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Clusty is a new open source toolbox dedicated to earthquake clustering based on waveforms recorded across a network of seismic stations. Its main application is the study of active faults and the detection and characterization of faults and fault networks. By using a density-based clustering approach, earthquakes pertaining to a common fault can be recognized even over long fault segments, and the first-order geometry and extent of active faults can be inferred. Clusty implements multiple techniques to compute a waveform based network similarity from maximum cross-correlation coefficients at multiple stations. The clustering procedure is designed to be transparent and parameters can be easily tuned. It is supported by a number of analysis visualization tools which help to assess the homogeneity within each cluster and the differences among distinct clusters. The toolbox returns graphical representations of the results. A list of representative events and stacked waveforms facilitate further analyses like moment tensor inversion. Results obtained in various frequency bands can be combined to account for large magnitude ranges. Thanks to the simple configuration, the toolbox is easily adaptable to new data sets and to large magnitude ranges. To show the potential of our new toolbox, we apply Clusty to the aftershock sequence of the M-w 6.9 25 October 2018 Zakynthos (Greece) Earthquake. Thanks to the complex tectonic setting at the western termination of the Hellenic Subduction System where multiple faults and faulting styles operate simultaneously, the Zakynthos data set provides an ideal case-study for our clustering analysis toolbox. Our results support the activation of several faults and provide insight into the geometry of faults or fault segments. We identify two large thrust faulting clusters in the vicinity of the main shock and multiple strike-slip clusters to the east, west and south of these clusters. Despite its location within the largest thrust cluster, the main shock does not show a high waveform similarity to any of the clusters. This is consistent with the results of other studies suggesting a complex failure mechanism for the main shock. We propose the existence of conjugated strike-slip faults in the south of the study area. Our waveform similarity based clustering toolbox is able to reveal distinct event clusters which cannot be discriminated based on locations and/or timing only. Additionally, the clustering results allows distinction between fault and auxiliary planes of focal mechanisms and to associate them to known active faults.
Impact of Late Pleistocene climate variability on paleo-erosion rates in the western Himalaya
(2022)
It has been proposed that at short timescales of 10(2)-10(5) yr, climatic variability can explain variations in sediment flux, but in orogens with pronounced climatic gradients rate changes caused by the oscillating efficiency in rainfall, runoff, and/or sediment transport and deposition are still not well-constrained.
To explore landscape responses under variable climatic forcing, we evaluate time windows of prevailing sediment aggradation and related paleo-erosion rates from the southern flanks of the Dhauladhar Range in the western Himalaya.
We compare past and present Be-10-derived erosion rates of well-dated Late Pleistocene fluvial landforms and modern river sediments and reconstruct the sediment aggradation and incision history based on new luminescence data.
Our results document significant variations in erosion rates ranging from 0.1 to 3.4 mm/yr over the Late Pleistocene.
We find that, during times of weak monsoon intensity, the moderately steep areas (hillslope angles of 27 +/- 13 degrees) erode at lower rates of 0.1-0.4 mm/yr compared to steeper (>40 degrees) crestal regions of the Dhauladhar Range that erode at 0.8-1.3 mm/yr.
In contrast, during several millennia of stronger monsoon intensity, both the moderately steep and high slope areas record higher erosion rates (>1-3.4 mm/yr). Lithological clast-count analysis shows that this increase of erosion is focused in the moderately steep areas, where Lesser Himalayan rocks are exposed.
Our data thus highlight the highly non-linear response of climatic forcing on landscape evolution and suggest complex depositional processes and sedimentary signals in downstream areas. (C) 2021 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Bastnsite [REE(CO3)F] is the main mineral of REE ore deposits in carbonatites. Synthetic bastnsite-like compounds were precipitated from aqueous solutions by many different methods, but previous attempts to model magmatic crystallization of bastnsite from hydrous calciocarbonatite melts were unsuccessful.
Here we present the first experimental evidence that bastnsite and two other REE carbonates, burbankite, and lukechangite, can crystallize from carbonatite melt in the synthetic system La(CO3)F-CaCO3-Na2CO3 at temperatures between 580 and 850 degrees C and a pressure 100 MPa.
The experiments on starting mixtures of reagent-grade CaCO3, Na2CO3, La-2(CO3)(3), and LaF3 were carried out in cold-seal rapid-quench pressure vessels.
The studied system is an isobaric pseudoternary join of a quinary system where CO2 and fluorides act as independent components. Liquidus phases in the run products are calcite, nyerereite, Na carbonate, bastnsite, burbankite solid solution (Na,Ca)(3)(Ca,La)(3)(CO3)(5), and lukechangite Na3La2(CO3)(4)F. Calcite and bastnite form a eutectic in the boundary join La(CO3)F-CaCO3 at 780 +/- 20 degrees C and 58 wt% La(CO3)F. Phase equilibria in the boundary join La(CO3)F-Na2CO3 are complicated by peritectic reaction between Ca-free end-member of burbankite solid solution petersenite (Pet) and lukechangite (Luk) with liquid (L): Na4La2(CO3)(5) (Pet) + NaF (L) = Na3La2(CO3)(4)F (Luk) + Na2CO3 (Nc).
The right-hand-side assemblage becomes stable below 600 +/- 20 degrees C. In ternary mixtures, bastnsite (Bst), burbankite (Bur), and calcite (Cc) are involved in another peritectic reaction: 2La(CO3)F (Bst) + CaCO3 (Cc) + 2Na(2)CO(3) (L) = Na2CaLa2(CO3)(5) (Bur) + 2NaF (L). Burbankite in equilibrium with calcite replaces bastnsite below 730 +/- 20 degrees C. Stable solidus assemblages in the pseudoternary system are: basnsite-burbankite-fluorite-calcite, basnasite-burbankite-fluorite-lukechangite, bastnsite-burbankite-lukechangite, burbankite-lukechangite-nyerereitecalcite, and burbankite-lukechangite-nyerereite-natrite. Addition of 10 wt% Ca-3(PO4)(2) to one of the ternary mixtures resulted in massive crystallization of La-bearing apatite and monazite and complete disappearance of bastnsite and burbankite.
Our results confirm that REE-bearing phosphates are much more stable than carbonates and fluorocarbonates.
Therefore, primary crystallization of the latter from common carbonatite magmas is unlikely. Possible exceptions are carbonatites at Mountain Pass that are characterized by very low P2O5 concentrations (usually at or below 0.5 wt%) and extremely high REE contents in the order of a few weight percent or more. In other carbonatites, bastnsite and burbankite probably crystallized from highly concentrated alkaline carbonate-chloride brines that were found in melt inclusions and are thought to be responsible for widespread fenitization around carbonatite bodies.
The chaotic spatio-temporal electrical activity during life-threatening cardiac arrhythmias like ventricular fibrillation is governed by the dynamics of vortex-like spiral or scroll waves. The organizing centers of these waves are called wave tips (2D) or filaments (3D) and they play a key role in understanding and controlling the complex and chaotic electrical dynamics. Therefore, in many experimental and numerical setups it is required to detect the tips of the observed spiral waves. Most of the currently used methods significantly suffer from the influence of noise and are often adjusted to a specific situation (e.g. a specific numerical cardiac cell model). In this study, we use a specific type of deep neural networks (UNet), for detecting spiral wave tips and show that this approach is robust against the influence of intermediate noise levels. Furthermore, we demonstrate that if the UNet is trained with a pool of numerical cell models, spiral wave tips in unknown cell models can also be detected reliably, suggesting that the UNet can in some sense learn the concept of spiral wave tips in a general way, and thus could also be used in experimental situations in the future (ex-vivo, cell-culture or optogenetic experiments).
From June to August 2021, we deployed a dense seismic nodal network across the Hengill geothermal area in southwest Iceland to image and characterize faults and high-temperature zones at high resolution.
The nodal network comprised 498 geophone nodes spread across the northern Nesjavellir and southern Hverahlio geothermal fields and was complemented by an existing permanent and temporary backbone seismic network of a total of 44 short-period and broadband stations.
In addition, we recorded distributed acoustic sensing data along two fiber optic telecommunication cables near the Nesjavellir geothermal power plant with commercial interrogators.
During the time of deployment, a vibroseis survey took place around the Nesjavellir power plant.
Here, we describe the network and the recorded datasets.
Furthermore, we showsome initial results that indicate a high data quality and highlight the potential of the seismic records for various follow up studies, such as high-resolution event location to delineate faults and body- and surface-wave tomographies to image the subsurface velocity structure in great detail.
