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Geovisualizations play a central role in communicating hurricane storm surge risks to the public by connecting information about the hazard to a place. Meanwhile, people connect to places through meaning, functions, and emotional bond, known as a sense of place. The mixed-method approach presented in this paper focuses on the intersection of sense of place, geovisualization, and risk communication. We explored place meaning, scale of place, and place attachment in the coastal communities in Georgia and South Carolina. We conducted cognitive mapping focus groups and developed a series of geovisualizations of storm surge risk with varying representations of place. We then investigated people’s ability to connect visual storm surge information to a place and understand their risk by testing these geovisualizations in a large population survey (n= 1442). We found that a 2D regional-scale map displayed together with a 3D abstract representation of a neighborhood was the most helpful in enabling people to relate to a place, quickly make sense of the information, and understand the risk. Our results showed that while the geovisualizations of storm surge risk can be effective generally, they were less effective in several important and vulnerable groups. We found substantial impacts of race, income, map-reading ability, place attachment, and scale of place on how people connected the storm surge risk shown in the visual to a place. These findings have implications for future research and for considering the way weather forecasters and emergency managers communicate storm surge information with diverse audiences using geovisualizations.

Weather forecasters and emergency managers often use geovisualizations to communicate hurricane storm surge risks and threats to the public. Despite the important role that geovisualizations play, few studies have empirically investigated their effectiveness in hazardous weather risk communication. With the overarching goal of understanding how geovisualizations enable coastal residents to understand and respond to risk, we use an interdisciplinary approach to create new knowledge about the effectiveness of geovisualizations in storm surge risk communication. Our results show substantial impacts of sociodemographic factors across many of the measures that enable people to connect to a place through visualizations. These findings have implications for communicating geospatially varying risk to diverse audiences.

 

Abstract The field of dark matter detection is a highly visible and highly competitive one. In this paper, we propose recommendations for presenting dark matter direct detection results particularly suited for weak-scale dark matter searches, although we believe the spirit of the recommendations can apply more broadly to searches for other dark matter candidates, such as very light dark matter or axions. To translate experimental data into a final published result, direct detection collaborations must make a series of choices in their analysis, ranging from how to model astrophysical parameters to how to make statistical inferences based on observed data. While many collaborations follow a standard set of recommendations in some areas, for example the expected flux of dark matter particles (to a large degree based on a paper from Lewin and Smith in 1995), in other areas, particularly in statistical inference, they have taken different approaches, often from result to result by the same collaboration. We set out a number of recommendations on how to apply the now commonly used Profile Likelihood Ratio method to direct detection data. In addition, updated recommendations for the Standard Halo Model astrophysical parameters and relevant neutrino fluxes are provided. The authors of this note include members of the DAMIC, DarkSide, DARWIN, DEAP, LZ, NEWS-G, PandaX, PICO, SBC, SENSEI, SuperCDMS, and XENON collaborations, and these collaborations provided input to the recommendations laid out here. Wide-spread adoption of these recommendations will make it easier to compare and combine future dark matter results. 

The nature of dark matter and properties of neutrinos are among the most pressing issues in contemporary particle physics. The dual-phase xenon time-projection chamber is the leading technology to cover the available parameter space for weakly interacting massive particles, while featuring extensive sensitivity to many alternative dark matter candidates. These detectors can also study neutrinos through neutrinoless double-beta decay and through a variety of astrophysical sources. A next-generation xenon-based detector will therefore be a true multi-purpose observatory to significantly advance particle physics, nuclear physics, astrophysics, solar physics, and cosmology. This review article presents the science cases for such a detector.