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Prof. Francesco Pilla
University College Dublin

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Short Biography

My work lies at the intersection between cities and technologies. My goal is to build better cities through technology, innovation and citizen participation. I focus on giving a voice to local communities using technology so they can build an argument to tackle local issues with data. I'm leveraging my European projects to bring climate action in education. In specific, I'm showing children in primary and secondary schools how they could have an active role in making our cities and communities more sustainable.

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Case report
Published: 31 July 2021 in Cities
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Social media services such as TripAdvisor and Foursquare can provide opportunities for users to exchange their opinions about urban green space (UGS). Visitors can exchange their experiences with parks, woods, and wetlands in social communities via social networks. In this work, we implement a unified topic modeling approach to reveal UGS characteristics. Leveraging Artificial Intelligence techniques for opinion mining using the mentioned platforms (e.g., TripAdvisor and Foursquare) reviews is a novel application to UGS quality assessments. We show how specific characteristics of different green spaces can be explored by using a tailor-optimized sentiment analysis model. Such an application can support local authorities and stakeholders in understanding—and justification for—future urban green space investments.

ACS Style

Mohammadhossein Ghahramani; Nadina J. Galle; Carlo Ratti; Francesco Pilla. Tales of a city: Sentiment analysis of urban green space in Dublin. Cities 2021, 103395 .

AMA Style

Mohammadhossein Ghahramani, Nadina J. Galle, Carlo Ratti, Francesco Pilla. Tales of a city: Sentiment analysis of urban green space in Dublin. Cities. 2021; ():103395.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Mohammadhossein Ghahramani; Nadina J. Galle; Carlo Ratti; Francesco Pilla. 2021. "Tales of a city: Sentiment analysis of urban green space in Dublin." Cities , no. : 103395.

Journal article
Published: 12 July 2021 in IEEE Access
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Transport emissions, including road, rail, air, and marine transportation, account for a large part of the overall emissions; hence, there is a need to review strategies for managing associated issues and coping with negative impacts. A simultaneous improvement in economic efficiency can help us achieve our desired objectives in the concerned context. Sharing economy, i.e., a peer-to-peer-based sharing of access to assets, can help reduce the total resources required and consequently reduce carbon footprints. In line with this objective, we propose an intelligent model to study carbon dioxide emissions from road transport using taxi trips in Dublin, Ireland. The proposed method is a hybrid unsupervised learning approach tailored for the particular structure of the problem. We present how an intelligent approach can be implemented to model CO2 emissions from road transport. The model categorizes taxis based on different features related to the emissions they release. Five clusters are detected, which can be attributed to varying levels of emissions. Accordingly, those vehicles labeled as the highest emitters can be targeted for further improvements in reducing CO2, i.e., replacing pollutant cars with electric cars or including them in the taxi fleet as sharing ones only.

ACS Style

Mohammadhossein Ghahramani; Francesco Pilla. Analysis of Carbon Dioxide Emissions From Road Transport Using Taxi Trips. IEEE Access 2021, 9, 98573 -98580.

AMA Style

Mohammadhossein Ghahramani, Francesco Pilla. Analysis of Carbon Dioxide Emissions From Road Transport Using Taxi Trips. IEEE Access. 2021; 9 ():98573-98580.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Mohammadhossein Ghahramani; Francesco Pilla. 2021. "Analysis of Carbon Dioxide Emissions From Road Transport Using Taxi Trips." IEEE Access 9, no. : 98573-98580.

Books book
Published: 25 June 2021 in Sundarbans Mangrove Systems
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Mangrove ecosystem is providing a substantial amount of ecosystem services (ESs) that has a positive impact on human well-being. Indian Sundarbans is one of the biodiversity hotspots in the world and declared as “World Heritage Site” by UNESCO. The present chapter presents the application of satellite remote sensing data to assess the economic value of the Indian Sundarbans. Ten machine learning (ML) supervised classification models were employed for land use land cover classification and subsequent interpretation. Multiple accuracy assessment tests, including user’s accuracy, producer’s accuracy (PA), kappa statistics, and Jaccard similarity test, were performed for validating the accuracy of the models. Economic valuation of natural capitals was computed using benefits transfer approach. Among the models, maximum likelihood classification (MLC) algorithm has the lowest accuracy observed throughout the study period, except for the year 1973. While the random forest (RF) and support vector machine (SVM) models performed most accurately. Also, among the models, the high similarity is found for SVM, RF, Bayes and artificial neural network (ANN) models. However, a comparably lower similarity estimates had found for MLC model. This suggests the superiority and functional capability of SVM and RF models in capturing land dynamics. For all reference years, the highest ES values (ESVs, in million US$) was found for waste treatment service, followed by erosion control, habitat, food production, disturbance regulation, genetic, soil formation, water supply, recreation, climate regulation, raw material production, water regulation, cultural, nutrient cycling, biological control and pollination services, respectively. The present research has demonstrated that machine models could be a feasible solution for accounting importance of natural capitals across the regions. Secondary sourced freely available remote sensing data are also found highly cost-effective for moderate to large-scale land use decision-making. The valuation approaches and methods adopted in this study could be a reference for future ES studies in other regions and could be replicated easily for similar research interest across the ecosystems.

ACS Style

Srikanta Sannigrahi; Francesco Pilla; Bidroha Basu; Arunima Sarkar Basu; P.S. Roy; P.K. Joshi. Economic Valuation of Ecosystem Services of Sundarbans Natural Reserve Region, India. Sundarbans Mangrove Systems 2021, 145 -166.

AMA Style

Srikanta Sannigrahi, Francesco Pilla, Bidroha Basu, Arunima Sarkar Basu, P.S. Roy, P.K. Joshi. Economic Valuation of Ecosystem Services of Sundarbans Natural Reserve Region, India. Sundarbans Mangrove Systems. 2021; ():145-166.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Srikanta Sannigrahi; Francesco Pilla; Bidroha Basu; Arunima Sarkar Basu; P.S. Roy; P.K. Joshi. 2021. "Economic Valuation of Ecosystem Services of Sundarbans Natural Reserve Region, India." Sundarbans Mangrove Systems , no. : 145-166.

