The Cyprus Institute

About: The Cyprus Institute is a other organization based out in Nicosia, Cyprus. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Aerosol & Environmental science. The organization has 418 authors who have published 1252 publications receiving 32586 citations.

Documentation of the decision-making process in the analysis of digital heritage objects

Abstract: Decision-making is a fundamental part of digital objects production in the field of digital heritage. We present in this paper our efforts on developing an application that will enable easy documentation of the decision-making processes, and provide access to digital objects used in various stages of the process. Our application is built on top of a data repository built in our group. On top of the repository we developed a functionality to represent and describe decisions in a structure of a hierarchical tree. Each step of the decision process is described by linking together data from the repository with decision descriptions. In order to access and explore available decisions and related data we developed an interactive visualization tools that shows the structure of the decision making process and provides access to each individual digital object and relevant information.

LIDO and CRM dig from a 3D cultural heritage documentation perspective

Abstract: The most important characteristic of Digital Libraries is their flexibility in exposing content. Typically a DL provides a search interface which allows resources to be found. These resources can be local or remote, depending on how the data are organised within the DL and on how these data are made available for harvesting from/to other DLs. This kind of communication is possible because the structures of different DLs are expressed in formal specifications. In particular, especially in Cultural Heritage where we need to describe an extremely heterogeneous environment, some metadata standards are emerging and mappings are proposed to allow metadata exchange and enrichment. The CIDOC-CRM is an ontology designed to mediate contents in the area of tangible cultural heritage and it is ISO 21127 : 2006 standard. In particular an extension of the CIDOC-CRM, known as CRMdig, enables to document information about data provenance and digital objects in a very precise way. LIDO is a rich metadata schema suitable for handling museum-related data, still under development but very promising. In this paper we propose an update of the CIDOC-CRM to LIDO mapping and using a case study we will compare how CIDOC-CRMdig and LIDO handle the digital information of an object.

Low-lying positive-parity excited states of the nucleon

Abstract: We present an overview of the correlation-matrix methods developed recently by the CSSM Lattice Collaboration for the isolation of excited states of the nucleon. Of particular interest is the first positive-parity excited-state of the nucleon known as the Roper resonance. Using eigenvectors of the correlation matrix we construct parity and eigenstate projected correlation functions which are analysed using standardized methods. The robust nature of this approach for extracting the eigenstate energies is presented. We report the importance of using a variety of source and sink smearings in achieving this. Ultimately the independence of the eigenstate energies from the interpolator basis is demonstrated. In particular we consider $4\times 4$ correlation matrices built from a variety of interpolators and smearing levels. Using FLIC fermions to access the light quark mass regime, we explore the curvature encountered in the energy of the states as the chiral limit is approached. We report a low-lying Roper state contrasting earlier results using correlation matrices. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first time a low-lying Roper resonance has been found using correlation matrix methods. Finally, we present our results in the context of the Roper results reported by other groups.

Applications of geoinformatics for the prevention and mitigation of natural hazards

Abstract: This Special Issue of Natural Hazards is entitled ‘‘Applications of Geoinformatics for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards.’’ It encompasses selected papers that were presented at the ‘‘Third International Conference on Remote Sensing and Geoinformation of Environment—RSCy2015’’ that was held in Cyprus from March, 16 to 19, 2015. The Special Issue comprises thirteen papers which cover a wide spectrum of geoinformatics applications. I am very glad to have been invited to act as the Guest Editor for this Special Issue of Natural Hazards. I consider it a privilege and an honor to closely collaborate with so many authors in order to deliver this volume after a strict anonymous review process. The first paper in this volume by Agapiou et al. forms an attempt to assess the risk of natural and anthropogenic hazards for cultural heritage in Cyprus by integrating multitemporal GIS and earth observation analyses based on homogeneous clustering of the local monuments under consideration. The proposed clustering of monuments is based on a variety of parameters, taking into consideration characteristics of their immediate environment. For each one of the five clusters of monuments studied, an analytical hierarchy process (AHP) method is followed in order to address the individual and unique characteristics of the monuments and sites. Subsequently, the weight factors from these clusters were interpolated to the whole district, prior to the application of the overall AHP risk assessment. Fiorani et al. report on the direct measurement of carbon dioxide in a volcanic plume as retrieved by a volcanic lidar, thus showing the high potential of laser remote sensing in early detection of volcanic hazard. Anomalous releases of carbon dioxide precede volcanic eruptions. The development of the volcanic lidars has been undertaken at the Italian National Agency for New Technologies, Energy and Sustainable Economic Development. Lidar profiling allows the scanning of volcanic plumes remotely in a fast and continuous