ULTRA-Ex: Double Exposures: Socioecological Vulnerabilities in the Miami-Dade Urban Region

迈阿密-戴德市区的特点是一系列独特而自相矛盾的条件和力量。它是一个全球商业中心，资产容易受到沿海灾难性灾难的影响。它是一个富裕的城市，贫困率在全国名列前茅。它是一座植被稀少的城市，位于独特的、受保护的自然环境之间，并依赖于这些环境。这是一座降雨量很大的城市，但其淡水供应极易受到气候变化的影响。将这些优势和弱点结合在一起的是它们对当地和全球力量之间相互作用的依赖。这一研究项目的目的是调查全球生物物理和社会经济力量如何与当地进程相互作用，以塑造迈阿密-戴德市区的社会生态结构和动态。研究人员将使用双重曝光框架，强调经济全球化和气候变化之间的多重互动，作为研究的启发式重点。该项目将汇集一个由学术和应用科学家、教育工作者、公民组织以及州和地方政府组成的跨学科团队，探讨气候变化和经济全球化的双重威胁如何加剧现有的社会和生态脆弱性，以及城市地区如何变得更具弹性。该项目的最终目标是研究城市转型过程如何带来更具弹性的社会生态景观。研究计划遵循合作和参与研究的原则，因为研究人员计划充分整合多个学术学科和机构、联邦、州和地方机构、非政府组织、教育工作者和学生的目标、精力和不同的背景。这项研究将由三个主题工作组进行，重点是沿海脆弱性、城市土地管理和淡水可持续发展。每个小组将描述人口和资源的空间分布；推导人口/资源易受气候变化和全球化影响的控制的概念模型；并确定资源和脆弱性之间的空间和统计关系，从而为今后的经验性验证提供模板。工作组的产品将包括同行评议的文章；面向政策制定者和社区合作伙伴的白皮书；课程模块和论文研究等教育产品；以及各种技术产品，包括地理信息系统数据库、算法和互动地图。除了指导三名致力于该项目的研究生外，研究人员还将开设一门关于“城市系统的社会生态分析”的研究生课程，为学生提供寻找、分析和展示城市生态数据的实践经验，并让他们参与三个工作组的活动。基于这项研究，还将为K-12教育工作者开发一套教学模块。该项目将把干扰和景观异质性的生态学研究与城市政治生态学以及社会对生物物理和社会经济扰动的脆弱性研究的关键概念结合起来。该项目将把全球气候变化和经济全球化的影响与当地的生态和社会动态联系起来，从而扩大全球气候变化和经济全球化双重风险的概念。研究人员预计，这些跨尺度的相互作用将是理解城市社会生态系统弹性和动态的关键。该项目将促进大学内社会科学和自然科学的整合，促进大学与当地社区和政府的利益攸关方之间的专业和智力参与。研究与教育的整合将培养出一批具有合作、跨学科研究经验的研究生和中小学教育工作者，并将城市理解为复杂的社会生态系统，这两者将对发展自我维持的城市系统研究计划至关重要。该奖项是由美国国家科学基金会和美国农业部林业局联合支持的一项特别竞赛的结果，作为城市长期研究区域探索(ULTRA-EX)奖的资助。

The Miami-Dade urban region is characterized by a unique and paradoxical set of conditions and forces. It is a global commerce center, where assets are vulnerable to catastrophic coastal disasters. It is an affluent city with among the highest rates of poverty in the nation. It is a de-vegetated city situated between and dependent upon unique and protected natural environments. It is a city that receives significant rainfall but whose freshwater supply is critically vulnerable to climatic change. What unites these strengths and vulnerabilities is their dependence on the interaction between local and global forces. The objectives of this research project are to investigate how global biophysical and socioeconomic forces interact with local processes in shaping the socioecological structure and dynamics of the Miami-Dade urban region. The investigators will use a double-exposure framework that stresses the multiple interactions between economic globalization and climate change as the heuristic focus of the research. This project will bring together an interdisciplinary team of academic and applied scientists, educators, citizen organizations, and state and local governments to explore how existing social and ecological vulnerabilities may be exacerbated by the double threats of climate change and economic globalization and how the urban region might become more resilient. The project's ultimate goal is to examine how processes of urban transformation can lead to a more resilient socioecological landscape. The research plan is guided by principles of collaborative and engaged research, because the investigators plan to fully integrate the goals, energy, and diverse backgrounds of multiple academic disciplines and institutions; federal, state, and local agencies; non-governmental organizations; educators; and students. The research will be conducted by three themed working groups that focus on Coastal Vulnerabilities, Urban Land Stewardship, and Freshwater Sustainability. Each group will describe the spatial distribution of populations and resources; derive a conceptual model of the controls on population/resource vulnerability to climate change and globalization; and identify spatial and statistical relationships among resources and vulnerabilities, thereby providing a template for future empirical validation. Working group products will include peer-reviewed articles; white papers for policy makers and community partners; educational products such as course modules and dissertation research; and various technical products, including GIS databases, algorithms, and interactive maps. In addition to mentoring the three graduate students committed to the program, the researchers will offer a graduate course on "socioecological analysis of urban systems" to provide students with practical experience in finding, analyzing, and presenting urban ecological data and to engage them in the activities of the three working groups. A set of teaching modules for K-12 educators based on this research also will be developed.This project will integrate key concepts from the ecological study of disturbance and landscape heterogeneity with urban political ecology and the study of social vulnerability to biophysical and socioeconomic perturbations. This project will extend the concept of double exposure with respect to both global climate change and economic globalization by linking the effects of these global forces to local ecological and social dynamics. The investigators anticipate that these cross-scale interactions will be key to understanding the resilience and dynamics of urban socioecosystems. The project will facilitate integration of the social and natural sciences within the university and professional and intellectual engagement between the university and stakeholders in the local community and government. The integration of research and education will produce a cohort of graduate students and primary and secondary educators with experience in collaborative, interdisciplinary research and an understanding of cities as complex socioecological systems, both of which will be critical to the development of a self-sustaining research program in the study of urban systems. This award was funded as an Urban Long-Term Research Area Exploratory (ULTRA-Ex) award as the result of a special competition jointly supported by the National Science Foundation and the U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest Service.