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This paper explores how claims for transformative adaptation toward more equitable and sustainable societies can be assessed. We build on a theoretical framework describing transformative adaptation as it manifests across four core elements of the public-sector adaptation lifecycle: vision, planning, institutional frameworks, and interventions. For each element, we identify characteristics that can help track adaptation as transformative. Our purpose is to identify how governance systems can constrain or support transformative choices and thus enable targeted interventions. We demonstrate and test the usefulness of the framework with reference to three government-led adaptation projects of nature-based solutions (NBS): river restoration (Germany), forest conservation (China), and landslide risk reduction (Italy). Building on a desktop study and open-ended interviews, our analysis adds evidence to the view that transformation is not an abrupt system change, but a dynamic complex process that evolves over time. While each of the NBS cases fails to fulfill all the transformation characteristics, there are important transformative elements in their visions, planning, and interventions. There is a deficit, however, in the transformation of institutional frameworks. The cases show institutional commonalities in multi-scale and cross-sectoral (polycentric) collaboration as well as innovative processes for inclusive stakeholder engagement; yet, these arrangements are ad hoc, short-term, dependent on local champions, and lacking the permanency needed for upscaling. For the public sector, this result highlights the potential for establishing cross-competing priorities among agencies, cross-sectoral formal mechanisms, new dedicated institutions, and programmatic and regulatory mainstreaming.

Non-technical summary We identify a set of essential recent advances in climate change research with high policy relevance, across natural and social sciences: (1) looming inevitability and implications of overshooting the 1.5°C warming limit, (2) urgent need for a rapid and managed fossil fuel phase-out, (3) challenges for scaling carbon dioxide removal, (4) uncertainties regarding the future contribution of natural carbon sinks, (5) intertwinedness of the crises of biodiversity loss and climate change, (6) compound events, (7) mountain glacier loss, (8) human immobility in the face of climate risks, (9) adaptation justice, and (10) just transitions in food systems. Technical summary The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Assessment Reports provides the scientific foundation for international climate negotiations and constitutes an unmatched resource for researchers. However, the assessment cycles take multiple years. As a contribution to cross- and interdisciplinary understanding of climate change across diverse research communities, we have streamlined an annual process to identify and synthesize significant research advances. We collected input from experts on various fields using an online questionnaire and prioritized a set of 10 key research insights with high policy relevance. This year, we focus on: (1) the looming overshoot of the 1.5°C warming limit, (2) the urgency of fossil fuel phase-out, (3) challenges to scale-up carbon dioxide removal, (4) uncertainties regarding future natural carbon sinks, (5) the need for joint governance of biodiversity loss and climate change, (6) advances in understanding compound events, (7) accelerated mountain glacier loss, (8) human immobility amidst climate risks, (9) adaptation justice, and (10) just transitions in food systems. We present a succinct account of these insights, reflect on their policy implications, and offer an integrated set of policy-relevant messages. This science synthesis and science communica

This presentation explores how claims for transformative adaptation toward more equitable and sustainable societies can be assessed. We build on a theoretical framework describing transformative adaptation as it manifests across four core elements of the public-sector adaptation lifecycle: vision, planning, institutional frameworks, and interventions. For each element, we identify characteristics that can help track adaptation as transformative. Our purpose is to identify how governance systems can constrain or support transformative choices and thus enable targeted interventions. We demonstrate and test the usefulness of the framework with reference to three case studies of nature-based solutions (NBS): river restoration (Germany), forest conservation (China), and landslide risk reduction (Italy). Building on a desktop study and open-ended interviews, our analysis adds evidence to the view that transformation is not an abrupt system change, but a dynamic complex process that evolves over time. While each of the NBS cases fails to fulfill all the transformation characteristics, there are important transformative elements in their visions, planning, and interventions. There is a deficit, however, in the transformation of institutional frameworks. The cases show institutional commonalities in multi-scale and cross- sectoral (polycentric) collaboration as well as innovative processes for inclusive stakeholder engagement; yet, these arrangements are ad hoc, short-term, dependent on local champions, and lacking the permanency needed for upscaling. For the public sector, this result highlights the potential for establishing cross-competing priorities among agencies, cross-sectoral formal mechanisms, new dedicated institutions, as well as programmatic and regulatory mainstreaming.

