Clouds have a large impact on the Earth’s radiation and energy budget and play consequently a crucial role in prediction of climate change. At the same time, they are highly variable in time and space. To study and distinguish the different influences of clouds on the climate system it is useful to separate clouds into individual cloud regimes. In this thesis a new cloud classification and their response to disturbed cloud droplet number concentration is presented. Liquid water clouds at cloud scale are separated on the basis of cloud properties derived from combined A-Train satellite measurements involving the MODIS measurements onboard Aqua, the CloudSat cloud radar and the CALIPSO cloud lidar. Using the combined MODIS and CALIPSO cloud-top phase discrimination, liquid water clouds are identified. The high resolved vertical measurements of the CALIPSO lidar provide three cloud base height classes and the spatial variability of cloud top height within a 20 km footprint as an inhomogeneity parameter from which two cloud inhomogeneity classes are defined resulting in a total of six liquid cloud classes. The classification smoothly disentangles marine and continental clouds as well as stratiform and cumuliform clouds in different latitudes at the high spatial resolution of about 20 km. Analyzing the cloud droplet effective radius reff , cloud optical thickness τc , adiabatic liquid water path Lad, adiabatic cloud droplet number concentration Nc,ad and cloud geometrical thickness Hthick,CC derived from collocated combined MODIS, CloudSat and CALIPSO measurements shows a useful discrimination between cloud regimes. Further separations between non precipitating and precipitating clouds using the CloudSat precipitation flag as well as between three classes of free tropospheric relative humidity from a meteorological reanalysis above cloud top are made to investigate adjustments to aerosol-cloud interactions for individual cloud regimes. For this, the cloud liquid water path response, cloud thickness response, and cloud fraction response to perturbed cloud droplet concentration is analyzed. All sensitivities depend on the chosen cloud or environmental parameter indicating the importance of analyzing aerosol-cloud interactions for particular cloud regimes since similar clouds with similar cloud parameter responses are grouped together helping to identify individual behavior of these cloud regimes to perturbations in cloud droplet number concentration.

Climate change is an environmental issue that has actual or potential strategic impacts on many companies. The research problem emanates from the scientific work on climate change and the vast health effects that would pose as implications within the healthcare industry. The aim of the research was to explore the strategic response of private healthcare funders in South Africa to global climate change. By means of a case-study based research design, the stimuli for strategic response, risks and opportunities related to global climate change and strategy and an overall strategic organisational posture under the RDAP continuum scale framework had evolved. Evidence from the results and analysis brings light to the fact that global climate change as a strategic concern to private healthcare funders remains a point of scepticism. Although some of the organisations from the sample have considered climate change as a strategic concern, there are others that do not. The study showed that global climate change continues to remain an issue of complexity and uncertainty in the external business environment such that strategy formulation and implementation and acting proactively on the matter remains complicated. Copyright / Dissertation (MBA)--University of Pretoria, 2010. / Gordon Institute of Business Science (GIBS) / unrestricted

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The estuarine sheepshead minnow (Cyprinodon variegatus) is the most eurythermic fish species, with a thermal tolerance window between 0.6°C and 45.1°C. However, little is known about the physiological mechanisms that allow this species to survive this temperature range. In order to understand how sheepshead minnow physiology is affected by temperature acclimation and acute changes in temperature, I conducted research on this species using a multi-level approach. I began at the organismal level, and examined the effects of these temperature changes on the sheepshead minnow's metabolic rate and swimming performance. The next chapter investigated the effects of changing temperatures on cardiac function (i.e., tissue/organ specific effects). In the final chapter, I conducted research at the sub-cellular level, and determined how mitochondrial bioenergetics / function is impacted by changing temperatures. This research shows that while sheepshead minnows are able to sustain heart function and mitochondrial respiration over a broad range of temperatures; they also display a plastic temperature response which is associated with the downregulation of standard metabolic rate and cardiac remodeling to maintain force generation. Collectively, these physiological responses may contribute to the sheepshead minnow's ability to maintain physiological and organismal function across a large temperature range.

