About
46
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358
Citations
Citations since 2017
Introduction
Dr. Gharbia is a Lecturer of Water Science at IT Sligo. Integrated environmental dynamic systems modelling using GIS & Machine Learning Techniques is his main field of interest. Dr. Gharbia is a civil engineer with a master degree in water & environmental sciences, in addition to a postgraduate diploma in statistics. His PhD developed an integrated modelling platform (GEO-CWB) to study water vulnerability in large catchments.
Additional affiliations
September 2019 - present
October 2016 - August 2019
May 2015 - September 2016
Education
March 2018 - March 2019
September 2014 - September 2017
September 2014 - June 2015
Publications
Publications (46)
Environmental exposure to active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) can have negative effects on the health of ecosystems and humans. While numerous studies have monitored APIs in rivers, these employ different analytical methods, measure different APIs, and have ignored many of the countries of the world. This makes it difficult to quantify the sca...
This paper summarises an updated climate change trends analysis—developed for the period from 1 October 1864 to 30 September 2021 within the scope of a Horizon 2020-funded project to increase climate resilience in European coastal cities—for a representative site of the Lisbon Metropolitan Area (Portugal). By using long ground-based daily records o...
Wind energy is a key element in the ongoing push to decarbonize the energy supply. The first step in the development of a wind farm at a specific site is to conduct feasibility studies including accurate long-term wind potential assessments and estimates of the annual energy production. However, as evidence of climate change becomes more apparent r...
Water is a basic element of the natural environment and the most important component in human water management. Rainfall is the main source of water. Therefore, determining the amount of precipitation reaching the ground using sensors is crucial information. Precise precipitation data are necessary for better modeling quality, as the observation da...
The performance of a desalination membrane depends on a specific pore size suitable for both water permeability and salt rejection. To increase membrane permeability, the applied pressure should be increased, which creates the need to improve membrane stability. In this research article, a molecular dynamics (MD) simulation was performed using Reax...
Climate change leads to an unequivocal rise in the intensity and frequency of natural disasters. This necessitates mainstreaming of climate adaptation strategies in the global movement on climate action. Ecosystem-Based Adaptation (EBA) has become popular as an effective means of climate adaptation, which can be resilient and flexible compared to h...
Climate change has been recognised for decades, and environmental risks related to it areexpected to become more common over time as the world's population continues to grow. Thistendency is compounded by people congregating in areas such as coastal regions, which arebecoming increasingly vulnerable due to climate change. It is demonstrated that ov...
Changes in streamflow within catchments can have a significant impact on agricultural production, as soil moisture loss, as well as frequent drying and wetting, may have an effect on the nutrient availability of many soils. In order to predict future changes and explore the impact of different scenarios, machine learning techniques have been used r...
A significant growth in the future demand for water resources is expected. Hence researchers have focused on finding new technologies to develop water filtration systems by using experimental and simulation methods. These developments were mainly on membrane-based separation technology, and photocatalytic degradation of organic pollutants which pla...
Environmental exposure to active pharmaceutical ingredients
(APIs) can have negative effects on the health of ecosystems and
humans. While numerous studies have monitored APIs in rivers,
these employ different analytical methods, measure different
APIs, and have ignored many of the countries of the world. This
makes it difficult to quantify the sca...
Due to the rapid depletion of water resources, more interest is paid for the efficient desalination process in recent years. MoS 2 membrane aroused attention due to its high mechanical stability and electronic properties, which can sustain extra-large strains. In this study, the electronic properties and water desalination performance of TiO 2 /MoS...
Special Issue "Intelligent Sensing for Sustainable Production Industries"
A special issue of Sustainability (ISSN 2071-1050).
Dear Colleagues,
Over the last decade, there have been significant advances in intelligent sensing technologies which are having a major impact on the ability of many production industries to accurately monitor and control...
Assessment of dynamic regional Groundwater vulnerability on a spatiotemporal scale and develop a decision support tool that will generate different probabilistic groundwater contamination scenarios considering nitrate as an indicator.
Reverse osmosis (RO) technologies present a solution for water scarcity in many parts of the world where brackish water exists. Antiscalants act as a pre-treatment water additive for the RO plants in order to protect the membranes from scaling. This paper presents field and experimental lab works to examine the effects of antiscalants on the small...
Reverse osmosis (RO) technologies present a solution for water scarcity in many parts of the world where brackish water exists. Antiscalants act as a pre-treatment water additive for the RO plants in order to protect the membranes from scaling. This paper presents field and experimental lab works to examine the effects of antiscalants on the small...
The groundwater is the primary source for irrigation and other purposes in the Gaza Strip. The low irrigational water quality effects on the soil quality, which interrupts the growth of plants impacting agricultural yield and can cause risk to human health. Thus, it is essential to evaluate the water quality for irrigation uses. Therefore, it is a...
The evergrowing populations and increasing human activities are associated with a major increase in environmental pollution. However, their impact is still poorly understood due to the pervasiveness and spatiotemporal complexity of the phenomenon. Conventional approaches to environmental monitoring are based on networks of sparse measurement statio...