Climate change is a severe global threat. Research on climate change and vulnerability to natural hazards has made significant progress over the last decades. Most of the research has been devoted to improving the quality of climate information and hazard data, including exposure to specific phenomena, such as flooding or sea-level rise. Less attention has been given to the assessment of vulnerability and embedded social, economic and historical conditions that foster vulnerability of societies. A number of global vulnerability assessments based on indicators have been developed over the past years. Yet an essential question remains how to validate those assessments at the global scale. This paper examines different options to validate global vulnerability assessments in terms of their internal and external validity, focusing on two global vulnerability indicator systems used in the WorldRiskIndex and the INFORM index. The paper reviews these global index systems as best practices and at the same time presents new analysis and global results that show linkages between the level of vulnerability and disaster outcomes. Both the review and new analysis support each other and help to communicate the validity and the uncertainty of vulnerability assessments. Next to statistical validation methods, we discuss the importance of the appropriate link between indicators, data and the indicandum. We found that mortality per hazard event from floods, drought and storms is 15 times higher for countries ranked as highly vulnerable compared to those classified as low vulnerable. These findings highlight the different starting points of countries in their move towards climate resilient development. Priority should be given not just to those regions that are likely to face more severe climate hazards in the future but also to those confronted with high vulnerability already.

Community resilience has become an important concept for characterising and measuring the abilities of populations to anticipate, absorb, accommodate, and recover from the effects of a hazardous event in a timely and efficient manner. Many conceptual and empirical studies have shown that communities are an important scale and setting for building resilience that can enhance both individual/household and wider population‐level outcomes. The literature reviews at the early stages of the project aimed at providing a point of reference for the development of the emBRACE resilience framework. The emBRACE resilience framework conceptualises community resilience as a set of intertwined components in a three‐layer framework. The proposed three‐layered and tripartite framework for characterising community resilience is developed deductively by considering theoretical approaches of resilience from various disciplinary backgrounds and state of the art research. The result is a theory‐ informed heuristic that guides empirical research as well as practical disaster management and community development.

The level of community is considered to be vital for building disaster resilience. Yet, community resilience as a scientific concept often remains vaguely defined and lacks the guiding characteristics necessary for analysing and enhancing resilience on the ground. The emBRACE framework of community resilience presented in this paper provides a heuristic analytical tool for understanding, explaining and measuring community resilience to natural hazards. It was developed in an iterative process building on existing scholarly debates, on empirical case study work in five countries and on participatory consultation with community stakeholders where the framework was applied and ground-tested in different contexts and for different hazard types. The framework conceptualizes resilience across three core domains: (i) resources and capacities, (ii) actions and (iii) learning. These three domains are conceptualized as intrinsically conjoined within a whole. Community resilience is influenced by these integral elements as well as by extra-community forces comprising disaster risk governance and thus laws, policies and responsibilities on the one hand and on the other, the general societal context, natural and human-made disturbances and system change over time. The framework is a graphically rendered heuristic, which through application can assist in guiding the assessment of community resilience in a systematic way and identifying key drivers and barriers of resilience that affect any particular hazard-exposed community.

Despite continuing technological advancement in hazard and vulnerability assessment, risk modelling and hazard mitigation techniques, losses to disasters associated with natural hazards continue and in some cases are increasing across Europe and worldwide. This paper focuses on the need to bridge the gap between technical solutions and the sociopolitical contexts in which these are produced, to better understand and create more effective risk management regimes. We do so with application of the science–policy co-production frame to landslide risk management in Italy. The methodology deployed included a desk study informed by semi-structured interviews carried out with selected key stakeholders at national, regional and municipal level. We propose a normative and analytical framework for transferring co-production into natural hazard research by presenting a matrix identifying four contexts within which co-production may unfold. The matrix is based on two axes, which distinguish between innovation and its absence in science and policy domains. We examine several examples of co-production, such as the water–soil integrated approach to risk management or the implementation of hazard/risk assessment. The results highlight that the insulation of science from the institutional context within which knowledge is produced and used is a very problematic issue. This often hinders the implementation of desirable policies and undermines the effectiveness of interventions. Moreover, innovation in science and policy does not automatically result in successful solutions for landslide risk management. Finally, results confirm the utility of co-production but also highlight methodological challenges associated with the introduction of this new conceptual paradigm into the well-structured communities of scientists and policy-makers.

