Displaying 10 of 356 results for "J Van Der Beek" clear search
Modeling land use change from smallholder agricultural intensification
Agricultural expansion in the rural tropics brings much needed economic and social development in developing countries. On the other hand, agricultural development can result in the clearing of biologically-diverse and carbon-rich forests. To achieve both development and conservation objectives, many government policies and initiatives support agricultural intensification, especially in smallholdings, as a way to increase crop production without expanding farmlands. However, little is understood regarding how different smallholders might respond to such investments for yield intensification. It is also unclear what factors might influence a smallholder’s land-use decision making process. In this proposed research, I will use a bottom-up approach to evaluate whether investments in yield intensification for smallholder farmers would really translate to sustainable land use in Indonesia. I will do so by combining socioeconomic and GIS data in an agent-based model (Land-Use Dynamic Simulator multi-agent simulation model). The outputs of my research will provide decision makers with new and contextualized information to assist them in designing agricultural policies to suit varying socioeconomic, geographic and environmental contexts.
Sudhira’s research has been primarily on urban land-use and land cover change studies exploring their consequences on environmental sustainability and understanding their inter-relationship with transportation. His broader research addresses the evolution and growth of towns and cities invoking complexity sciences, understanding planning practices and studying the effect of varied governance structures.
Water scarcity generated by climate change and mismanagement, affects individual at microlevel and the society and the system at a more general level. The research focuses on irrigation system and their robustness and adaptation capacity to uncertainty. In particular it investigates the evolution of farmers interactions and the effectiveness of policies by means of dynamic game theory and incorporate the results into an Agent Based Model to explore farmers emergent behaviors and the role of an agency in defining policies. Early knowledge of individual decision makers could help the agency to design more acceptable solutions.
Sae Schatz, Ph.D., is an applied human–systems researcher, professional facilitator, and cognitive scientist. Her work focuses on human–systems integration (HSI), with an emphasis on human cognition and learning, instructional technologies, adaptive systems, human performance assessment, and modeling and simulation (M&S). Frequently, her work seeks to enhance individual’s higher-order cognitive skills (i.e., the mental, emotional, and relational skills associated with “cognitive readiness”).
The goal of my research program is to improve our understanding about highly integrated natural and human processes. Within the context of Land-System Science, I seek to understand how natural and human systems interact through feedback mechanisms and affect land management choices among humans and ecosystem (e.g., carbon storage) and biophysical processes (e.g., erosion) in natural systems. One component of this program involves finding novel methods for data collection (e.g., unmanned aerial vehicles) that can be used to calibrate and validate models of natural systems at the resolution of decision makers. Another component of this program involves the design and construction of agent-based models to formalize our understanding of human decisions and their interaction with their environment in computer code. The most exciting, and remaining part, is coupling these two components together so that we may not only quantify the impact of representing their coupling, but more importantly to assess the impacts of changing climate, technology, and policy on human well-being, patterns of land use and land management, and ecological and biophysical aspects of our environment.
To achieve this overarching goal, my students and I conduct fieldwork that involves the use of state-of-the-art unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) in combination with ground-based light detection and ranging (LiDAR) equipment, RTK global positioning system (GPS) receivers, weather and soil sensors, and a host of different types of manual measurements. We bring these data together to make methodological advancements and benchmark novel equipment to justify its use in the calibration and validation of models of natural and human processes. By conducting fieldwork at high spatial resolutions (e.g., parcel level) we are able to couple our representation of natural system processes at the scale at which human actors make decisions and improve our understanding about how they react to changes and affect our environment.
land use; land management; agricultural systems; ecosystem function; carbon; remote sensing; field measurements; unmanned aerial vehicle; human decision-making; erosion, hydrological, and agent-based modelling
I currently work on an agent-based model on energy-efficient renovation decisions.
Utilizing physics, especially thermodynamics, to model human history.
Electrical and Computer Engineer (NTU, Athens), M.Sc. and Ph.D. on Artificial Intelligence (Univ. Paris VI, France). Formerly senior researcher in the Institute of Communication and Computer Systems (NTU, Athens). I have taught a variety of courses on intelligent, complex and biological systems and cognitive science. I have participated in numerous national and european R&D projects and I have authored about a hundred articles in journals, books and conference proceedings, at least half of them as a single author. I am frequent reviewer for journals, conferences and research grants. My research interests lie on the intersection of biological, complex and cognitive systems and applications.
Area: Complex Biological, Social and Sociotechnical Systems
Specific focus: Origins of intelligent behavior
Development and usage of demographic microsimulation tools and applications, in particular combining statistical modeling and social theory
Displaying 10 of 356 results for "J Van Der Beek" clear search