Parametrising the spatially distributed dynamic catchment water balance is a critical factor in studying the hydrological system responses to climate and land use changes. This study presents the development of a geographic information system (GIS)-based set of algorithms (geographical spatially distributed water balance model (GEO-CWB)), which is...
![Fig. 3 Land use categories as defined in MODIS[49]. The CTR land-use is...](profile/Francesco-Pilla/publication/323295098/figure/fig3/AS:632270910136330@1527756540503/Land-use-categories-as-defined-in-MODIS49-The-CTR-land-use-is-on-the-left-The-VEG-run_Q320.jpg)
The increase of temperature attributed to anthropogenic emissions is projected to continue in future climate scenarios. Protocols and policies are being put in place in several European countries to reduce both emissions and impact of human activities on climate. The Irish Reforestation policy is a good example of such protocols. Nevertheless, ofte...
Climate change and human behaviour, such as building on floodplains, are increasing the incidence of floods in urban areas. This paper investigates the relationship between flood risk and residential accommodation costs, both sales and rental, using a detailed dataset of over 650,000 sale and rental listings in Dublin, Ireland over the period 2006-...
Renewable energy is considered to be a critical factor in developing wealthy and sustainable societies. However, its utilisation in the electrical power grid can be very challenging regarding the rates predictably. Renewable energy mainly depends on the local environmental conditions, such as temperature and rainfall-runoff ratios. Therefore, the e...
Reservoirs are designed to provide the balance between the flow brought by the river which is high variable in time and volume of water. The storage required on a river to meet a specific demand depends basically on three factors; the magnitude and the variability of the river, the size of the demand and the degree of reliability of this demand bei...
Evapotranspiration integrates energy and mass transfer between the Earth's surface and atmosphere and is the most active mechanism linking the atmosphere, hydrosphsophere, lithosphere and biosphere. This study focuses on the fine resolution modeling and projection of spatially distributed potential evapotranspiration on the large catchment scale as...
The increase of temperature attributed to anthropogenic emissions is projected to continue in future climate scenarios. Several protocols and policies are being put in place in several European countries to reduce both emissions and impact of human activities. The Irish Reforestation policy is a good example of such protocols. Nevertheless often co...
Reservoirs are designed to provide the balance between the flow brought by the river which is high variable in time and volume of water. The storage required on a river to meet a specific demand depends basically on three factors; the magnitude and the variability of the river flows, the size of the demand and the degree of reliability of this dema...
Water resources management and policies need to consider the dynamic nature of any catchment's water balance, particularly in planning stage, to develop effective strategies for the future. The main goal of this research is to create an innovative and integrated environmental modelling tool (GEO-CWB) by applying Machine Learning Techniques to a Geo...
Over the years, urban growth models have proven to be effective in describing and estimating urban development
and have consequently proven to be valuable for informed urban planning decision. Therefore, this paper investigates the implementation of an urban growth Cellular automata (CA) model using a GIS platform as a support tool for city planner...
Climate impact studies especially in the field of hydrology often depend on climate change projections at fine spatial resolution. General circulation models (GCMs), which are the tools for estimating future climate scenarios, run on a very coarse scale, so the output from GCMs need to be downscaled to obtain a finer spatial resolution. This paper...
General circulation models (GCMs) are used for estimating future climate scenarios, run on a very coarse scale, so the outputs from GCMs need to be downscaled to obtain a finer spatial resolution. This paper provides a methodology for GCM-Ensembles performance evaluation using a GIS platform by applying statistical spatial downscaling methods. Stat...
The concatenated effects of increased frequency of intense precipitations due to climate change and anthropogenic impacts in the form of construction in floodplains, channel straightening and increased presence of impermeable surfaces are increasing the incidence of floods in urban areas. This paper investigates behavioral responses to a natural ha...
Groundwater quality is a major environmental aspect which needs to be analyzed and managed depending on its spatial distribution. Utilization of insufficient management of groundwater resources in Gaza Strip, Palestine, produces not only a reduction in quantity but also deterioration in quality of groundwater. The aim of this study is to provide an...
Groundwater quality is a major environmental aspect which needs to be analyzed and managed depending on its spatial distribution. Utilization of insufficient management of groundwater resources in Gaza Strip, Palestine, produces not only a reduction in quantity but also deterioration in quality of groundwater. The aim of this study is to provide an...
The Gaza Strip is a part of the Palestinian coastal plain located in an arid to semi-arid region. It is bordered by Egypt from the south, the green line from the North, Nagev desert from the East and the Mediterranean Sea from the West, so the Gaza Strip is located on the south-eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea, between longitudes 34° 2” and 3...
The Gaza Strip is a part of the Palestinian coastal plain located in an arid to semi-arid region. It is bordered by Egypt from the south, the green line from the North, Nagev desert from the East and the Mediterranean Sea from the West, so The Gaza Strip is located on the south-eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea, between longitudes 34° 2” and 3...