Lakes act as important sinks for inorganic and organic sediment components. However, investigations of sedimentary carbon budgets within glacial lakes are currently absent from Arctic Siberia. The aim of this paper is to provide the first reconstruction of accumulation rates, sediment and carbon budgets from a lacustrine sediment core from Lake Rauchuagytgyn, Chukotka (Arctic Siberia). We combined multiple sediment biogeochemical and sedimentological parameters from a radiocarbon-dated 6.5m sediment core with lake basin hydroacoustic data to derive sediment stratigraphy, sediment volumes and infill budgets. Our results distinguished three principal sediment and carbon accumulation regimes that could be identified across all measured environmental proxies including early Marine Isotope Stage 2 (MIS2) (ca. 29-23.4 ka cal BP), mid-MIS2-early MIS1 (ca. 23.4-11.69 ka cal BP) and the Holocene (ca. 11.69-present). Estimated organic carbon accumulation rates (OCARs) were higher within Holocene sediments (average 3.53 gOCm(-2) a(-1)) than Pleistocene sediments (average 1.08 gOCm(-2) a(-1)) and are similar to those calculated for boreal lakes from Quebec and Finland and Lake Baikal but significantly lower than Siberian thermokarst lakes and Alberta glacial lakes. Using a bootstrapping approach, we estimated the total organic carbon pool to be 0.26 +/- 0.02 Mt and a total sediment pool of 25.7 +/- 1.71 Mt within a hydroacoustically derived sediment volume of ca. 32 990 557m(3). The total organic carbon pool is substantially smaller than Alaskan yedoma, thermokarst lake sediments and Alberta glacial lakes but shares similarities with Finnish boreal lakes. Temporal variability in sediment and carbon accumulation dynamics at Lake Rauchuagytgyn is controlled predominantly by palaeoclimate variation that regulates lake ice-cover dynamics and catchment glacial, fluvial and permafrost processes through time. These processes, in turn, affect catchment and within-lake primary productivity as well as catchment soil development. Spatial differences compared to other lake systems at a trans-regional scale likely relate to the high-latitude, mountainous location of Lake Rauchuagytgyn.
Martian atmospheric spectral end-members retrieval from ExoMars Thermal Infrared (TIRVIM) data
(2022)
Key knowledge about planetary composition can be recovered from the study of thermal infrared spectral range datasets.
This range has a huge diagnostic potential because it contains diagnostic absorptions from a planetary surface and atmosphere. The main goal of this study is to process and interpret the dataset from the Thermal Infrared channel (TIRVIM) which is part of the Atmospheric Chemistry Suite of the ExoMars2016 Trace Gas Orbiter mission to find and characterize dust and water ice clouds in the atmosphere.
The method employed here is based on the application of principal component analysis and target transformation techniques to extract the independent variable components present in the analyzed dataset. Spectral shapes of both atmospheric dust and water ice aerosols have been recovered from the analysis of TIRVIM data.
The comparison between our results with those previously obtained on Thermal Emission Spectrometer (TES) data and with previous analysis on TIRVIM data, validates the methodology here applied, showing that it allows to correctly recover the atmospheric spectral endmembers present in the TIRVIM data.
Moreover, comparison with atmospheric retrievals on PFS, TES and IRIS data, allowed us to assess the temporal stability and homogeneity of dust and water ice components in the Martian atmosphere over a time period of almost 50 years.
The early exhumation history of the Tauern Window in the European Eastern Alps and its surface expression is poorly dated and quantified, partly because thermochronological and provenance information are sparse from the Upper Austrian Northern Alpine Foreland Basin. For the first time, we combine a single-grain double-dating approach (Apatite Fission Track and U-Pb dating) with trace-element geochemistry analysis on the same apatites to reconstruct the provenance and exhumation history of the late Oligocene/early Miocene Eastern Alps. The results from 22 samples from the Chattian to Burdigalian sedimentary infill of the Upper Austrian Northern Alpine Foreland Basin were integrated with a 3D seismic-reflection data set and published stratigraphic reports. Our highly discriminative data set indicates an increasing proportion of apatites (from 6% to 23%) with Sr/Y values <0.1 up-section and an increasing amount of apatites (from 24% to 38%) containing >1,000 ppm light rare-earth elements from Chattian to Burdigalian time. The number of U-Pb ages with acceptable uncertainties increases from 40% to 59% up-section, with mostly late Variscan/Permian ages, while an increasing number of grains (10%-27%) have Eocene or younger apatite fission track cooling ages. The changes in the apatite trace-element geochemistry and U-Pb data mirror increased sediment input from an >= upper amphibolite-facies metamorphic source of late Variscan/Permian age - probably the otztal-Bundschuh nappe system - accompanied by increasing exhumation rates indicated by decreasing apatite fission track lag times. We attribute these changes to the surface response to upright folding and doming in the Penninic units of the future Tauern Window starting at 29-27 Ma. This early period of exhumation (0.3-0.6 mm/a) is triggered by early Adriatic indentation along the Giudicarie Fault System.
Natural gas can be temporarily stored in a variety of underground facilities, such as depleted gas and oil fields, natural aquifers and caverns in salt rocks. Being extensively monitored during operations, these systems provide a favourable opportunity to investigate how pressure varies in time and space and possibly induces/triggers earthquakes on nearby faults. Elaborate and detailed numerical modelling techniques are often applied to study gas reservoirs. Here we show the possibilities and discuss the limitations of a flexible and easily formulated tool that can be straightforwardly applied to simulate temporal pore-pressure variations and study the relation with recorded microseismic events. We use the software POEL (POroELastic diffusion and deformation) which computes the poroelastic response to fluid injection/extraction in a horizontally layered poroelastic structure. We further develop its application to address the presence of vertical impermeable faults bounding the reservoir and of multiple injection/extraction sources. Exploiting available information on the reservoir geometry and physical parameters, and records of injection/extraction rates for a gas reservoir in southern Europe, we perform an extensive parametric study considering different model configurations. Comparing modelled spatiotemporal pore-pressure variations with in situ measurements, we show that the inclusion of vertical impermeable faults provides an improvement in reproducing the observations and results in pore-pressure accumulation near the faults and in a variation of the temporal pore-pressure diffusion pattern. To study the relation between gas storage activity and recorded local microseismicity, we applied different seismicity models based on the estimated porepressure distribution. This analysis helps to understand the spatial distribution of seismicity and its temporal modulation. The results show that the observed microseismicity could be partly linked to the storage activity, but the contribution of tectonic background seismicity cannot be excluded.
Reservoir-triggered seismicity has been observed near dams during construction, impoundment, and cyclic filling in many parts of the earth. In Turkey, the number of dams has increased substantially over the last decade, with Ataturk Dam being the largest dam in Turkey with a total water capacity of 48.7 billion m(3). After the construction of the dam, the monitoring network has improved. Considering earthquakes above the long-term completeness magnitude of M-C = 3.5, the local seismicity rate has substantially increased after the filling of the reservoir. Recently, two damaging earthquakes of M-w 5.5 and M-w 5.1 occurred in the town of Samsat near the Ataturk Reservoir in 2017 and 2018, respectively. In this study, we analyze the spatio-temporal evolution of seismicity and its source properties in relation to the temporal water-level variations and the stresses resulting from surface loading and pore-pressure diffusion. We find that water-level and seismicity rate are anti-correlated, which is explained by the stabilization effect of the gravitational induced stress imposed by water loading on the local faults. On the other hand, we find that the overall effective stress in the seismogenic zone increased over decades due to pore-pressure diffusion, explaining the enhanced background seismicity during recent years. Additionally, we observe a progressive decrease of the Gutenberg-Richter b-value. Our results indicate that the stressing rate finally focused on the region where the two damaging earthquakes occurred in 2017 and 2018.
The accelerating climatic changes and new infrastructure development across the Arctic require more robust risk and environmental assessment, but thus far there is no consistent record of human impact. We provide a first panarctic satellite-based record of expanding infrastructure and anthropogenic impacts along all permafrost affected coasts (100 km buffer, approximate to 6.2 Mio km(2)), named the Sentinel-1/2 derived Arctic Coastal Human Impact (SACHI) dataset. The completeness and thematic content goes beyond traditional satellite based approaches as well as other publicly accessible data sources. Three classes are considered: linear transport infrastructure (roads and railways), buildings, and other impacted area. C-band synthetic aperture radar and multi-spectral information (2016-2020) is exploited within a machine learning framework (gradient boosting machines and deep learning) and combined for retrieval with 10 m nominal resolution. In total, an area of 1243 km(2) constitutes human-built infrastructure as of 2016-2020. Depending on region, SACHI contains 8%-48% more information (human presence) than in OpenStreetMap. 221 (78%) more settlements are identified than in a recently published dataset for this region. 47% is not covered in a global night-time light dataset from 2016. At least 15% (180 km(2)) correspond to new or increased detectable human impact since 2000 according to a Landsat-based normalized difference vegetation index trend comparison within the analysis extent. Most of the expanded presence occurred in Russia, but also some in Canada and US. 31% and 5% of impacted area associated predominantly with oil/gas and mining industry respectively has appeared after 2000. 55% of the identified human impacted area will be shifting to above 0 C-circle ground temperature at two meter depth by 2050 if current permafrost warming trends continue at the pace of the last two decades, highlighting the critical importance to better understand how much and where Arctic infrastructure may become threatened by permafrost thaw.
We revise the conceptual model of calcite varves and present, for the first time, a dual lake monitoring study in two alkaline lakes providing new insights into the seasonal sedimentation processes forming these varves. The study lakes, Tiefer See in NE Germany and Czechowskie in N Poland, have distinct morphology and bathymetry, and therefore, they are ideal to decipher local effects on seasonal deposition. The monitoring setup in both lakes is largely identical and includes instrumental observation of (i) meteorological parameters, (ii) chemical profiling of the lake water column including water sampling, and (iii) sediment trapping at both bi-weekly and monthly intervals. We then compare our monitoring data with varve micro-facies in the sediment record. One main finding is that calcite varves form complex laminae triplets rather than simple couplets as commonly thought. Sedimentation of varve sub-layers in both lakes is largely dependent on the lake mixing dynamics and results from the same seasonality, commencing with diatom blooms in spring turning into a pulse of calcite precipitation in summer and terminating with a re-suspension layer in autumn and winter, composed of calcite patches, plant fragments and benthic diatoms. Despite the common seasonal cycle, the share of each of these depositional phases in the total annual sediment yield is different between the lakes. In Lake Tiefer See calcite sedimentation has the highest yields, whereas in Lake Czechowskie, the so far underestimated re-suspension sub-layer dominates the sediment accumulation. Even in undisturbed varved sediments, re-suspended material becomes integrated in the sediment fabric and makes up an important share of calcite varves. Thus, while the biogeochemical lake cycle defines the varves' autochthonous components and micro-facies, the physical setting plays an important role in determining the varve sub-layers' proportion.
