09
Podcasts
What is a Tipping Point?
IHRR
Online
Reports
Tipping Points
Annual Report
The first annual report from IHRR’s Tipping
Points project is available. It gives an overview
of the project’s progress so far along with its
aims and goals for the future. In its first year
the project has shown that there is clearly much
more to ‘tipping point’ than simply being a popular
‘buzz word’ and that it may actually describe
something quite profound about the physical
and social world we live in.
http://bit.ly/pfTmnM
Building Rural Resilience
in Seismically Active Areas
A research brief was published by IHRR on the
NERC and ESRC-funded project ‘Increasing
Resilience to Natural Hazards’. This project
focuses on how to increase the resilience of rural
communities in Nepal to earthquakes and their
secondary hazards, such as landslides. There is a
clear role to play for both the physical and social
sciences in engaging with communities vulnerable
to earthquakes, especially communities in
developing countries such as Nepal.
http://bit.ly/iK0VHX
A flood scientist, mathematician, geographer,
political scientist, English Studies professor, and
others, talk about what tipping point means for
them in their respective fields and beyond. So if
you’re interested in exploring the ‘meaning’ of
tipping point, give it a listen. http://bit.ly/leTvOe
Brownfield Regeneration
In this podcast from ROBUST (Regeneration of
Brownfield Land Using Sustainable Technologies)
project, Dr Karen Johnson explains different
aspects of the project including how to remediate
brownfield land using recycled minerals known as
manganese oxides left from the water treatment
industry and other sources. http://bit.ly/ozPc8F
Insurers using computer modelling
to identify ‘risky clients’
This podcast from a graduate of the MA in Risk,
Health and Public Policy at Durham University
explains how some insurance companies are using
computer modelling and data mining of people’s
lifestyle choices found on the internet to evaluate
health-related risks.
http://bit.ly/pM038
Video
Tabletop strike-slip
earthquake experiment
Dr Alex Densmore demonstrates the strikeslip behaviour of an earthquake using basic
materials you can find at home. This video is
appropriate for teaching younger and older
people (or anyone else in between) about
how earthquakes occur.
http://vimeo.com/32287249
Uncovering the climate
of the past in Greenland
Scientists from the Tipping Points project travel
to Greenland to collect artifacts (insects and
pollen grains) that will help them uncover the
mystery of a rapid cooling event that took place
in the North Atlantic around 5000 years ago.
http://vimeo.com/36511751
Building Resilience to Landslides
in Mountain Communities
Screencast seminar from Prof Dave Petley
on how mountain communities in Nepal,
Japan and other countries throughout the
world build resilience to landslides.
http://vimeo.com/31140142