Coastal floods are one of the most dangerous and harmful natural hazards affecting urban areas adjacent to shorelines. The present paper discusses the FP7-ENV-2013 EU funded PEARL (Preparing for Extreme And Rare events in coastaL regions) project which brings together world leading expertise in both the domain of hydro-engineering and risk reduction and management services to pool knowledge and practical experience in order to develop more sustainable risk management solutions for coastal communities focusing on present and projected extreme hydro-meteorological events. The PEARL approach draws upon the complexity theory and the use of complex adaptive system (CAS) models as tools to identify root causes of vulnerabilities and their multi-stressors and to analyze risk and the behavior of key actors., Energy & Industry

In the face of needed transformation of disaster policy towards more pro-active investments in prevention and preparedness, we discuss the factors contributing to or driving disaster policy change. Building on policy learning and change theory, the research focuses on the relationship between widely publicized catastrophic events, advocacy coalitions that promote new policy initiatives, and other contextual factors driving change. We demonstrate the complex interaction of transformative changes and context by analyzing the history of Italian landslide risk policy, including the policy process, legal and institutional landscapes, scientific innovation and major hydro-geological disasters. A desk study is combined with 18 semi-structured interviews with expert informants and stakeholders at the national level. Two historical examples, the 1966 Florence flood (influencing landslide policy) and the 1998 Sarno landslide, show how catastrophic disasters can open a policy window; but events, alone, are not sufficient for driving major reforms. In these examples, disaster events were coupled with strong advocacy coalitions that promoted policy change. Some disciplinary coalitions proved to be particularly successful in influencing policy paths, especially if they belonged to long established and organized groups (e.g. hydrologists as opposed to geophysicists). Also, the capability to provide models and scenarios, e.g. due to more reliable forecasts for floods than landslides, influenced the capacity of certain coalitions to push their ideas forward. The study reveals the critical need to proactively promote exchanges between scientists and policy-makers in order to better formulate and implement needed changes in disaster policy.

This chapter focuses on the implications of changing climate extremes for development, and considers how disaster risk management and climate change adaptation together can contribute to a sustainable and resilient future. Changes in the frequency, timing, magnitude, and characteristics of extreme events pose challenges to the goals of reducing disaster risk and vulnerability, both in the present and in the future. Enhancing the capacity of social-ecological systems to cope with, adapt to, and shape change is central to building sustainable and resilient development pathways in the face of climate change. The concept for social-ecological systems recognizes the interdependence of social and ecological factors in the generation and management of risk, as well as in the pursuit of sustainable development. Despite 20 years on the policy agenda, sustainable development remains contested and elusive. However, within the context of climate change, it is becoming increasingly clear that the sustainability of humans on the Earth is closely linked to resilient social-ecological systems, which is influenced by social institutions, human agency, and human capabilities.

Other authors: S Hallegatte, A Maskrey, T Oki, U Oswald-Spring, T Wilbanks, PZ Yanda, F Berkhout, HG Brauch, K Brown, L Harrington, H Kunreuther, C Lacambra, R Leichenko, R Mechler, C Pahl-Wostl, V Przyluski, D Satterthwaite, F Sperling, L Sygna, T Tanner, P Tschakert, K Ulsrud, V Viguié.

Using the HEXTE experiment on-board the RXTE satellite, we performed a search for hard X-ray tails in Sco X-1 spectra. We found strong evidence for the presence of such a non-thermal component on several occasions. Using the PCA/RXTE we were able to track the position of the source along the Z diagram, and we observed that the presence of the hard X-ray tail is not confined to a particular region. However, we found a correlation between the power law index of the non-thermal component and the position of the source in the Z diagram, suggesting that the hard X-ray spectrum (i.e., E > 50 keV) becomes flatter as the mass accretion rate increases. We were also able to study the temporal variation of the appearance/absence of the hard X-ray component. With our derived luminosities, we were also able to test the idea that X-ray luminosities can be used to distinguish between X-ray binary systems containing neutron stars and black holes., Comment: 6 pages, 2 figures; Presented at the 33rd COSPAR Scientific Assembly (Warsaw, Poland, 2000 July); Accepted for publication in Advances in Space Research

