Remote Mountainous Regions Research Articles

Detecting precursors of an imminent landslide along the Jinsha River

Abstract. Landslides are major hazards that may pose serious threats to mountain communities. Even landslides in remote mountains could have non-negligible impacts on populous regions by blocking large rivers and forming dam-breached mega floods. Usually, there are slope deformations before major landslides occur, and detecting precursors such as slope movement before major landslides is important for preventing possible disasters. In this work, we applied multi-temporal optical remote sensing images (Landsat 7 and Sentinel-2) and an image correlation method to detect subpixel slope deformations of a slope near the town of Mindu in the Tibet Autonomous Region. This slope is located on the right bank of the Jinsha River, ∼80 km downstream from the famous Baige landslide. We used a DEM-derived aspect to restrain background noise in image correlation results. We found the slope remained stable from November 2015 to November 2018 and moved significantly from November 2018. We used more data to analyse slope movement in 2019 and found retrogressive slope movements with increasingly large deformations near the riverbank. We also analysed spatial–temporal patterns of the slope deformation from October 2018 to February 2020 and found seasonal variations in slope deformations. Only the foot of the slope moved in dry seasons, whereas the entire slope was activated in rainy seasons. Until 24 August 2019, the size of the slope with displacements larger than 3 m was similar to that of the Baige landslide. However, the river width at the foot of this slope is much narrower than the river width at the foot of the Baige landslide. We speculate it may continue to slide down and threaten the Jinsha River. Further modelling works should be carried out to check if the imminent landslide could dam the Jinsha River and measures should be taken to mitigate possible dam breach flood disasters. This work illustrates the potential of using optical remote sensing to monitor slope deformations over remote mountain regions.

Brazilian Diplosmittia Sæther: D. trifida sp. n. and new records of D. plaumanni Pinho, Mendes Andersen, 2009 (Diptera: Chironomidae).

Sæther (1981) erected the genus Diplosmittia based on a species from Saint Lucia and Saint Vincent in the British West Indies. The genus was revised by Pinho et al. (2009). To date, the genus comprises ten species: Diplosmittia harrisoni Sæther, 1981; D. carinata Sæther, 1985; D. recisus Sæther, 1988; D. beluina Andersen, 1996; D. forficata Andersen, 1996; D. plaumanni Pinho, Mendes Andersen, 2009; D. boraceia Pinho, Mendes Andersen, 2009; D. aragua Pinho, Mendes Andersen, 2009; D. cerayma Pinho, Mendes Andersen, 2009; and D. caribensis Wiedenbrug Silva, 2016. Diplosmittia sasai Makarchenko Makarchenko, 2005 was placed as a synonym of Pseudosmittia mathildae Albu, 1968 by Makarchenko Makarchenko (2008). Except for D. carinata from Michigan, U.S.A., all species are Neotropical and mostly recorded from the Caribbean and northern part of South America. During field work in a remote mountainous region in the Brazilian Amazon, a unique new species with the gonostylus split into three parts was collected and is described and figured below. In addition, new records of D. plaumanni are provided.

Mixed infections by different Trypanosoma cruzi discrete typing units among Chagas disease patients in an endemic community in Panama.

BackgroundTrypanosoma cruzi, the hemoparasite that causes Chagas disease, is divided into six Discrete Typing Units or DTUs: TcI-TcVI plus Tcbat. This genetic diversity is based on ecobiological and clinical characteristics associated with particular populations of the parasite. The main objective of this study was the identification of DTUs in patients with chronic chagasic infections from a mountainous rural community in the eastern region of Panama.MethodsA total of 106 patients were tested for Chagas disease with three serological tests (ELISA, rapid test, and Western blot). Molecular diagnosis and DTU typing were carried out by conventional PCRs and qPCR targeting different genomic markers, respectively. As a control sample for the typing, 28 patients suspected to be chagasic from the metropolitan area of Panama City were included.ResultsResults showed a positivity in the evaluated patients of 42.3% (33/78); high compared to other endemic regions in the country. In the control group, 20/28 (71.43%) patients presented positive serology. The typing of samples from rural patients showed that 78.78% (26/33) corresponded to TcI, while 9.09% (3/33) were mixed infections (TcI plus TcII/V/VI). Seventy-five percent (15/20) of the patients in the control group presented TcI, and in five samples it was not possible to typify the T. cruzi genotype involved.ConclusionsThese results confirm that TcI is the main DTU of T. cruzi present in chronic chagasic patients from Panama. However, the circulation of other genotypes (TcII/V/VI) in this country is described for the first time. The eco-epidemiological characteristics that condition the circulation of TcII/V/VI, as well as the immune and clinical impact of mixed infections in this remote mountainous region should be investigated, which will help local action programs in the surveillance, prevention, and management of Chagas disease.