Journal article
Published: 29 May 2021 in City and Environment Interactions
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Increasing recognition of the potential ecosystem services provided by urban forests suggests a need to examine soil quality under urban conditions. Soil quality assessment tools are presently mostly applied in agricultural production, but these approaches must also be evaluated in the urban context. This proof-of-concept exploratory study evaluates whether Worldview-3 spectral vegetation indices (SVIs) generated for individual tree crown (ITC) objects can be correlated to soil health attributes measured in the field in Metro Boston, Massachusetts, USA. While similar studies have completed such analysis for agricultural crops, none have done so for urban trees. The statistical analysis by Pearson correlation and principal component analysis (PCA) showed that SVIs, specifically the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI), correlated significantly and positively with bulk density (BD) (r = 0.536) and soil luminance (r = 0.562) and negatively with CO2 respiration (r = −0.536), active fungi and active bacteria (r = −0.401), and total carbon (r = −0.548). The negative correlations with parameters commonly considered positive for soil health in agricultural settings may indicate strong perturbation at the urban soil surface level; they also suggest soil health attributes measured at this study’s 0–15 cm sampling depth may not be satisfactorily indicative of tree health as measured by SVIs. This study evidences the ground truthing of satellite-based urban SVIs, including their relationships with soil health attributes at the individual tree level.

ACS Style

Nadina J. Galle; William Brinton; Robin Vos; Bidroha Basu; Fábio Duarte; Marcus Collier; Carlo Ratti; Francesco Pilla. Correlation of WorldView-3 spectral vegetation indices and soil health indicators of individual urban trees with exceptions to topsoil disturbance. City and Environment Interactions 2021, 11, 100068 .

AMA Style

Nadina J. Galle, William Brinton, Robin Vos, Bidroha Basu, Fábio Duarte, Marcus Collier, Carlo Ratti, Francesco Pilla. Correlation of WorldView-3 spectral vegetation indices and soil health indicators of individual urban trees with exceptions to topsoil disturbance. City and Environment Interactions. 2021; 11 ():100068.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Nadina J. Galle; William Brinton; Robin Vos; Bidroha Basu; Fábio Duarte; Marcus Collier; Carlo Ratti; Francesco Pilla. 2021. "Correlation of WorldView-3 spectral vegetation indices and soil health indicators of individual urban trees with exceptions to topsoil disturbance." City and Environment Interactions 11, no. : 100068.

Journal article
Published: 29 April 2021 in Open Research Europe
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Background: Soil spatial variability is a major concern when deciding how to collect a representative topsoil sample for laboratory analysis. Sampling design to capture site-specific variability is documented in the agricultural literature, but poorly understood for urban forest soils where soils may be characterized by strong horizontal and vertical variability and large temporal anthropogenic disturbances. Methods: This paper evaluates the spatial variability of selected topsoil properties under urban trees to define a statistically robust sampling design that optimizes the number of samples to reliably characterize basal soil respiration (BSR), a property associated with soil health. To provide a reference on variability, two additional soil properties were measured, unrelated to BSR: electrical conductivity (EC) and bulk density (BD). Thirteen sampling sites comprising both park and street trees (Acer rubrum) were selected in Cambridge, MA, USA. Results: Results indicate street tree topsoil had approximately twice as much variation, requiring more intensive sampling, as did park tree topsoil, even though street trees had smaller soil sampling zones, constricted by tree pits. The variability of BSR was nearly identical to that of EC, and BD results varied least. A large number of samples would be required for acceptable levels of statistical reliability (90% CI - 10% ER) of 44.4, 41.7, and 6.4 for BSR, EC, and BD, respectively, whereas by accepting a lower level of certainty (80% CI - 20% ER) the number of required soil samples was calculated as 6.8, 6.4, and 0.4 for BSR, EC, and BD, respectively. Conclusions: The use of EC testing as a baseline measure to determine spatial variation in the topsoil is proposed, to alleviate the financial implications of more expensive BSR testing. Factors of topsoil disturbance and soil access restrictions at sites with severe root-sidewalk conflicts and the overall generalizability of the results are also discussed.

ACS Style

Nadina Galle; William Brinton; Robin Vos; Fábio Duarte; Marcus Collier; Carlo Ratti; Francesco Pilla. Spatial variability of urban forest topsoil properties: towards representative and robust sampling design. Open Research Europe 2021, 1, 45 .

AMA Style

Nadina Galle, William Brinton, Robin Vos, Fábio Duarte, Marcus Collier, Carlo Ratti, Francesco Pilla. Spatial variability of urban forest topsoil properties: towards representative and robust sampling design. Open Research Europe. 2021; 1 ():45.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Nadina Galle; William Brinton; Robin Vos; Fábio Duarte; Marcus Collier; Carlo Ratti; Francesco Pilla. 2021. "Spatial variability of urban forest topsoil properties: towards representative and robust sampling design." Open Research Europe 1, no. : 45.

