Identification of Artificial Recharge Sites for Nand Samand Catchment

Security of groundwater is widely regarded as a serious impediment to India's economic and social progress. According to the Central Ground Water Board's (CGWB) assessment, India's groundwater tables are plummeting at an alarming rate, with reserves in some regions reaching critical levels. Unregulated groundwater use in southern peninsular India has also resulted in excessive extraction, lowering the 'critical' threshold. With over 30 million groundwater structures in use, India is on the verge of a disaster of over-extraction that will leave 60% of all aquifers in critical condition within the next two decades. To resolve the issue, a variety of renewable groundwater solutions must be implemented. Artificial recharge is a procedure that augments groundwater at a pace that is significantly greater than the rate of replenishment under natural conditions, which may give a solution. The current study is for the Nand Samand catchment in the district of Rajasthan. The investigation of artificial groundwater recharge sites is being conducted using an integrated Remote Sensing and Geographic Information System (GIS) approach. Thematic maps such as topographic elevation, post-mosoon groundwater level, recharge, slope, transmissivity and soils map are created, and weighted overlay analysis is used to identify areas suitable for artificial recharge. Keywords: Nand Samand catchment, artificial recharge zone, thematic map, remote sensing, GIS

REMOTELY SENSED IMAGE FAST CLASSIFICATION AND SMART THEMATIC MAP PRODUCTION

Apps available for Smartphone, as well as software for GNSS/GIS devices, permit to easily mapping the localization and shape of an area by acquiring the vertices coordinates of its contour. This option is useful for remote sensing classification, supporting the detection of representative sample sites of a known cover type to use for algorithm training or to test classification results. This article aims to analyse the possibility to produce smart maps from remotely sensed image classification in rapid way: the attention is focalized on different methods that are compared to identify fast and accurate procedure for producing up-to-date and reliable maps. Landsat 8 OLI multispectral images of northern Sicily (Italy) are submitted to various classification algorithms to distinguish water, bare soil and vegetation. The resulting map is useful for many purposes: appropriately inserted in a larger database aimed at representing the situation in a space-time evolutionary scenario, it is suitable whenever you want to capture the variation induced in a scene, e.g. burnt areas identification, vegetated areas definition for tourist-recreational purposes, etc. Particularly, pixel-based classification approaches are preferred, and experiments are carried out using unsupervised (k-means), vegetation index (NDVI, Normalized Difference Vegetation Index), supervised (minimum distance, maximum likelihood) methods. Using test sites, confusion matrix is built for each method, and quality indices are calculated to compare the results. Experiments demonstrate that NDVI submitted to k-means algorithm allows the best performance for distinguishing not only vegetation areas but also water bodies and bare soils. The resulting thematic map is converted for web publishing.

Entomological surveillance of mosquitoes (Diptera: Culicidae), vectors of arboviruses, in an ecotourism park in Cachoeiras de Macacu, state of Rio de Janeiro-RJ, Brazil

Arboviruses are arthropod-dependent viruses to complete their zoonotic cycle. Among the transmitting arthropods, culicids stand out, which participate in the cycle of several arboviruses that can affect humans. The present study aimed to identify species of culicidae and to point out the risk of circulation, emergency, or reemergence of pathogenic arboviruses to humans in the region of the Jequitibá headquarters of the Parque Estadual dos Três Picos (PETP), in Cachoeiras de Macacu, state of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Sampling was carried out at five Sample Points (SP) demarcated on trails from the headquarters, with CDC light traps, HP model with dry ice attached to the side, for 48 hours of activity each month. Additionally, active catches were made with a castro catcher in the period of one hour per day in the field, from six to eleven o’clock in the morning, in each PM. After the captures, thematic map was assembled using the ArcGIS 10 software and performing a multidimensional scaling (MDS). A total of 1151 specimens were captured and the presence of culicids already incriminated as vectors of arboviruses circulating in the region was observed: Aedes fluviatilis Lutz, 1904 (71 specimens); Aedes scapularis Rondani, 1848 (55 specimens); Haemagogus leococelaenus Dyar and Shannon, 1924 (29 specimens). In addition to the subgenus Culex (culex) spp. (163 specimens). In this sense, we highlight the importance of strengthening the actions of continuous entomological surveillance of the emergence and re-emergence of new arboviruses in ecotourism visitation parks.

Understanding the Complexities of Community-Dwelling Older Adults’ Lived Experiences During COVID-19

Since December 2019, COVID-19 has spurred rapid and extensive research, but this research has focused on some perspectives with others understudied. In particular, studies have not yet explored the complexities of community-dwelling older adults’ lived experiences during the pandemic. This study aimed to address this gap. Community-dwelling older adults living in Central Texas (N = 200; age, 65–92 years, M = 73.6± 6.33) responded to open- and closed-ended questions over the telephone during June–August 2020. Data were analyzed using inductive thematic analysis. We identified three key themes. (1) Positive experiences, with 4 subthemes: perception that the pandemic has not changed one’s lifestyle; adjusting well—particularly with the aid of technology; being positive in perspective; and a “loner advantage” (being a “loner” pre-pandemic was advantageous during the pandemic). (2) Mixed experiences, with 4 subthemes: doing okay but unhappy about changing lifestyle routines; doing okay but unhappy about loss of in-person interactions with family and friends; doing okay but frustrated by witnessing absence of social distancing or facemask use by others; and maintaining physical health with fluctuating symptoms of depression or anxiety. (3) Negative experiences, with 3 subthemes: bitter about others/society/government not caring for older adults; feeling isolated, bored, and powerless; and worsening as time goes by. A thematic map was subsequently developed. These findings reveal the complexities of community-dwelling older adults’ lived experiences, illustrating effective coping and resilience during the pandemic and dissatisfaction owing to the pandemic’s effects on their lives and to their observations of others’ behaviors.