In this paper, we summarize the RXTE measurements of cyclotron resonance scattering features in 8 accreting pulsars. The wide bandpass and modest resolution of the RXTE instruments make them ideal for measuring these generally broad features. In particular, the high energy response of HEXTE provides a window for discovery of new lines not detectable with proportional counters such as Ginga or the PCA alone., Comment: 5 pages. To appear in "Proceedings of the 5th Compton Symposium"

We report phase resolved spectroscopy of the transient accreting pulsar, 4U0115+63. For the first time, more than two cylotron resonance scattering features are detected in the spectrum of an X-ray pulsar. The shape of the fundamental line appears to be complex, and this is in agreement with predictions of Monte-Carlo models. As in other pulsars, the line energies and optical depths are strong functions of pulse phase. One possible model for this is an offset of the dipole of the neutron star magnetic field., Comment: 5 pages. To appear in "Proceedings of the 5th Compton Symposium"

A failed main-on in the 35d cycle of Her X-1 was observed with the Rossi X-Ray Timing Explorer (RXTE) on 1999 April 26. Exceptions to the normal 35d cycle have been seen only twice before; in 1983 and again 1993. We present timing and spectral results of this latest Anomalous Low State (ALS) along with comparisons to the main-on and normal low states. Pulsations were observed in the 3-18 keV band with a fractional RMS variation of (0.037+-0.003). Spectral analysis indicates that the ALS spectrum has the same shape as the main-on but is modified by heavy absorption and scattering. We find that 70% of the observed emission has passed through a cold absorber (N_H=5.0x10^{23}cm^{-2}). This partially absorbing spectral fit can be applied to the normal low state with similar results. We find that the ALS observations may be interpreted as a decrease in inclination of the accretion disk causing the central X-Ray source to be obscured over the entire 35d cycle., Comment: revised text, 6 revised figures, accepted for publication in ApJ

We have discovered a third harmonic cyclotron resonance scattering feature (CRSF) in observations of the recent outburst of 4U 0115+63 with the Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer (RXTE). The spectrum in a narrow pulse phase range shows CRSFs at 12.40+0.65/-0.35, 21.45+0.25/-0.38, and 33.56+0.70/-0.90 keV. With centroid energy ratios to the fundamental of 1.73+/-0.08 and 2.71+/-0.13, the CRSFs are not harmonically spaced. Strong variability of the continuum and CRSFs with pulse phase indicate a complex emission geometry near the neutron star polar cap. In addition, one RXTE observation, which spanned periastron passage, revealed a strong 2 mHz quasi-periodic oscillation (QPO). This is slower by two orders of magnitude than the beat-frequency QPO expected in this system and slower by a factor of more than 5 compared with other QPOs seen in accreting X-ray pulsars., Comment: To appear in The Astrophysical Journal Letters. 4 pages, 5 figures. Uses "emulateapj.sty". Revised version includes new figures and additions to the analysis

We report on the discovery of a new pulsating X-ray source during Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer observations of a low galactic latitude field centered at RA (J2000) = 19 hr 05 m 43 s and Dec (J2000) = +08 deg 58 arcmin 48 arcsec. Significant pulsations were detected by both the PCA and HEXTE instruments aboard RXTE at a fundamental period of 89.17 +/- 0.02 seconds, with higher harmonics also visible in the 2-10 keV power spectrum. The folded lightcurve from the source is multiply peaked at lower energies, and changes to single peaked morphology above ~20 keV. The phase averaged spectrum from the source is well fit by strongly absorbed power law or thermal bremsstrahlung spectral models of photon index 1.9 +/- 0.1 or temperature 19.5 +/- 4.6 keV, respectively. The mean neutral hydrogen column density is approximately 10^23 cm^-2, suggesting a distance of >10 kpc to the source and a minimum 2-10 keV X-ray luminosity of 2*10^{35} ergs s^{-1}. By comparison with other pulsars with similar periods and luminosities, we suggest that XTE J1906+09 has a supergiant companion with an underfilled Roche lobe. We speculate further that one of the M stars in a peculiar M star binary system may be the companion., Comment: 14 pages, 2 figures. Accepted by ApJ Letters

