Forests play a fundamental part in the well-being of humankind, and restoration of forests has now emerged as a global priority. Yet, it is still poorly understood how efficiently forest restoration can bring back the complexity of functioning ecosystems, such as the crucial networks of species interactions. In this project, we study the assembly of food webs during tropical forest restoration in Kibale National Park, Uganda.

Team

Sille Holm Geoffrey M. Malinga

VitalSens is a joint research project with the main goal of designing a smart, cost effective and scale-able personalized biomedical remote monitoring health platform. Printable wireless electronic sensors for continuous ECG monitoring are designed. Further, the ECG recordings are stored in a cloud storage. We then proceed by developing a computational engine which processes the physiological measurements and provide automated event detection for cardiovascular diseases (CVDs). The primary focus is to create an intelligent processing system which is adaptive to the patient ECG recording.

Team

Sampo Nurmentaus, Metropolia UAS, Moncef Gabbouj, TUT, Tapio Seppänen, OU, Niku Oksala, UTA.

The primary aim of the research is to analyze the effects of environmental change on vulnerable communities, and to suggest means of coping with this by way of co-management, bearing in mind the underlying power relations involved.

Team

The foresight part of NEO-CARBON ENERGY explores possible futures of a new renewables-based energy production and storage system, which is being developed by VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland, Lappeenranta University of Technology (LUT) and University of Turku – Finland Futures Research Centre (FFRC). This joint research project is one of the strategic research openings of Tekes – The Finnish Funding Agency for Innovation. The foresight work is conducted in the Finland Futures Research Centre. A possibly distributed energy production system of neo-/low-carbon technologies and emerging issues such as prosumerism can drive economic, political, cultural and social changes. Radically new innovations, services and practices could emerge as a result of the third industrial revolution.

Team

Sirkka Heinonen, Juho Ruotsalainen, Joni Karjalainen, Marjukka Parkkinen

The primary objective of the PhD study is to understand and analyse the role that Traditional Ecological Knowledge plays in relation to the multiple domains of well-being among the youth of an indigenous, former hunter-gatherer tribe.

Team

Assistant Professor Pirjo Virtanen, Dr Aili Pyhälä, Professor Barry Gills

Impact assessments used by large-scale development projects are often portrayed as neutral tools providing objective and value-free information to decision-makers. However, scholars widely agree that impact assessments are inherently biased, political, and distorted by power dynamics. Using a forthcoming natural gas project in Mozambique as case study, my ethnographic field research provides important baseline study of the social, relational, and place-bound aspects of wellbeing, often overlooked in impact assessment processes.

Team

General Objective: Promote ecosystems conservation through watershed management to improve human well-being and conserve high biodiversity Amazonian areas of Peru and Colombia. Geographic location: The project will focus on five basins, the Alto Mayo River Basin in Peru, which includes the development of payment-for-water ecosystem services (PES) schemes in the Moyabamba, Rioja, and Yuracyacu subwatersheds, and the Orito, Mocoa, Guineo and Orteguáza River Basins in the Amazonian Piedmont in Colombia. Project Area: The total area the project will cover in both countries is 1,408,317 has; The Orito, Mocoa, Guineo and Orteguáza River basins, cover 93,448 ha, 68,851 ha, 36,532 ha and 428,768 respectively, for a total area of 627,599 ha. The Alto Mayo River Basin covers approximately 780,718 hectares. Beneficiaries: The project will benefit a total of approximately 460,000 people; 238,000 people in the Orito, Mocoa, Guineo and Orteguáza River basins and 221,642 inhabitants in the Alto Mayo River basin. Duration: July 2012 – July 2017 (5 years)

Team

Ulla Helimo, Erwin Palacios, Eddy Mendoza, Milagros Sandoval, Carmen Noriega, Claudio Schneider, Alonso Castro, Ivo Encomenderos, Jose Rodriguez, Arturo Rivas and varios consultants and experts.

This research project approached one to three-year-old children’s everyday life and well-being from a multidisciplinary perspective (childhood geographies, sociological childhood studies, and developmental psychology). The main objective of the project was to address the dynamic interplay in between the culturally constructed meanings, ideals and expectations of (good) toddlerhood, the local level of practices, and the toddlers’ construction of places (lived-through-experiences). The project was based on a qualitative case study approach. In addition to analysis of Finnish curricula and guiding documents for ECEC, the project included ethnographic fieldwork in one daycare centre. The questions were: how are (good) toddlerhoods and the 'best interest of the child' narrated and materialized in everyday practices, and how do toddlers engage in construction of lived spaces (places)? In addition, with a comparative qualitative data from Brazil, two different cases were investigated to interpret how the commitment to the 'best interest of the child' was translated into local, culturally diverse practices in child care institutions.

Team

Professor Katia de Souza Amorim and research group CINDEDI (Centro de Investigação sobre Desenvolvimento e Educação Infantil); Elisa Tanner; Kaisa-Reeta Laitila; Sirja Hannula; Salla Jokinen