Over the years, global climate modelling has advanced, aiming for realistic and precise models by increasing their complexity. An integral component of climate models, the physics parameterizations, are a major limitation, but are required due to limited computational power. Grid adaptivity is an avenue that is being explored to mitigate these challenges, but comes with its own difficulties. For example, the question of whether the physics should be ``scale-aware’’, by adjusting according to the resolution and the fact that parameterizations are optimized for specific grid ranges. To research these challenges, test cases that work in both the adaptive and non-adaptive cases are required. This thesis concentrates on physics parameterizations of Atmospheric Global Climate Models (AGCMs) presenting the current hierarchy of idealized physics parameterizations found in the literature. It focuses on and provides a comprehensive explanation of a simplified dry physics model for AGCMs, exploring where it is situated in the current hierarchy and its steady states in the uncoupled case. A coupling of the physics model to the adaptive dynamical core wavetrisk is explained and explored. This includes characterizing the results in the non-adaptive case for time convergence, grid convergence, and the effects of the soil, while also benchmarking the climatology of the coupling. The simplified dry physics model introduces another level of complexity in the current dry physics hierarchy and is stable in the coupled and uncoupled cases. A decreasing temperature trend with height is observed, however warmer surface temperatures and cooler upper atmosphere temperatures, than that of Earth, are produced in the steady states. Additionally a linear rate of convergence in space is noted and an improvement in parallel efficiency with resolution is required. Overall these results can be used as a benchmark for future coupling in the adaptive case. / Thesis / Master of Science (MSc)

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No description available.

A mesoscale evaluation is performed to determine the impacts of climate change on terrestrial hydrological components and the Net Irrigation Water Requirement (NIWR) throughout the Chesapeake Bay watershed in the mid-Atlantic region of the United States. The Noah-MP land surface model is calibrated and evaluated against the observed datasets of United States Geological Survey (USGS) streamflow gages, actual evapotranspiration from USGS Simplified Surface Energy Balance (SSEBop) Model and soil moisture from Soil Analysis Climate Network (SCAN). Six best performing Global Climate Models (GCM) based on Multivariate Adaptive Constructed Analogs (MACA) scheme are included for two future scenarios (RCP 4.5 and RCP 8.5), to assess the change in water balance components, change in NIWR for two dominant crops (corn and soybeans) and uncertainty in GCM projections. Using these long-term simulations, the flood inundation maps are developed for future scenarios along the Susquehanna River including the City of Harrisburg in Pennsylvania. The HEC-RAS 2D model is calibrated and evaluated against the high-water marks from major historical flood events and the stage-discharge relationship of the available USGS streamgages. Finally, the impacts of climate change are assessed on flood inundation depth and extent by comparing a 30-yr and 100-yr flood event based on the historical and future (scenario-based) peak discharge estimates at the USGS streamgages. Interestingly, flood inundation extent and severity predicted by the model along the Susquehanna River near Harrisburg is expected to rise in the future climate scenarios due to the greater frequency of extreme events increasing total precipitation. / Master of Science / Climate change is inevitable due to increased greenhouse gas emissions, with impacts varying in space and time significantly throughout the globe. The impacts are strongly driven by the change in precipitation and temperature which affect the control of the movement of water on the surface of the Earth. These changes in the water cycle require an understanding of hydrological components like streamflow, soil moisture, and evapotranspiration. Development of long-term climate models and computational hydrological models (based on mathematical equations and governed by laws of physics) has helped us in understanding this climate variability in space and time. This study performs a long-term simulation using the datasets from six different climate models to analyze the change in terrestrial hydrological components for the entire Chesapeake Bay watershed in the mid-Atlantic region of the United States. The simulations provide an understanding of the interplay between various land surface processes due to climate change and can help determine future water availability and consumption. To illustrate the usefulness of such long-term simulations, the crop water requirement is quantified for the dominant crops in Chesapeake Bay watershed to project water availability and support the development of mitigation strategies. Flood inundation maps are also developed for a section of Susquehanna River near the City of Harrisburg in south-central Pennsylvania using the streamflow from long-term simulations. The flood inundation depth and extent for major flood events such as Tropical Storm Agnes (1972) and Tropical Storm Lee (2011) are compared along the Susquehanna River, which can aid in managing flood operations, reduce the future flood damages and prioritize the mitigation efforts for endangered communities near the City of Harrisburg.

