Geography & Atmospheric Science Dissertations and Theses
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Recent Submissions
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The Geographies of Non-Lethal Weapons: Transformative Technologies and Political Violence
(University of Kansas, 2019-12-31)Non-lethal weapons, like police batons, rubber bullets and tear gas, are increasingly deployed in interventions against a rising number of bodies in contested spaces. They are formed through notions of (in)security and an ... -
Tracking hydrologic response of tile outlet terraces in agricultural systems to storm events
(University of Kansas, 2019-12-31)Title outlet terrace (TOT) systems have been employed for the last century as a best management practice (BMP) to control surface runoff and associated erosion in agricultural fields. By altering the topography (artificial ... -
Using Numerical Simulations to Assess Urban Heat Island Mitigation by Converting Vacant Areas into Green Spaces
(University of Kansas, 2019-12-31)Impervious surfaces and buildings in the urban environment alter the radiative balance and energy exchange in the boundary layer, increasing sensible heat flux and decreasing latent heat flux near the surface. This typically ... -
Tracking Multidecadal Lake Water Dynamics with Landsat Imagery and Topography/Bathymetry
(American Geophysical Union, 2019-10-10)Water resource management is of critical importance due to its close relationship with nearly every industry, field, and lifeform on this planet. The success of future water management will rely upon having detailed data ... -
Managing malaria: Selected maps of the twentieth century.
(University of Kansas, 2007-12-31)Understanding malaria's geographic occurrence throughout the world is amazingly complex. Jacques May wrote that "a whole atlas, comprising several dozens of maps, could justifiably be devoted to the cartographical ... -
Regional flow conditions associated with stratocumulus cloud-clearing events over the southeast Atlantic
(University of Kansas, 2019-08-31)Large, abrupt clearing events have been documented in the marine stratocumulus cloud deck that resides over the subtropical Southeast Atlantic Ocean. In these events, clouds are rapidly eroded along a line hundreds–to–thousands ... -
Pipelines, Protectors, and a Sense of Place: Media Representations of the Dakota Access Pipeline Protest
(University of Kansas, 2019-05-31)Indigenous resistance to the construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) garnered national and international media attention in 2016 as thousands gathered near the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation in protest. Increased ... -
Socio-Environmental Impacts of Argentine Yerba Mate Cultivation: “El Problema es el Precio Bajo”
(University of Kansas, 2019-05-31)Consumption in today’s globalized economy makes it difficult to understand the consequences of our actions across the globe. A political-ecological lens, informed by the work of Robert Sack and Ian Cook, can help guide an ... -
Ouray Postcard Sense-of-Place: Looking at Words and Reading Pictures
(University of Kansas, 2019-05-31)To modernize sense-of-place research methods and restore humanistic depth to the field of geography, this research is an exploration into inventive tools and techniques for sense-of-place investigations. A historical ... -
Structural diversity and ecosystem-resource relationships in tropical savanna and a legume-cereal intercrop
(University of Kansas, 2019-05-31)While the most productive ecosystems on Earth, correspondingly the most diverse, function within limitations of energy and resource flows, the general approach of high-yielding agriculture, in contrast, has been to simplify ... -
Archaeological predictive model of southwestern Kansas
(University of Kansas, 2006-12-31)Knowledge on the archaeological condition of southwestern Kansas is anomalously low, therefore a high-resolution archaeological predictive model has been constructed for the High Plains region of southwestern Kansas. Using ... -
In Our Country, but Outside Our Homeland: Identity and Diaspora Among Ukraine’s Internally Displaced Crimeans
(University of Kansas, 2018-12-31)In response to Russia’s annexation of the Crimean Peninsula in 2014, tens of thousands of Crimean residents have relocated to mainland Ukraine as Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs), including many ethnic Ukrainians, ... -
Rethinking the Scales of Eurasia: Geopolitical Narratives and Borders in Ukraine
(University of Kansas, 2018-12-31)Geopolitics relies on discursive constructions of world affairs to forge privileged meanings in the service of particular aims involving spatial relations. This study interrogates how geographical scale is used to spatialize ... -
A Paleosol-Derived Environmental Perspective on MIS 3 in the Central Great Plains
(University of Kansas, 2018-08-31)The Marine Isotope Stage (MIS) 3 Gilman Canyon Formation (GCF) is a unique stratigraphic unit prevalent throughout the Central Great Plains of North America and serves as an important underutilized archive of paleoenvironmental ... -
EFFECTS OF GREENSPACE CONFIGURATION ON THE URBAN HEAT ISLAND: A STUDY OF THE KANSAS CITY METROPOLITAN AREA
(University of Kansas, 2018-05-31)To investigate the relationship between greenspace pattern and UHIs we conducted a multi-resolution wavelet analysis of land surface temperature (LST) to determine the dominant length scales of LST. We used these scales ... -
Climatology of the San Francisco Bay and the Initiation of Wind Reversals along the Western United States Coast Determined from AMDAR Data
(University of Kansas, 2018-05-31)Observations from commercial aircraft through the Aircraft Meteorological Data Relay (AMDAR) automated weather reports provide a higher frequency sampling of the lower atmosphere than the twice daily radiosonde launches ... -
Using GIS and historical flood data to analyze the risk and vulnerability of a rural community, past and present: The Neosho River in Coffey County, Kansas
(University of Kansas, 2018-05-31)Flooding is among the most destructive natural disasters. Continuous monitoring of potential flooding is necessary for decision makers and planners. Using GIS, analysis and visual representation allow for vulnerable areas ... -
Relating Urban Morphology and Urban Heat Island During Extreme Heat Events in the Kansas City Metropolitan Area
(University of Kansas, 2018-05-31)Satellite images offer continuous spatial and temporal coverage of surface temperature, thus allowing us to transcend limitations of in-situ measurements and giving us a powerful tool to understand the Urban Heat Island ... -
QUANTITATIVE CHARACTERIZATION AND PEDOGENIC DEVELOPMENT OF SOIL STRUCTURE
(University of Kansas, 2018-05-31)Soil particles are often arranged into repeating patterns of aggregates with similar shapes, sizes, and degrees of expression. These repeating aggregates, known as ‘peds,’ are currently described using qualitative and ... -
Influence of Grassland Heterogeneity on Land-Atmosphere Coupling
(University of Kansas, 2018-05-31)Land surface processes and interactions with the atmosphere have been identified as a weak point in our understanding of the Earth's climate system and contribute to uncertainty in projections of future climate. This ...