Filtern
Erscheinungsjahr
- 2014 (21) (entfernen)
Sprache
- Englisch (21) (entfernen)
Volltext vorhanden
- ja (21) (entfernen)
Schlagworte
- Hydrocortison (2)
- Kognition (2)
- Physiologische Psychologie (2)
- Stress (2)
- attitudes (2)
- 15N (1)
- AFLP (1)
- Affekt (1)
- Aggression (1)
- Allozym-Elektrophorese (1)
- Antibiotikum (1)
- Aposeris foetida (1)
- Arbeitsökonomie (1)
- Arealgrenzen (1)
- Bias-Korrektur (1)
- Biogeographie (1)
- Bioindication (1)
- Bioindikation (1)
- Biomonitoring (1)
- Bodenaggregate (1)
- Bodenmikrobiologie (1)
- Bodenverschmutzung (1)
- Brackwasser (1)
- Brustkrebs (1)
- COSMO-CLM (1)
- Central Nervous System (1)
- Chinesisch (1)
- Cluster-Analyse (1)
- Cognition (1)
- Constraints to Growth (1)
- Cortisol (1)
- Cuvelai Etoscha Becken (1)
- Cuvelai Etosha-basin (1)
- Deutschland (1)
- Development Economics (1)
- Distractor-Response Binding (1)
- Distraktor-Reaktionsbindung (1)
- Einstellung (1)
- Einstellungsforschung (1)
- Einzelinvestor (1)
- Einzugsgebiet (1)
- Eiszeit (1)
- Elektroencephalographie (1)
- Emotionsregulation (1)
- Entsalzung (1)
- Entscheidung (1)
- Entwicklungspolitik (1)
- Entwicklungszusammenarbeit (1)
- Ereigniskorreliertes Potenzial (1)
- Europa (1)
- Europe (1)
- Evaluation (1)
- Evaluative Konditionierung (1)
- Event file (1)
- Extremwert (1)
- Extremwertanalyse (1)
- F0 (1)
- Fehlzeiten (1)
- Fernerkundung (1)
- Flechten (1)
- Food pictures (1)
- Forst (1)
- Funktionalanalysis (1)
- Gebirgswald (1)
- Gedächtnisrepräsentation (1)
- Gesundheitsökonomie (1)
- Glaziale Refugien (1)
- Glucocorticoids (1)
- Gravity Model (1)
- Gravitätsmodell (1)
- Grundfrequenz (1)
- Handel (1)
- Hochmoorgelbling (1)
- Human (1)
- Hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenocortical axis (1)
- Hypothalamus-Hypophysen-Nebennierenrinden-Achse (1)
- Inhibitorische Kontrolle (1)
- Insulin (1)
- Integration (1)
- Intranasal insulin (1)
- Klimamodell (1)
- Klimaänderung (1)
- Kognitive Psychologie (1)
- Kosten-Nutzen-Analyse (1)
- Kurtosis (1)
- Labour economics (1)
- Landwirtschaft (1)
- Lexikologie (1)
- Lexikostatistik (1)
- Lichens (1)
- Linguistik (1)
- Lohnfortzahlung (1)
- Mensch (1)
- Metabolism (1)
- Meteorologie (1)
- Methode (1)
- Mixture-Model (1)
- Modellierung (1)
- Mohrenfalter (1)
- Moor (1)
- Moose (1)
- Mosses (1)
- Niederschlag (1)
- Nische (1)
- Nitrogen Deposition (1)
- Nutzwertanalyse (1)
- Parameterabhängigkeit (1)
- Parapatrie (1)
- Parapatry (1)
- Pharmazeutika (1)
- Phylogeographie (1)
- Portfoliomanagement (1)
- Private Banking (1)
- Process benchmarking (1)
- Provokation (1)
- Prozessbenchmarking (1)
- Präsentismus (1)
- Qualitative Comparative Analysis (1)
- Qualitative Komparative Analyse (1)
- Rassentrennung (1)
- Rechtsradikalismus (1)
- Regenwurmgang (1)
- Remote sensing (1)
- Ressourcen-Konkurrenz (1)
- Rheinland-Pfalz (1)
- Rhizosphäre (1)
- Right-Wing Extremism (1)
- Risikomaß (1)
- Salamander (1)
- Schiefe (1)
- Schreckreaktion (1)
- Segregation (1)
- Social Capital (1)
- Solar thermal desalination technique (1)
- Solarthermische Entsalzungstechnologie (1)
- Sozialkapital (1)
- Sozialpsychologie (1)
- Splitting (1)
- Stabile Isotope (1)
- Stable Isotopes (1)
- Startle modulation (1)
- Statistik (1)
- Stickstoffdeposition (1)
- Stimme (1)
- Strukturierte Produkt (1)
- Sulfadiazin (1)
- Temperatur (1)
- Terrestrisches Laserscanning (1)
- Trade (1)
- Turkey (1)
- Türkei (1)
- Umweltüberwachung (1)
- Unsicherheit (1)
- Utility analysis (1)
- Value at Risk (1)
- Wachstum (1)
- Wachtelweizen (1)
- Wirtschaft (1)
- Wirtschaftspolitik (1)
- Wuchsmodellierung (1)
- Zentralnervensystem (1)
- abiotic factors (1)
- abiotische Faktoren (1)
- absenteeism (1)
- affect (1)
- allozyme electrophoresis (1)
- antibiotic (1)
- attitude formation (1)
- bias correction (1)
- chronic stress (1)
- chronischer Stress (1)
- cortisol (1)
- decision making (1)
- dual task interference (1)
- ecological niche (1)
- emotion regulation (1)
- evaluative conditioning (1)
- event file (1)
- extreme value analysis (1)
- forestry (1)
- functional analysis (1)
- glacial refugia (1)
- growth modelling (1)
- health economics (1)
- high-resolution (1)
- hochauflösend (1)
- homological methods (1)
- homologische Methoden (1)
- individual investor (1)
- inhibitory control (1)
- memory (1)
- memory representation (1)
- microorganisms (1)
- parameter dependence (1)
- peak-over-threshold (1)
- phylogeography (1)
- postnatal stress factors (1)