Journal article
Published: 20 April 2021 in Remote Sensing
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Plastic pollution poses a significant environmental threat to the existence and health of biodiversity and the marine ecosystem. The intrusion of plastic to the food chain is a massive concern for human health. Urbanisation, population growth, and tourism have been identified as major contributors to the growing rate of plastic debris, particularly in waterbodies such as rivers, lakes, seas, and oceans. Over the past decade, many studies have focused on identifying the waterbodies near the coastal regions where a high level of accumulated plastics have been found. This research focused on using high-resolution Sentinel-2 satellite remote sensing images to detect floating plastic debris in coastal waterbodies. Accurate detection of plastic debris can help in deploying appropriate measures to reduce plastics in oceans. Two unsupervised (K-means and fuzzy c-means (FCM)) and two supervised (support vector regression (SVR) and semi-supervised fuzzy c-means (SFCM)) classification algorithms were developed to identify floating plastics. The unsupervised classification algorithms consider the remote sensing data as the sole input to develop the models, while the supervised classifications require in situ information on the presence/absence of floating plastics in selected Sentinel-2 grids for modelling. Data from Cyprus and Greece were considered to calibrate the supervised models and to estimate model efficiency. Out of available multiple bands of Sentinel-2 data, a combination of 6 bands of reflectance data (blue, green, red, red edge 2, near infrared, and short wave infrared 1) and two indices (NDVI and FDI) were selected to develop the models, as they were found to be most efficient for detecting floating plastics. The SVR-based supervised classification has an accuracy in the range of 96.9–98.4%, while that for SFCM and FCM clustering are between 35.7 and 64.3% and 69.8 and 82.2%, respectively, and for K-means, the range varies from 69.8 to 81.4%. It needs to be noted that the total number of grids with floating plastics in real-world data considered in this study is 59, which needs to be increased considerably to improve model performance. Training data from other parts of the world needs to be collected to investigate the performance of the classification algorithms at a global scale.

ACS Style

Bidroha Basu; Srikanta Sannigrahi; Arunima Sarkar Basu; Francesco Pilla. Development of Novel Classification Algorithms for Detection of Floating Plastic Debris in Coastal Waterbodies Using Multispectral Sentinel-2 Remote Sensing Imagery. Remote Sensing 2021, 13, 1598 .

AMA Style

Bidroha Basu, Srikanta Sannigrahi, Arunima Sarkar Basu, Francesco Pilla. Development of Novel Classification Algorithms for Detection of Floating Plastic Debris in Coastal Waterbodies Using Multispectral Sentinel-2 Remote Sensing Imagery. Remote Sensing. 2021; 13 (8):1598.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Bidroha Basu; Srikanta Sannigrahi; Arunima Sarkar Basu; Francesco Pilla. 2021. "Development of Novel Classification Algorithms for Detection of Floating Plastic Debris in Coastal Waterbodies Using Multispectral Sentinel-2 Remote Sensing Imagery." Remote Sensing 13, no. 8: 1598.

Journal article
Published: 15 April 2021 in Resources
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The adoption of Nature-Based Solutions (NBSs) represents a novel means to mitigate natural hazards. In the framework of the OPERANDUM project, this study introduces a methodology to assess the efficiency of the NBSs and a series of Open-Air Laboratories (OALs) regarded as a proof-of-concept for the wider uptake of NBSs. The OALs are located in Finland, Greece, UK, Italy, and Ireland. The methodology is based on a wide modeling activity, incorporated in the context of future climate scenarios. Herein, we present a series of models’ chains able to estimate the efficiency of the NBSs. While the presented models are mainly well-established, their coupling represents a first fundamental step in the study of the long-term efficacy and impact of the NBSs. In the selected sites, NBSs are utilized to cope with distinct natural hazards: floods, droughts, landslides, salt intrusion, and nutrient and sediment loading. The study of the efficacy of NBSs to mitigate these hazards belongs to a series of works devoted to the implementation of NBSs for environmental purposes. Our findings prove that land management plays a crucial role in the process. Specifically, the selected NBSs include intensive forestry; the conversion of urban areas to grassland; dunes; marine seagrass; water retention ponds; live cribwalls; and high-density plantations of woody vegetation and deep-rooted herbaceous vegetation. The management of natural resources should eventually consider the effect of NBSs on urban and rural areas, as their employment is becoming widespread.

ACS Style

Glauco Gallotti; Marco Santo; Ilektra Apostolidou; Jacopo Alessandri; Alberto Armigliato; Bidroha Basu; Sisay Debele; Alessio Domeneghetti; Alejandro Gonzalez-Ollauri; Prashant Kumar; Angeliki Mentzafou; Francesco Pilla; Beatrice Pulvirenti; Paolo Ruggieri; Jeetendra Sahani; Aura Salmivaara; Arunima Basu; Christos Spyrou; Nadia Pinardi; Elena Toth; Silvia Unguendoli; Umesh Pillai; Andrea Valentini; George Varlas; Giorgia Verri; Filippo Zaniboni; Silvana Di Sabatino. On the Management of Nature-Based Solutions in Open-Air Laboratories: New Insights and Future Perspectives. Resources 2021, 10, 36 .

AMA Style

Glauco Gallotti, Marco Santo, Ilektra Apostolidou, Jacopo Alessandri, Alberto Armigliato, Bidroha Basu, Sisay Debele, Alessio Domeneghetti, Alejandro Gonzalez-Ollauri, Prashant Kumar, Angeliki Mentzafou, Francesco Pilla, Beatrice Pulvirenti, Paolo Ruggieri, Jeetendra Sahani, Aura Salmivaara, Arunima Basu, Christos Spyrou, Nadia Pinardi, Elena Toth, Silvia Unguendoli, Umesh Pillai, Andrea Valentini, George Varlas, Giorgia Verri, Filippo Zaniboni, Silvana Di Sabatino. On the Management of Nature-Based Solutions in Open-Air Laboratories: New Insights and Future Perspectives. Resources. 2021; 10 (4):36.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Glauco Gallotti; Marco Santo; Ilektra Apostolidou; Jacopo Alessandri; Alberto Armigliato; Bidroha Basu; Sisay Debele; Alessio Domeneghetti; Alejandro Gonzalez-Ollauri; Prashant Kumar; Angeliki Mentzafou; Francesco Pilla; Beatrice Pulvirenti; Paolo Ruggieri; Jeetendra Sahani; Aura Salmivaara; Arunima Basu; Christos Spyrou; Nadia Pinardi; Elena Toth; Silvia Unguendoli; Umesh Pillai; Andrea Valentini; George Varlas; Giorgia Verri; Filippo Zaniboni; Silvana Di Sabatino. 2021. "On the Management of Nature-Based Solutions in Open-Air Laboratories: New Insights and Future Perspectives." Resources 10, no. 4: 36.