Large earthquakes can increase the amount of water feeding stream flows, raise groundwater levels, and thus grant plant roots more access to water in water-limited environments. We examine growth and photosynthetic responses of Pine plantations to the Maule M-w 8.8 earthquake in headwater catchments of Chile's Coastal Range. We combine high-resolution wood anatomic (lumen area) and biogeochemical (delta 13C of wood cellulose) proxies of daily to weekly tree growth sampled from trees on floodplains and close to ridge lines. We find that, immediately after the earthquake, at least two out of six tree trees on valley floors had increased lumen area and decreased delta 13C, while trees on hillslopes had a reverse trend. Our results indicate a control of soil water on this response, largely consistent with models that predict how enhanced postseismic vertical soil permeability causes groundwater levels to rise on valley floors, but fall along the ridges. Statistical analysis with boosted regression trees indicates that streamflow discharge gained predictive importance for photosynthetic activity on the ridges, but lost importance on the valley floor after the earthquake. We infer that earthquakes may stimulate ecohydrological conditions favoring tree growth over days to weeks by triggering stomatal opening. The weak and short-lived signals that we identified, however, show that such responses are only valid under water-limited, rather than energy-limited tree, growth. Hence, dendrochronological studies targeted at annual resolution may overlook some earthquake effects on tree vitality.
Seafloor spreading at slow rates can be accommodated on large-offset oceanic detachment faults (ODFs), that exhume lower crustal and mantle rocks in footwall domes termed oceanic core complexes (OCCs). Footwall rocks experience large rotation during exhumation, yet important aspects of the kinematics-particularly the relative roles of solid-block rotation and flexure-are not clearly understood. Using a high-resolution numerical model, we explore the exhumation kinematics in the footwall beneath an emergent ODF/OCC. A key feature of the models is that footwall motion is dominated by solid-block rotation, accommodated by the nonplanar, concave-down fault interface. A consequence is that curvature measured along the ODF is representative of a neutral stress configuration, rather than a "bent" one. Instead, it is in the subsequent process of "apparent unbending" that significant flexural stresses are developed in the model footwall. The brittle strain associated with apparent unbending is produced dominantly in extension, beneath the OCC, consistent with earthquake clustering observed in the Trans-Atlantic Geotraverse at the Mid-Atlantic Ridge.
The wetland cover is defined as the spatially homogenous region of a wetland attributed to the underlying biophysical conditions such as vegetation, turbidity, hydric soil, and the amount of water.
Here, we present a novel method to derive the wetland-cover types (WCTs) combining three commonly used multispectral indices, NDVI, MNDWI, and NDTI, in three large Ramsar wetlands located in different geomorphic and climatic settings across India. These wetlands include the Kaabar Tal, a floodplain wetland in east Ganga Plains, Chilika Lagoon, a coastal wetland in eastern India, and Nal Sarovar in semi-arid western India.
The novelty of our approach is that the derived WCTs are stable in space and time, and therefore, a given WCT across different wetlands or within different zones of a large wetland will imply similar underlying biophysical attributes.
The WCTs can therefore provide a novel tool for monitoring and change detection of wetland cover types.
We have automated the proposed WCT algorithm using the Google Earth Engine (GEE) environment and by developing ArcGIS tools. The method can be implemented on any wetland and using any multispectral imagery dataset with visible and NIR bands.
The proposed methodology is simple yet robust and easy to implement and, therefore, holds significant importance in wetland monitoring and management.
The Alpine mountains in central Europe are characterized by a heterogeneous crust accumulating different tectonic units and blocks in close proximity to sedimentary foreland basins. Centroid moment tensor inversion provides insight into the faulting mechanisms of earthquakes and related tectonic processes but is significantly aggravated in such an environment. Thanks to the dense AlpArray seismic network and our flexible bootstrap-based inversion tool Grond, we are able to test different setups with respect to the uncertainties of the obtained moment tensors and centroid locations. We evaluate the influence of frequency bands, azimuthal gaps, input data types, and distance ranges and study the occurrence and reliability of non-double-couple (DC) components. We infer that for most earthquakes (M-w >= 3.3) a combination of time domain full waveforms and frequency domain amplitude spectra in a frequency band of 0.02-0.07 Hz is suitable. Relying on the results of our methodological tests, we perform deviatoric moment tensor (MT) inversions for events with M-w > 3.0. Here, we present 75 solutions for earthquakes between January 2016 and December 2019 and analyze our results in the seismotectonic context of historical earthquakes, seismic activity of the last 3 decades, and GNSS deformation data. We study regions of comparably high seismic activity during the last decades, namely the Western Alps, the region around Lake Garda, and the eastern Southern Alps, as well as clusters further from the study region, i.e., in the northern Dinarides and the Apennines. Seismicity is particularly low in the Eastern Alps and in parts of the Central Alps. We apply a clustering algorithm to focal mechanisms, considering additional mechanisms from existing catalogs. Related to the N-S compressional regime, E-W-to-ENE-WSW-striking thrust faulting is mainly observed in the Friuli area in the eastern Southern Alps. Strike-slip faulting with a similarly oriented pressure axis is observed along the northern margin of the Central Alps and in the northern Dinarides. NW-SE-striking normal faulting is observed in the NW Alps, showing a similar strike direction to normal faulting earthquakes in the Apennines. Both our centroid depths and hypocentral depths in existing catalogs indicate that Alpine seismicity is predominantly very shallow; about 80% of the studied events have depths shallower than 10 km.
The magnitude of earthquakes on continental normal faults rarely exceeds 7.0 Mw. However, because of their vicinity to large population centers they can be highly destructive.
Long recurrence time, relatively small deformations, and limited observations hinder our understanding of the deformation patterns and mechanisms controlling the magnitude of events.
Here, this problem is addressed with 2D thermomechanical modeling of normal fault seismic cycles.
The 2020 Samos, Greece Mw7.0 earthquake is used as an example as it is one of the largest and most studied continental normal fault earthquakes. The modeling approach employs visco-elasto-plastic rheology, compressibility, free surface, and a rate-and-state friction law for the fault.
Modeling of the Samos earthquake suggests the pore fluid pressure ratio on the fault ranges from 0 to 0.7. The model demonstrates that most of the deformation during interseismic and coseismic periods, besides on the fault, occurs in the hanging wall and footwall below the seismogenic part of the fault. The largest vertical surface displacement during the earthquake is the subsidence of the hanging wall in the vicinity of the fault, while the uplift of the footwall and remote part of the hanging wall is significantly smaller.
Modeling of the seismic cycles on normal faults with different setups shows the dependency of the magnitude on the thermal profile and dipping angle of the fault; low heat flow and low dipping angle are favorable conditions for the largest events, while steep normal faults in the areas of high heat flow tend to have the smallest magnitudes.
In a warming Arctic, permafrost-related disturbances, such as retrogressive thaw slumps (RTS), are becoming more abundant and dynamic, with serious implications for permafrost stability and bio-geochemical cycles on local to regional scales. Despite recent advances in the field of earth observation, many of these have remained undetected as RTS are highly dynamic, small, and scattered across the remote permafrost region. Here, we assessed the potential strengths and limitations of using deep learning for the automatic segmentation of RTS using PlanetScope satellite imagery, ArcticDEM and auxiliary datasets. We analyzed the transferability and potential for pan-Arctic upscaling and regional cross-validation, with independent training and validation regions, in six different thaw slump-affected regions in Canada and Russia. We further tested state-of-the-art model architectures (UNet, UNet++, DeepLabv3) and encoder networks to find optimal model configurations for potential upscaling to continental scales. The best deep learning models achieved mixed results from good to very good agreement in four of the six regions (maxIoU: 0.39 to 0.58; Lena River, Horton Delta, Herschel Island, Kolguev Island), while they failed in two regions (Banks Island, Tuktoyaktuk). Of the tested architectures, UNet++ performed the best. The large variance in regional performance highlights the requirement for a sufficient quantity, quality and spatial variability in the training data used for segmenting RTS across diverse permafrost landscapes, in varying environmental conditions. With our highly automated and configurable workflow, we see great potential for the transfer to active RTS clusters (e.g., Peel Plateau) and upscaling to much larger regions.
The formation of the Central Andes dates back to similar to 50 Ma, but its most pronounced episode, including the growth of the Altiplano-Puna Plateau and pulsatile tectonic shortening phases, occurred within the last 25 Ma.
The reason for this evolution remains unexplained. Using geodynamic numerical modeling we infer that the primary cause of the pulses of tectonic shortening and growth of the Central Andes is the changing geometry of the subducted Nazca plate, and particularly the steepening of the mid-mantle slab segment which results in a slowing down of the trench retreat and subsequent increase in shortening of the advancing South America plate.
