the development and testing of an Vulnerability Assessment Evaluation methodology, designed to validate, or assess the accuracy, of our work. Chapter 9 summarized our efforts on the former task; this chapter presents the results of the latter task. Accordingly, at the end of this chapter, we will be in a position to posit some synthetic conclusions about vulnerability in and across the four HERO sites.
Accuracy assessments are difficult to conduct in many research domains, but they are particularly challenging in the domain of vulnerability because the multidimensional nature of this concept makes it difficult for an individual researcher to observe and measure the principal variable of interest. The multi-site context, where the number of places and researchers is larger, amplifies this challenge. Clearly, then, conducting vulnerability research in a networked environment will present particular challenges to validating the research. In this light, a methodology for validating – or what we term evaluating – our research findings is needed.
Methods and data
There are two datasets involved in the application of our Vulnerability Assessment Evaluation methodology: the reference dataset and the validation dataset.
Contributors
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- By Nalini Vadivelu, Christian J. Whitney, Raymond S. Sinatra, M. Khurram Ghori, Yu-Fan (Robert) Zhang, Raymond S. Sinatra, Joshua Wellington, Yuan-Yi Chia, Francis J. Keefe, Jon McCormack, Ian Power, John Butterworth, P. M. Lavand’homme, M. F. De Kock, Bradley Urie, Oscar A. de Leon-Casasola, Frederick M. Perkins, Larry F. Chu, David Clark, Martin S. Angst, Cynthia M. Welchek, Lisa Mastrangelo, Raymond S. Sinatra, Richard Martinez, Scott S. Reuben, Asokumar Buvanendran, Raymond S. Sinatra, Pamela E Macintyre, Julia Coldrey, Daniel B. Maalouf, Spencer S. Liu, Susan Dabu-Bondoc, Samantha A. Franco, Raymond S. Sinatra, James Benonis, Jennifer Fortney, David Hardman, Gavin Martin, Holly Evans, Karen C. Nielsen, Marcy S. Tucker, Stephen M. Klein, Benjamin Sherman, Ikay Enu, Raymond S. Sinatra, James W. Heitz, Eugene R. Viscusi, Jonathan S. Jahr, Kofi N. Donkor, Raymond S. Sinatra, Manzo Suzuki, Johan Raeder, Vegard Dahl, Stefan Erceg, Keun Sam Chung, Kok-Yuen Ho, Tong J. Gan, Dermot R. Fitzgibbon, Paul Willoughby, Brian E. Harrington, Joseph Marino, Tariq M. Malik, Raymond S. Sinatra, Giorgio Ivani, Valeria Mossetti, Simona Italiano, Thomas M. Halaszynski, Nousheh Saidi, Javier Lopez, Kate Miller, Ferne Braveman, Jaya L. Varadarajan, Steven J. Weisman, Sukanya Mitra, Raymond S. Sinatra, Theodore J. Saclarides, Knox H. Todd, James R. Miner, Chris Pasero, Nancy Eksterowicz, Margo McCaffery, Leslie N. Schechter, Amr E. Abouleish, Govindaraj Ranganathan, Tee Yong Tan, Stephan A. Schug, Marie N. Hanna, Spencer S. Liu, Christopher L. Wu, Craig T. Hartrick, Garen Manvelian, Christine Miaskowski, Brian Durkin, Peter S. A. Glass
- Edited by Raymond S. Sinatra, Oscar A. de Leon-Cassasola, University of Rochester Medical Center, New York, Eugene R. Viscusi, Brian Ginsberg
- Foreword by Henry McQuay
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- Book:
- Acute Pain Management
- Published online:
- 26 October 2009
- Print publication:
- 27 April 2009, pp vii-xii
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9 - Attitudes toward reducing greenhouse gas emissions from local places
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- By Susan L. Cutter, Carolina Distinguished Professor University of South Carolina, Jerry T. Mitchell, Assistant Professor of Geography Bloomsburg University of Pennsylvania, Arleen A. Hill, Department of Geography and research assistant University of South Carolina, Lisa M. B. Harrington, Associate Professor of Geography Kansas State University, Sylvia-Linda Kaktins, Doctoral candidate Kansas State University, William A. Muraco, Research Professor & Professor Emeritus University of Toledo, Jennifer DeHart, Doctoral candidate Department of Geography, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, Audrey Reynolds, University of Texas, Austin, Robin Shudak, Special Assistant to the Program Director Environmental Protection Agency's Energy State Program
- Association of American Geographers GCLP Research Team
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- Book:
- Global Change and Local Places
- Published online:
- 31 July 2009
- Print publication:
- 26 June 2003, pp 171-191
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Summary
Greenhouse gas emissions arise from the acts of people in their local environments, and the sources of greenhouse gases and the driving forces behind their emissions are as varied as the localities included in the Global Change and Local Places project. These different mixes of emission sources and driving forces produce a range of local vulnerabilities, including different perceptions of the magnitude and nature of the problem, and different potential solutions. In order to reduce these emissions, a one-size-fits-all strategy may not work. Instead, analysts and policy makers may be faced with multi-faceted solutions that require an understanding of the dimensions of local vulnerabilities as well as local opportunities for prevention or reduction of emissions. These opportunities may not be realized, in large part because of differing perceptions of risks to different localities. Not only are there perceptual differences on the issue within and among economic sectors and governments, but there is also a significant degree of public indifference to the issue at local, state, and national levels.
Perceptions of climate change: thinking globally and mitigating locally?
Both lay and expert perceptions lead to different evaluations of the nature, extent, and scientific certainty regarding the existence or probability of climate change and its possible impacts (Redclift 1998; Stehr and von Storch 1995). These perceptions are often framed within highly localized sociocultural or sociopolitical contexts, which undoubtedly vary from place to place. In the same way, the willingness of local residents, industries, and businesses to reduce emissions may vary among places.
3 - Global change and Southwestern Kansas: local emissions and non-local determinants
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- By John Harrington, Professor and Head of the Department of Geography Kansas State University, David E. Kromm, Professor Emeritus of Geography Kansas State University, Lisa M. B. Harrington, Associate Professor of Geography Kansas State University, Douglas G. Goodin, Associate Professor of Geography Kansas State University, Stephen E. White, Interim Dean College of Arts and Sciences, Kansas State University
- Association of American Geographers GCLP Research Team
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- Book:
- Global Change and Local Places
- Published online:
- 31 July 2009
- Print publication:
- 26 June 2003, pp 57-78
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Summary
Landscape, life, and livelihood
The Southwestern Kansas study area (Figure 2.1) lies within the American High Plains, a semi-arid region west of the 100° meridian that extends northward from West Texas through Kansas and Nebraska to the Dakotas. Characterized by nineteenth century explorers as the ‘Great American Desert,’ the first European-American landholders introduced cattle ranching to this nearly treeless shortgrass prairie. Through the Homesteading Act and the efforts of railroads, much of the High Plains was settled by crop farmers in the late nineteenth century. The area of land successfully cultivated varied with precipitation cycles, however, and the particularly long dry spell that occurred in the 1930s resulted in land abandonment through much of the region, lending the High Plains a new name: The Dust Bowl.
The study site lies at the center of the High Plains and in the heart of the former Dust Bowl. Its six counties encompass an area of approximately 14,120 square kilometers (5,450 square miles), inhabited by slightly more than 90,000 people and over 900,000 cattle. The three principal settlements are Garden City (2000 population of 28,451), Dodge City (25,276), and Liberal (19,666). Southwestern Kansas lies at relatively high elevation: 610–1,070 m (2,000–3,500 ft) above sea level, but contains little internal topographical relief.
The study area's climate is semi-arid with mean monthly temperatures ranging from -1 to +27°C (30–80°F). Precipitation averages less than 58 cm (23 in) per year, most of which falls as spring and summer rain (Goodin et al. 1995).