Microgels and Nanogels at Interfaces and Emulsions: Identifying Opportunities From a Bibliometric Analysis

In this work, we used Bibliometrix and Biblioshiny to perform a bibliometric qualitative and quantitative analysis on the main topic “microgels and nanogels”, and the sub-topic “microgels and nanogels at interfaces and emulsions”. Word-counting of the titles of the publications enabled a descriptive analysis of thematic trends. A more complex conceptual analysis used the co-occurrence of words in titles, clustered into research themes with links to other themes. A thematic map allowed to characterize the centrality and density of the themes within the topic. A similar clustering of co-authorship enabled the mapping of the collaborations. We identified in this way research opportunities theme- and collaboration-wise, such as the opportunity to bring more fundamental studies into biomedical applications and into Pickering emulsions stabilized with microgels.

Challenges and Positives Caused by Changing Roles during Emergency Remote Education in Estonia as Revealed by Facebook Messages

At the beginning of 2020, education worldwide, including in Estonia, was affected by the coronavirus pandemic, which necessitated the transfer of all levels of education to distance learning. Emergency remote education created both challenges and positives for different stakeholders, especially during the early part of this staggering situation. This study aims to describe the challenges and positives encountered by people in different roles, using data from the Facebook group ‘Homeschooling with technology’ from 6 March–26 April 2020. Members of the Facebook group were divided into eight role groups. A qualitative method study design was used and inductive thematic analysis of 130 messages posted by different roles was conducted. 72 messages were coded as expressing negative sentiments and describing various problems and challenges, which were then used to create a thematic map with seven main themes. Two themes (teachers’ unreadiness and problems related to technology) were reported by all stakeholder groups except members from government institutions, who did not post any messages about challenges. Seven main themes describing positives in the Facebook messages were identified using 58 messages coded as expressing positive sentiments. All role groups posted some messages about the positives but only the theme ‘Stress management’ was mentioned by all roles. Several themes (e.g., digital tools, teachers) included both negative and positive reports. The results help capture the effect of changing roles on challenges and positives experienced by different stakeholders during the implementation of emergency remote education, which can be used for future application of distance learning in education.

Hypoxic-ischemic brain injuries after cardiosurgical interventions: clinical options of somatogenic asthenic symptom complex in patients in the preoperative period

Annotation. The article presents the results of studying the symptomatology of different clinical variants of somatogenous asthenic symptom complex (SASC). The primary material of the study was a specially developed thematic map, the completion of which involved the implementation of clinical and anamnestic study and taking into account about 30 symptoms. Clinical and statistical methods were used: anamnestic quantitative analysis, variation statistics, probabilistic distribution of clinical signs with assessment of the reliability of the obtained results. It was found that in the structure of SASC the largest share belongs to the asthenic variant: is – 40.7%, while astheno-anxiety – 26.3%, astheno-subdepressive – 20.3%, and the smallest – dissomnic (12.7%). The symptomatic structure of SASC variants is characterized by the prevalence of the phenomena of physical and mental asthenia with symptoms of bodily synthesis, which allows to determine the most characteristic symptomatic complexes for cardiac surgery patients. The symptom complexes defined in research on each of variants of SASC allow to objectify at a preoperative stage a psychosomatic condition for maintenance of the integrated neurologic support of cardiosurgical patients.

Mapping and Classification of Use Only in the Municipality of Ulianópolis-PA: Dynamics of the Landscape in the Hydrographic Micro-basin of the Cabeludo River

The search for economic development, in its most varied production models, anthropic actions have caused great environmental impacts, changing the environment and consequently causing environmental risks in different ways. In this sense, this work aimed to map the use and occupation of land through the spatial temporal dynamics of the hydrographic landscape of the Rio Cabeludo, in the municipality of Ulianópolis - PA, using integrated techniques of remote sensing and geoprocessing. Through the images, the supervised classification of the area was carried out, using the ENVI software for digital image processing and ArcGIS software for the elaboration of the thematic map. Some classes were investigated, such as urban area, exposed soil, temporary tillage, permanent tillage, dense vegetation, scrub, pasture, hydrography, cloud, shade, it is noteworthy that not all classes were repeated in the analyzed period. The evaluation of the studied area showed that there were significant changes in some classes. The identified classes reflect the dynamics of agricultural activity and not commercial plantation areas or large tracts of land. The work showed the possibility and importance of using geoprocessing techniques to monitor the territory and manage the environment, enabling better forms of land occupation and use of natural resources.