This steepening first happens after the end of the flat slab episode at similar to 25 Ma, and later during the buckling and stagnation of the slab in the mantle transition zone. Processes that mechanically weaken the lithosphere of the South America plate, as suggested in previous studies, enhance the intensity of the shortening events.
These processes include delamination of the mantle lithosphere and weakening of foreland sediments.
Our new modeling results are consistent with the timing and amplitude of the deformation from geological data in the Central Andes at the Altiplano latitude.
Plain Language Summary
The Central Andes is a subduction-type orogeny that formed as a result of the interaction between the Nazca oceanic plate and the South American continental plate over the last 50 million years. Growth of the Andes is primarily the result of crustal shortening. Nevertheless, "geological" data compiled from previous studies have shown that phases of drastic pulsatile shortening occur at 15 and 5 Ma.
In this study, we used high-resolution 2D numerical geodynamic simulations to investigate the link between oceanic and continental plate dynamics and their interaction. We find that when the oceanic plate steepens in the mantle transition zone, the trench retreat is hindered. Coupled with the weakening of the continental plate through the slab flattening and subsequent delamination of the lithospheric mantle, this leads to pulsatile shortening phases of a magnitude equivalent to that suggested by the data.
Magma-filled dikes may feed erupting fissures that lead to alignments of craters developing at the surface, yet the details of activity and migrating eruptions at the crater row are difficult to monitor and are hardly understood.
The 2021 Tajogaite eruption at the Cumbre Vieja, La Palma (Spain), lasted 85 days and developed a pronounced alignment of craters that may be related to changes within the volcano edifice.
Here, we use COSMO-SkyMed satellite radar data and ground-based time-lapse photographs, offering a high-resolution dataset to explore the locations and characteristics of evolving craters.
Our results show that the craters evolve both gradually and suddenly and can be divided into three main phases. Phase 1, lasting the first 6 weeks of the eruption, was characterized by a NW-SE linear evolution of up to seven craters emerging on the growing cone.
Following two partial collapses of the cone to the northwest and a seismicity increase at depth, Phase 2 started and caused a propagation of the main activity toward the southeastern side, together with the presence of up to 11 craters along this main NW-SE trend. Associated with strong deep and shallow earthquakes, Phase 3 was initiated and continued for the final 2 weeks of the eruption, expressed by the development of up to 18 craters, which became dominant and clustered in the southeastern sector in early December 2021. In Phase 3, a second and oblique alignment and surface fracture was identified.
Our findings that crater and eruption changes coincide together with an increase in seismic activity at depth point to a deep driver leading to crater and morphology changes at the surface.
These also suggest that crater distributions might allow for improved monitoring of changes occurring at depth, and vice versa, such that strong seismicity changes at depth may herald the migration and new formation of craters, which have major implications for the assessment of tephra and lava flow hazards on volcanoes.
The Sea of Marmara is a tectonically active basin that straddles the North Anatolian Fault Zone (NAFZ), a major strike-slip fault that separates the Eurasian and Anatolian tectonic plates. The Main Marmara Fault (MMF), which is part of the NAFZ, contains an approximately 150 km long seismotectonic segment that has not ruptured since 1766. A key question for seismic hazard and risk assessment is whether or not the next rupture along this segment is likely to produce one major earthquake or a series of smaller earthquakes. Geomechanical characteristics such as along-strike variations in rock strength may provide an important control on seismotectonic segmentation. We find that variations in lithospheric strength throughout the Marmara region control the mechanical segmentation of the MMF and help explain its long-term seismotectonic segmentation. In particular, a strong crust that is mechanically coupled to the upper mantle spatially correlates with aseismic patches, where the MMF bends and changes its strike in response to the presence of high-density lower crustal bodies. Between the bends, mechanically weaker crustal domains that are decoupled from the mantle indicate a predominance of creeping. These results are highly relevant for the ongoing debate regarding the characteristics of the Marmara seismic gap, especially in view of the seismic hazard (Mw > 7) in the densely populated Marmara region.
On 12 August 2021, a > 220 s lasting complex earthquake with Mw > 8.2 hit the South Sandwich Trench. Due to its remote location and short interevent times, reported earthquake parameters varied significantly between different international agencies. We studied the complex rupture by combining different seismic source characterization techniques sensitive to different frequency ranges based on teleseismic broadband recordings from 0.001 to 2 Hz, including point and finite fault inversions and the back-projection of high-frequency signals.
We also determined moment tensor solutions for 88 aftershocks. The rupture initiated simultaneously with a rupture equivalent to a M-w 7.6 thrust earthquake in the deep part of the seismogenic zone in the central subduction interface and a shallow megathrust rupture, which propagated unilaterally to the south with a very slow rupture velocity of 1.2 km/s and varying strike following the curvature of the trench.
The slow rupture covered nearly two-thirds of the entire subduction zone length, and with M-w 8.2 released the bulk of the total moment of the whole earthquake.
Tsunami modeling indicates the inferred shallow rupture can explain the tsunami records. The southern segment of the shallow rupture overlaps with another activation of the deeper part of the megathrust equivalent to M-w 7.6. The aftershock distribution confirms the extent and curvature of the rupture. Some mechanisms are consistent with the mainshocks, but many indicate also activation of secondary faults. Rupture velocities and radiated frequencies varied strongly between different stages of the rupture, which might explain the variability of published source parameters.
Plain Language Summary
The earthquake of 12 August 2021 along the deep-sea trench of the South Sandwich Islands in the South Atlantic reached a magnitude of 8.2 and triggered a tsunami. The automatic earthquake parameter determination of different agencies showed very different results shortly after the earthquake and partially underestimated the tsunami potential of the earthquake.
A possible reason was the complex rupture process and that the tsunami was generated by a long and shallow slow slip rupture sandwiched between more conventional fast slip subevents at its northern and southern ends. In addition, the fault surface, which extended over 450 km, was highly curved striking 150 degrees-220 degrees.
We investigated the different components of the seismic wavefields in different frequency ranges and with different methods.
The analysis shows how even complex earthquakes can be deciphered by combining analyzing methods. The comparison with aftershocks and the triggered tsunami waves confirms our model that explains the South Sandwich rupture by four subevents in the plate boundary along the curved deep-sea trench. Here, the depth, rupture velocities, and slip on each segment of the rupture vary considerably.
The method can also be applied to other megathrust earthquakes and help to further improve tsunami warnings in the future.
New middle Miocene to Pliocene (~14–3 Ma) apatite fission track (AFT) cooling ages combined with published K–Ar/Ar–Ar and zircon fission track (ZFT) ages from the Hazara and Swat regions of Pakistan are used to explain the Oligocene to Pliocene structural evolution in the Western Himalaya. The structural model explains the distribution of K–Ar/Ar–Ar ages in three distinct age groups (Proterozoic, Paleozoic-Mesozoic, and Eocene to Oligocene). The Proterozoic to Mesozoic sequence of northern Hazara and Swat experienced elevated temperature and pressure conditions, evident by reset Eocene to Oligocene K–Ar/Ar–Ar hornblende and Eocene to Miocene muscovite ages, caused by Kohistan overthrusting the Indian margin during and after the India–Asia collision. Samples from the Indus syntaxis with Paleo to Mesoproterozoic K–Ar/Ar–Ar hornblende ages and Eocene to Oligocene Ar–Ar muscovite ages show no signs of Cenozoic metamorphism; these samples were thermally imprinted up to the Ar–Ar muscovite closure temperature. Neoproterozoic to Lower Paleozoic rocks from the southern parts of Hazara and Swat show Mesozoic to Oligocene partially reset Ar–Ar muscovite ages and preservation of Ordovician metamorphism. The combined analysis of published K–Ar/Ar–Ar (muscovite), ZFT, and new AFT ages (~14–12 Ma) suggests that the Main Central thrust/Panjal thrust was active from Oligocene to early Miocene (~30–18 Ma), and the Nathia-Gali and Main Boundary thrusts were active from the middle to late Miocene (~14–9 Ma) in the Hazara area. New and published AFT ages (~6–3 Ma) from the Indus syntaxis suggest that early Pliocene tectonic thickening in the hinterland formed the N–S trending Indus anticline, creating an erosional half window in the Main Mantle thrust, forming the Indus syntaxis, and dividing the Main Central thrust sheet into the Hazara and Swat segments.
We propose lacunarity as a novel recurrence quantification measure and illustrate its efficacy to detect dynamical regime transitions which are exhibited by many complex real-world systems. We carry out a recurrence plot-based analysis for different paradigmatic systems and nonlinear empirical data in order to demonstrate the ability of our method to detect dynamical transitions ranging across different temporal scales. It succeeds to distinguish states of varying dynamical complexity in the presence of noise and non-stationarity, even when the time series is of short length. In contrast to traditional recurrence quantifiers, no specification of minimal line lengths is required and geometric features beyond linear structures in the recurrence plot can be accounted for. This makes lacunarity more broadly applicable as a recurrence quantification measure. Lacunarity is usually interpreted as a measure of heterogeneity or translational invariance of an arbitrary spatial pattern. In application to recurrence plots, it quantifies the degree of heterogeneity in the temporal recurrence patterns at all relevant time scales. We demonstrate the potential of the proposed method when applied to empirical data, namely time series of acoustic pressure fluctuations from a turbulent combustor. Recurrence lacunarity captures both the rich variability in dynamical complexity of acoustic pressure fluctuations and shifting time scales encoded in the recurrence plots. Furthermore, it contributes to a better distinction between stable operation and near blowout states of combustors.