Review article
Published: 15 April 2021 in Science of The Total Environment
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Nature-based solutions (NBS) for hydro-meteorological risks (HMRs) reduction and management are becoming increasingly popular, but challenges such as the lack of well-recognised standard methodologies to evaluate their performance and upscale their implementation remain. We systematically evaluate the current state-of-the art on the models and tools that are utilised for the optimum allocation, design and efficiency evaluation of NBS for five HMRs (flooding, droughts, heatwaves, landslides, and storm surges and coastal erosion). We found that methods to assess the complex issue of NBS efficiency and cost-benefits analysis are still in the development stage and they have only been implemented through the methodologies developed for other purposes such as fluid dynamics models in micro and catchment scale contexts. Of the reviewed numerical models and tools MIKE-SHE, SWMM (for floods), ParFlow-TREES, ACRU, SIMGRO (for droughts), WRF, ENVI-met (for heatwaves), FUNWAVE-TVD, BROOK90 (for landslides), TELEMAC and ADCIRC (for storm surges) are more flexible to evaluate the performance and effectiveness of specific NBS such as wetlands, ponds, trees, parks, grass, green roof/walls, tree roots, vegetations, coral reefs, mangroves, sea grasses, oyster reefs, sea salt marshes, sandy beaches and dunes. We conclude that the models and tools that are capable of assessing the multiple benefits, particularly the performance and cost-effectiveness of NBS for HMR reduction and management are not readily available. Thus, our synthesis of modelling methods can facilitate their selection that can maximise opportunities and refute the current political hesitation of NBS deployment compared with grey solutions for HMR management but also for the provision of a wide range of social and economic co-benefits. However, there is still a need for bespoke modelling tools that can holistically assess the various components of NBS from an HMR reduction and management perspective. Such tools can facilitate impact assessment modelling under different NBS scenarios to build a solid evidence base for upscaling and replicating the implementation of NBS.

ACS Style

Prashant Kumar; Sisay E. Debele; Jeetendra Sahani; Nidhi Rawat; Belen Marti-Cardona; Silvia Maria Alfieri; Bidroha Basu; Arunima Sarkar Basu; Paul Bowyer; Nikos Charizopoulos; Glauco Gallotti; Juvonen Jaakko; Laura S. Leo; Michael Loupis; Massimo Menenti; Slobodan B. Mickovski; Seung-Jae Mun; Alejandro Gonzalez-Ollauri; Jan Pfeiffer; Francesco Pilla; Julius Pröll; Martin Rutzinger; Marco Antonio Santo; Srikanta Sannigrahi; Christos Spyrou; Heikki Tuomenvirta; Thomas Zieher. Nature-based solutions efficiency evaluation against natural hazards: Modelling methods, advantages and limitations. Science of The Total Environment 2021, 784, 147058 .

AMA Style

Prashant Kumar, Sisay E. Debele, Jeetendra Sahani, Nidhi Rawat, Belen Marti-Cardona, Silvia Maria Alfieri, Bidroha Basu, Arunima Sarkar Basu, Paul Bowyer, Nikos Charizopoulos, Glauco Gallotti, Juvonen Jaakko, Laura S. Leo, Michael Loupis, Massimo Menenti, Slobodan B. Mickovski, Seung-Jae Mun, Alejandro Gonzalez-Ollauri, Jan Pfeiffer, Francesco Pilla, Julius Pröll, Martin Rutzinger, Marco Antonio Santo, Srikanta Sannigrahi, Christos Spyrou, Heikki Tuomenvirta, Thomas Zieher. Nature-based solutions efficiency evaluation against natural hazards: Modelling methods, advantages and limitations. Science of The Total Environment. 2021; 784 ():147058.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Prashant Kumar; Sisay E. Debele; Jeetendra Sahani; Nidhi Rawat; Belen Marti-Cardona; Silvia Maria Alfieri; Bidroha Basu; Arunima Sarkar Basu; Paul Bowyer; Nikos Charizopoulos; Glauco Gallotti; Juvonen Jaakko; Laura S. Leo; Michael Loupis; Massimo Menenti; Slobodan B. Mickovski; Seung-Jae Mun; Alejandro Gonzalez-Ollauri; Jan Pfeiffer; Francesco Pilla; Julius Pröll; Martin Rutzinger; Marco Antonio Santo; Srikanta Sannigrahi; Christos Spyrou; Heikki Tuomenvirta; Thomas Zieher. 2021. "Nature-based solutions efficiency evaluation against natural hazards: Modelling methods, advantages and limitations." Science of The Total Environment 784, no. : 147058.

Journal article
Published: 18 March 2021 in Urban Forestry & Urban Greening
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Tree diversity, on a species-, genus-, and family-level, is an important factor in securing healthy urban forests and providing ecosystem services for billions of city dwellers. Using open-source data on global tree inventories, this study examines (1) the diversity of species, genera, and family of urban street trees in eight cities internationally; (2) how they score on diversity benchmarks and indices; and (3) the diversity variation inside and outside of cities’ centers. We hypothesized most cities would score poorly on diversity benchmarks and spatial patterns in species composition would exist, as illustrated by established relationships between urban density and urban tree diversity. Results indicate city centers were less likely to approach the proposed diversity benchmarks than outside the city center. Overall, both Shannon and Simpson diversity indices show greater diversity outside of the city center, especially at the species-level. Understanding street tree diversity and spatial variation patterns across cities internationally can offer needed evidence to back up heuristic benchmarks. The methodology and open-source data used in this study are intended to enable practitioners better target tree diversity efforts.

ACS Style

Nadina J. Galle; Dylan Halpern; Sophie Nitoslawski; Fábio Duarte; Carlo Ratti; Francesco Pilla. Mapping the diversity of street tree inventories across eight cities internationally using open data. Urban Forestry & Urban Greening 2021, 61, 127099 .

