Santos Daniel Chicas

• Doctor of Philosophy
• Professor (Assistant) at Kyushu University

Unsustainable land use practices have led to increased forest loss rates. Implementing cacao agroforestry can reduce forest loss by preventing the clear-cutting of forests for monoculture plantations. However, research is needed on its effectiveness in preventing forest loss and the factors influencing its adoption between full-time and part-time f...

The displacement prediction of step-like landslides is the simplest and most reasonable method for assessing their potential destructiveness. Over the years, machine learning methods have been progressively developed and optimized, and are now extensively used by researchers for predicting the displacement of step-like landslides. However, these me...

Community forestry is a regime of forest management that engages local communities to conserve forests and improve their livelihoods. As the number of community-conserved forests grows, a growing body of evidence indicates the positive effects of community forests in reducing deforestation. However, there is little analysis encompassing the compreh...

Debris flow is a type of natural disaster characterized by sudden outbreaks, rapid movement, short duration, and extreme destructive power, posing a serious threat to human lives and property. Among debris flow events, gully-type debris flows constitute a significant proportion. Therefore, comprehending the mechanisms that trigger gully-type debris...

Landslides cause significant economic, social, and environmental impacts worldwide. However, selecting the most suitable model and factors for landslide susceptibility mapping (LSM) remains challenging due to the diverse factors influencing landslides and the unique environmental settings in which they occur. Here, we conducted a systematic literat...

Plastic global production increased from 1.7 million tons in the 1950s to 335 million tons in 2016, and trends based on production, demographics, and consumer use patterns suggest an increase in plastic use in the future. East Asia contributes significantly to the accumulation of microplastics in marine environments due to its rapid industrializati...

Background Wildland fires are part of the ecology of forests in Central America. Nevertheless, limited understanding of fire probability and the factors that influence it hinder the planning of intervention strategies. Aims This research combined climatic, anthropogenic and vegetation factors to identify wildland fire probability and determine the...

With the global climate problem worsening, accurately predicting carbon dioxide emissions has become critical. In this study, we compared and selected various neural network models and a support vector regression (SVR) model to predict China's carbon dioxide emissions from 2022 to 2030. Among the models tested, we found that the Genetic Algorithm-b...

Ecosystems around the globe are enduring wildfires with greater frequency, intensity, and severity and this trend is projected to continue as a result of climate change. Climate-smart agriculture (CSA) has been proposed as a strategy to prevent wildfires and mitigate climate change impacts; however, it remains poorly understood as a strategy to pre...

Landslide damage time prediction is the most economical and reasonable means to carry out landslide control. The inverse velocity method (INVM), as the simplest and most practical method, has become the most common technique for landslide prediction nowadays. However, the application of the INVM results in false alarm when applied to step-like land...

Although deemed unsuitable for construction, Peat soils have remarkable applications in MFCs by generating electric power because of the microbial decomposition of rich organic matter. The demerits such as weak skeleton, high water content, acidic nature, and humus contamination of peat soil for civil engineering applications are considered merits...

The study of PM2.5 and NO2 has been emphasized in recent years due to their adverse effects on public health. To better understand these pollutants, many studies have researched the spatiotemporal distribution, trend, forecast, or influencing factors of these pollutants. However, rarely studies have combined these to generate a more holistic unders...

Plaster board waste generated from industries, usually contains major proportion of calcium as calcium sulfate. In addition, fluoride is remarkably one among the constituents of this waste material which leaches off into the soil and aquatic environments and causes fluoride pollution. In order to simulate how the dumping of PBW causes fluoride cont...

A large number of engineering case studies have shown that the traditional early warning criteria, which evolved on the basis of displacement as a single piece of information, have many limitations in practical engineering. The displacement speed ratio (DSR) cannot determine the development trend of landslides due to the influence of periodic exter...

In the last decades, natural fire regimes have experienced significant alterations in terms of intensity, frequency and severity in fire prone regions of the world. Modelling forest fire susceptibility has been essential in identifying areas of high risk to minimize threats to natural resources, biodiversity and life. There have been significant im...

Wildfires are serious threats to Belize’s protected areas and ecosystems. In Belize the spatial variability of wildfire susceptibility and influencing factors at a national scale are poorly understood which hinders wildfire management interventions. Hence, in this research we conducted a joint application and performance comparison of AHP (Analytic...

