[en] The Norwegian University of Life Sciences (NMBU) started global radiation (G) measurements in 1949. PAR measurements started in 1978 as part of a Nordic project. The project terminated in 1981, but the measurements continued at NMBU. We have used the data from the Nordic project’s seven stations and the long time series from NMBU to investigate the limitations of using the relative flux density method for the estimation of PAR from G. The yearly mean value of the relative flux density PAR/G at NMBU is 0.48 with a standard deviation of 0.02. The monthly mean values of PAR/G show a seasonal variation, with its maximum (0.50) in late summer and minimum in the winter months (0.45). The seasonal variation corresponds to 15% difference in relative cloud cover. Data from the original Nordic project gave the opportunity to investigate the usability of the relative flux density method in the Nordic area. The flux ratio for July was generally larger than the ratio for September or October, even though the differences are small and not statistically significant. In trying to explain this, one obvious candidate is the cloud cover. In the lack of cloud data, time records of global radiation were used to select fair weather and overcast days. For all stations, fair days show higher flux ratios and overcast days show lower flux ratios. Neglect of cloud cover may lead to an error in the calculation of PAR from the simple formula PAR = constant G of the order of 10%.

[en] Climate model projections are usually utilised to assess how the climate will change or develop in the future. Climate models are simplified representations of the Earth’s climate system, that allow us to know the possible evolution of climate in the future (Garijo and Mediero 2018). Climate models are forced with the expected evolution of a set of variables, such as greenhouse gas emissions, to assess how climate change will affect climatic variables, such as precipitation. Global Climate Models (GCM) usually have a gross spatial resolution. Thus, regionalization methods are used to obtain results at a higher spatial resolution. In Spain, there are two main data sources of climate change projections under the Fifth Assessment Report (AR5) of the IPCC: AEMET (‘Agencia Estatal de Meteorología’, in Spanish) and CORDEX. AEMET generated climatic projections in a set of existing rain-gauging stations throughout Spain by statistical regionalisation. The CORDEX project offers several realisations of Regional Climate Models (RCM), producing climatic data over a mesh focused on a given area of the planet. For example, EURO-CORDEX focuses on Europe (Jacob et al. 2014). Despite several studies were carried out in recent years assessing how climate models simulate the current climate (Frei et al. 2003; Jacob et al. 2007; Mascaro et al. 2018), few studies were focused on Spain. A comparison between AEMET projections and observations at rain-gauging stations was conducted by Garijo et al. (2018), finding that such projections characterise better the mean climate behaviour than the extremes. However, no studies examine how EURO-CORDEX model simulations fit observed data over the Iberian Peninsula, and, therefore, how proper simulations of EURO-CORDEX climate models are for consequent studies. In this manuscript, EURO-CORDEX projections are investigated, to assess how precipitation simulated by climate models fit the actual behaviour of observed precipitation time series. Such assessment is based on a set of statistics that represent the spatial and temporal distribution of rainfall.

[en] The original version of this article unfortunately contained a mistake. Please find below the relevant part of the Appendix, with changes in the last 2 formulae.

[en] This analysis of the frequency, intensity, and duration of thermal inversions is based on daily minimum (tn) and maximum (tx) temperatures recorded over 3 years at 16 pairs of data loggers located under forest cover in the Jura Mountains of France. Each pair consists of a logger located at the bottom of a depression and another located higher up either nearby (local site) or more than 40 km away (regional site). The daily frequency of inversions is maximum at local sites for tn (50%) and minimum for tx at regional sites (4%). The maximum intensity of the inversions reaches 15.1 °C for tn and 16.2 °C for tx. The average intensity is about 2 °C: 1.5 °C for tx at local sites and 2.4 °C at regional sites. The duration of inversions is generally short: 60% of them last less than a day. Of the inversions that last for more than 1 day, 15% exceed 3 days and the maximum duration observed is 22 days. The relationship between the diurnal amplitude of temperature and the frequency, intensity, and duration of inversions indicates that mesoscale atmospheric conditions directly influence inversions.

[en] The personnel organization of radiation protection is one of the cornerstones for a functioning radiation protection in companies. For this reason, committee A7 of the Commission on Radiation Protection (SSK) has dealt with this topic in detail on behalf of the Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety.

[en] Drought is one of the most damaging natural hazards in the Iberian Peninsula (IP), causing varied socioeconomic and environmental impacts (Maia and Serrano 2017). To prevent these impacts, there must be a close cooperation between Portugal (PT) and Spain (SP), namely regarding drought planning and management in the IP, as the two countries share five river basins, to which correspond four international River Basin Districts (Minho and Lima river basins on a same RBD, both in Portugal and in Spain). Unlike Portugal, which only approved a national drought plan in 2017, Spain has already approved (in 2007) and implemented drought plans in all the RBDs, and those have been revised in 2017. In the Spanish plans, two types of indicators are defined: prolonged drought indicators and scarcity indicators. In this context, the main objective of the present work was the definition of indicators in the Portuguese part of Minho and Lima river basins, corresponding to those that have been established in the drought plan of the Spanish part of both basins (CHMS 2017). A comparison was made between the Portuguese and Spanish parts of the two basins regarding the values and evolution of the indicators. This work is aimed to be a prototype for the definition of new and similar drought indicators to be applied in common by Portugal and Spain, in the shared river basins, and was developed in close collaboration with the Portuguese Minho and Lima RBD and the corresponding Spanish RBD authorities (respectively APA - Agência Portuguesa do Ambiente and CMS - Confederación del Miño-Sil) under the scope of the RISC-ML project (RISC_ML 2018).

[en] The dam break study of this communication uses two interrelated sub-models: a) the dam breach submodel and b) the hydrodynamic routing sub-model. The first sub-model generates the flood hydrograph from the dam which is derived for a specific set of the parameters describing the breach process. This is also the input for the hydrodynamic model, with which simulates the flood wave propagation in the computational domain. Due to complexity, dam breach parameters are characterised by significant uncertainties, which are propagated to the output of the dam-breach sub-model and the consequent hydrodynamic model. Therefore, it is not safe to derive a unique solution for the flood hydrograph, without taking into account the uncertainty of the simulated results. In this study, a forward uncertainty analysis is implemented in order to quantify and propagate uncertainty introduced by the dam breach parameters, in a real-world case study.

[en] Brief history of the German quiver project and background for experiments In the German history of atoms for peace the back-end perspective changed substantially several times. Although it seemed far away when the plants started commercial operation in the seventies, a moving target on such a lang lead item can easily create problems. All German commercial plants (table 1) were equipped with an unlimited license and there was not a strict design lifetime.

[en] Preface

Introduction:

The Applied Nanotechnology and Nanoscience International Conference is an international meeting organized in a different European country each year. The Chairs Committee and Plenary Speakers change each year in order to enrich the content and provide the participants with different views.

After the success of Paris (2015) and Barcelona (2016), the Applied Nanotechnology and Nanoscience International Conference 2017 was held in Rome, on October 18^th -20^th. (paper)

[en] We use the adversarial risk analysis (ARA) framework to deal with the protection of a critical networked infrastructure from the attacks of intelligent adversaries. We deploy an ARA model for each relevant element (node, link, hotspot in link) in the network, using a Sequential Defend–Attack–Defend template as a reference. Such ARA models are related by resource constraints and result aggregation over various sites, for both the Defender and the Attacker. As a case study, we consider the protection of a section of the Spanish railway network from a potential terrorist attack.