AMA Style

Nadina J. Galle, Dylan Halpern, Sophie Nitoslawski, Fábio Duarte, Carlo Ratti, Francesco Pilla. Mapping the diversity of street tree inventories across eight cities internationally using open data. Urban Forestry & Urban Greening. 2021; 61 ():127099.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Nadina J. Galle; Dylan Halpern; Sophie Nitoslawski; Fábio Duarte; Carlo Ratti; Francesco Pilla. 2021. "Mapping the diversity of street tree inventories across eight cities internationally using open data." Urban Forestry & Urban Greening 61, no. : 127099.

Journal article
Published: 15 March 2021 in Sustainable Cities and Society
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The spatialization of socioeconomic data can be used and integrated with other sources of information to reveal valuable insights. Such data can be utilized to infer different variations, such as the dynamics of city dwellers and their spatial and temporal variability. This work focuses on such applications to explore the underlying association between socioeconomic characteristics of different geographical regions in Dublin, Ireland, and the number of confirmed COVID cases in each area. Our aim is to implement a machine learning approach to identify demographic characteristics and spatial patterns. Spatial analysis was used to describe the pattern of interest in electoral divisions (ED), which are the legally defined administrative areas in the Republic of Ireland for which population statistics are published from the census data. We used the most informative variables of the census data to model the number of infected people in different regions at ED level. Seven clusters detected by implementing an unsupervised neural network method. The distribution of people who have contracted the virus was studied.

ACS Style

Mohammadhossein Ghahramani; Francesco Pilla. Leveraging artificial intelligence to analyze the COVID-19 distribution pattern based on socio-economic determinants. Sustainable Cities and Society 2021, 69, 102848 .

AMA Style

Mohammadhossein Ghahramani, Francesco Pilla. Leveraging artificial intelligence to analyze the COVID-19 distribution pattern based on socio-economic determinants. Sustainable Cities and Society. 2021; 69 ():102848.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Mohammadhossein Ghahramani; Francesco Pilla. 2021. "Leveraging artificial intelligence to analyze the COVID-19 distribution pattern based on socio-economic determinants." Sustainable Cities and Society 69, no. : 102848.

Preprint content
Published: 04 March 2021
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Increase in extreme rainfall and storm events due to climate change and decrease in water retention in soil due to urbanization has increased the risk of flooding in cities globally. Since majority of the cites are mostly developed, expanding the conventional urban drainage system to account for the excess runoff produced by the rainfall event has limited scope. The challenge is to develop sustainable urban drainage systems (SUDS) to reduce runoff and create a flood control system in major cities. One of the SUDS that are becoming popular is the use of nature-based solutions (NBSs). A set of conventional NBSs to mitigate flood risk include bioswales, bio-retention, tree pits, infiltration trenches. However, even though their performance in flood control is found to be effective, they require considerable land area for deployment, which might be difficult to obtain in cities. For this purpose, green roofs have becoming popular as an alternative NBS in flood control, as it does not require any additional land area for deployment. This study investigates the effectiveness of a green roof in reduction of runoff via real-world case study. A green roof deployed in the CHQ building located at the city centre in Dublin, Ireland has been considered for the study. The green roof has a total size of 70 sq. m. Performance of the green roof in runoff reduction was measured based on rainfall and water retention data collected at four modular units, each having 1 sq. meter area, located at the centre of the roof with an IoT weight scale. The data has been collected for 1 week at 3-minute interval, and the reduction in runoff with and without the presence of the green roof has been estimated. The performance of the green roofs in runoff reduction was found to vary between 20-40% depending on the intensity of storm events.

ACS Style

Bidroha Basu; Arunima Sarkar Basu; Srikanta Sannigrahi; Francesco Pilla. Effectiveness of green roofs in reduction of rainfall-fed runoff: A case study in Dublin, Ireland. 2021, 1 .

AMA Style

Bidroha Basu, Arunima Sarkar Basu, Srikanta Sannigrahi, Francesco Pilla. Effectiveness of green roofs in reduction of rainfall-fed runoff: A case study in Dublin, Ireland. . 2021; ():1.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Bidroha Basu; Arunima Sarkar Basu; Srikanta Sannigrahi; Francesco Pilla. 2021. "Effectiveness of green roofs in reduction of rainfall-fed runoff: A case study in Dublin, Ireland." , no. : 1.

Preprint content
Published: 04 March 2021
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The concept of Ecosystem-Based Management (EBM) as part of Nature-Based Solutions (NBS) have frequently been adopted in different strategic planning as a cross-sectoral mechanism to manage environmental problems. The EBM combines all relevant approaches, methods, tools, and software that collectively provide key scientific and socioeconomic evidence and eventually address environmental issues more sustainably. The specific application of EBM in different environmental problems, including flooding, have been proven effective in many cases. This ensures the superiority of EBM approaches for designing collaborative programs for solving environmental problems. The EBM offers a variety of sustainable interventions such as reducing impervious surface through porous paving, green parking lots, brownfield restoration, and deployment of green-roofs, which collectively attenuates water runoff and peak discharge, and offers protection against extreme precipitation events by enhancing water infiltration. In addition to the targeted benefits and cost-effectiveness of EBM, the supply of potential ecosystem service co-benefits that usually comes with EBM can contribute substantially to generating environmental benefits and adds community well-being. In order to analyse the superior effects of green-roof as a part of a smart-EBM framework, which has been deployed in CHQ building in Dublin, Ireland, a conceptual upscaling scenario framework has been formulated for measuring the city scale impact of green-roofs in providing multiple-valued ecosystem services. The biophysical and economic benefits of smart green-roof EBM will be estimated using varied ecosystem service modelling and standard cost-benefit analysis. The proposed smart green-roof framework is expected to have a more significant impact in minimising the flooding problems in Dublin city and expected to provide multiple regulating, supporting provisioning, and cultural benefits that can collectively surpass the deployment cost of green-roofs in the long run.

