Related papers: Floating Cities, Islands and States
One of the unique features associated with the Earth is that the fraction of its surface covered by land is comparable to that spanned by its oceans and other water bodies. Here, we investigate how extraterrestrial biospheres depend on the…
Many extrasolar (bound) terrestrial planets and free-floating (unbound) planets have been discovered. The existence of bound and unbound terrestrial planets with liquid water is an important question, and of particular importance is the…
Earth likely acquired much of its inventory of volatile elements during the main stage of its formation. Some of Earth's proto-atmosphere must therefore have survived the giant impacts, collisions between planet-sized bodies, that dominate…
The 15-minute city concept, which advocates for cities where essential services are accessible within a 15-minute walk or bike ride, has gained significant attention in recent years. However, despite being celebrated for promoting…
Despite the importance and vulnerability of small island nations and their ecosystems, they frequently have insufficient observations to provide baseline or long-term perspectives on climate variability and change, and global model…
As urbanization and climate change progress, urban heat island effects are becoming more frequent and severe. To formulate effective mitigation plans, cities require detailed air temperature data, yet conventional machine learning models…
If humanity is ever to consider substantial, long-term colonization of Mars, the resources needed are going to be extensive. For a long-term human presence on Mars to be established, serious thought would need to be given to terraforming…
Cities are some of the most intricate and advanced creations of humanity. Most objects in cities are perfectly synchronised to coordinate activities such as jobs, education, transportation, entertainment, and waste management. Although each…
Water and land surfaces on a planet interact with gases in the atmosphere and with radiation from the star. These interactions define the environments that prevail on the planet, some of which may be more amenable to prebiotic chemistry,…
Ocean General Circulation Models require extensive computational resources to reach equilibrium states, while deep learning emulators, despite offering fast predictions, lack the physical interpretability and long-term stability necessary…
The tidal heating of hypothetical rocky (or terrestrial) extra-solar planets spans a wide range of values depending on stellar masses and initial orbits. Tidal heating may be sufficiently large (in many cases, in excess of radiogenic…
Although tidally-locked habitable planets orbiting nearby M-dwarf stars are among the best astronomical targets to search for extrasolar life, they may also be deficient in volatiles and water. Climate models for this class of planets show…
On a planet without atmosphere, sustaining human life is very difficult and dangerous, especially during short sunlit period when low temperature prevails. To counter these environmental stresses, the author offer an innovative artificial…
The habitable fraction of a planet's surface is important for the detectability of surface biosignatures. The extent and distribution of habitable areas is influenced by external parameters that control the planet's climate, atmospheric…
We consider the problem of constructing public facilities, such as hospitals, airports, or malls, in a country with a non-uniform population density, such that the average distance from a person's home to the nearest facility is minimized.…
I propose the Cosmic Hitchhikers hypothesis as follows. Advanced extraterrestrial civilizations may use free-floating planets as interstellar transportation for space exploration and interstellar colonization. Large groups or populations of…
Many cities are expanding in areas with scarce rainfall and limited water retention capacity, and are also becoming elongated and sprawled, making it harder to deliver services. This study quantifies the impact of urban form on access to…
Planets less massive than about 10 MEarth are expected to have no massive H-He atmosphere and a cometary composition (50% rocks, 50% water, by mass) provided they formed beyond the snowline of protoplanetary disks. Due to inward migration,…
The authors suggest a low cost closed AB-Dome, which may protect small cities such as Sederot from rockets, mortar shells, chemical and biological weapons. The offered AB-Dome is also very useful in peacetime because it protects the city…
Two new interplanetary technologies have advanced in the past decade to the point where they may enable exciting, affordable missions that reach further and faster deep into the outer regions of our solar system: (i) small and capable…