- postnatale Stressfaktoren (1)
- prenatal stress factors (1)
- presenteeism (1)
- private banking (1)
- provocation (1)
- pränatale Stressfaktoren (1)
- quantitative Linguistik (1)
- quantitative linguistics (1)
- resource competition (1)
- rhizosphere (1)
- risk measure (1)
- salamanders (1)
- selective attention (1)
- selektive Aufmerksamkeit (1)
- sick pay (1)
- soil microhabitats (1)
- splitting (1)
- structured products (1)
- sulfadiazine (1)
- synergetic linguistics (1)
- synergetische Linguistik (1)
- terrestrial laser scanning (1)
- uncertainty (1)
- voice (1)
Institut
Geographic ranges of species and their determinants are of great interest in the field of biogeography and are often studied in terms of the species" ecological niches. In this context, the range of a species is defined by the accessibility of an area, abiotic factors and biotic interactions, which affect a species" distributions with different intensities across spatial scales. Parapatry describes a distributional pattern in which the ranges of two species meet along sharp range limits with narrow contact zones. Such parapatric range limits are determined by changing abiotic conditions along sharp environmental gradients or can result from interspecific resource competition. However, it has been shown that often the interplay of abiotic conditions and species interactions determine parapatry. The geographic ranges of the land salamanders, Salamandra salamandra and S. atra, narrowly overlap in the European Alps with only few syntopic localities and to date, the cause of parapatry is unknown. The goal of this thesis was thus to identify the importance of abiotic and biotic factors for their parapatric range limits at different spatial scales. On a broad spatial scale, the role of climate for the parapatric range limits of the species was investigated within three contact zones in Switzerland. Climatic conditions at species" records were analysed and species distribution modelling techniques were used to explore the species" climatic niches and to quantify the interspecific niche overlap. Furthermore, it was tested whether the parapatric range limit coincides with a strong climatic gradient. The results revealed distinct niches for the species as well as the presence of strong climatic gradients which could explain the parapatric range limits of the species. Yet, there was a moderate interspecific niche overlap in all contact zones indicating that the species may co-occur and interact with each other in areas where they both find adequate conditions. Comparison among contact zones revealed geographic variation in the species" niches as well as in the climatic conditions at their records suggesting that the species can occur in a much wider range of conditions than they actually do. These findings imply that climate represents a main factor for the species" parapatric range limits. Yet, interspecific niche overlap and the geographic variation provide indirect evidence that interspecific interaction may also affect their spatial distribution. To test whether competition restricts the species" ranges on the habitat scale and to understand local syntopic co-occurrence of the salamanders within their contact zones, site-occupancy modelling was used. This approach allowed to find the habitat predictors that best explain the species" local distribution. While the slope of the site positively affected the occupancy probability of S. salamandra, no tested predictor explained that of S. atra. Also, there was no effect of the occurrence of one species on the occupancy probability of the other providing no evidence for competition. Should competition occur, it does not lead to spatial segregation of the species on this scale. Because biotic interactions most significantly affect the ranges of species on small spatial scales, the microhabitat conditions at locations of the species within syntopic contact zones were compared and a null model analysis was applied to determine their niche overlap. Resource selection probability function models were used to assess those attributes that affect the species" habitat selections. The results revealed species-specific microhabitat preferences related to leaf litter cover, tree number and that the species were active at different temperatures as well as times of the day. The high degree of diurnal activity of S. atra may be due to its preference of