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Resilience Beyond Earth: The Human Determinants of Sustainability
No full textAs humanity prepares for a continued presence beyond Earth, sustainability must extend beyond engineering and environmental systems to include the human dimensions of sustainability. Building on resilience science and human systems theory, this work introduces an integrative human systems framework that identifies key psychological, cultural, and institutional drivers shaping how communities adapt and thrive over time in complex environments.
While technology supports survival, long-term sustainability also depends on how human systems evolve together as people maintain well-being, adapt behaviorally, cooperate across cultures, and govern shared resources under constraint. This work highlights four interrelated determinants of sustainable human adaptation including psychological well-being, behavioral adaptation, cultural cohesion, and institutional governance.
Drawing on research in space mission psychology, cross-cultural collaboration, and sustainability governance, the framework demonstrates how integrating these human determinants fosters resilience both beyond Earth and within our own planet’s communities. By understanding and designing for the factors that sustain people rather than only systems, we can build societies that endure and evolve in the face of change
Localized Nuclear Utility for ERAU Environmental Improvement
No full textThe reliance of Embry Riddle Aeronautical University (ERAU) on energy supplied by Florida Power & Light (FPL), which currently draws large amounts of power from fossil fuel sources, is continuously suboptimal both environmentally and financially. This study proposes assessing the feasibility of deploying a campus scale nuclear reactor tailored to ERAU’s power consumption profile. This serves as a path toward reducing greenhouse gas emissions and limiting dependence on external fossil fuel generation. The methods used are primarily literature review(s), and numerical analysis on comparable use cases. The literature reviews focused on design theory and yield of nuclear reactors on a large scale, along with the use of lower yield nuclear reactors in cases with similar power needs, for instance aircraft carrier reactors and nuclear submarine reactors. Numerical analysis included deriving when the university could expect monetary return and the cost of maintenance, among other considerations. Some naval nuclear reactors are capable of providing up to 700 MW of thermal power, and enough steam for 125 MW of electricity, with submarine reactors being in the 50 MW range. Considering the power usage in Daytona is around the 90 MW range, a reactor like the ones researched could power ERAU and potentially oVset the cost by providing power to nearby areas. For the university, this would be an opportunity to have another source of income through power generation, promote academic expansion, and act as a significant step forward in the acceptance of nuclear power in more applications
Jeopardy: International Edition
No full textTest your knowledge of world geography, languages, global pop culture, and international firsts—perfect for friendly competition and bragging rights
Jeopardy: International Edition
No full textTest your knowledge of world geography, languages, global pop culture, and international firsts—perfect for friendly competition and bragging rights
Repurposed Wetlands - A Case Study of a Reconstructed Urban Stormwater System along East Central Florida’s Halifax River
No full textWetlands play a critical role in functioning watershed systems. They act as natural sinks for absorbing excess water, mitigating flood risk while also removing and sequestering surplus nutrients, pollutants, and sediments from stormwater runoff before it enters other water bodies. In highly urbanized areas, impervious surfaces restrict runoff infiltration, exacerbating flooding and pollution impacts. The Halifax River, an urbanized estuarine lagoon system located in East Central Florida and an important part of the broader Halifax watershed, is encompassed by large portions of impervious surfaces in the adjacent cities. In this case study, an existing detention pond connected to the Halifax River outfall canal system was retrofitted with a stormwater treatment system to help improve filtration of pollutants and excess nutrients. This project details the planning, construction, and in-situ water quality data collection and monitoring, documenting the before, during, and after impacts of the treatment wetland’s construction. The initial monitoring began in Winter 2017 and concluded post-construction monitoring in Summer 2019. Remote sensing images from Dec. 2017, Nov. 2019, Nov. 2021, and Jan. 2023 were downloaded from the USGS Earth Explorer and analysed with vegetation indices (NDVI) to evaluate the wetland’s long-term productivity trends and current conditions. Additionally, single and multivariate statistical analyses were conducted with the water quality data, such as salinity, TKN, and NO3, and evaluated across the project’s stages (pre-, during, and post-restoration). The remote sensing analysis indicates development and maturation of the wetland vegetation, while multivariate analysis shows significant differences in water quality variables post-restoration compared to those collected at the pre- and during stages. Treatment wetlands can better support urbanized areas, particularly when retrofitting the existing system, reducing hazard and pollution impacts while creating hotspots for biodiversity and increasing watershed functionality