Promising pipelines and hydrocarbon nationalism: the sociality of unbuilt infrastructure in indigenous Siberia

Promising pipelines and hydrocarbon nationalism: the sociality of unbuilt infrastructure in indigenous Siberia

GLACIAL LAKE EVOLUTION BASED ON REMOTE SENSING TIME SERIES: A CASE STUDY OF TSHO ROLPA IN NEPAL

Abstract. Himalayan glaciers have retreated rapidly in recent years. Resultant glacial lakes in the region pose potential catastrophic threats to downstream communities, especially under a changing climate. The potential for Glacial Lake Outburst Floods (GLOFs) has increased and studies have assessed the risks of those in Nepal and prioritised several glacial lakes for urgent and closer investigation. The risk posed by the Tsho Rolpa Glacial Lake is one of the most serious in Nepal. To investigate the feasibility of high-frequency monitoring of glacial lake evolution by remote sensing, this paper proposes a workflow for automated glacial lake boundary extraction and evolution using a time series of Sentinel optical imagery. The waterbody is segmented and vectorised using bimodal histograms from water indices. The vectorised lake boundary is validated against reference data extracted from rigorous contemporary unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV)-based photogrammetric survey. Lake boundaries were subsequently extracted at four different epochs to evaluate the evolution of the lake, especially at the glacier terminus. The final lake area was estimated at 1.61 km2, significantly larger than the areal extent last formally reported. A 0.99 m/day maximum, and a 0.45 m/day average, horizontal glacier retreat rates were estimated. The reported research has demonstrated the potential of remote sensing time series to monitor glacial lake evolution, which is particularly important for lakes in remote mountain regions that are otherwise difficult to access.

Integrating multi-source data for wildlife habitat mapping: A case study of the black-and-white snub-nosed monkey (Rhinopithecus bieti) in Yunnan, China

Wildlife habitat mapping is a widely used tool for supporting decision making in conservation. It requires data indicating wildlife habitat use to model and map habitat suitability. Collecting wildlife data, however, requires much effort, especially for species in remote mountainous regions of limited accessibility. Such circumstances often necessitate the integration of limited amounts of data available from multiple sources for habitat mapping. To that end, this study presents a framework for integrating multi-source wildlife data for habitat mapping. For evaluating the integration framework, a case study of mapping habitat suitability of the black-and-white snub-nosed monkey (Rhinopithecus bieti) by integrating sightings elicited from local volunteer villagers and obtained from official patrol records was conducted in Yunnan, China. The integration was explored at three levels: data-, knowledge- and model-level following disparate principles. The predicted habitat suitability maps were validated against monkey occurrence data independently collected though field-tracking. Results show the suitability maps predicted based on data integration were more accurate compared to maps predicted based on individual data sources. Data- and model-level integration achieved higher accuracy compared to knowledge-level integration. Further, data- and model-level integration following a conservative principle, i.e., the ‘minimum’ operator, led to higher mapping accuracy. The integration framework is generally applicable for integrating data from multiple sources for habitat mapping. It is also easy to implement and thus can be conveniently adopted by practitioners. Habitat suitability maps generated based on integrated data from multiple sources could better supporting decision making in biodiversity monitoring and conservation.

Assessment of Native Radar Reflectivity and Radar Rainfall Estimates for Discharge Forecasting in Mountain Catchments with a Random Forest Model