forest floor microhabitats that long remain suitable during daytime. Besides, there was a great niche overlap for shelters indicating that the species may compete for this resource. Differential habitat selection and the use of the available shelters at different times of the day may minimize species interactions and allow their local co-occurrence within contact zones. To identify whether the potential infection with the pathogenic chytrid fungus could serve as an alternative biotic explanation for the range margins of S. atra, several populations throughout its range were screened for infection. Since the occurrence of this pathogen was detected mostly at lower altitudes of the Alps, it may confine the range of S. atra to higher elevations. Because chytrid was not detected in any of the samples, the pathogen unlikely plays a role in determining its range limits. Overall, these findings underline the complexity of mechanisms that determine the range margins of parapatric species and provide an important basis for subsequent studies regarding the determinants of the parapatric distribution of the two salamander species.
The presented research aims at providing a first empirical investigation on lexical structure in Chinese with appropriate quantitative methods. The research objects contain individual properties of words (part of speech, polyfunctionality, polysemy, word length), the relationships between properties (part of speech and polyfunctionality, polyfunctionality and polysemy, polysemy and word length) and the lexical structure composed by those properties. Some extant hypotheses in QL, such as distributions of polysemy and the relationship between word length and polysemy, are tested on the data of Chinese, which enrich the applicability of the laws with a language not tested yet. Several original hypotheses such as the distribution of polyfunctionality and the relationship between polyfunctionality and polysemy are set up and inspected.
Fast and Slow Effects of Cortisol on Several Functions of the Central Nervous System in Humans
(2014)
Cortisol is one of the key substances released during stress to restore homeostasis. Our knowledge of the impact of this glucocorticoid on cognition and behavior in humans is, however, still limited. Two modes of action of cortisol are known, a rapid, nongenomic and a slow, genomic mode. Both mechanisms appear to be involved in mediating the various effects of stress on cognition. Here, three experiments are presented that investigated fast and slow effects of cortisol on several functions of the human brain. The first experiment investigated the interaction between insulin and slow, genomic cortisol effects on resting regional cerebral blood flow (rCBF) in 48 young men. A bilateral, locally distinct increase in rCBF in the insular cortex was observed 37 to 58 minutes after intranasal insulin admission. Cortisol did not influence rCBF, neither alone nor in interaction with insulin. This finding suggests that cortisol does not influence resting cerebral blood flow within a genomic timeframe. The second experiment examined fast cortisol effects on memory retrieval. 40 participants (20 of them female) learned associations between neutral male faces and social descriptions and were tested for recall one week later. Cortisol administered intravenously 8 minutes before retrieval influenced recall performance in an inverted U-shaped dose-response relationship. This study demonstrates a rapid, presumably nongenomic cortisol effect on memory retrieval in humans. The third experiment studied rapid cortisol effects on early multisensory integration. 24 male participants were tested twice in a focused cross-modal choice reaction time paradigm, once after cortisol and once after placebo infusion. Cortisol acutely enhanced the integration of visual targets and startling auditory distractors, when both stimuli appeared in the same sensory hemi-field. The rapidity of effect onset strongly suggests that cortisol changes multisensory integration by a nongenomic mechanism. The work presented in this thesis highlights the essential role of cortisol as a fast acting agent during the stress response. Both the second and the third experiment provide new evidence of nongenomic cortisol effects on human cognition and behavior. Future studies should continue to investigate the impact of rapid cortisol effects on the functioning of the human brain.