George Henderson Wilson Course 14 Biography
Get PDFBiography of RAF cadet George Henderson Wilson who was killed in a plane crash on September 1, 1943, while training to be a pilot at 5BFTS. He is buried in the Commonwealth War Graves Commission British Plot. at Oak Ridge Cemetery, Arcadia alongside his co-pilot, Robert Albert Wood who died in the same crash
Engineering Clean Water: Pure Water Project
No full textAfter earthquakes devastated Haiti in 2010, a team of Embry-Riddle students and faculty built and installed a solar-powered water purifier to improve both the environmental and human health concerns created by the lack of infrastructure, clean water, and sanitation. Since then, the group Pure Water Project has installed 10 water purifiers in orphanages, clinics, schools, and community centers in Haiti and the Dominican Republic. The group relies on its partner selection criteria and local contacts to determine the best locations for the purifiers. Once determined, teams of students (Mechanical, Electrical, and WASH) construct the purifiers in ERAU’s Energy Systems Laboratory. In May, Pure Water Project students and faculty installed the purifier to accomplish the group’s overall goal: to use engineering principles to provide clean water to areas in need. A final component of the project is to launch a micro-business on-site. The local operators are empowered with ongoing maintenance and operation of the system, as well as the micro-business operations
Aviation’s Net-Zero Emission Goals of 2050: U.S. Travelers’ Perspectives
No full textIn 2021, the United States released the Aviation Climate Action Plan, its first roadmap for achieving net-zero aviation emissions by 2050. The plan outlines policies to advance sustainable aviation through collaboration among manufacturers, airlines, fuel providers, air traffic controllers, and airports. Achieving such ambitious goals will require substantial effort. However, while policy actions have been widely discussed, limited attention has been given to public perspectives on the plan, and it remains unclear how U.S. travelers view the net-zero emission goals. This study examined U.S. travelers’ perspectives and intentions regarding aviation’s net-zero emission goals. Specifically, it (1) investigated whether attitudinal, normative, environmental, and policy factors influence the perceived achievability of the 2050 goals; (2) evaluated travelers’ perceptions of goal relevance and their intentions to support these goals; and (3) assessed how these factors shape travelers’ willingness to take voluntary actions that contribute to emission reduction. To address these questions, six predictors—attitudes, subjective norms, government leadership, environmental self-identity, information availability, and perceived relevance—were analyzed for their effects on perceived goal achievability and the intention to fly less. Data were collected from U.S. travelers using convenience sampling and analyzed with structural equation modeling (SEM). Results show that attitudes, subjective norms, government leadership, perceived relevance, and environmental self-identity significantly influenced perceived achievability and intentions to reduce air travel. Further analysis revealed that U.S. travelers were influenced primarily by external factors, with government leadership and information availability emerging as the strongest predictors
Bridging Ecology and Technology: The Role of UAS in Enhancing Spatial and Temporal Environmental Data Collection
No full textThe integration of uncrewed aircraft systems (UAS) into ecosystem research has expanded significantly in both scope and precision, driven by advances in platform technology, data processing capabilities, and the development of adaptive sensor payloads. Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University (ERAU), a recognized leader in aviation innovation, leverages established partnerships with environmental scientists, municipal agencies, and organizations such as the Brevard Zoo and Stetson University Institute for Water and Environmental Resilience to advance environmental monitoring through aerial sensing technologies.
The research team has extensive experience conducting complex UAS operations and developing innovative methodologies for environmental observation and remote sensing. Utilizing state-of-the-art RGB, multispectral, thermal, and LiDAR imaging technologies, the team’s efforts are designed to augment traditional monitoring methods by addressing spatial and temporal data gaps. These aerial data products provide critical insights that support water quality management, ecosystem health assessments, and climate change research.
This interdisciplinary collaboration unites environmental scientists, engineers, and UAS operations specialists to develop scalable and replicable monitoring frameworks. The team’s adaptive approach enables coverage of remote and inaccessible locations using long-range UAS platforms. In particular, the group’s vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) systems, capable of Beyond Visual Line of Sight (BVLOS) operations currently authorized in Florida, exemplify the next generation of environmentally focused aerial research and data acquisition