Discharge forecasting is a key component for early warning systems and extremely useful for decision makers. Forecasting models require accurate rainfall estimations of high spatial resolution and other geomorphological characteristics of the catchment, which are rarely available in remote mountain regions such as the Andean highlands. While radar data is available in some mountain areas, the absence of a well distributed rain gauge network makes it hard to obtain accurate rainfall maps. Thus, this study explored a Random Forest model and its ability to leverage native radar data (i.e., reflectivity) by providing a simplified but efficient discharge forecasting model for a representative mountain catchment in the southern Andes of Ecuador. This model was compared with another that used as input derived radar rainfall (i.e., rainfall depth), obtained after the transformation from reflectivity to rainfall rate by using a local Z-R relation and a rain gauge-based bias adjustment. In addition, the influence of a soil moisture proxy was evaluated. Radar and runoff data from April 2015 to June 2017 were used. Results showed that (i) model performance was similar by using either native or derived radar data as inputs (0.66 < NSE < 0.75; 0.72 < KGE < 0.78). Thus, exhaustive pre-processing for obtaining radar rainfall estimates can be avoided for discharge forecasting. (ii) Soil moisture representation as input of the model did not significantly improve model performance (i.e., NSE increased from 0.66 to 0.68). Finally, this native radar data-based model constitutes a promising alternative for discharge forecasting in remote mountain regions where ground monitoring is scarce and hardly available.

Chinese public participation monitoring and warning system for geological hazards

In China, many geological hazards occurred in remote mountainous regions, and it was time-consuming to disseminate disaster information for the responsible parties to make timely judgements. Besides, only relying on professionals to monitor and manage disasters was demanding and costly. The Chinese government created a system to engage residents in the process of disaster risk management, namely ‘Public Participation Monitoring and Warning’ (PPMW), to disseminate timely disaster information and bring down management costs. The objective of this system was to reduce casualties with minimum cost by organizing residents to evacuate from disasters in advance. This paper introduced the PPMW system, including its structure, operation mechanism by reviewing government documents and research articles, and its implementation by a case study of a landslide at Boli village (E 101°01′, N 27°29′), Yanyuan County, Sichuan Province, China on July 19th 2018. Further, this paper analyzed the strengths and limitations of the system and discussed its future development. It had the potential to become an affordable disaster risk management tool for other countries facing similar situations to China.

Acoustics of Kalasha laterals.

Kalasha, a Northwestern Indo-Aryan language spoken in a remote mountainous region of Pakistan, is relatively unusual among languages of the region as it has lateral approximants contrasting in secondary articulation-velarization and palatalization (/ɫ/ vs /lʲ/). Given the paucity of previous phonetic work on the language and some discrepancies between descriptive accounts, the nature of the Kalasha lateral contrast remains poorly understood. This paper presents an analysis of fieldwork recordings with laterals produced by 14 Kalasha speakers in a variety of lexical items and phonetic contexts. Acoustic analysis of formants measured during the lateral closure revealed that the contrast was most clearly distinguished by F2 (as well as by F2-F1 difference), which was considerably higher for /lʲ/ than for /ɫ/. This confirms that the two laterals are primarily distinguished by secondary articulation and not by retroflexion, which is otherwise robustly represented in the language inventory. The laterals showed no positional differences but did show considerable fronting (higher F2) next to front vowels. Some inter-speaker variation was observed in the realization of /ɫ/, which was produced with little or no velarization by older speakers. This is indicative of a change in progress, resulting in an overall enhancement of an otherwise auditorily vulnerable contrast.

СУЧАСНІ ТЕХНОЛОГІЇ КОНТРОЛЮ ЗНАНЬ ТА ВМІНЬ ЗДОБУВАЧІВ ОСВІТИ

У статті проведено аналіз сучасного тлумачення поняття «контроль знань». До основних функцій контролю знань і вмінь здобувачів освіти належать навчальна, діагностична, стимулювальна, виховна функція оцінки. Надзвичайне значення має управлінська функція. Оскільки, окрім перевірки рівня засвоєння навчального матеріалу, контроль важливий для ухвалення рішень з оптимізації освітнього процесу.
 Види контролю знань та вмінь класифікують залежно від місця в процесі досягнення дидактичної мети освітньої діяльності. Для збільшення ефективності навчання варто практикувати різні способи організації контролю. Адже правильна та раціональна організація контролю знань та вмінь сприяє вчасному виявленню прогалин у знаннях і вміннях здобувачів освіти, визначенню рівня готовності їх до засвоєння нового матеріалу, формуванню в них навичок самоконтролю.
 До найефективніших методів контролю знань належать тестові форми. За сучасного стану розвитку технологій їх застосовують з використанням тестових оболонок стаціонарного типу або на онлайн-платформах.
 Набувають поширення хмарні сервіси, які дозволяють залучати дистанційно широкі аудиторії та проводити оцінювання рівня знань і вмінь у реальному часовому режимі. Такі засоби рекомендуємо використовувати з урахуванням особливостей як фахових, так і регіональних (наприклад, для студентів нестаціонарної форми навчання з віддалених гірських регіонів).

