Tag: island

What Makes The Show ‘Love Island’ So Successful?
TELEVISION

What Makes The Show ‘Love Island’ So Successful?

Audiences can’t get enough of reality dating TV shows, including First Dates and Married at First Sight. But few programmes have been able to drum up the same level of excitement as Love Island, which returned this week after an 18-month break. You can listen to more articles from The Conversation, narrated by Noa, here. With viewing figures usually in the millions, Love Island, in particular, has become ubiquitous in British pop culture since its arrival in 2015. But beyond the apparent appeal of watching people go through the up and downs of finding love, what is the enduring attraction of this genre of reality TV? The gimmicks of shows like Love is Blind and the upcoming Netflix dating show Sexy Beasts, (in which participants wear animal prosthetics to mask their true appearanc...
To Help Combat The Urban Heat Island Effect Satellites Zoom In On Cities’ Hottest Neighborhoods
ENVIRONMENT

To Help Combat The Urban Heat Island Effect Satellites Zoom In On Cities’ Hottest Neighborhoods

Spend time in a city in summer and you can feel the urban heat rising from the pavement and radiating from buildings. Cities are generally hotter than surrounding rural areas, but even within cities, some residential neighborhoods get dangerously warmer than others just a few miles away. Within these “micro-urban heat islands,” communities can experience heat wave conditions well before officials declare a heat emergency. I use Earth-observing satellites and population data to map these hot spots, often on projects with NASA. Satellites like the Landsat program have become crucial for pinpointing urban risks so cities can prepare for and respond to extreme heat, a top weather-related killer. Among the many things we’ve been able to track with increasingly detailed satellite data is that...