The effectiveness of water resources management and policies need to consider the dynamic nature of any catchment’s water balance, particularly in planning stage, to develop innovative strategies for the future. Hence, future management planning scenarios and policies for a specific catchment have to integrate a dynamic water balance with future ch...
Climate changes over the Gaza strip area as a semi-arid area is a major factor that affects the developing strategic plans for water sector. This study aims to determine the future climate changes over Gaza strip. Fossil energy intensive (A1F1) with high sensitivity is the emission scenario that was used for the prediction process. The median assem...
As Mediterranean coastal area, the Gaza Strip is likely to be at high risk for water scarcity due to climate change, thus hydrological studies are necessary. This study aims to investigate the impacts of climate change on water balance elements of the Gaza Strip and generate future projections. The Water Balance computer model (WetSPASS) integrated...
The Gaza Strip is subjected to considerable impacts of climate change that may adversely affect the groundwater resource. A decrease in annual precipitation as well as an increase in temperatures are projected from an ensemble of global climate models. In this study, the impact of climate change on groundwater resources in Gaza coastal aquifer was...
The study of the impacts of climate change on groundwater is a major factor that affects the developing strategic plans. The Gaza strip coastal aquifer area as one of the semi-arid areas is affected by climate changes and that absolutely affects all kinds of water resources including groundwater resource. The purpose of this study is to study the i...
Projects
Projects (4)
SCORE is a €10m Horizon 2020-funded research project to increase climate resilience in European coastal cities lead by IT Sligo.
The overall aim of SCORE is to design, develop, monitor and validate robust adaptation measures in coastal and low-lying areas to protect them from increasing climate and sea level risks, including coastal flooding and erosion, to enhance their overall long-term resilience.
SCORE outlines a co-creation strategy, developed via a network of 10 coastal city ‘living labs’ (CCLLs), to rapidly, equitably and sustainably enhance coastal city climate resilience through Ecosystem-Based Approaches (EBAs) and sophisticated digital technologies. SCORE will establish an integrated coastal zone management framework for strengthening EBA and smart coastal city policies, creating European leadership in coastal city climate change adaptation in line with The Paris Agreement.
SCORE will involve citizen science in providing prototype coastal city early-warning systems and will enable smart, instant monitoring and control of climate resilience in European coastal cities through open, accessible spatial ‘digital twin’ tools.
SCORE will provide innovative platforms to empower stakeholders’ deployment of EBAs to increase climate resilience, business opportunities and financial sustainability of coastal cities.
The SCORE interdisciplinary team consists of 28 world-leading organisations from academia, local authorities, RPOs, and SMEs encompassing a wide range of skills including environmental science and policy, climate modelling, citizen and social science, data management, coastal management and engineering, security and technological aspects of smart sensing research.
Dear Colleagues,
Over the last decade, there have been significant advances in intelligent sensing technologies which are having a major impact on the ability of many production industries to accurately monitor and control processes to improve efficiencies, reduce waste, lower environmental impact, improve product quality and to develop new products to improve the quality of life of citizens. Intelligent sensors utilize advanced signal processing, sensor fusion, mathematical models and learning algorithms to gain a better understanding of industrial processes and products and the factors that affect them. Intelligent sensing technologies can allow powerful information to be quickly and easily extracted from sensors such as low cost vision devices and sensors with highly complex responses such as spectroscopic methods which are difficult for human interpretation.
Examples of the transformative potential of intelligent sensing technologies for improving sustainability are rife across production sectors including agriculture, manufacturing, materials and chemical industries, textiles and food production.
This Special Issue will highlight recent and emerging research on concepts, methods, tools, and applications of intelligent sensing technologies for enhancement of sustainability across wide ranging industrial production sectors. This special issue aims to advance and promote the uptake of intelligent sensing approaches as an aid in accelerating the transition to sustainable industry.
Dr. Marion McAfee
Dr. Johannes D. Stigter
Dr. Salem Gharbia
Guest Editors
Manuscript Submission Information
Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All papers will be peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.
Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sustainability is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.
Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1900 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.
Keywords
Signal Processing, Control and Estimation
Soft Sensors for sustainable industrial processes
Model-based design for sustainable production
Intelligent sensing for food production and safety
System identification and control for sustainable production
Intelligent sensing for low cost sensor networks
Information and Sensor Fusion
The role of sensing for Sustainable Agriculture
Coordinated by Trinity College Dublin, Connecting Nature is a partnership of 29 organisations from 16 countries which includes local authorities, communities, industry partners, NGOs and academics. Our partnership will work with 11 European cities who are investing in multi–million euro large scale implementation of nature–based projects in urban settings. We will measure the impact of these initiatives on climate change adaptation, health and well-being, social cohesion and sustainable economic development in these cities. Innovative actions to foster the start-up and growth of commercial and social enterprises active in producing nature-based solutions and products will also be an integral part of our work.