Veterinary antibiotics are released to arable agricultural soil together with manure, including nutrients, organic matter, and microorganisms. Previously, the effects of antibiotic-contaminated manure on soil microbial community activity, function, structure, and resistance have been reported under controlled experimental conditions. This thesis further evaluated the antimicrobial effects as influenced by different manure compositions, soil microhabitats and moisture regimes, plants, and different distances to roots. Microbial community responses were determined by phenotypic phospholipid fatty acid (PLFA) and genotypic 16S rRNA gene fragment analyses. (Chapter 3) demonstrates that medication of pigs with difloxacin (DIF) and sulfadiazine (SDZ) alters the molecular-chemical pattern of slurries, confounding the detection of a consistent antibiotic effect in bulk and respective rhizosphere soil. This was evaluated in a 63-day mesocosm experiment considering typical agricultural manure applications to maize planted soil. Fecal bacteria were detected even 14 days after manure amendment. Manure of DIF- and SDZ-medicated pigs clearly affected the microbial community in mesocosm bulk and rhizosphere soil, temporarily matching antibiotic effects reported in previous studies. (Chapter 4) discusses the influences of different soil microhabitats on antibiotic fate and the effects on soil microflora. Total extractable SDZ was more than two-fold larger in earthworm burrows and soil macroaggregate surfaces compared to bulk soil or the interior fraction of aggregates. Furthermore, soil microbial communities were affected by a combination of soil microhabitat and treatment, which was reflected by different structural and functional community responses to SDZ in laboratory and under field conditions. (Chapter 5) evaluates if SDZ effects on microbial communities are more pronounced in soils which undergo periodic changes in soil moisture by drying-rewetting dynamics compared to soils without such moisture fluctuations. This was tested in a 49-day climate chamber soil pot experiment grown with grass. Manure-amended pots without or with SDZ contamination were incubated under a dynamic moisture regime with repeated drying and rewetting changes of more than twenty percent maximum water holding capacity compared to the control moisture regime. The microbial biomass, but less pronouncedly the community structure, showed an increased responsiveness to the combined stress of SDZ and dynamic moisture changes in the laboratory. Similar responses were documented under field conditions. (Chapter 6) indicated adverse effects of SDZ on root geotropism, number of lateral roots, and water uptake by plants in a 40-day greenhouse experiment with willow and maize grown in soil with environmentally relevant and worst-case antibiotic contamination. (Chapter 7) showed that the associated microbial community responded to a combination of plant species, distance to the root, and antibiotic spiking concentration. In highly antibiotic-contaminated soils, the structural and functional responses of the microbial community were dominated by indirect antibiotic effects on plants and roots.
A sustainable development of forests and their ecosystem services requires the monitoring of the forests" state and changes as well as the prediction of their future development. To achieve the latter, eco-physiological forest growth models are usually applied. These models require calibration and validation with forestry reference data. This data includes forest structural parameters such as tree height or stem diameter which are easy to measure and can be used to estimate the core model parameters, i.e. the tree- biomass pools. The methods traditionally applied to derive the structural parameters are mainly manual and time-consuming. Hence, the in situ data acquisition is inefficient and limited in its ability to capture the vertical and horizontal variability in stand structure. Ground-based remote sensing bears the potential to overcome the limitations of the traditional methods. As they can be automated, ground-based remote sensing methods allow a much more efficient data acquisition and a larger spatial coverage. They are also able to capture forest structure in its three dimensions. Nevertheless, at present further research is required, in particular with respect to the practical integration of ground-based remote sensing data into forest growth models as well as regarding factors influencing the structural parameter retrieval from this data. Therefore, the goal of this PhD thesis was to investigate the influencing factors of two ground-based remote sensing methods (terrestrial laser scanning and hemispherical photography), which have not or only scarcely been studied to date. In addition, the use of forest structural parameters derived from these methods for the calibration of a forest growth model was assessed. Both goals were achieved. The results of this thesis could contribute significantly to a comprehensive assessment of ground-based remote sensing and its potential to derive the forest structural parameters. However, the use of these methods to calibrate forest growth models proved to be limited. An optimized data sampling design is expected to eliminate the major limitations, though. Furthermore, the combination of ground-based, airborne, and satellite remote sensing sensors was suggested to provide an optimized framework for the general integration of remotely sensed data into forest growth models. This combination of remote sensing observations at different scales will contribute greatly to a modern forest management with the purpose of warranting a sustainable forest development even under growing economic and ecological pressures.
The influence of affect on vocal parameters has been well investigated in speech portrayed by actors, but little is known about affect expression in more natural or authentic speech behavior. This is partly due to the difficulty of generating speech samples that represent authentic expression of speaker affect. The present work investigates the influence of speaker affect on the vocal fundamental frequency (F0) in comparatively authentic speech samples. Three well-documented psychophysiological research methods were applied for the induction of affective states in German native speakers in order to obtain speech samples with authentic affect expression: the Cold Pressor Test (CPT), the Stroop Color-Word Test (SCWT) and the presentation of slides from the International Affective Pictures System (IAPS). The here reported results show that the influence of affect on F0 is differentially modulated by psychophysiological processes as well as socio-cultural influences. They also indicate that this approach may be useful for future research and further to gain a deeper understanding of authentic vocal affect expression. Moreover, F0 may constitute an additional non-invasive, easy to obtain measure for the established psychophysiological research methodology.