ACS Style

Srikanta Sannigrahi; Bidroha Basu; Arunima Sarkar Basu; Francesco Pilla. The ecosystem service benefits of green-roof as a part of smart ecosystem-based management: A case study in Dublin, Ireland. 2021, 1 .

AMA Style

Srikanta Sannigrahi, Bidroha Basu, Arunima Sarkar Basu, Francesco Pilla. The ecosystem service benefits of green-roof as a part of smart ecosystem-based management: A case study in Dublin, Ireland. . 2021; ():1.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Srikanta Sannigrahi; Bidroha Basu; Arunima Sarkar Basu; Francesco Pilla. 2021. "The ecosystem service benefits of green-roof as a part of smart ecosystem-based management: A case study in Dublin, Ireland." , no. : 1.

Journal article
Published: 04 March 2021 in Environmental Research
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Clean air is a fundamental necessity for human health and well-being. Anthropogenic emissions that are harmful to human health have been reduced substantially under COVID-19 lockdown. Satellite remote sensing for air pollution assessments can be highly effective in public health research because of the possibility of estimating air pollution levels over large scales. In this study, we utilized both satellite and surface measurements to estimate air pollution levels in 20 cities across the world. Google Earth Engine (GEE) and Sentinel-5 Precursor TROPOspheric Monitoring Instrument (TROPOMI) application were used for both spatial and time-series assessment of tropospheric Nitrogen Dioxide (NO2) and Carbon Monoxide (CO) statuses during the study period (1 February to May 11, 2019 and the corresponding period in 2020). We also measured Population-Weighted Average Concentration (PWAC) of particulate matter (PM2.5 and PM10) and NO2 using gridded population data and in-situ air pollution estimates. We estimated the economic benefit of reduced anthropogenic emissions using two valuation approaches: (1) the median externality value coefficient approach, applied for satellite data, and (2) the public health burden approach, applied for in-situ data. Satellite data have shown that ~28 tons (sum of 20 cities) of NO2 and ~184 tons (sum of 20 cities) of CO have been reduced during the study period. PM2.5, PM10, and NO2 are reduced by ~37 (μg/m3), 62 (μg/m3), and 145 (μg/m3), respectively. A total of ~1310, ~401, and ~430 premature cause-specific deaths were estimated to be avoided with the reduction of NO2, PM2.5, and PM10. The total economic benefits (Billion US$) (sum of 20 cities) of the avoided mortality are measured as ~10, ~3.1, and ~3.3 for NO2, PM2.5, and PM10, respectively. In many cases, ground monitored data was found inadequate for detailed spatial assessment. This problem can be better addressed by incorporating satellite data into the evaluation if proper quality assurance is achieved, and the data processing burden can be alleviated or even removed. Both satellite and ground-based estimates suggest the positive effect of the limited human interference on the natural environments. Further research in this direction is needed to explore this synergistic association more explicitly.

ACS Style

Srikanta Sannigrahi; Prashant Kumar; Anna Molter; Qi Zhang; Bidroha Basu; Arunima Sarkar Basu; Francesco Pilla. Examining the status of improved air quality in world cities due to COVID-19 led temporary reduction in anthropogenic emissions. Environmental Research 2021, 196, 110927 .

AMA Style

Srikanta Sannigrahi, Prashant Kumar, Anna Molter, Qi Zhang, Bidroha Basu, Arunima Sarkar Basu, Francesco Pilla. Examining the status of improved air quality in world cities due to COVID-19 led temporary reduction in anthropogenic emissions. Environmental Research. 2021; 196 ():110927.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Srikanta Sannigrahi; Prashant Kumar; Anna Molter; Qi Zhang; Bidroha Basu; Arunima Sarkar Basu; Francesco Pilla. 2021. "Examining the status of improved air quality in world cities due to COVID-19 led temporary reduction in anthropogenic emissions." Environmental Research 196, no. : 110927.

Preprint content
Published: 04 March 2021
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Hydro-meteorological hazards such as floods have been a long-standing challenge for urban planners. A substantial increase in urbanization has undeniably pressurized the existing drainage network which has increased the flood proneness. The OPERANDUM project (H2020, grant agreement No 776848) has proposed a unique methodology for handling urban flooding by setting up open-air laboratories (OALs). As a pilot study of open-air laboratory Ireland (OAL-IE), an interdisciplinary methodology is adapted. Flood modeling techniques are identified for better flood risk assessment and flood management. Nature-based innovations are proposed to help identify and improve the existing urban drainage systems. The adaptability of nature-based systems and their efficacy as a supplemental tool to better flood management is a predominant and significant question. The awareness of citizens on their experience, challenges, and narratives are an equally reliable parameter to examine whether the spatio-temporal viability of new flood management techniques through nature-based innovations is a promising path for sustainable urban management. The intermittent relationship of flood hazard and the citizen access to infrastructure such as schools, childcare, old age homes, offices, transportation network holds a place of relevancy. The dynamics of “lived experiences” can help urban planners to pull out the traditional and formal strategies to be implemented for better liveability of citizens. Moreover, the willingness of citizens to maintain and share activities for co-deployment as a successful participatory process for innovative nature-based solutions support the social purpose of the OPERANDUM project. This research focuses on understanding the social background, cognitive thinking, and ideology that holds unique opportunities to OAL-IE for potential retrospective interpretation of nature-based innovations. A detailed survey with the stakeholders is aimed to understand their perspective on flooding, to identify how and where nature-based innovations can assist the city council to develop an efficient sustainable flood management system. This information on how citizens perceived and attributed the delivery of nature-based innovation can provide guidelines for developing better flood management and mitigation policies in Dublin.

ACS Style

Arunima Sarkar Basu; Bidroha Basu; Srikanta Sannigrahi; Francesco Pilla. A citizen-oriented understanding of nature-based innovations: A case study in Dublin, Ireland. 2021, 1 .

