ETH Zurich

About: ETH Zurich is a education organization based out in Zurich, Switzerland. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Computer science. The organization has 48393 authors who have published 122408 publications receiving 5111383 citations. The organization is also known as: Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich & Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule Zürich.

Climate and the Collapse of Maya Civilization

Abstract: In the anoxic Cariaco Basin of the southern Caribbean, the bulk titanium content of undisturbed sediment reflects variations in riverine input and the hydrological cycle over northern tropical South America. A seasonally resolved record of titanium shows that the collapse of Maya civilization in the Terminal Classic Period occurred during an extended regional dry period, punctuated by more intense multiyear droughts centered at approximately 810, 860, and 910 A.D. These new data suggest that a century-scale decline in rainfall put a general strain on resources in the region, which was then exacerbated by abrupt drought events, contributing to the social stresses that led to the Maya demise.

An Efficient Dense and Scale-Invariant Spatio-Temporal Interest Point Detector

Abstract: Over the years, several spatio-temporal interest point detectors have been proposed. While some detectors can only extract a sparse set of scale-invariant features, others allow for the detection of a larger amount of features at user-defined scales. This paper presents for the first time spatio-temporal interest points that are at the same time scale-invariant (both spatially and temporally) and densely cover the video content. Moreover, as opposed to earlier work, the features can be computed efficiently. Applying scale-space theory, we show that this can be achieved by using the determinant of the Hessian as the saliency measure. Computations are speeded-up further through the use of approximative box-filter operations on an integral video structure. A quantitative evaluation and experimental results on action recognition show the strengths of the proposed detector in terms of repeatability, accuracy and speed, in comparison with previously proposed detectors.

Energy system transformations for limiting end-of-century warming to below 1.5 °C

Abstract: A new analysis shows that global warming could be limited to 1.5 °C by 2100, but that the window for achieving this is small and rapidly closing.

DebtRank: Too Central to Fail? Financial Networks, the FED and Systemic Risk

Abstract: Systemic risk, here meant as the risk of default of a large portion of the financial system, depends on the network of financial exposures among institutions. However, there is no widely accepted methodology to determine the systemically important nodes in a network. To fill this gap, we introduce, DebtRank, a novel measure of systemic impact inspired by feedback-centrality. As an application, we analyse a new and unique dataset on the USD 1.2 trillion FED emergency loans program to global financial institutions during 2008–2010. We find that a group of 22 institutions, which received most of the funds, form a strongly connected graph where each of the nodes becomes systemically important at the peak of the crisis. Moreover, a systemic default could have been triggered even by small dispersed shocks. The results suggest that the debate on too-big-to-fail institutions should include the even more serious issue of too-central-to-fail.