The High Energy X-ray Timing Experiment (HEXTE) is one of three scientific instruments aboard the Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer (RXTE), which was launched on December 30, 1995. RXTE performs timing and spectral studies of bright x-ray sources to determine the physical parameters of these systems. The HEXTE consists of two independent clusters of detectors, each cluster containing four NaI(Tl)/CsI(Na) phoswich scintillation counters sharing a common 1 degree FWHM field of view. The field of view of each cluster is switched on- and off-source to provide near real-time background measurements. The net open area of the eight detectors is 1600 cm2, and each detector covers the energy range 15-250 keV with an average energy resolution of 15.4% at 60 keV. The in-flight performance of the HEXTE is described, the light curve and spectrum of the Crab Nebula/Pulsar is given, and the 15-240 keV spectrum of the weak source, active galaxy MCG 8-11-11 is presented to demonstrate the weak source spectral capabilities of HEXTE., Comment: 30 pages, 14 figures, 4 tables, accepted by Ap. J., to be published in vol 496, March 20, 1998

We present the results of observations of the PSR B1509$-$58/MSH 15$-$52 system in X-rays ($2-250$ keV) by the Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer. The spectra of the peak of the pulsed component (radio phase $0.17-0.53$) is fit by a power law of photon index $1.36\pm0.01$, with no evidence of a high energy spectral break seen up to $\sim200$ keV. For the off-pulse spectral component, the spectrum from $2-250$ keV is fit by a power law of photon index $2.215\pm0.005$. An iron emission line at 6.7 keV with an equivalent width of 129 eV improves the fit, but only at a marginal significance. Thermal bremsstrahlung and Raymond-Smith models produce much worse fits to the unpulsed data. The lack of a high energy spectral break in the pulsed emission implies an efficiency of $\geq 3%$ in the conversion of pulsar spindown energy to pulsed X-rays in the system., Comment: Accepted by ApJ Letters, 18 pages, 4 postscript figures

We present the 2-60 keV spectrum of the supernova remnant Cassiopeia A measured using the Proportional Counter Array and the High Energy X-ray Timing Experiment on the Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer satellite. In addition to the previously reported strong emission-line features produced by thermal plasmas, the broad-band spectrum has a high-energy "tail" that extends to energies at least as high as 120 keV. This tail may be described by a broken power law that has photon indices of 1.8 +0.5/-0.6 and 3.04 +0.15/-0.13 and a break energy of 15.9 +0.3/-0.4 keV. We argue that the high-energy component, which dominates the spectrum above about 10 keV, is produced by synchrotron radiation from electrons that have energies up to at least 40 TeV. This conclusion supports the hypothesis that Galactic cosmic rays are accelerated predominantly in supernova remnants., Comment: 10 pages of text, 3 figures, accepted for Astrophys. J. Letters

This paper describes the structure and application of a multistate projection model that was developed by the Operational Research Service of the Department of Health and Social Security, UK. The model can be used to calculate the evolution of a multistate manpower or population distribution, with each state's stock classified either by length of time in a state or by age and subdivided into up to four noninteracting population subgroups (e.g., according to sex and country of origin). Both Markov ("push") and Renewal ("pull") flows can be simulated and a wide range of different network configurations can be modeled. Medical manpower planning problems are also discussed--in particular the issue of career planning for doctors in the presence of demand constraints--to exemplify the possible uses of the model. As background, the role of manpower planning in health care planning and the sorts of problems that arise in balancing the supply of, and demand for, any manpower group are outlined. The generality of the Department of Health and Social Security model is demonstrated by highlighting its structural similarity to the multistate models that have been the subject of study at IIASA in recent years. The model's uses in detecting both potential manpower supply instabilities in market-based manpower systems and planning in feasibilities in planned systems are pointed out. A model run is discussed, based on a hypothetical situation, in which growth rates of one grade in a manpower network lead to supply problems for the whole network. The Appendix contains sample input and output files.