As glaciações do Quaternário moldaram os padrões filogeográficos das espécies em geral. Em algumas regiões da América do Sul, (e.g. Cerrado e Caatinga) a mudança estrutural foi mais acentuada, havendo o predomino de savanas, ao passo que em outras regiões (e.g. Amazônica e Mata Atlântica) as mudanças foram menores, formando áreas de refúgios florestais. A Modelagem Preditiva de Distribuição de espécies usa associações entre variáveis ambientais e registros de ocorrência da espécie para estimar modelos que representam as condições ambientais favoráveis à espécie. Neste trabalho foram estudadas três espécies de figueiras Neotropicais com características ecológicas distintas, representando duas linhagens filogenéticas independentes, i.e., seções Americana (Ficus citrifolia) e Pharmacosycea (Ficus adhatodifolia e Ficus insipida). Foram gerados modelos para os cenários passados (Interglacial 140.000 e Glacial 21.000 anos atrás), presente e futuro (2050 e 2070, nos cenários otimistas e pessimistas) para as três espécies estudadas usando o programa Maxent 3.3.3k. Os resultados obtidos mostram que para F. adhatodifolia as variáveis mais importantes nos modelos foram temperatura mínima do mês mais frio e precipitação do mês mais seco. Para F. insipida as variáveis mais importantes nos modelos foram temperatura mínima do mês mais frio e precipitação anual. Para F. citrifolia as variáveis mais importantes nos modelos foram temperatura mínima do mês mais frio e precipitação do mês mais chuvoso. Os modelos projetados no cenário interglacial, para as três espécies estudadas, apresentaram áreas de adequabilidade ambiental próximas ao cenário atual. Durante o período glacial F. adhatodifolia mostrou uma mudança considerável em sua área de ocorrência, ocorrendo em regiões consideradas refúgios para algumas espécies. Ficus insipida apresentou uma retração na sua adequabilidade ambiental, porém mantendo-se na região amazônica, enquanto que F. citrifolia teve um aumento na sua área de adequabilidade. Nos cenários futuros (2050 e 2070) F.adhatodifolia apresentou uma diminuição em sua área de ocorrência em ambos os cenários otimista e pessimista, F. insipida apresentou um aumento em sua área de adequabilidade ambiental e F.citrifolia apresentou uma diminuição e fragmentação na região Amazônica nos cenários otimista e pessimista de 2050 e otimista de 2070. As exigências ambientais e os possíveis padrões filogeográficos das três espécies são discutidos no contexto dos modelos preditivos gerados. / The Quaternary glaciations shaped the phylogeographic patterns of species in general. In some regions of South America (e.g.Cerrado and Caatinga) structural change was more pronounced and savannas predominated, whereas in other regions (e.g. Amazon and Atlantic Forest) changes were minor, forming areas of forest refuges. Species distribution Predictive Modeling uses associations between environmental variables and species occurrence records to estimate models that represent the environmental conditions favorable to the species. In the present study we chose three species of Neotropical Ficus with different ecological characteristics, representing two independent phylogenetic lineages, i.e., sections Americana (Ficus citrifolia) and Pharmacosycea (F.adhatodifolia and F.insipida). We generated models for the past (interglacial 140,000 years ago and Glacial 21,000 years ago), present and future scenarios (2050 and 2070 in optimistic and pessimistic scenarios) for the three study species using Maxent 3.3.3k program. Our results showed thatfor F. adhatodifolia the most important variables in the models were minimum temperature in the coldest month and precipitation in the driest month. For F.insipida the most important variables in the models were minimum temperature in the coldest month and annual precipitation. For F. citrifolia the most important variables in the models were minimum temperature in the coldest month and precipitation in the wettest month. The models designed for the interglacial stage showed areas of environmental suitability similar to the current scenario of the three species. During the glacial period F. adhatodifolia showed a considerable change in its range, occurring in regions considered refuges for some species. Ficus insipida had its environmental suitability decreased, but remained in the Amazon region, while F. citrifolia increased its area of suitability. In the future models (2050 and 2070) F.adhatodifolia showed a decrease in its range on both optimistic and pessimistic scenarios, F.insipida showed an increase in its area of environmental suitability and F.citrifolia has been decreasing and fragmentation in the Amazon region in the optimistic and pessimistic scenarios 2050 and optimistic 2070. The environmental requirements and the potential phylogeographic patterns of the study species are discussed in the context of the generated predictive models.