AMA Style

Arunima Sarkar Basu, Bidroha Basu, Srikanta Sannigrahi, Francesco Pilla. A citizen-oriented understanding of nature-based innovations: A case study in Dublin, Ireland. . 2021; ():1.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Arunima Sarkar Basu; Bidroha Basu; Srikanta Sannigrahi; Francesco Pilla. 2021. "A citizen-oriented understanding of nature-based innovations: A case study in Dublin, Ireland." , no. : 1.

Journal article
Published: 19 February 2021 in Sustainable Cities and Society
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Since December 2019, the world has witnessed the stringent effect of an unprecedented global pandemic, coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). As of January 29,2021, there have been 100,819,363 confirmed cases and 2,176,159 deaths reported. Among the countries affected severely by COVID-19, the United States tops the list. Research has been conducted to discuss the causal associations between explanatory factors and COVID-19 transmission in the contiguous United States. However, most of these studies focus more on spatial associations of the estimated parameters, yet exploring the time-varying dimension in spatial econometric modeling appears to be utmost essential. This research adopts various relevant approaches to explore the potential effects of driving factors on COVID-19 counts in the contiguous United States. A total of three global spatial regression models and two local spatial regression models, the latter including geographically weighted regression (GWR) and multiscale GWR (MGWR), are performed at the county scale to take into account the scale effects. For COVID-19 cases, ethnicity, crime, and income factors are found to be the strongest covariates and explain most of the variance of the modeling estimation. For COVID-19 deaths, migration (domestic and international) and income factors play a critical role in explaining spatial differences of COVID-19 deaths across counties. Such associations also exhibit temporal variations from March to July, as supported by better performance of MGWR than GWR. Both global and local associations among the parameters vary highly over space and change across time. Therefore, time dimension should be paid more attention to in the spatial epidemiological analysis. Among the two local spatial regression models, MGWR performs more accurately, as it has slightly higher Adj. R2 values (for cases, R2 = 0.961; for deaths, R2 = 0.962), compared to GWR’s Adj. R2 values (for cases, R2 = 0.954; for deaths, R2 = 0.954). To inform policy-makers at the nation and state levels, understanding the place-based characteristics of the explanatory forces and related spatial patterns of the driving factors is of paramount importance. Since it is not the first time humans are facing public health emergency, the findings of the present research on COVID-19 therefore can be used as a reference for policy designing and effective decision making.

ACS Style

Arabinda Maiti; Qi Zhang; Srikanta Sannigrahi; Suvamoy Pramanik; Suman Chakraborti; Artemi Cerda; Francesco Pilla. Exploring spatiotemporal effects of the driving factors on COVID-19 incidences in the contiguous United States. Sustainable Cities and Society 2021, 68, 102784 -102784.

AMA Style

Arabinda Maiti, Qi Zhang, Srikanta Sannigrahi, Suvamoy Pramanik, Suman Chakraborti, Artemi Cerda, Francesco Pilla. Exploring spatiotemporal effects of the driving factors on COVID-19 incidences in the contiguous United States. Sustainable Cities and Society. 2021; 68 ():102784-102784.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Arabinda Maiti; Qi Zhang; Srikanta Sannigrahi; Suvamoy Pramanik; Suman Chakraborti; Artemi Cerda; Francesco Pilla. 2021. "Exploring spatiotemporal effects of the driving factors on COVID-19 incidences in the contiguous United States." Sustainable Cities and Society 68, no. : 102784-102784.

Conference paper
Published: 17 February 2021 in Lecture Notes in Electrical Engineering
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Living labs are spaces where public and private stakeholders work together to develop and prototype new products, technologies and services in real environments embedded in the community or market place. This paper outlines the approach chosen by AUSILIA (Assisted Unit for Simulating Independent Living Activities), a living lab established in Provincia Autonoma di Trento in 2016 to develop an innovation model for taking care of the elderly or disabled patient by fusion of technology innovation and patient centered integrated care approach. AUSILIA goal is triple: i. to provide an innovative framework based on augmented virtual reality for occupational therapy in ageing and fragile individuals; ii. to help people who are losing autonomy and independence living at home reducing care burden; iii. warrant continuous innovation through the mixed contribution of the academy and private enterprise. The paper describes the specific solutions adopted for the three objectives, reporting an implementation example for each of them.

ACS Style

Andrea Grisenti; Giandomenico Nollo; Michela Dalprá; Francesco De Natale; Mariolino De Cecco; Andrea Francesconi; Alberto Fornaser; Paolo Tomasin; Nicola Garau; Luca Guandalini; Barbara Bauer; Barbara Gasperini; Patrizia Ianes; Francesco Pilla; Giovanni Guandalini. Technological Infrastructure Supports New Paradigm of Care for Healthy Aging: The Living Lab Ausilia. Lecture Notes in Electrical Engineering 2021, 85 -99.

AMA Style

Andrea Grisenti, Giandomenico Nollo, Michela Dalprá, Francesco De Natale, Mariolino De Cecco, Andrea Francesconi, Alberto Fornaser, Paolo Tomasin, Nicola Garau, Luca Guandalini, Barbara Bauer, Barbara Gasperini, Patrizia Ianes, Francesco Pilla, Giovanni Guandalini. Technological Infrastructure Supports New Paradigm of Care for Healthy Aging: The Living Lab Ausilia. Lecture Notes in Electrical Engineering. 2021; ():85-99.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Andrea Grisenti; Giandomenico Nollo; Michela Dalprá; Francesco De Natale; Mariolino De Cecco; Andrea Francesconi; Alberto Fornaser; Paolo Tomasin; Nicola Garau; Luca Guandalini; Barbara Bauer; Barbara Gasperini; Patrizia Ianes; Francesco Pilla; Giovanni Guandalini. 2021. "Technological Infrastructure Supports New Paradigm of Care for Healthy Aging: The Living Lab Ausilia." Lecture Notes in Electrical Engineering , no. : 85-99.