Geotechnical anchoring technology is an important tool for disaster prevention and mitigation in slope engineering. Anchor bolts which are commonly used in slope engineering can be divided into prestressed anchors and non-prestressed anchors. Due to the superiority of anchor support technology, research on various aspects of anchor bolts, such as m...

A large number of engineering examples show that the displacement speed ratio(DSR) warning criterion derived from displacement as a single base information can predict the occurrence of landslides, but cannot identify the future development direction of landslides, which leads to false alarms in the warning system. In order to solve this problem, a...

The present investigation in the Tiruvannamalai region is about high fluoride contamination of groundwater samples from bore wells and open wells. About 75% of groundwater samples were found predominantly containing the fluoride content greater than the acceptable limit of 1.5 mg/L in the ranges 1.51 – 2.00 mg/L (23%), 2.01 – 3.00 mg/L (36%) and gr...

The present research deals with the development of Solid Phase Microbial Fuel Cell (SMFC) using the organic wastes and their admixture in the presence of 0.01% fulvic acid. The organic wastes such as fallen leaves (FL), bamboo waste (BW), leaf mould (LM), rice bran (RB) and fulvic acid (FA) were used during the operation of SMFC. The anode and cath...

In the twenty-first century extensive use and production of hazardous chemicals referred as persistent organic pollutants (POPs) have raised significant concerns owing to their widespread environmental, health and ecosystem impacts. Although, the manufacture and usage of many POPs have been discontinued by many developed counties in many developing...

The present chapter summarizes the general architecture of plant microbial fuel cells with a focus on the utilized anodic and cathodic materials. An elaborate discussion on the potential of various plants and significance of microbial communities toward the generation of power has been provided. In addition, the recent improvements and limitations...

Day by day the demand for petroleum products has been increasing greatly and the difficulty raised because it has given rise to different kinds of problem such as heavy pollution, thus leading to be a cause of global warming. This lays a strong reason for the researchers to find the alternative source of energy and reduce the risk associated with i...

Plant microbial fuel cells (PMFCs) are a recently developed technology that uses organic rhizodeposits as the electron donor for heterotrophic microorganisms in the plant rhizosphere. Graphite is often used as cathode material in PMFCs. However, the reduction of oxygen on graphite is slow and limits the power output of the PMFCs. In these study car...

Reduction and recycling of wastes are very serious problems all over the world for the limiting final disposal sites and decreasing environmental loads. The purpose of this study is to investigate a performance of soil microbial fuel cell (SMFC) to generate electricity in accordance with the metabolism of microorganisms in composting of organic was...

Understanding the trans-boundary deforestation history and patterns in protected areas along the Belize-Guatemala border is of regional and global importance. To assess deforestation history and patterns in our study area along a section of the Belize-Guatemala border, we incorporated multi-temporal deforestation rate analysis and spatial metrics w...

In Belize, the lack of forest degradation and socioeconomic data results in the inability of forest management organizations to make timely assessments and decisions for sustainable forest resource management. This study uses CLASlite algorithms and social surveys to identify drivers, measure, analyze and map deforestation, and forest degradation t...

In recent years trans-boundary incursions from Petén, Guatemala into Belize’s Maya Mountain Massif (MMM) have increased. The incursions are rapidly degrading cultural and natural resources in Belize’s protected areas. Given the local, regional and global importance of the MMM and the scarcity of deforestation data, our research team conducted a tim...

In recent years trans-boundary incursions from Petén, Guatemala into Belize’s Maya Mountain Massif (MMM) have increased. The incursions are rapidly degrading cultural and natural resources in Belize’s protected areas. Given the local, regional and global importance of the MMM and the scarcity of deforestation data, our research team conducted a tim...

Erosion in the Rio Grande watershed of Belize, Central America results in widespread ecological impacts and significant economic costs. In this study, quantitative soil loss analysis and qualitative social surveys were integrated to identify erosion vulnerable areas or hotspots, and to analyze varying perspectives between communities near and far f...

The Chiquibul Forest Reserve and National Park in Belize is a priority conservation area within the ‘Maya Forest’ in Central America. Although taxonomic data are essential for the development of conservation plans in the region, there is limited knowledge of the existing species in the area. Here we present a botanical species list of mostly woody...

Toledo, the southernmost district, is the hub of Belize’s Mayan population, descendants of the ancient Mayan civilization. The Toledo District is primarily inhibited by Kekchi and Mopan Mayans whose subsistence needs are met by the Milpa slash-and-burn agricultural system and the extraction of forest resources. The poverty assessment in the country...