The distractor-response binding effect (Frings & Rothermund, 2011; Frings, Rothermund, & Wentura, 2007; Rothermund, Wentura, & De Houwer, 2005) is based on the idea that irrelevant information will be integrated with the response to the relevant stimuli in an episodic memory trace. The immediate re-encounter of any aspect of this saved episode " be it relevant or irrelevant " can lead to retrieval of the whole episode. As a consequence, the previously executed and now retrieved response may influencing the response to the current relevant stimulus. That is, the current response may either be facilitated or be impaired by the retrieved response, depending on whether it is compatible or incompatible to the currently demanded response. Previous research on this kind of episodic retrieval focused on the influence on action control. I examined if distractor response binding also plays a role in decision making in addition to action control. To this end I adapted the distractor-to-distractor priming paradigm (Frings et al., 2007) and conducted nine experiments in which participants had to decide as fast as possible which disease a fictional patient suffered from. To infer the correct diagnosis, two cues were presented; one did not give any hint for a disease (the irrelevant cue), whereas the other did (the relevant cue). Experiments 1a to 1c showed that the distractor-response binding effect is present in deterministic decision situations. Further, experiments 2a and 2b indicate that distractor-response binding also influences decisions under uncertainty. Finally, experiments 3a to 3d were conducted to test some constraints and underlying mechanisms of the distractor-response binding effect in decision making under uncertainty. In sum, these nine experiments provide strong evidence that distractor-response binding influences decision making.
Comparing the results of the phylogeographies of the four species included in this thesis, some accordances have been found, even though certain patterns are only represented in one or two species. In all cases, the findings of the studied species strongly support the existence of forests or forest-like ecosystems beyond the classic forest refugia in the Mediterranean areas (Iberian, Apennine and Balkan peninsulas) during glacial times. However, evidence of glacial refugial areas in Southeastern Europe, especially the Balkans, have been found in this study as well. The analysed populations of Aposeris foetida, Melampyrum sylvaticum and Erebia euryale showed high genetic diversity values and mostly higher private fragments in this area, which is a strong indicator for centres of glacial survival during Würm and, regarding the results of M. sylvaticum, even during the Riss ice age. Three of the analysed species (A. foetida, M. sylvaticum and Colias palaeno) supported a second main glacial refuge area located along the Northern Alps. Again, high genetic diversity values and the uniqueness of the populations living in this region today prove the importance of this area as a glacial centre of survival. Those results confirm several recently published studies on forest species and strongly indicate the persistence of forest-like structures or even forests during the ice ages along the foothills of the Northern Alps. Additionally, the persistence of C. palaeno in this area furthermore supports the existence of peatlands north of the Alps, at least during the last glacial. The results of M. sylvaticum and E. euryale further indicate the vicinity of the Tatra Mountains as core areas for glacial survival. However, the genetic patterns found for E. euryale are ambiguous. Due to an intermediate position of two genetic lineages (originating in the Eastern Alps and Southeastern Europe), the Tatras could also reflect a postglacial mixture zone of those lineages. Moreover, the glacial and postglacial importance of this area for woodland species was accentuated, supporting other phylogeographic studies published. Besides the congruities among the results of the study species, some unique patterns and therefore further potential glacial refugia have also been illuminated in this thesis. For instance, the calcicole species, A. foetida, most probably had further survival area at both sides of the Dinaric Alps, supported by high genetic diversity values and a high number of private fragments found in Croatian populations. Furthermore, the surroundings of the German Uplands and the margin of the Southern Alps provided suitable conditions for glacial survival for M. sylvaticum, while the Eastern and Southeastern Alpine region most probably sheltered the Large Ringlet E. euryale during ice ages. Additionally, this butterfly species survived at least the glaciation along the foothills of the Massif Central, whose present populations showed a unique genetic lineage and their genetic diversity values have been measurably higher than in other populations for this species. Finally, a large and continuous Würm distribution is highly likely south of the Fennoscandian glaciers in Central Europe for C. palaeno, which might indicate extended peatland areas during Würm glacial. With all the patterns found in this study, the understanding of glacial persistence of forest, respectively forest-like structures and peatlands during Würm or even Riss glacial in Europe could be advanced. The congruencies among the analysed woodland and bog species illustrate the importance and location of extra-Mediterranean refugia for European mountain forests and the glacial presence of Central European peatlands. Thus, already postulated theories could be supported and further pieces of the overall puzzle could be added. The varieties of the different survival centres once more clarified that further phylogeographic studies on mountain forest of different habitat requirements and especially peatland species have to be implemented to get a clearer picture of the glacial history of these habitats.
