University of the Aegean

About: University of the Aegean is a education organization based out in Mytilene, Greece. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Context (language use). The organization has 2818 authors who have published 8100 publications receiving 179275 citations. The organization is also known as: UAEG.

Model projected heat extremes and air pollution in the eastern Mediterranean and Middle East in the twenty-first century

Abstract: The eastern Mediterranean and Middle East, a region with diverse socioeconomic and cultural identities, is exposed to strong climatic gradients between its temperate north and arid south. Model projections of the twenty-first century indicate increasing hot weather extremes and decreasing rainfall. We present model results, which suggest that across the Balkan Peninsula and Turkey climate change is particularly rapid, and especially summer temperatures are expected to increase strongly. Temperature rise can be amplified by the depletion of soil moisture, which limits evaporative cooling, prompted by the waning of large-scale weather systems that generate rain. Very hot summers that occurred only rarely in the recent past are projected to become common by the middle and the end of the century. Throughout the region, the annual number of heat wave days may increase drastically. Furthermore, conditions in the region are conducive for photochemical air pollution. Our model projections suggest strongly increasing ozone formation, a confounding health risk factor particularly in urban areas. This adds to the high concentrations of aerosol particles from natural (desert dust) and anthropogenic sources. The heat extremes may have strong impacts, especially in the Middle East where environmental stresses are plentiful.

Functional analysis : an introduction

Abstract: Hilbert spaces and basic operator theory: Linear spaces normed spaces first examples Hilbert spaces The dual space Bounded linear operators Spectrum. Fredholm theory of compact operators Self-adjoint operators Functions of operators spectral decomposition Basics of functional analysis: Spectral theory of unitary operators The fundamental theorems and the basic methods Banach algebras Unbounded self-adjoint and symmetric operators in $H$ Solutions to exercises Bibliography Symbols index Subject index.

Who Becomes an Unwed Mother in Greece? Sociodemographic and Geographical Aspects of an Emerging Phenomenon

Abstract: Out of all European countries, the one with the lowest rate of childbearing outside marriage is Greece. However, it seems that the traditional attitudes towards family formation and childbearing have begun to change in Greece as well. Illegitimacy ratio has increased fourfold in less than 30 years. It is by using the vital statistics provided by the National Statistical Service of Greece that this paper answers to research questions regarding the sociodemographic profile of unwed mothers in Greece, in terms of educational level, age, and nationality. It also tries to find out what are the reasons of non-marital childbearing in Greece and to investigate the geographical variation of this phenomenon within the country. A key finding is that the rise in the illegitimacy ratio from the 1990s onwards is largely due to the inflow of immigrants from other countries, mostly from the former Eastern Bloc. The social profile of these unwed mothers is totally different from their Greek counterparts, implying that foreign nationals who have children outside marriage do so by conviction and not because an unwanted pregnancy resulted to birth, which is mostly the case with Greek unwed mothers. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Intercomparison of shortwave radiative transfer schemes in global aerosol modeling: results from the AeroCom Radiative Transfer Experiment

Abstract: In this study we examine the performance of 31 global model radiative transfer schemes in cloud-free conditions with prescribed gaseous absorbers and no aerosols (Rayleigh atmosphere), with prescribed scattering-only aerosols, and with more absorbing aerosols. Results are compared to benchmark results from high-resolution, multi-angular line-by-line radiation models. For purely scattering aerosols, model bias relative to the line-by-line models in the top-of-the atmosphere aerosol radiative forcing ranges from roughly −10 to 20%, with over- and underestimates of radiative cooling at lower and higher solar zenith angle, respectively. Inter-model diversity (relative standard deviation) increases from ~10 to 15% as solar zenith angle decreases. Inter-model diversity in atmospheric and surface forcing decreases with increased aerosol absorption, indicating that the treatment of multiple-scattering is more variable than aerosol absorption in the models considered. Aerosol radiative forcing results from multi-stream models are generally in better agreement with the line-by-line results than the simpler two-stream schemes. Considering radiative fluxes, model performance is generally the same or slightly better than results from previous radiation scheme intercomparisons. However, the inter-model diversity in aerosol radiative forcing remains large, primarily as a result of the treatment of multiple-scattering. Results indicate that global models that estimate aerosol radiative forcing with two-stream radiation schemes may be subject to persistent biases introduced by these schemes, particularly for regional aerosol forcing.

Biodiversity and ecosystem functioning: reconciling the results of experimental and observational studies

Abstract: Biodiversity and ecosystem functioning research has been some of the most controversial of the last decade but rapid progress has been made by deriving hypotheses from the differing view points and challenging them with appropriate experimental and analytical tests (Loreau et al. 2001). Here we address some recent criticisms of the BIODEPTH project (Thompson et al. 2005) and show that: 1. While legume species play an important role in the BIODEPTH results, patterns are not generally consistent with the multispecies sampling effect for legumes proposed by Huston & McBride (2002) as suggested in Thompson et al. (2005). 2. The BIODEPTH results are also not consistent with transient biodiversity effects. Levels of species diversity were generally maintained over the 3 years of the project (i.e. little competitive exclusion) and diversity-productivity relationships in BIODEPTH generally strengthened during the experiments.