The Potential of Domestic and International Courts to Protect Women’s Right to Family Life in the North Caucasus

Abstract The North Caucasus region of Russia is known for spawning the highest number of adverse judgments from the European Court of Human Rights compared to any other Russian region—over 500 as of mid-2020. Since 2005, the Court has found Russia responsible for enforced disappearances, extrajudicial killings and torture carried out on a mass scale during the second Chechen war and in its aftermath. The Head of the Chechen Republic, Ramzan Kadyrov, has become internationally infamous for the brutal repression of even his mildest critics, ensuring that most Chechens will be too afraid to claim their rights in any forum. Domestically, the Russian federal authorities have either ignored or tacitly condoned the increasing subversion of state law in the region in favour of de facto customary norms—adat—and elements of sharia law that have had a devastating effect mainly on women’s and girls’ rights. Harmful traditional practices such as ‘honour killings’, child marriage, bride-kidnapping, and—in certain remote mountain regions of Dagestan—female genital mutilation take place on a regular basis. Yet such violations, however grave, do not easily lend themselves to litigation. This practice note focuses on one of the few areas in the region in which systematic focused litigation is being carried out in domestic courts, often against enormous odds: the systematic denial of women’s right to family life after divorce or the death of their children’s biological father.

Water for life: ceaseless routine efforts for collecting drinking water in remote mountainous villages of Nepal

The objective of this research was to investigate the current status of water-collection behaviours and their determinants, which are associated with the burden of collecting water. This research was focused on the remote hinterlands of Nepal, and little is known about the residents’ livelihoods; therefore, particular attention was paid to the household burdens in terms of the time devoted to water-collection activities. A survey was conducted in households from mountainous regions of Nepal whose infrastructure is limited in terms of poor water supply and access to electricity. The results of the survey indicated that one or two members of a household were responsible for collecting water, and approximately 40% of households used multiple sites. Moreover, household members visited their collection location approximately 3–4 times per day. Based on the water-collection behaviours of each household member, an average of 148.6 min were used for water-collection activities each day. The factors associated with the total time devoted to water-collection activities include the number of household members, the sex of the household head, the number of years of education of the household members, and the share of children and women engaged in water collection. The estimation results also indicated that members of households with access to water storage spent less time collecting water. The results yield key information from villagers in remote mountainous regions, and substantial improvement is pivotal for achieving universal water access under sustainable development goals.

Activity Rhythms of Coexisting Red Serow and Chinese Serow at Mt. Gaoligong as Identified by Camera Traps.

Simple SummaryHow congeneric species with similar realized niches manage to coexist is a central question in the study of biodiversity. Here, we examined the daily activity rhythm of two coexisting serow species in a mid-mountain humid evergreen broadleaf forest. We used camera traps in a five-year survey at Mt. Gaoligong, western Yunnan, China. We compared the daily activity rhythm of the rare red serow (Capricornis rubidus), a medium-sized solitary ungulate, with the coexisting Chinese serow (C. milneedwardsii milneedwardsii). Although their overall daily activity rhythms were similar, the rare red serow tended to range, feed, and stay vigilant from afternoon through midnight throughout the year. By contrast, Chinese serows preferred to be active from sunrise to noon in the wet season, but shifted their activities and behaviors to afternoon and midnight in the dry season. Interestingly, we found red serows sometimes ranging together with Chinese serows. When they encountered each other, red serows altered their activity patterns more notably, while Chinese serows significantly increased their activity level. These findings are understandable given their similar resource requirements. Although exploitative competitors, red and Chinese serow coexist by avoiding interference competition by altering their respective activity patterns in time.Surveying the activity rhythms of sympatric herbivorous mammals is essential for understanding their niche ecology, especially for how they partition resources and their mechanisms of coexistence. Over a five-year period, we conducted infrared camera-trapping to monitor the activity rhythms of coexisting red serow (Capricornis rubidus) and Chinese serow (C. milneedwardsii milneedwardsii) in the remote mountainous region of Pianma, Mt. Gaoligong, Yunnan, China. Cameras captured images of red serow and Chinese serow on 157 and 179 occasions, respectively. We used circular kernel density models to analyze daily activity rhythms and how temporal variations in activity ensure their co-existence. Although their overall activity levels and patterns were similar, temporal activity and behavior partitioning among the two species occurred during the wet season. Compared with Chinese serows, red serows exhibited less variable daily activity levels, patterns, as well as feeding and vigilance behaviors between seasons. When the two species occasionally ranged together, red serows tended to alter their activity pattern while Chinese serows significantly increased their activity level. Red serow and Chinese serow are exploitative competitors but coexist by altering their daily activity rhythms when in contact and changing activity patterns during the wet season, enabling their coexistence.

