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Urbanisation processes result in land cover changes which can modify the biological, chemical, and geological characteristics of the urban environment. As a result, cities face increased exposure to environmental hazards, placing individuals and communities at risk. While the role of urban green space in mitigating these hazards and enhancing urban resilience is widely recognised, brownfield land has been largely overlooked, with a paucity of research investigating the contribution of brownfield ecosystem services to urban resilience. Brownfield land is experiencing rapid land cover changes in urban areas due to brownfield-first approaches to development. Brownfield is disproportionately located in densely built urban areas, characterised by high levels of socio-economic deprivation, low amounts of green space, and increased exposure to environmental hazards. As the developmental pressure on brownfield increases, and the importance of urban resilience intensifies, it is important to understand the potential impacts of brownfield loss before they are redeveloped. It is important to understand the potential impacts of urban redevelopment processes utilising brownfield before they are redeveloped. Thus, this research explored how brownfield ecosystem services may contribute to building resilience to environmental hazards in urban areas. This research applies new approaches to the characterisation of brownfield, the quantification of their ecosystem services, comparison to existing green infrastructure, their relationship to environmental hazards and those who are most at risk in Greater Manchester, UK. Findings show that brownfield is widely distributed, disproportionately concentrated in urban areas, providing highly vegetated (51%) and pervious (58%) space. A novel typology developed utilising land cover analysis, landscape metric analysis and cluster analysis identified 26 distinct types which vary in terms of physical and ecological characteristics and impacts upon ecosystem services provision. In total, brownfield provided an estimated 52 kt of carbon storage, annual carbon sequestration of 2kt, removed 305t of air pollution, and avoided 133,000m3 of surface water runoff. Several types of brownfield (irregular shaped and vegetated, densely vegetated, vegetated with water body, and uneven and vegetated), provide more regulating ecosystem services than many types of park. In densely built urban areas, brownfield provides five times more regulating ecosystem services than parks, where scenario analysis indicated that interventions like extensive tree planting could deliver an 8-fold increase in benefits. Hotspots where high social vulnerability and exposure to environmental hazards intersected with increased brownfield were identified in urban regions. Brownfield is 8 times more prevalent in acute socially vulnerable areas than areas of low social vulnerability. Recommendations for strategic greening opportunities, the removal of impervious surfaces, enabling public access and redevelopment avoidance are made. The findings demonstrate several types of brownfield can provide significant regulating ecosystem services, are a valuable component of a city's green infrastructure in densely built urban areas and have scope to be managed or modified to maintain or increase urban resilience. The abundance of brownfield, with both high and low ecosystem service provision, in socially vulnerable neighbourhoods, suggest that brownfield could provide additional open green space and reduce exposure to environmental hazards. Strategic redevelopment of brownfield should be employed contingent on their location, distribution, and characteristics, and it is recommended that a rapid ecosystem service assessment tool is developed to support practice.

This study examines how Mesolithic lithic technology provides direct, yet often neglected, information about the Mesolithic hunter-gatherer mobility strategies in northern England, especially in relation to the Central Pennines {CP} of northwest England. It therefore provides a narrative which intimately links Mesolithic mobility strategies, settlement patterns, lithic raw material consumption, and tool use in the Central Pennine upland landscape and adjacent areas. The research area of the Central Pennines provides an ideal case study upon which to test current models of Mesolithic mobility and Mesolithic tool use because it is probably the densest distribution of Mesolithic sites currently known, and is in an area which has virtually no naturally occurring lithic resources which meant the Mesolithic people had to import all lithic raw materials. In order to elucidate the narrative, this study develops the Lithoscapes Referential Framework Model {LRFM} which integrates: 1} a methodological foundation for the documenting of lithic and landscape data including historiographic studies, and an explicitly defined lithic methodology, period and sub-period/sub-phase definitions with a radiocarbon chronology} with 2} an interpretive structure which defines conceptual links between the lithic evidence, hunter-gatherer mobility, and the landscape including the concepts of persistent places, risk, taskscapes, the choine operatoire model, positive feedback loops, and the equipotential hypothesis and idea of flexible tool use. The LRFM is placed at the , core of this study and enables the use of lithic evidence to document and investigate both Mesolithic choine operatoires on and between Central Pennine sites, as well as related aspects of Mesolithic mobility and the landscape. In particular, this study uses the lithic evidence to reappraise the mobility models that have been widely employed by archaeologists to explain Mesolithic settlement patterns. It shows that the Central Pennine Mesolithic sites were persistent places, that were repeatedly visited to exploit local plant and animal resources, had significant levels of site investment, were situated on Trans-Pennine pathways that linked rivers (which are argued to have been the main navigable transit routes), and were near to near to culturally significant 'handrail' landmarks. The lithics found on these persistent places are shown to have been exclusively imported from a hinterland covering Northern England. This hinterland compares well with population density reconstructions, and contains similar lithic styles (during the Early and Late Mesolithic). Consequently, this hinterland is suggested - to reflect a socio- ethnic/linguistic territory and/or that it implies that mobility was from throughout Northern England, with the Pennines being a key node or the Nexus of increasingly logistical resource and mobility networks. This therefore challenges traditional east-west mobility models, and the suggestions of smaller separate interior and coastal social territories. The long distance transport of the raw materials to the Central Pennines is shown to have impacted on the chaine operatoires and resulted in distinctly different Central Pennine lithic exploitation strategies (compared to those seen in the more traditionally researched lowland assemblages from karstic areas). In the Central Pennines impacts of the long distances included the virtual lack of on-site knapping, high levels of blade/let or tool importation, and the increased occurrence of flexible strategies (such as risk avoidance, caching, equipotentiality, and retooling). Furthermore, changes in raw material preferences appear to be directly linked to changes in the transit routes used (i.e. as part of changes in the larger mobility cycle over time). In addition, evidence is presented that shows there were distinct te~hnological traditions and cultural preferences in the Mesolithic of northern England. The evidence also implies that the Mesolithic knappers were extremely resourceful and able to adapt these formal trajectories in response to distance related stress (i.e. risk avoidance strategies), and the mitigation of unfavourable raw material properties. Deviation from the formal trajectories was also caused by the use of flexible strategies such as equipotentiality, retooling, and caching which also caused positive feedback loops on the chaine operatoires. Reasons for the flexible technological strategies are investigated including the necessity to import raw materials to the Central Pennines.

This study examines perceived benefits and costs of instructors who contributed to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) OpenCourseWare (OCW) project. While previous research has investigated the benefits and costs of OCW from the perspectives of the users and institution, the instructor's perspective is the focus of this qualitative case study. Instructors created the original educational content and would seem to have the most to lose by contributing to OCW. Data come from six years worth of surveys conducted by the evaluation team of the MIT OCW project, follow-up interviews with contributing MIT instructors, and a content analysis of written feedback comments received by the MIT OCW team. Findings include instructor benefits of: (1) improved reputation, (2) networking, (3) supplementary opportunities, (4) improved course content, (5) course feedback, (6) students accessing materials, and (7) working with the MIT OCW team; and instructor costs of: (1) damaged reputation, (2) loss of intellectual property rights, (3) requirement of extra resources, (4) realignment of individual professional goals, (5) public materials, and (6) working with the MIT OCW team. [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800) 1-800-521-0600. Web page: http://www.proquest.com/en-US/products/dissertations/individuals.shtml.]