Collaborative Research: Vulnerabilities in Critical Global Trade Infrastructures

对基础设施的科学兴趣试图了解影响信息和服务流的机械，人力和自然力量。这些基础设施越来越依赖于货物和人员的全球流动。然而，提供这些资源的全球系统不可避免地要通过瓶颈或“阻塞点”，如运河、隧道、海上航道、边境口岸等。这些阻塞点限制了物资和人员的流动，对国家和经济利益至关重要，而且特别脆弱、动态，容易受到干扰。毫不奇怪，政府、企业和社区对保护和监管这些网站非常感兴趣。然而，人们对这些通道的实际工作原理知之甚少。这个合作项目旨在探索当地社区，环境和基础设施如何相互作用，以允许通过这些网站（或不），以及如何普通在交通阻塞点发生的（有时是非常的）事件会影响经济系统、安全和生活，这些影响远远超出了交通阻塞点。查佩尔山的北卡罗来纳州大学的克里斯托弗·米德尔顿和加布里埃拉·瓦尔迪维亚，范德比尔特大学的阿什利·卡斯，密歇根大学安阿伯分校的贾廷·杜瓦、印第安纳州大学的伊丽莎白·邓恩和德克萨斯大学奥斯汀分校的杰森·康斯将探索世界各地的六个瓶颈。团队的每个成员都是他们研究领域的专家。每一个都将集中在一个特定的瓶颈上。其中包括：巴拿马运河、俄罗斯的隧道、印度的陆桥、厄瓜多尔的炼油厂和输油管道、孟加拉国的河流网络以及通往红海的海峡。研究人员将利用广泛的采访，观察和第一人称接触官员，工人和阻塞点居民，以了解这些过境区的独特人性化层面。这项研究汇集了来自世界各地的数据，将通过审查这些国家和世界利益的重要和动态点，对全球货物、信息和人员流动进行战略重新评估。调查结果将直接反映当前对移民、安全和经济福祉的担忧。 通过这样做，该项目有望改变政府，行业和其他人对当今世界这些关键过境点的理解和参与方式。

Scientific interest in infrastructure has tried to understand the mechanical, human, and natural forces that impact the flow of information and services. These infrastructures have become increasingly dependent on the global movement of goods and peoples. The global systems that deliver these resources, however, are inevitably funneled through bottlenecks or "chokepoints", such as canals, tunnels, maritime straights, border crossings, etc. Constricting the flow of materials and people, such chokepoints are both vital to national and economic interests, and uniquely vulnerable, dynamic, and prone to disturbances. Not surprisingly, governments, corporations, and communities have taken a keen interest in securing and regulating these sites. Little is known, however, about how these passageways actually work. This collaborative project seeks to explore how local communities, environments, and infrastructures interact to allow passage through these sites (or not), as well how ordinary (and sometimes extraordinary) events at chokepoints affect economic systems, security, and lives well beyond these points of passage.Christopher Middleton and Gabriela Valdivia of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Ashley Carse of Vanderbilt University, Jatin Dua of the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, Elizabeth Dunn of Indiana University, and Jason Cons of the University of Texas at Austin, will explore six chokepoints around the world. Each member of the team is an expert in their region of study. Each will focus on a particular kind of chokepoint. These include: the Panama Canal, a tunnel in Russia, a land bridge in India, an oil-refinery and pipelines in Ecuador, a network of rivers in Bangladesh, and a maritime strait leading into the Red Sea. The researchers will utilize extensive interviews, observation, and first-person engagement with officials, workers, and chokepoint residents in order to understand the distinctly human dimensions of these transit zones. Bringing together data from around the world, this study will provide a strategic reassessment of the global movement of goods, information, and people by examining these vital and dynamic points of national and world interest. The results will speak directly to current concerns over migration, security, and economic wellbeing. In doing so, this project promises to alter the ways governments, industries, and others understand and engage with these critical transit points of the world today.