The Lakshadweep islands are a group of 36 coral islands in the Indian Ocean. These small islands are unique for their aquatic bio-diversity and vast blue lagoons. This book presents the results of studies done by the authors during the period 1990 to 2009 that address the beach morphology, hydrodynamics, energy resources and management options with special reference to the issue of both natural and anthropogenic coastal erosion. The relatively low island elevation makes the islands more susceptible to high-wave attack and coastal flooding during adverse weather conditions. The islands are...

This book describes the iterative steps that were successfully undertaken to develop adaptation measures to climate change in two Vietnamese provinces. The methodology used to develop the scientific basis and the societal agreement of the need to adapt to climate change is applicable also to other regions in Vietnam, Asia and worldwide.

The uncertainties of climate change models make it difficult to justify investments to finance protection from uncertain impacts. Setting out with the projected climate change impacts in Vietnam, which is one of the most vulnerable countries to...

This book takes an in-depth look at the theory and methods inherent in the tracing of riverine sediments. Examined tracers include multi-elemental concentration data, fallout radionuclides (e.g., ²¹⁰Pb, ¹³⁷Cs, ⁷Be), radiogenic isotopes (particularly those of Pb, Sr, and Nd), and novel ( non-traditional ) stable isotopes (e.g., Cd, Cu, Hg, and Zn), the latter of which owe their application to recent advances in analytical chemistry. The intended goal is not to replace more traditional analyses of the riverine sediment system, but to show how...

The subject of the book is helium, the element, and its use in myriad applications including MRI machines, particle accelerators, space telescopes, and of course balloons and blimps. It was at the birth of our Universe, or the Big Bang, where the majority of cosmic helium was created; and stellar helium production continues. Although helium is the second most abundant element in the Universe, it is actually quite rare here on Earth and only exists because of radioactive elements deep within the Earth. This book includes a detailed history of the discovery of helium, of the commercial...

This book contains a detailed presentation of general principles of sensitivity analysis as well as their applications to sample cases of remote sensing experiments. An emphasis is made on applications of adjoint problems, because they are more efficient in many practical cases, although their formulation may seem counterintuitive to a beginner. Special attention is paid to forward problems based on higher-order partial differential equations, where a novel matrix operator approach to formulation of corresponding adjoint problems is presented.

Sensitivity analysis (SA) serves for...

This book assists the reader in determining storm risks, focussing on sandy coasts and cliff coasts in the context of expected sea level rise from littoral transformation and climate change. It examines storm impacts through matrixes concerning physical parameters, socio-economic activities, ecological and historic resources, and it presents the Coastline Risk to Storms Index as a single numerical measure of the risk for a given area.

The methodology is described and tested against two coastal areas: one in the Caribbean Sea (Cartagena, Colombia) and the other on the coast of the...

This book seeks to provide a comprehensive reconstruction of the 1667 Dalmatia earthquake phenomenon on the basis of eyewitness testimony. At the same time, one of the distinctive features of this book is that the earthquake observations are treated and arranged in time and space so as to provide earthquake data on the macroseismic intensity, which might be used in seismic hazard and risk studies.

On April 6, 1667 a devastating earthquake struck the southernmost region of Dalmatia (Croatia). Most of the affected area at that time belonged to the independent Republic of Ragusa, the...

This book is devoted to the problems that occur when attempting to understand and construct a concise representation of the original conditions, composition and dynamics of the evolution of the Earth-Moon system in the form in which it is seen today. This volume will perhaps contribute to a better understanding of what is necessary to research the dynamics of the Solar system.

This work reviews the mechanism of rifting with a focus on pre-existing tectonic weaknesses in pre-rift and/or basement rocks, i.e., on tectonic inheritance. The passive margins that are studied in this book are the Norwegian Continental Shelf, the Eastern North America and the East and West Indian Continental Margins. The continental rifts that have been analysed are the East African Rift System, the Brazilian Continental Rift Systems and the European Cenozoic Rift System. It states how rifts and passive margins serve as valuable locations for hydrocarbon exploration. Tectonic...

This book presents a new theory of effective stresses in soils, which takes into account the internal stresses caused by the molecular, electrostatic, and structural mechanical forces. These forces exist in thin hydrate films of adsorbed water molecules at the contacts of structural elements, producing the so-called disjoining effect. They can be evaluated by incorporating theoretical achievements of molecular physics and colloidal chemistry. The novel theory described in this book considers not only external but also internal stresses and gives different results for effective forces...