The human population is rapidly urbanizing. While this will undoubtedly present challenges for humans it will also place pressure on birds in these areas. To better manage these spaces in a manner that promotes avian biodiversity, we must first come to understand how human development affects the distribution and abundance of bird species and guilds within cities and if patterns observed previously in large cities can be extended to smaller ones. Breeding birds were surveyed along a gradient of increasing urbanization in Iowa City, Iowa, during the summers of 2014 and 2015. Study areas included a forested park, recreational park, low density residential area, medium density residential area, high density/mixed-use area, and urban core. Birds were censused a total of four times at each site using variable circular plot counts. Landscape characteristics were measured using a high resolution land cover dataset and tree canopy model. Regression models were developed to investigate relationships between the bird community and land cover characteristics. Bird species richness, diversity, and evenness all decreased with increasing urbanization, while biomass and the number of individuals peaked in the urban core. The community shifted from non-native, resident, granivorous, multi-brooding building nesters in highly developed areas to native, migrant, invertivorous, single-brooding, tree and tree cavity nesters at the least developed sites. Regression models indicated varied relationships among landscape characteristics and species richness and community prevalence of functional guilds. Native, migratory, invertivorous, tree cavity-nesting, and single-brooding species showed negative relationships to variables measuring the built environment, while non-native, resident, granivorous, building nesting, and multi-brooding species showed positive relationships to these measures. Overall, the response of avian functional guilds to varying levels of urban intensity in Iowa City were remarkably similar to the results of previous studies. This suggests that much of what has been learned previously concerning avian responses to human development can be extended to planning and implementing conservation strategies in smaller cities.

Thesis (M.S. in Defense Analysis)--Naval Postgraduate School, December 2009. / Thesis Advisor(s): Freeman, Michael. Second Reader: Rothstein, Hy. "December 2009." Description based on title screen as viewed on January 26, 2010. Author(s) subject terms: Salinas, violence, gangs, education, unemployment rate, economy, population, housing, police force, prison, rivalry, social service, community involvement, prevention, intervention. Includes bibliographical references (p. 81-87). Also available in print.

Thesis (M.L.A) -- University of Texas at Arlington, 2008.

This thesis explores the relationship between water infrastructure, ecological change, and the politics of planning in New Orleans and the Mississippi River Delta, USA. Complex assemblages of water control infrastructure have been embedded in the delta over the last several centuries in an effort to keep its cities protected from floodwaters and maintain its waterways as standardized conduits for maritime transportation. This thesis investigates the historical development of these infrastructural interventions in the delta’s dynamics, and shows how the region’s eco-hydrology is ensnared in the politics and materiality of pipes, pumps, canals, locks, and levees. These historical entanglements complicate contemporary efforts to enact large-scale ecosystem restoration, even while the delta’s landscape is rapidly eroding into the sea. This historical approach is extended into the present through an examination of how waterway standards established at so-called chokepoints in the global maritime transportation system (the Panama Canal, for example) become embedded and contested in coastal landscapes and port cities worldwide. Turning towards urban ecology, the thesis examines socioecological responses to the flooding following Hurricane Katrina in 2005, with a special focus on how infrastructure failures, flooding intensity, and land abandonment are driving changing vegetation patterns in New Orleans over the past decade. The thesis contributes new conceptual language for grappling with the systemic relations bound up in water infrastructure, and develops one of the first studies describing urban ecosystem responses to prolonged flooding and post-disaster land management. This provides insights into the impending planning challenges facing New Orleans and coastal cities globally, where rising sea levels are bringing about renewed attention to how infrastructure is implicated in patterns of ecological change, hazard exposure, resilience, and social inequality. / <p>At the time of the doctoral defense, the following papers were unpublished and had a status as follows: Paper 2: Manuscript. Paper 3: Manuscript. Paper 4: Accepted. Paper 5: Manuscript.</p>