The present-day structure of the Eastern Cordillera in NW Argentina is governed by structural and lithological heterogeneities inherited from preceding deformation phases, which influence the localization of newly-formed faults and the inversion of pre-existing structures.
The Salta Rift Basin formed during a Late Jurassic-Cretaceous extensional phase and created a dominant structural and stratigraphic imprint in NW Argentina that is partic-ularly evident within the Eastern Cordillera, where uplift and exhumation have exposed the Salta Group syn-rift succession.
Although in general, the Salta Group rests upon Paleozoic rocks, locally the Tacuru Group forms an intermediate succession, consisting of interfingering eolian sandstones and proximal fault-related conglomerates with a Jurassic maximum depositional age. This succession might be the key to unraveling the Mesozoic history of NW Argentina, prior to the deposition of the Salta Group.
The conglomerates represent the earliest deposits related to extension in the western Lomas de Olmedo sub-basin, which is also documented in predominantly Jurassic zircon (U-Th-Sm)/He cooling ages of the rift shoulders. The detrital zircon U-Pb age signature and sandstone provenance of the Tacuru Group conglomerates differs strongly from the Salta Group syn-rift strata, which show a more regional signal.
These variations and the angularity of the unconformity may be connected to a rotation of the extension direction in the western Lomas de Olmedo sub-basin.
In the Gasht-Masuleh area in the Alborz Mountains, gabbroic magma intruded Palaeozoic metasediments and Mesozoic sediments and crystallised as isotropic and cumulate gabbros. LREE enrichment points to relatively low degrees of mantle melting and depletion of Ti, Nb and Ta relative to primitive mantle points to an arc related component in the magma. Clinopyroxene compositions indicate MORB to arc signatures. U–Pb zircon crystallisation ages of 99.5 ± 0.6 Ma and 99.4 ± 0.6 Ma and phlogopite 40Ar/39Ar ages of 97.1 ± 0.4 Ma, 97.5 ± 0.4 Ma, 97.1 ± 0.1 Ma, within 2σ error, indicate that gabbro intrusion occurred in the (Albian-)Cenomanian (mid-Cretaceous). As active subduction did not take place in the Cretaceous in North Iran, the small volume mafic magmatism in the Gasht-Masuleh area must be due to local, extension-related mantle melting. Melting was most likely caused by far field effects triggered by roll-back of the Neo-Tethys subducting slab. As subduction took place at a distance of ~ 400 km (present distance) from the Alborz Mountains, the observed arc geochemical signatures must be inherited from a previous subduction event and concomitant mantle metasomatism, possibly in combination with contamination of the magma by crustal material.
In recurrence analysis, the tau-recurrence rate encodes the periods of the cycles of the underlying high-dimensional time series. It, thus, plays a similar role to the autocorrelation for scalar time-series in encoding temporal correlations.
However, its Fourier decomposition does not have a clean interpretation. Thus, there is no satisfactory analogue to the power spectrum in recurrence analysis.
We introduce a novel method to decompose the tau-recurrence rate using an over-complete basis of Dirac combs together with sparsity regularization.
We show that this decomposition, the inter-spike spectrum, naturally provides an analogue to the power spectrum for recurrence analysis in the sense that it reveals the dominant periodicities of the underlying time series.
We show that the inter-spike spectrum correctly identifies patterns and transitions in the underlying system in a wide variety of examples and is robust to measurement noise.
Late Miocene-Pliocene onset of fluvial incision of the Cauca River Canyon in the Northern Andes
(2022)
The incision of kilometer-scale canyons into high-standing topography is often used to constrain the surface uplift history of mountain ranges, controlled by tectonic and geodynamic processes.
However, changes in climate may also be responsible for canyon incision. This study deciphers the timing of incision of the similar to 2.5-km-deep Cauca River Canyon in the Central Cordillera of the Northern Andes using the cooling (exhumation) history of rocks from the canyon walls and a regional analysis of channel steepness in rivers.
Ten bedrock samples and one detrital sample were collected on the eastern border of the canyon between 300 m and 2300 m of elevation.
Bedrock and detrital AFT data yield ages from 50 to 38 Ma, while two bed-rock AHe ages from the valley bottom yield ages of 7-6 Ma.
The AHe ages and inverse thermal history models reveal a previously unidentified late Miocene (ca. 7-6 Ma) pulse of exhumation that we interpret as the age of a single incision event that formed the Cauca River Canyon.
We conclude that the Cauca River Canyon was carved as a response to rock uplift in the northern Central Cordillera and propagation of an erosion wave into the mountain range starting in the latest Miocene.
Strain NGK35T is a motile, Gram-stain-negative, rod-shaped (1.0-2.1 mu m long and 0.6-0.8 mu m wide), aerobic bacterium that was isolated from plastic-polluted landfill soil. The strain grew at temperatures between 6 and 37 degrees C (optimum, 28 degrees C), in 0-10 % NaCl (optimum, 1 %) and at pH 6.0-9.5 (optimum, pH 7.5-8.5).
It was positive for cytochrome c oxidase, catalase as well as H2S production, and hydrolysed casein and urea. It used a variety of different carbon sources including citrate, lactate and pyruvate.
The predominant membrane fatty acids were C-16:1 cis9 and C-16:0, followed by C-17:0 cyclo and C-18:1 cis11. The major polar lipids were phosphatidylglycerol and phosphatidylethanolamine, followed by diphosphatidyglycerol. The only quinone was ubiquinone Q-8. Phylogenetic analysis based on 16S rRNA gene sequences indicated that strain NGK35(T) belongs to the genus Paenalcaligenes (family Alcaligenaceae), appearing most closely related to Paenalcaligenes hominis CCUG 53761A(T) (96.90 %) and Paenalcaligenes suwonensis ABC02-12(T) (96.94 %).
The genomic DNA G+C content of strain NGK35(T) was 52.1 mol%. Genome-based calculations (genome-to-genome distance, average nucleotide identity and DNA G+C content) clearly indicated that the isolate represents a novel species within the genus Paenalcaligenes.
Based on phenotypic and molecular characterization, strain NGK35(T) can clearly be differentiated from its phylogenetic neighbours establishing a novel species, for which the name Paenalcaligenes niemegkensis sp. nov. is proposed.
The type strain is NGK35T (=DSM 113270(T)=NCCB 100854(T)).
A marine sediment record from the central Bering Sea, spanning the last 20 thousand years (ka), was studied to unravel the depositional history with regard to terrigenous sediment supply and biogenic sedimentation. Methodic approaches comprised the inference of accumulation rates of siliciclastic and biogenic components, grain-size analysis, and (clay) mineralogy, as well as paleoclimatic modelling. Changes in the depositional history provides insight into land-ocean linkages of paleoenvironmental changes. During the finale of the Last Glacial Maximum, the depositional environment was characterized by hemipelagic background sedimentation. A marked change in the terrigenous sediment provenance during the late Heinrich 1 Stadial (15.7-14.5 ka), indicated by increases in kaolinite and a high glaciofluvial influx of clay, gives evidence of the deglaciation of the Brooks Range in the hinterland of Alaska. This meltwater pulse also stimulated the postglacial onset of biological productivity. Glacial melt implies regional climate warming during a time of widespread cooling on the northern hemisphere. Our simulation experiment with a coupled climate model suggests atmospheric teleconnections to the North Atlantic, with impacts on the dynamics of the Aleutian Low system that gave rise to warmer winters and an early onset of spring during that time. The late deglacial period between 14.5 and 11.0 ka was characterized by enhanced fluvial runoff and biological productivity in the course of climate amelioration, sea-level rise, seasonal sea-ice retreat, and permafrost thaw in the hinterland. The latter processes temporarily stalled during the Younger Dryas stadial (12.9-11.7 ka) and commenced again during the Preboreal (earliest Holocene), after 11.7 ka. High river runoff might have fertilized the Bering Sea and contributed to enhanced upper ocean stratification. Since 11.0 ka, advanced transgression has shifted the coast line and fluvial influence of the Yukon River away from the study site. The opening of the Bering Strait strengthened contour currents along the continental slope, leaving behind winnowed sand-rich sediments through the early to mid-Holocene, with non-deposition occurring since about 6.0 ka.
Rapid humidity changes across the Northern South China Sea during the last similar to 40 kyrs
(2021)
A key aspect of East Asian climate is its summer monsoonal system which influences nearly one-third of the world's population. Recent results indicate that the primary response of the East Asian summer monsoon (EASM) to anthropogenic forced climate warming may be a shift in geographical range instead of an intensity change, which would lead to spatial coexistence of floods and droughts over southeastern Asia. The predicted EASM variability in the future has made it paramount to study its past changes and the associated tempo-spatial pattern of aridity and humidity in its purview. In order to decipher past changes in EASM, we applied a multi-proxy geochemical approach to the sediment core ORI-891-16-P1 located in the northern South China Sea. The position of this sediment core on top of a seamount makes it uniquely sensitive to changes in the terrigenous input into northern South China Sea unbiased by sea level-induced downslope transport processes. Utilizing the ln(Ti/Ca) ratio throughout the sediment sequence we trace terrigenous influx changes reflecting EASM prevalence during the last similar to 40 kyrs. Based on the comparison of our results to previous studies we infer that the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM; similar to 20 ka BP) was characterized by a steep N-S humidity gradient. This spatial pattern was in line with a southward shift or contraction of the summer monsoonal trough of 10-15 degrees from its current position toward the centre of the South China Sea. Superimposed on orbital time scale fluctuations we also find strong indication of millennial-scale variability related to Heinrich Stadials. The impact of Heinrich Stadials on the EASM seems amplified during insolation minima, while high summer insolation seems to buffer the monsoonal system to such perturbations. We infer that (i) the humidity-aridity distribution during the LGM mimics predictions of the proposed future EASM configuration, and (ii) that the sensitivity of the EASM to weakening in the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation is the strongest since the last glacial.