Journal article
Published: 04 February 2021 in City and Environment Interactions
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Continued population growth and urbanization is shifting research to consider the quality of urban green space over the quantity of these parks, woods, and wetlands. The quality of urban green space has been hitherto measured by expert assessments, including in-situ observations, surveys, and remote sensing analyses. Location data platforms, such as TripAdvisor, can provide people’s opinion on many destinations and experiences, including UGS. This paper leverages Artificial Intelligence techniques for opinion mining and text classification using such platform’s reviews as a novel approach to urban green space quality assessments. Natural Language Processing is used to analyze contextual information given supervised scores of words by implementing computational analysis. Such an application can support local authorities and stakeholders in their understanding of–and justification for–future investments in urban green space.

ACS Style

Mohammadhossein Ghahramani; Nadina J. Galle; Fábio Duarte; Carlo Ratti; Francesco Pilla. Leveraging artificial intelligence to analyze citizens’ opinions on urban green space. City and Environment Interactions 2021, 10, 100058 .

AMA Style

Mohammadhossein Ghahramani, Nadina J. Galle, Fábio Duarte, Carlo Ratti, Francesco Pilla. Leveraging artificial intelligence to analyze citizens’ opinions on urban green space. City and Environment Interactions. 2021; 10 ():100058.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Mohammadhossein Ghahramani; Nadina J. Galle; Fábio Duarte; Carlo Ratti; Francesco Pilla. 2021. "Leveraging artificial intelligence to analyze citizens’ opinions on urban green space." City and Environment Interactions 10, no. : 100058.

Book chapter
Published: 29 January 2021 in Monitoring Environmental Contaminants
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This chapter presents the citizen science (CS) activities aimed at air pollution monitoring with low-cost sensors (the Smart Citizen Kits) undertaken by the six iSCAPE Living Labs (LLs) with a variety of local stakeholders. iSCAPE is a H2020 project funded by the European Commission and aims at improving the smart control of air pollution in European cities. The iSCAPE LLs are available in Bologna, Bottrop, Dublin, Guildford, Hasselt, and Vantaa. The LLs followed a CS framework developed by the partner in charge of this task, Connected Places Catapult (CPC), which resulted in the participation of approximately 100 participants across the six LL cities. The goal of the workshops was to engage with the public as well as to establish a CS community.

ACS Style

Francesco Pilla; Katinka Schaaf; Lee Markham. Citizen science monitoring of air pollution: Challenges and experiences from the six iSCAPE living labs. Monitoring Environmental Contaminants 2021, 109 -122.

AMA Style

Francesco Pilla, Katinka Schaaf, Lee Markham. Citizen science monitoring of air pollution: Challenges and experiences from the six iSCAPE living labs. Monitoring Environmental Contaminants. 2021; ():109-122.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Francesco Pilla; Katinka Schaaf; Lee Markham. 2021. "Citizen science monitoring of air pollution: Challenges and experiences from the six iSCAPE living labs." Monitoring Environmental Contaminants , no. : 109-122.

Book chapter
Published: 29 January 2021 in Monitoring Environmental Contaminants
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The evergrowing populations and increasing human activities are associated with a major increase in environmental pollution. However, their impact is still poorly understood due to the pervasiveness and spatiotemporal complexity of the phenomenon. Conventional approaches to environmental monitoring are based on networks of sparse measurement stations or in situ human-operated measurements. However, these are prohibitively expensive to capture the spatiotemporal heterogeneity of most of the environmental pollution phenomenon. Current advancements in the wireless sensor network (WSN) technology are radically changing the conventional approach, allowing for the capture of real-time information in a capillary form.

ACS Style

Francesco Pilla; Bidroha Basu; Salem Gharbia; Panagiota Katsikouli. Pervasive sensing approaches for environmental pollution. Monitoring Environmental Contaminants 2021, 57 -71.

AMA Style

Francesco Pilla, Bidroha Basu, Salem Gharbia, Panagiota Katsikouli. Pervasive sensing approaches for environmental pollution. Monitoring Environmental Contaminants. 2021; ():57-71.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Francesco Pilla; Bidroha Basu; Salem Gharbia; Panagiota Katsikouli. 2021. "Pervasive sensing approaches for environmental pollution." Monitoring Environmental Contaminants , no. : 57-71.

Journal article
Published: 26 January 2021 in Sustainability
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Nature-based solutions (NBS) to address societal challenges have been widely recognised and adopted by governments in climate change and biodiversity strategies. Nevertheless, significant barriers exist for the necessary large-scale implementation of NBS and market development is still in its infancy. This study presents findings from a systematic review of literature and a survey on private sector agents in the planning and implementation of NBS, with the aim to identify them. In this study, we propose a typology for organisations delivering NBS and a categorisation of their economic activities. The most common organisation type found is nature-based enterprise which offers products or services where nature is a core element and used sustainably and engages in economic activity. Moreover, eleven categories of economic activities were identified, ranging from ecosystem restoration, living green roofs, and eco-tourism to smart technologies and community engagement for NBS. Nature-based enterprises contribute to a diverse range of sustainable economic activities, that standard industry classification systems do not adequately account for. The recognition of the value created by these activities is essential for designing effective policy support measures, and for market development of the sector and its potential to facilitate the wider adoption of NBS.

ACS Style

Esmee Kooijman; Siobhan McQuaid; Mary-Lee Rhodes; Marcus Collier; Francesco Pilla. Innovating with Nature: From Nature-Based Solutions to Nature-Based Enterprises. Sustainability 2021, 13, 1263 .

AMA Style

Esmee Kooijman, Siobhan McQuaid, Mary-Lee Rhodes, Marcus Collier, Francesco Pilla. Innovating with Nature: From Nature-Based Solutions to Nature-Based Enterprises. Sustainability. 2021; 13 (3):1263.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Esmee Kooijman; Siobhan McQuaid; Mary-Lee Rhodes; Marcus Collier; Francesco Pilla. 2021. "Innovating with Nature: From Nature-Based Solutions to Nature-Based Enterprises." Sustainability 13, no. 3: 1263.