Wildfire management networks allow for collaborative intervention in mitigating the ever-present risk of major wildfire events. This thesis consists of two manuscripts that explore the topology and characteristics of wildfire management networks and their ability to influence wildfire severity in social-ecological systems. The first manuscript focuses on the characteristics of...
Like many areas around the globe experiencing ever-growing demand for diminishing natural resources, the south-central region of Texas is facing a wicked problem in water resource planning and sustainability. This Region includes San Antonio, the seventh largest city in the U.S. With a projected population increase over one million residents...
Renewable energy is on the rise in the U.S. Additional efforts will be required to integrate intermittent and decentralized sources of energy into the electrical grid. Given that storing large amounts of electricity is not yet available at a reasonable cost, electric grid operators must match supply and demand at...
Wildfires in the modern era have grown ever more destructive and dangerous following decades of suppression-only policies and climate change. Because of this, the wildfire incident management teams (IMTs) and their public information officers (PIOs) that manage these fires have taken on a more visible and important role, especially in...
California and Steller sea lions (Zalophus californianus, Eumetopias jubatus, respectively) are considered sentinel species because they have long life spans, are long-term coastal residents, feed at high trophic levels, and have large blubber stores that serve as depots for anthropogenic toxicants. There are few studies on sea lion health and...
We are witness to an ever tighter coupling between natural hazard-related disasters ("disasters") and violent social conflict ("conflict"). Previous research has established that disaster has the propensity to lead to conflict, and conflict, in turn, has been found to contribute to disaster vulnerabilities. The field of disaster diplomacy, by contrast,...
Private matching (PM) is a key cryptographic primitive in secure computation that allows several parties to jointly compute some functions depending on their private inputs. Indeed, this primitive has many practical applications. For instance, in online advertising, two companies may wish to find their common customers for a joint marketing...
Pets are reshaping human lifestyles in countries around the world. More people than ever include pets as part of their family. Organizations including the Society for Companion Animal Studies (SCAS) and the Human Animal Bond Research Institute (HABRI) have conducted and sponsored a wealth of research into human-companion animal interactions...
The global demand for food is expected to double by 2050, presenting a need that is complicated by the many interrelated of pressures on the world’s natural resources from climate change, growing urban populations, and increasing development. As one of the fastest growing food production sectors, aquaculture is poised to...
With the advent of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in every sphere of life in today's day and age, it has become increasingly important for non-AI experts to be able to comprehend the underlying logic of how AI systems work, assess them and find faults in these systems, particularly when they are...