Discovery of Eurytrema Eggs in Sediment from a Colonial Period Latrine in Taiwan.

In this study we take a closer look at the diseases that afflicted Japanese police officers who were stationed in a remote mountainous region of Taiwan from 1921 to 1944. Samples were taken from the latrine at the Huabanuo police outpost, and analyzed for the eggs of intestinal parasites, using microscopy and ELISA. The eggs of Eurytrema sp., (possibly E. pancreaticum), whipworm and roundworm were shown to be present. True infection with Eurytrema would indicate that the policemen ate uncooked grasshoppers and crickets infected with the parasite. However, false parasitism might also occur if the policemen ate the uncooked intestines of infected cattle, and the Eurytrema eggs passed through the human intestines. These findings provide an insight into the diet and health of the Japanese colonists in Taiwan nearly a century ago.

Retrospective deformation of the Baige landslide using optical remote sensing images

Detecting slope deformations before major landslides is crucially important for mitigating landslide disasters. In this work, we explored the use of Sentinel-2 images and an image correlation method, Co-Registration of Optically Sensed Images and Correlation (COSI-Corr), to derive slope deformations before the 2018 Baige landslide along the Jinsha River. We found that larger sliding windows outperform smaller ones in extracting the moving slope. Different solar zenith angles in image pairs have an influence on the derived displacements. Although the spatial resolution of Sentinel-2 images is 10 m, uncertainties in estimating slope deformation are found within 2 m. Using the COSI-Corr technique, we monitored sub-pixel slope deformation in Sentinel-2 images from November 2015 to August 2018. We found that the slope moved faster in summer than in winter months, which was probably driven by the monsoon climate in this region. From 2015 to 2018, the slope movement became faster, and an acceleration stage was observed before the slope failed completely. To derive reliable slope displacements, this work suggests testing different sliding window size combinations in the use of image correlation methods, and optical images acquired with similar zenith angles are preferred. This work also demonstrated the capability of using optical remote sensing images to monitor large slope deformations before major landslides. As more optical images with high spatial resolution become available, monitoring minor slope deformations directly would be practicable for large remote mountain regions.

Tree Species Classification by Integrating Satellite Imagery and Topographic Variables Using Maximum Entropy Method in a Mongolian Forest

Forests are an important natural resource that achieve ecological balance by regulating water regimes and promoting soil conservation. Based on forest inventories, the government is able to make decisions to sustainably conserve, improve, and manage forests. Fieldwork for forestry investigation requires intensive physical labor, which is costly and time-consuming, especially for surveys in remote mountainous regions. Remote sensing technology has been recently used for forest investigation on a large scale. An informative forest inventory must include forest attributes, including details of tree species; however, tree species mapping is not always applicable due to the similarity of surface reflectance and texture between tree species. Topographic variables such as elevation, slope, aspect, and curvature are crucial in allocating ecological niches to different species; therefore, this study suggests that integrating topographic information and optical satellite image classification can improve mapping accuracy for tree species. The main purpose of this study is to classify forest tree species in Erdenebulgan County, Huwsgul Province, Mongolia, by integrating Landsat satellite imagery with a Digital Elevation Model (DEM) using a Maximum Entropy algorithm. A forest tree species inventory from the Forest Division of the Mongolian Ministry of Nature and Environment was used as training data and as ground truth to perform the accuracy assessment. In this study, the classification was made using two different experimental approaches. First, classification was done using only Landsat surface reflectance data; and second, topographic variables were integrated with the Landsat surface reflectance data. The integration approach showed a higher overall accuracy and kappa coefficient, indicating that an accurate forest inventory can be achieved by integrating satellite imagery data and other topographic information to enhance the practice of forest management in remote regions.