Stress related disorders increase continuously. It is not yet clear if stress also promotes breast cancer. This dissertation provides an analyses of the current state of research and focuses on the significance of pre-/postnatal stress factors and chronic stress. The derived hypotheses are empirically examined on breast cancer patients. The clinical study investigates the links between those factors and prognosis and outcome.
Evaluation of desalination techniques for treating the brackish water of Olushandja sub-basin
(2014)
The groundwater of Olushandja sub-basin as part of Cuvelai basin in central-northern Namibia is saline with TDS content varying between 4,000ppm to 90,000ppm. Based on climatic conditions, this region can be classified as a semi-arid to arid region with an annual rainfall during summer time varying between 200mm to 500mm. The mean annual evaporation potential is about 2,800mm, which is much higher than the annual rainfall. The southern block of this sub-basin is of low population density. It has not been covered by the supply networks for electricity and water. Therefore, the inhabitants are forced to use the untreated groundwater from the hand-dug wells for their daily purposes. This groundwater is not safe for human consumption and therefore needs to be desalinated for that purpose. The goal of this thesis has been to select a suitable desalination technology for that region. The technology to be selected is from those which use renewable energy sources, which have capacity of production from 10m3 to 100m3 per day, which are simple and robust against existing harsh environmental conditions and have already been implemented successfully in some place. Based on these criteria, the technologies which emerged from the literature are: multistage flashing (MSF), multi effect distillation (MED), multi effect humidification (MEH), membrane distillation (MD), reverse osmosis (RO) and electro dialysis reversed (ED). Out of these technologies, RO & ED are based on membrane techniques and MSF, MED & MEH use thermal processes whereas MD technology uses a hybrid process of thermal and membrane techniques for desalinating the water. For evaluation of technical performance, environmental sustainability and financial feasibility of the above mentioned desalination techniques, the following criteria have been used: gained output ratio, recovery rate, pretreatment requirements, sensitivity to feed water quality, post treatment, operating temperature, operating pressure, scaling and fouling potential, corrosion susceptibility, brine disposal, prime energy requirement, mechanical and electrical power output, heat energy, running costs and water generation costs. The data regarding the performance standards of the successfully implemented desalination techniques have been obtained from the literature of performance benchmarks. The Utility Value Analysis Tool of the Rafter-Group of Multi-Criteria Analysis (MCA) has been used for measuring the performance score of a technology. To perform the utility analysis, an evaluation matrix has to be constructed through the following procedures: selection of the decision options (or assessment groups), identification of the evaluation criteria, measurement of performance and transformation of the units. Then the criteria under the objective groups are assigned a level of importance for determining their weights.To perform the sensitivity analysis the level of importance of a criterion is changed by giving more weight or rate to the assessment group of interest (or study). Within the assessment group of interests, the best performing desalination technology has been selected according to the outcome of the sensitivity analysis. The important conclusions of this study are the identification of the capabilities of thermal and membrane based small scale desalination technologies and their applicability based on site specific needs. The sensitivity analysis indicates that the MED technology is the most environmental friendly technology that uses minimum energy and produces least concentrated brine for disposal. The ED technology has emerged to be technically suitable, but it is only applicable when source water has less than 12.000 ppm salt content. The MSF process has favorable thermal efficiency and it is insensitive to feed water quality. Its major drawbacks are energy needs and post treatment requirements that affected its net score. The MD and MSF process have scored the lowest for the technical and economic assessment groups and are concluded not to be suitable for Olushandja sub-basin. The MEH process is cheaper and technically more appropriate than the MED in the two assessment groups. Based on the above mentioned evaluations, this study concluded that Olushandja sub-basin needs more data collection on the geological profile, distinctive identification of aquifers and evidence on the interaction between the aquifers. From the best available data obtained, it could not be established with certainty where the highest level of salinity can be found in the profile, or how the geological profile is layered. More data on ground water quality for spatial overview of the trends and pattern of the sub-basin will be useful in drawing better conclusion on the specific desalination technology needed which is suitable for a specified village or living space.