With the present study, we introduce a fast and robust method to calculate the source displacement spectra of small earthquakes on a local to regional scale. The work is based on the publicly available Qopen method of full envelope inversion, which is further tuned for the given purpose. Important source parameters-seismic moment, moment magnitude, corner frequency, and high-frequency fall off-are determined from the source spectra by fitting a simple earthquake source model. The method is demonstrated by means of a data set comprising the 2018 West Bohemia earthquake swarm. We report moment magnitudes, corner frequencies, and centroid moment tensors inverted from short-period body waves with the Grond package for all earthquakes with a local magnitude larger than 1.8. Moment magnitudes calculated by envelope inversion show a very good agreement to moment magnitudes resulting from the probabilisitc moment tensor inversion. Furthermore, source displacement spectra from envelope inversion show a good agreement with spectra obtained by multiple taper analysis of the direct onsets of body waves but are not affected by the large scatter of the second. The seismic moments obtained with the envelope inversion scale with corner frequencies according to M-0 proportional to f(c)(-4.7). Earthquakes of the present data set result in a smaller stress drop for smaller magnitudes. Self-similarity of earthquake rupture is not observed. In addition, we report frequency-dependent site amplification at the used stations.
The Shanderman lamprophyre dykes crop out in the western part of the Alborz Mountains (Talesh).
These rocks are classified as camptonites, composed of primary olivine, Ti-rich diopside, kaersutite, biotite, plagioclase, K-feldspar, and minor Ti-rich spinels, magnetite, pentlandite-pyrrhotite/chalcopyrite, and powellite-scheelite. Secondary analcime-wairakite, serpentines, and prehnite are common minor minerals within the studied rocks.
Olivine, Ti-rich diopside, spinel, and amphibole show distinct chemical zoning. Spinels display a core-to-rim decrease in Cr2O3, MgO, and Al2O3 concentrations and an increase in TiO2 and FeOT (total Fe as FeO), reflecting the oxidation state increase due to hydrothermal fluid influx. Low SiO2 contents (< 42 wt%), high MgO (12.44 to 13.98 wt%), and Fe2O3T (12.76 to 13.43 wt%), Cr (318-537 mu g/g) and Ni (231-327 mu g/g) contents indicate the ultrabasic nature of the rocks.
The samples show potassic character (2.1-2.8 wt% K2O), along with elevated LREE and LILE, and also exhibit minor positive Eu anomalies (Eu/Eu* = 1.09 to 1.20).
Olivine-spinel geothermometry indicates a maximum crystallization temperature of 1227 degrees C (ave. 988 degrees C +/- 65 degrees C).
Exsolution of pentlandite-pyrrhotite/chalcopyrite solid solutions occurred during magma cooling and crystallization. At lower temperatures, analcime-wairakite and prehnite partially replaced plagioclases.
The geochemical modeling of the rocks indicates the Shanderman lamprophyre magmas were derived from low-grade melting (< 5%) of amphibole-bearing garnet lherzolite source without or with very few phlogopites.
The primary magma of Shanderman lamprophyres was derived from a depth of similar to 135 km by partial melting of a metasomatized mantle source in a post-collisional environment.
Ground subsidence caused by natural or anthropogenic processes affects major urban areas worldwide. Sinkhole formation and infrastructure fractures have intensified in the federal capital of Maceio (Alagoas, Brazil) since early 2018, forcing authorities to relocate affected residents and place buildings under demolition. In this study, we present a 16-year history (2004-2020) of surface displacement, which shows precursory deformations in 2004-2005, reaching a maximum cumulative subsidence of approximately 200 cm near the Mundau Lagoon coast in November 2020. By integrating the displacement observations with numerical source modelling, we suggest that extensive subsidence can be primarily associated with the removal of localized, deep-seated material at the location and depth where salt is mined. We discuss the accelerating subsidence rates, influence of severe precipitation events on the aforementioned geological instability, and related hazards. This study suggests that feedback destabilization mechanisms may arise in evaporite systems due to anthropogenic activities, fostering enhanced and complex superficial ground deformation.
Geochemical homogeneity in shale is often assumed when tracing subsurface fluids and characterizing sedimentary basins. This study presents measurements of the bulk gas composition, stable isotopes, and noble gas volume fraction and isotopes for shale gas samples collected from gas wells in the Wufeng-Longmaxi Shale, the southern Sichuan Basin, China. The dryness [C-1 /(C-2 + C-3)] ranging from 166.3 to 251.2, combined with delta C-13(1) and delta DC1 that vary from -28.8 to -27.3 parts per thousand and - 153 to -145 parts per thousand, respectively, point to a late mature thermogenic origin of hydrocarbon gas. He-3/He-4 ratios of gas samples are around 0.01 times the air value suggesting dominantly crust-derived He. Ne-21/Ne-22 and Ar-40/Ar-36 ratios of many gas samples are higher than the corresponding air values indicating the mixing of crustal and atmospheric noble gases. Multiple dichotomous patterns are observed in noble gas signatures of forelimb and backlimb samples, and depression and crest samples. Ne-20/Ne-22 ratios of some crest samples are higher than that of depression samples in the backlimb, pointing to the presence of diffusion-driven fractionation that is likely caused by the long-distance migration from depression to crest. Elemental ratios of air-derived noble gas isotopes - Ne-22/Ar-36, Kr-84/Ar-36, and Xe-132/Ar-36 are compared to the recharge water values, suggesting the interactions of oil, gas, and water phases in the shale over geologic time. Forelimb samples generally display older ages than backlimb samples, indicating a larger flux of external radiogenic He-4 due to the higher density of deep faults in the forelimb area caused by the basementinvolved deformation. The basement-involved deformation also causes pore collapse especially in the forelimb leading to a lower porosity that results in a more pristine noble gas signature in the forelimb due to the reduced impact of younger recharge water.
Equilibrium mass-dependent ("stable") isotopic fractionation of an element during magmatic processes is driven by a contrast in bonding environment between minerals and silicate melt, which is expressed as an isotopic fractionation factor.
A quantitative understanding of such isotopic fractionation factors is vital to interpret observed isotopic variations in magmatic rocks.
It is well known that the local environment and the bond strength of an element dictate the sign and magnitude of isotopic fractionation between minerals, but it is uncertain how the structure and chemical composition of a silicate melt can affect mineral-melt isotopic fractionation factors.
To explore this, we studied the coordination environment of nickel (Ni) in different silicate glasses using extended X-ray absorption fine structure (EXAFS) measurements at the German synchrotron X-ray source (DESY).
We determined -Ni-O bond lengths in a suite of synthetic but near-natural silicate glasses using EXAFS and found that the former vary systematically with melt alkalinity, which is best described by the parameter ln[1 + (Na + K)/Ca]. With increasing melt alkalinity, Ni occupies more IV-fold coordinated sites, which are associated with a shorter -Ni-O bond length. Next, we use the ionic model, which allows to predict isotopic fractionation factors based on the difference in bond length between two phases.
We find that more alkaline melts have a stronger preference for the heavier isotopes of Ni than less alkaline melts. This implies that the magnitude of mineral-melt Ni isotope fractionation factors, for instance between olivine and melt, will depend on the alkalinity of the melt.
At magmatic temperatures, however, the variation in fractionation factors caused by melt alkalinity will rarely exceed 0.05 parts per thousand and is thus mostly negligible, in particular in the realm of basaltic melt compositions. Nevertheless, the relationship between melt alkalinity and fractionation factor reported here can be used to extrapolate empirical data for mineral-melt Ni isotope fractionation factors, once such data become available, to the full range of magma compositions on Earth and other Solar System bodies.
Origin and migration of fluoride in the area of the Aluto Volcanic Complex (Main Ethiopian Rift)
(2022)
Fluoride-enriched ground and surface waters represent a major health risk for the local population in many areas along the East African Rift.
The present study investigates the origin of fluoride and the reason for its accumulation in the rift waters, following two hypotheses: (i) fluid-rock-interactions release fluoride from minerals into the water and (ii) magmatic-derived fluoride-containing liquids and gases migrate along permeable fault zones until they dissolve in ground-and surface water or be released to the atmosphere.
Rock-, gas, water-, soil-, and plant samples were collected from the area within and close by the Aluto Volcanic Complex, which is part of the Main Ethiopian Rift. Most analyzed waters showed fluoride concentrations above the drinking water limit (> 1.5 mg/L) with the highest values in hot springs (up to 70 mg/L) and the geothermal well (76 mg/L).