Estrategias frente a la despoblación de la Serranía Celtibérica en el marco de la política de cohesión europea 2021–2027

<div data-canvas-width="539.2341066666655">The European Union considers sparsely populated regions those with a density equal to or less than 8 inhabitants/km2. This is the case of the Serranía Celtibérica, with 7.09 inhabitants/km2. This circumstance, together with its status as a remote rural and mountain region, makes it possible to identify it as a disadvantaged area. In this paper, the referential legislative framework is discussed so that the cohesion policy of the period 2021-2027 can be applied to the Serranía Celtibérica. Likewise, it reflects on the possible strategies to reverse its demographic deterioration.</div>

Prehospital ECG transmission results in shorter door-to-wire time for STEMI patients in a remote mountainous region

BackgroundPre-hospital triage with ECG-transmission may reduce time to reperfusion in patients with ST-elevation acute myocardial infarction (STEMI). Less, however, is known on potential benefit of ECG-transmission triage in mountain areas, with complex orography. MethodsPatients admitted for STEMI and primary coronary angioplasty (pPCI) in a mountain area served by a single cathlab and triaged with ECG-transmission were enrolled in the study and compared with controls: patients' demographics and time to coronary wire were recorded. ResultsForty-seven consecutive patients were enrolled in the study: 23 patients following ECG transmission and 24 STEMI patients who presented directly to the Emergency Department. At multivariable regression analysis, pre-hospital ECG-transmission electrocardiogram was an independent predictor of shorter time-to-wire (beta −0.34, p < 0.05). In case of transport times >30 min, ECG-transmission triage achieved time-to-wire times 20% shorter. Excluding unreducible transport time, avoidable delay was reduced by 38% in the whole population, by 48% in case of peripheral areas (transport time > 30 min from cathlab) and elderly (>80 years) patients (p < 0.05 in all cases). ConclusionsPre-hospital triage with ECG-transmission is associated with shorter ischemic time even in mountain areas with a complex orography profile. The benefit is greater in elderly patients and remote areas.

Improving water resources management using participatory monitoring in a remote mountainous region of Nepal

Study RegionWe interrogate the water resources of the Upper Kaligandaki River Basin (UKGRB), in the remote Mustang District of northwestern Nepal. The Nepal Himalayas are a major reservoir of freshwater; yet the impediments to its exploitation by local inhabitants are manifold, including weak governance structures, steep and irregular terrain, and frequent natural hazards that are linked to climate change. The UKGRB is characterised by its extreme fragility, paucity of water and water-related data, and enormous variability of the effects of climate change on glaciers through time and space. Study FocusThe purpose of this paper is to elucidate catchment hydrology and local flow variability, before demonstrating the ways in which sustainable water resource management (WRM) can be achieved regionally. New Hydrological Insights for the RegionWe present the local crop water balance, and suggest methods to reduce crop water requirements and to ensure a more equitable distribution of available seasonal flow. We also propose a series of long-term changes that are needed to secure sustainability. Then, we suggest that the principles of citizen science can help to improve the spatial coverage of data, generating new hydrological time series (e.g. river discharge), which can aid local decision makers in the WRM realm (e.g. irrigation scheduling). This approach has the potential to be scaled-up across the entire UKGRB (and, indeed, Nepal as a whole).

Mapping heat-related health risks of elderly citizens in mountainous area: A case study of Chongqing, China

Heat wave becomes a leading cause of weather-related illness and death across the world under the background of climate change, urban heat island, and population ageing. Heat health risk assessment is an important starting point for heat-related morbidity and mortality reduction within the risk governance framework. Chongqing, a mountainous municipality with a fast rate of population ageing in China, was selected as a case study for mapping the heat health risk of the elderly population at a raster scale. The results indicated that the high heat hazard and human exposure areas were mainly distributed in the metropolitan areas, which largely resulted in high heat health risk in the urban areas. However, the high heat vulnerability pixels were mainly concentrated at the remote mountainous regions which have broken terrains and low socioeconomic statuses. Compared with traditional general heat risk indicator, this new model can provide more targeted spatial information to decision makers, and is helpful to improve the flexibility and comparability of heat risk assessment tool. Furthermore, this new model is particularly valuable for quantifying heat health risk in developing countries with limited open access data.