Science
Simulating the future of the global agro-food system
Cybernetic models analyze scenarios of interactions between future global food consumption, agriculture, landuse, and the biogeochemical cycles of water, nitrogen and carbon.
How can we feed a growing world population within a resilient Earth System? This session will present results from our cybernetic computer models that simulate how future trends in population growth, diets, technology and policy may change the global land cover, freshwater usage, the nitrogen cycle and the climate system, and how more sustainable pathways can be reached. We want to discuss how our computer models and our data can be made accessible and usable by a broader community, and which new ways exist to visualize key insights and provide decision support to our society. We will also showcase some interactive physical installations that have been developed jointly with a group of art students to visualize future scenarios.
Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research is specialized on simulations of the Earth System using supercomputing facilities, pushing the cybernetic concepts of the 20st century to the next level. Dozens of researchers jointly coded for more than a decade a number of Integrated Assessment Models that simulate the complex interactions between humans and the environment in great detail, drawing concepts from both natural and social sciences. Building such computer-supported macroscopes allow us to make the vast complexity of the Earth System comprehensible and supports decision makers in finding sustainable pathways into the future.
This session will address the question: How can we feed a growing world population within a resilient Earth System? It will present results from our cybernetic computer models that simulate how future trends in population growth, diets, technology and policy may change the global land cover, freshwater usage, the nitrogen cycle and the climate system, and how more sustainable pathways can be reached. We want to discuss how our computer models and our data can be made accessible and usable by a broader community, and which new ways exist to visualize key insights and provide decision support to our society.
We will also showcase some interactive physical installations that have been developed jointly with a group of art students to visualize future scenarios.
Additional information
| Type | lecture |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
More sessions
| 12/27/17 |
We're supposed to trust evidence-based information in all areas of life. However disconcerting news from several areas of science must make us ask how much we can trust scientific evidence.
|
| 12/27/17 |
Quantitative science evaluation, such as university rankings, rely on man-made algorithms and man-made databases. The modelling decisions underlying this data-driven algorithmic science evaluation are, among other things, the outcome of a specific power structure in the science system. Power relations are especially visible, when negotiated during processes of boundary work. Therefore, we use the discourse on 'citation cartels', to shed light on a specific perception of fairness in the ...
|
| 12/27/17 |
For a few decades by now, satellites offer us the tools to observe the whole Earth with a wide variety of sensors. The vast amount of data these Earth observations systems collect enters the public discourse reduced to a few numbers, numbers like 3 or even 300. So, how do we know the amount of ice melting in the arctic or how much rain is falling in the Amazon? Are groundwater aquifers stable or are they are being depleted? Are these regular seasonal changes or is there a trend? How can we even ...
|
| 12/27/17 |
Jeder kennt sie, kaum jemand versteht sie wirklich, die vielleicht berühmteste Gleichung der Welt: E=mc^2 Was hat es damit auf sich, was ist die spezielle- und was die allgemeine Relativitätstheorie? Wie kann man sicher sein, dass das wirklich stimmt? Bleibt die Zeit stehen, wenn man sich mit Lichtgeschwindigkeit bewegt? Was ist das Zwillings-Paradoxon und dehnt sich das Universum aus, oder werden wir einfach nur immer kleiner?
|
| 12/28/17 |
Eine wissenschaftliche Perspektive auf die achtlose Anwendung der Algorithmen des maschinellen Lernens und der künstlichen Intelligenz, z.B. in personalisierten Nachrichtenempfehlungssystemen oder Risikosoftware im US-Justizsystem.
|
| 12/28/17 |
Wouldn’t it be awesome to have a microscope which allows scientists to map atomic details of viruses, film chemical reactions, or study the processes in the interior of planets? Well, we’ve just built one in Hamburg. It’s not table-top, though: 1 billion Euro and a 3km long tunnel is needed for such a ‘free electron laser’, also called 4th generation synchrotron light source. I will talk about the basic physics and astonishing facts and figures of the operation and application of these ...
|
| 12/29/17 |
Holography of Wi-Fi radiation Philipp Holl [1,2] and Friedemann Reinhard [2] [1] Max Planck Institute for Physics [2] Walter Schottky Institut and Physik-Department, Technical University of Munich When we think of wireless signals such as Wi-Fi or Bluetooth, we usually think of bits and bytes, packets of data and runtimes. Interestingly, there is a second way to look at them. From a physicist's perspective, wireless radiation is just light, more precisely: coherent electromagnetic radiation. It ...
|