In the solid phase, a high fluoride content was found in acid volcanic rocks (ignimbrite: 4391 ppm; rhyolite: 3248 ppm) as well as in pumice (up to 1955 ppm). The fluoride content of soil samples collected within the volcanic complex varied between 82 and 1036 ppm, whereas former lake sediments from outside the Aluto Volcanic Complex showed higher fluoride contents ranging from 674 to 8171 ppm. Identified fluoride-rich minerals are various amphiboles (about 3 wt.-% F-), fluor-apatite (about 3 wt % F-), minerals of the fluorcaphite group (about 5 wt.-% F-), parisite (up to 9 wt.-% F-), and fluorite (CaF2).
Elevated fluoride concentrations were also measured in some gas samples from fumaroles (up to 50 ppm) and in plant samples collected next to the fumaroles (up to 65 ppm). Leaching experiments of solid samples with deionized water demonstrated that fluoride can easily be mobilized from pumice and sediments but hardly from consolidated rocks.
This fluoride release increased with temperature (up to 150 C) and correlated roughly with dis-solved silica indicating the binding of some fluoride to the amorphous or weakly crystalline silica fraction. Based on these results it was concluded that fluoride migrates via different pathways through the environment: At the depth of the magma chamber during magmatic differentiation fluoride enriches initially in the magmatic melt and accumulates in some late-crystallizing minerals of igneous rocks such as fluorite or mica. Upon volcanic eruption fluoride is predominantly incorporated in the glass (ignimbrite) and ash phase (pumice).
On the surface, these rocks are exposed to weathering and fluoride leaches partly out into the aqueous phase. Soft and porous rocks such as pumice release fluoride first whereas hard extrusive/igneous rocks are less prone to weathering and retain the fluoride. Pumice and (lake) sediments might act both, as source and as sink for fluoride in the area.
Although some fluoride might drain from the surface into the deeper subsoil, we conclude that magmatic fluids (liquid and gas) contribute more substantially to the overall fluoride ground water content because (i) of the much higher fluoride content in deep geothermal waters and hot springs as compared to surface-near waters; (ii) active geothermal surface manifestations located along fault zones indicate that fluids migrate from deep magmatic intrusions (as gas and liquid) towards the surface, where fluoride dissolves in groundwater; (iii) and the good correlation between bicarbonate (deriving from dissolution of magmatic CO2) and fluoride content in all analyzed water samples.
Forward stratigraphic modelling is a fast-developing modelling approach, used to test conceptual models, and predict stratigraphic architecture and depositional facies from basin to reservoir scales.
Published subsurface applications demonstrate its added value by integrating multidisciplinary data as well as geological concepts into its constraints.
When applied to carbonate depositional systems, composed of multiple sediment factories, the cooperating and interdependent production mechanisms remain poorly studied.
By applying the technique to a well-studied section of the Maldives carbonate platform, a specific model design-adapted to the geological age and setting, and constrained by available data-sheds light on the interaction of its carbonate producers.
The results yield a naturalistic depositional facies distribution and offer insight in the changing relationship between biotic communities during the platform evolution.
After calibration, the reference model unequivocally links the formerly proposed genetic model to the seismostratigraphic architecture.
Furthermore, the results show how environmental changes (seemingly of secondary impact compared to changes in physical accommodation in the stratigraphic record) can induce substantial fluctuations in carbonate production rates of biotic communities, affect the ecological accommodation, and thus impact the platform architecture. Therefore, it is crucial to treat carbonate production rates during periods of environmental change as variables with associated uncertainties in a forward stratigraphic model setup.
Floodplain wetlands are critical for sustaining various ecological and hydrological functions in a riverine environment. Severe anthropogenic alterations and human occupation of floodplains have threatened these wetlands in several parts of the world. A major handicap in designing sustainable restoration and monitoring strategies for these wetlands is the lack of scientific process-based understanding and information on the basin-scale controls of their degradation. Here, we offer a novel approach to integrate the connectivity of the wetlands with the surrounding landscape along with other attributes such as stream density, hydrometeorological parameters, and groundwater dynamics to explain their degradation and then to prioritise them for restoration and monitoring.
We hypothesise that the best possible connectivity scenario for the existence of a wetland would be if (a) the wetland has a high connectivity with its upslope area, and (b) the wetland has a low connectivity with its downslope region.
The first condition ensures the flow of water into the wetland and the second condition allows longer water residence time in the wetland. Accordingly, we define four connectivity-based wetland health scenarios-good, no impact, bad, and worst.
We have implemented the proposed method in 3226 wetlands in the Ramganga Basin in north India. Further, we have applied specific selection criteria, such as distance from the nearest stream and stream density, to prioritise the wetlands for restoration and monitoring.
We conclude that the connectivity analysis offers a quick process-based assessment of wetlands' health status and serves as an important criterion to prioritise the wetlands for developing appropriate management strategies.
This research demonstrated the application of hydrochemical data and stable water isotopes of delta O-18 and delta D (or delta 2H) for evaluating the relationship between surface water in Lake Bosumtwi and the underlying groundwater system.
It aimed at determining the presence or absence of a hydraulic relationship and for evaluating the possible direction of flow at the interface between the two reservoirs. The study also estimated evaporative losses of infiltrating rainwater as it transits the unsaturated zone and provided important information on the hydrological processes prevailing in the area.
The results of Q-Mode hierarchical cluster analysis (HCA) clearly differentiate the lake water from the groundwater based on their spatial relationship.
These results indicated that groundwater recharge occurs on the hilltops of the crater, where it is slightly acidic with low levels of dissolved ions, characterised by short residence time and rapid unrestricted vertical infiltration and recharge.
The groundwater becomes more mineralized with longer contact times and deeper circulation with the host rock, while it flows from the recharge areas towards the lake at lower elevations.
Analyses of delta O-18 and delta D showed a high evaporation rate on the lake surface (90%) with a significant evaporative enrichment, whereas groundwater showed no significant isotopic variations.
Thus suggesting that the aquifers have been recharged by recent meteoric water that has undergone some evaporative enrichment since the study established an evaporation rate of water infiltrating the unsaturated zone ranging from 54 to 60%. Both reservoirs do not appear to be hydraulically connected, and where such a connection exists, it is expected to favour the lake.
A circular, single-contig Methanobacterium sp. metagenome-assembled genome (MAG) was recovered from high-CO2 enrichments inoculated with drill core material from the tectonic Eger Rift terrestrial subsurface.
Annotation of the recovered MAG highlighted putative methanogenesis genes, providing valuable information on archaeal activity in the deep biosphere.
Refractive index provides fundamental insights into the electronic structure of materials. At high pressure, however, the determination of refractive index and its wavelength dispersion is challenging, which limits our understanding of how physical properties of even simple materials, such as MgO, evolve with pressure.
Here, we report on the measurement of room-temperature refractive index of MgO up to similar to 140 GPa.
The refractive index of MgO at 600 nm decreases by similar to 2.4% from similar to 1.737 at 1 atm to similar to 1.696 (+/- 0.017) at similar to 140 GPa.
Despite the index at 600 nm is essentially pressure independent, the absolute wavelength dispersion of the refractive index at 550-870 nm decreases by similar to 28% from similar to 0.015 at 1 atm to similar to 0.011 (+/- 8.04 x 10(-4)) at similar to 103 GPa.
Single-effective-oscillator analysis of our refractive index data suggests that the bandgap of MgO increases by similar to 1.1 eV from 7.4 eV at 1 atm to similar to 8.5 (+/- 0.6) eV at similar to 103 GPa.
The Gram-negative bacterium Paenalcaligenes niemegkensis NGK35(T) was isolated from plastic debris in an abandoned landfill.
It has the ability to grow on polyethylene and hexadecane as the sole carbon sources. Here, we report the corresponding draft genome, which contains 3.66 Mbp and is characterized by a G+C content of 52.1%.
International migration patterns, at the global level, can to a large extent be explained through economic factors in origin and destination countries.
On the other hand, it has been shown that global climate change is likely to affect economic development over the coming decades.
Here, we demonstrate how these future climate impacts on national income levels could alter the global migration landscape.
Using an empirically calibrated global migration model, we investigate two separate mechanisms. The first is through destination-country income, which has been shown consistently to have a positive effect on immigration.
As countries' income levels relative to each other are projected to change in the future both due to different rates of economic growth and due to different levels of climate change impacts, the relative distribution of immigration across destination countries also changes as a result, all else being equal.
Second, emigration rates have been found to have a complex, inverted U-shaped dependence on origin-country income.
Given the available migration flow data, it is unclear whether this dependence-found in spatio-temporal panel data-also pertains to changes in a given migration flow over time. If it does, then climate change will additionally affect migration patterns through origin countries' emigration rates, as the relative and absolute positions of countries on the migration "hump" change.
We illustrate these different possibilities, and the corresponding effects of 3 degrees C global warming (above pre-industrial) on global migration patterns, using climate model projections and two different methods for estimating climate change effects on macroeconomic development.
Seismicity models are probabilistic forecasts of earthquake rates to support seismic hazard assessment.
Physics-based models allow extrapolating previously unsampled parameter ranges and enable conclusions on underlying tectonic or human-induced processes.
The Coulomb Failure (CF) and the rate-and-state (RS) models are two widely used physics-based seismicity models both assuming pre-existing populations of faults responding to Coulomb stress changes.
The CF model depends on the absolute Coulomb stress and assumes instantaneous triggering if stress exceeds a threshold, while the RS model only depends on stress changes.
Both models can predict background earthquake rates and time-dependent stress effects, but the RS model with its three independent parameters can additionally explain delayed aftershock triggering.
