Hurricanes Irma and Maria struck Puerto Rico on the 6th and 20th of September 2017, respectively. These two powerful Cat 5 hurricanes severely defoliated forest canopy and deposited massive amounts of litterfall in the forests across the island. We e...
Mangroves form the dominant coastal plant community of low-energy tropical intertidal habitats and provide critical ecosystem services to humans and the environment. However, more frequent and increasingly powerful hurricanes and storm surges are cre...
The PROTECT research Center funded by the NIH’s National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) Superfund Research Program was launched in 2010 to explore the impact of exposure to pollutants on the high rate of premature births in...
8 October 2024
Since 2017, Puerto Rico has faced environmental, economic, and political crises, leading to the emigration of healthcare workers and weakening the healthcare system. These challenges have affected cancer treatment continuity, exacerbating healthcare...
25 October 2021
Background: Hurricanes are the immediate ways that people experience climate impacts in the Caribbean. These events affect socio-ecological systems and lead to major disruptions in the healthcare system, having effects on health outcomes. In Septembe...
Coastal, benthic communities, such as coral reefs, are at particular risk due to poor water quality caused by hurricanes. In addition to the physical impacts from wave action and storm surge, hurricanes bring significant rainfall resulting in increas...
Flooding during extreme weather events damages critical infrastructure, property, and threatens lives. Hurricane María devastated Puerto Rico (PR) on 20 September 2017. Sixty-four deaths were directly attributable to the flooding. This paper describe...
Absorption of colored dissolved organic matter or detrital gelbstoff (aCDOM/ADG) and light attenuation coefficient (Kd490) parameters were studied at La Parguera Natural Reserve in southwestern Puerto Rico, before and following Hurricanes Irma (6&nda...
The impact of Hurricane Maria on the U.S. Caribbean was used to study the causes of remotely-sensed spatial variation in the effects of (1) vegetation index loss and (2) landslide occurrence. The vegetation index is a measure of canopy ‘greenne...
The complete failure of the power systems infrastructure in Puerto Rico, following Hurricanes Irma and Maria in 2017, severely hampered the recovery efforts of multiple critical infrastructure systems (CIS). Understanding the relationships of infrast...
The effects of hurricanes Irma and Maria and a severe drought on the temperature, precipitation, and soil moisture (under canopy and in the open) were calculated at 22 sites from 0–1045 m in northeastern Puerto Rico from 2001–2021, agains...
17 August 2018
On 30 October 2017, selected faculty and administrators from Research Centers in Minority Institutions (RCMI) grantee institutions gathered to share first-hand accounts of the devastating impact of Hurricanes Harvey, Irma, and Maria, which had interr...
In September 2017, two category-5 hurricanes Irma and Maria swept through the Caribbean Sea in what is now known as the region’s most active hurricane season on record, leaving disastrous effects on infrastructure and people’s lives. In the U.S. Virg...
Utilization of remote sensing-derived meteorological data is a valuable alternative for tropical insular territories such as Puerto Rico (PR). The study of ecosystem resilience in insular territories is an underdeveloped area of investigation. Little...
An increasing sea surface temperature as a result of climate change has led to a higher frequency and strengthening of hurricanes across the northeastern Caribbean in recent decades, with increasing risks of impacts to endangered corals and to the su...
In 2017, Hurricanes Irma and Maria caused significant damage to the United States Virgin Islands (USVI), heightening the challenges many residents faced in accessing adequate healthcare and receiving recommended Zika virus screening services. To addr...
1 October 2023
Puerto Rico (PR) has faced environmental and public health challenges that could have significantly affected cancer screening access. Using administrative claims data from PR’s Medicaid population, this study assessed trends in colorectal and b...
The aim of this paper is to provide a framework to improve urban resilience independently of the nature of the disturbances. Recent disasters had a significant impact on critical infrastructures providing essential urban services such as energy, tran...
Social vulnerability and social capital have been shown to influence how severely communities are impacted by natural hazards and how quickly they recover. Indices exist to quantify these factors using publicly available data; however, more empirical...
A method has been developed for the retrieval of the atmospheric boundary layer parameters in tropical cyclones, namely the dynamic speed, the wind speed at a 10 m height, and the roughness parameter. For the analysis, the wind speed profiles were ob...
Hurricanes Irma and Maria, two powerful storms that hit the U.S. Virgin Islands less than 2 weeks apart in September 2017, caused extensive damage to the natural resources on St. John. Damage was particularly severe in a unique mangrove/coral ecosyst...
Roof damage caused by hurricanes and other storms needs to be rapidly identified and repaired to help communities recover from catastrophic events and support the well-being of residents. Traditional, ground-based inspections are time-consuming but h...
25 September 2024
Background: Mental health in Puerto Rico is a complex and multifaceted issue that has been shaped by the island’s unique history, culture, and political status. Recent challenges, including disasters, economic hardships, and political turmoil,...