Η ξυλώδης χλωρίδα της πόλης της Δράμας, που αποτελείται από 148 taxa Σπερματοφύτων, αναλύεται από βιολογική, χωρολογική και οικολογική άποψη. Γίνονται, επίσης, προτάσεις για τη βελτίωση του πρασίνου της πόλης. Από τα πιο πάνω taxa, 63 (42,6%) είναι ιθαγενή, 77 (52%) ξενικά και 8 (5,4%) υβρίδια. Στο βλαστητικό φάσμα της ξυλώδους χλωρίδας υπερτερούν τα θαμνώδη (54%) και ακολουθούν τα δενδρώδη φανερόφυτα με ποσοστό 25,7%. Διακρίθηκαν 21 χωρολογικές ομάδες, στις οποίες κυριαρχούν τα ασιατικά με ποσοστό 22,2% και τα αμερικανικά και μεσογειακά στοιχεία με ποσοστό 17,9% αντίστοιχα. Από οικολογική άποψη η ξυλώδης χλωρίδας της Δράμας μελετάται σε σχέση με τους πιο σημαντικούς παράγοντες: φως, θερμοκρασία, υγρασία, επίδραση αλατιού και αντίδραση εδάφους. Οι κλιματικοί και εδαφικοί παράγοντες επιτρέπουν την εγκατάσταση κυρίως φωτόφιλων, θερμόφιλων, μετρίως υγρόφιλων, αλόφοβων και βασεόφιλων ειδών. Η περίοδος ανθοφορίας των ξενικών ειδών είναι μεγαλύτερη απ’ αυτή των ιθαγενών. Από τα καρποφορούντα ξυλώδη είδη ένα σημαντικό ποσοστό taxa φέρει καρπούς εδώδιμους, που αποτελούν πολύ σημαντική πηγή τροφής για την ορνιθοπανίδα της περιοχής. Τέλος, προτείνονται τα προσήκοντα καλλιεργητικά μέτρα για την υπάρχουσα βλάστηση και εμπλουτισμό της με την προσθήκη κατάλληλων ειδών από την ιθαγενή χλωρίδα της περιοχής. / Η ξυλώδης χλωρίδα της πόλης της Δράμας, που αποτελείται από 148 taxa Σπερματοφύτων, αναλύεται από βιολογική, χωρολογική και οικολογική άποψη. Γίνονται, επίσης, προτάσεις για τη βελτίωση του πρασίνου της πόλης. Από τα πιο πάνω taxa, 63 (42,6%) είναι ιθαγενή, 77 (52%) ξενικά και 8 (5,4%) υβρίδια. Στο βλαστητικό φάσμα της ξυλώδους χλωρίδας υπερτερούν τα θαμνώδη (54%) και ακολουθούν τα δενδρώδη φανερόφυτα με ποσοστό 25,7%. Διακρίθηκαν 21 χωρολογικές ομάδες, στις οποίες κυριαρχούν τα ασιατικά με ποσοστό 22,2% και τα αμερικανικά και μεσογειακά στοιχεία με ποσοστό 17,9% αντίστοιχα. Από οικολογική άποψη η ξυλώδης χλωρίδας της Δράμας μελετάται σε σχέση με τους πιο σημαντικούς παράγοντες: φως, θερμοκρασία, υγρασία, επίδραση αλατιού και αντίδραση εδάφους. Οι κλιματικοί και εδαφικοί παράγοντες επιτρέπουν την εγκατάσταση κυρίως φωτόφιλων, θερμόφιλων, μετρίως υγρόφιλων, αλόφοβων και βασεόφιλων ειδών. Η περίοδος ανθοφορίας των ξενικών ειδών είναι μεγαλύτερη απ’ αυτή των ιθαγενών. Από τα καρποφορούντα ξυλώδη είδη ένα σημαντικό ποσοστό taxa φέρει καρπούς εδώδιμους, που αποτελούν πολύ σημαντική πηγή τροφής για την ορνιθοπανίδα της περιοχής. Τέλος, προτείνονται τα προσήκοντα καλλιεργητικά μέτρα για την υπάρχουσα βλάστηση και εμπλουτισμό της με την προσθήκη κατάλληλων ειδών από την ιθαγενή χλωρίδα της περιοχής.

Research on green roofs has shown their potential to moderate stormwater runoff and excessive heat in large cities. This has supported the implementation of a bylaw in Toronto, Canada which mandates large scale green roof construction. However, designers lack knowledge on appropriate plant selection for local green roofs. European research has demonstrated that healthy plant cover can significantly improve stormwater capture and cooling on green roofs. This thesis employed two methodologies to select native plants suitable for green roofs. Plants species were first identified from Ontario ecosystems with conditions similar to extensive green roofs including alvars, rock barrens, talus and cliffs. Secondly, plant surveys of existing extensive green roofs in Toronto and other southern Ontario locations to discover plant species already in use. Formal testing of the plant species generated from both methodologies can eventually provide designers with knowledge of dependable plant assemblages for extensive green roofs in Toronto.

This research seeks to pinpoint the telencephalic structures most closely correlated with feeding flexibility, which is operationalised as feeding innovation rate per taxon. By calculating a weighted average per taxon of 1030 feeding innovations collated from five zones of the world (western Europe, North America, Australia, New Zealand and India), the study shows that relative size of the hyperstriatum ventrale and, to a lesser extent, the neostriatum , best predicts weighted innovation rate; these two structures are thought to be functionally equivalent to the mammalian neocortex. The worst telencephalic predictors of innovation rate are two structures respectively thought to be involved in primary visual projection and the control of stereotyped, species-specific behaviour, the wulst area and the paleostriatum. / A second presumed correlate of behavioural flexibility, taxonomic variation in the use of urbanised and other anthropogenically-modified habitats, shows a consistent pattern in four geographical zones (Great Britain, North America, Australia and New Guinea), as well as a qualitative association with the relative size of the forebrain. There is no linear correlation, however, between urbanisation rate per taxon and either forebrain size or innovation rate, suggesting that other variables like diet, tameness and neophilia may have to be quantified at finer taxonomic levels in future studies of opportunism in habitat use.

This Master's research project begins from the question: is it possible that the phenomenon of the contemporary corporate-controlled urban environment- as epitomised by the enclosed shopping mall and highrise office block (protected by high-tech surveillance) paradoxically is giving rise to the development of an art practice which represents a new type of spirituality-one which is secular, complex and inclusive rather than religious and reductive? My thesis investigates this question through drawing upon writings by relevant theorists and critics; through a comparative examination of selected works by a number of notable, new mid-career and emerging international and Australian photo media artists and through my self-reflective art practice. In support of my thesis I particularly examine a number of photographic works which seek to reflect both the meditative and the anxious moments which characterise the way we experience everyday reality within our globalised consumer culture. These images are not traditionally religious in any sense but rather reflect the tension between materialism and a desire to escape this through negation of consumerism and corporate image marketing. The kind of images this contradictory response gives rise to I believe can be seen to reflect a 'temporary' or provisional sense of the sublime which transcends- or transforms- the banal and the ordinary in the presented reality. / Thesis (MVisualArts)--University of South Australia, 2004.

Zugl.: Freiburg (Breisgau), University, Diss., 2005.

Thesis (doctoral)--Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, 2008. / Includes reprints of four papers and manuscripts co-authored with others. Includes bibliographical references. Also partially issued electronically via World Wide Web in PDF format; online version lacks reprints of four papers and manuscripts.