This study introduces a modified CF model where the instantaneous triggering is replaced by a mean time-to-failure depending on the absolute stress value.
For the specific choice of an exponential dependence on stress and a stationary initial seismicity rate, we show that the model leads to identical results as the RS model and reproduces the Omori-Utsu relation for aftershock decays as well stress-shadowing effects.
Thus, both CF and RS models can be seen as special cases of the new model. However, the new stress response model can also account for subcritical initial stress conditions and alternative functions of the mean time-to-failure depending on the problem and fracture mode.
The most profound consequences of the presence of Ca-Mg carbonates (CaCO3-MgCO3) in the Earth's upper mantle may be to lower the melting temperatures of the mantle and control the melt composition.
Low-degree partial melting of a carbonate-bearing mantle produces CO2-rich, silica-poor melts compositionally imposed by the melting relations of carbonates.
Thus, understanding the melting relations in the CaCO3-MgCO3 system facilitates the interpretation of natural carbonate-bearing silicate systems.
We report the melting relations of the CaCO3-MgCO3 system and the partition coefficient of trace elements between carbonates and carbonate melt from experiments at high pressure (6 and 9 GPa) and temperature (1300-1800 degrees C) using a rocking multi-anvil press. In the absence of water, Ca-Mg carbonates are stable along geothermal gradients typical of subducting slabs.
Ca-Mg carbonates ( similar to Mg0.1-0.9Ca0.9-0.1CO3) partially melt beneath mid-ocean ridges and in plume settings. Ca-Mg carbonates melt incongruently, forming periclase crystals and carbonate melt between 4 and 9 GPa.
Furthermore, we show that the rare earth element (REE) signature of Group-I kimberlites, namely strong REE fractionation and depletion of heavy REE relative to the primitive mantle, is resembled by carbonate melt in equilibrium with Ca-bearing magnesite and periclase at 6 and 9 GPa.
This suggests that the dolomite-magnesite join of the CaCO3-MgCO3 system might be useful to approximate the REE signature of carbonate-rich melts parental to kimberlites.
A metagenome-assembled genome (MAG), named Methanosarcina sp. strain ERenArc_MAG2, was obtained from a 3-month-old H-2/CO2 atmosphere enrichment culture, originally inoculated with 60-m deep drill core sediment collected from the tectonic Eger Rift terrestrial subsurface.
Annotation of the recovered draft genome revealed putative archaeal methanogenesis genes in the deep biosphere.
A metagenome-assembled genome (MAG), named Methanosarcina sp. strain ERenArc_MAG2, was obtained from a 3-month-old H-2/CO2 atmosphere enrichment culture, originally inoculated with 60-m deep drill core sediment collected from the tectonic Eger Rift terrestrial subsurface.
Annotation of the recovered draft genome revealed putative archaeal methanogenesis genes in the deep biosphere.
Information regarding the spatial distribution of soil water content is key in many disciplines and applications including soil and atmospheric sciences, hydrology, and agricultural engineering.
Thus, within the past decades various experimental methods and strategies have been developed to map spatial variations in soil moisture distribution and to monitor temporal changes.
Our study examines the combination of electrical resistivity mapping and point observations of soil moisture to infer the spatial and the temporal variability of soil moisture.
Over a period of around two years, we performed field measurements on six days to collect repeated electrical resistivity mapping data for a nine-hectare test site south-east of Berlin, Germany.
Permanently installed TDR probes, temporary TDR measurements within permanently installed tubes, and gravimetric measurements using soil samples provided soil moisture data at various selected points.
In addition, soil analysis and classification results are available for 132 regularly distributed positions up to depths of 1.2 m.
We compare and link three-dimensional resistivity models obtained via data inversion to soil composition and soil moisture as provided by our point data.
Both the soil samples and the resistivity models indicate a two-layer medium characterized by a sandy top layer with varying thickness and a loamy bottom soil.
For all six field campaigns, we observe similar resistivity patterns reflecting the temporally stable influence of soil texture.
While the overall patterns are stable, the range of resistivity values changes with soil moisture. Finally, to estimate spatial models of soil moisture, we link our soil moisture and resistivity data using empirical petrophysical models relying on a second order polynomial function.
We observe a mean prediction error for soil moisture of +/-0.034 m3 & BULL; m? 3 using all observation points while we notice that point-specific models further reduce the error.
Thus, we conclude that our experimental and data analysis strategies represent a reliable approach to establish site-specific models and to estimate three-dimensional moisture distribution including temporal variations.
Tuning systems of traditional Georgian singing determined from a new corpus of field recordings
(2022)
In this study we examine the tonal organization of the 2016 GVM dataset, a newly-created corpus of high-quality multimedia field recordings of traditional Georgian singing with a focus on Svaneti. For this purpose, we developed a new processing pipeline for the computational analysis of non-western polyphonic music which was subsequently applied to the complete 2016 GVM dataset.
To evaluate under what conditions a single tuning system is representative of current Svan performance practice, we examined the stability of the obtained tuning systems from an ensemble-, a song-, and a corpus-related perspective.
Furthermore, we compared the resulting Svan tuning systems with the tuning systems obtained for the Erkomaishvili dataset (Rosenzweig et al., 2020) in the study by Scherbaum et al. (2020). In comparison to a 12-TET (12-tone-equal-temperament) system, the Erkomaishvili and the Svan tuning systems are surprisingly similar.
Both systems show a strong presence of pure fourths (500 cents) and fifths (700 cents), and 'neutral' thirds (peaking around 350 cents) as well as 'neutral' sixths.
In addition, the sizes of the melodic and the harmonic seconds in both tuning systems differ systematically from each other, with the size of the harmonic second being systematically larger than the melodic one.
We examine sub-caldera structure and seismicity in and around the Okataina Volcanic Centre (OVC), Taupo Volcanic Zone, New Zealand, using seismic data collected over 4+ years with a temporary array of broadband and short-period seismometers, supplementing data from the permanent New Zealand seismometer network.
We derive a new 3-D image of P-wave seismic velocity for the upper crust in the region, using double-difference seismic tomography and utilising waveform cross-correlations. We subsequently relocate 6989 earthquakes which occurred in the region over the 2010-2021 time period, using the 3D velocity model.
The seismicity distribution shows spatial clusters west of Lake Rotomahana, as well as beneath Haroharo and the Makatiti Dome, inside the Okataina caldera. Beneath Makatiti Dome 90% of the events are shallower than 7.7 +/- 0.5 km.
Outside of the Okataina caldera event relocations highlight short (similar to 3-4 km long) streaks of activity in the Ngakuru graben, part of the active Taupo Rift southwest of Okataina caldera. Inside the OVC the relocated seismicity beneath Makatiti appears closely associated with low (similar to 10%) P-wave velocity anomalies, which we resolve in the similar to 5-to-8-km depth range beneath the Okataina caldera, and which are likely related to partial melt and/or fluid-volatile pathways.
Moment tensor analyses for two larger-magnitude events (M(L)4.5 and M(L)4.9) near Haroharo indicate normal faulting, with NNE-SSW fault strike, but with positive CLVD and positive isotropic components when allowing for a full moment tensor, consistent with a magmatic environment with degassing and/or fluid migration.
An accurate estimation of crop yield under climate change scenarios is essential to quantify our ability to feed a growing population and develop agronomic adaptations to meet future food demand. A coordinated evaluation of yield simulations from process-based eco-physiological models for climate change impact assessment is still missing for soybean, the most widely grown grain legume and the main source of protein in our food chain. In this first soybean multi-model study, we used ten prominent models capable of simulating soybean yield under varying temperature and atmospheric CO2 concentration [CO2] to quantify the uncertainty in soybean yield simulations in response to these factors. Models were first parametrized with high quality measured data from five contrasting environments. We found considerable variability among models in simulated yield responses to increasing temperature and [CO2]. For example, under a + 3 degrees C temperature rise in our coolest location in Argentina, some models simulated that yield would reduce as much as 24%, while others simulated yield increases up to 29%. In our warmest location in Brazil, the models simulated a yield reduction ranging from a 38% decrease under + 3 degrees C temperature rise to no effect on yield. Similarly, when increasing [CO2] from 360 to 540 ppm, the models simulated a yield increase that ranged from 6% to 31%. Model calibration did not reduce variability across models but had an unexpected effect on modifying yield responses to temperature for some of the models. The high uncertainty in model responses indicates the limited applicability of individual models for climate change food projections. However, the ensemble mean of simulations across models was an effective tool to reduce the high uncertainty in soybean yield simulations associated with individual models and their parametrization. Ensemble mean yield responses to temperature and [CO2] were similar to those reported from the literature. Our study is the first demonstration of the benefits achieved from using an ensemble of grain legume models for climate change food projections, and highlights that further soybean model development with experiments under elevated [CO2] and temperature is needed to reduce the uncertainty from the individual models.
Geodetic studies of crustal deformation using Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS, earlier commonly referred to as Global Positioning System, GPS) measurements at CSIR-NGRI started in 1995 with the installation of a permanent GNSS station at CSIR-NGRI Hyderabad which later became an International GNSS Service (IGS) site. The CSIR-NGRI started expanding its GNSS networks after 2003 with more focussed studies through installation in the NE India, Himalayan arc, Andaman subduction zone, stable and failed rift regions of India plate. In each instance, these measurements helped in unravelling the geodynamics of the region and seismic hazard assessment, e.g., the discovery of a plate boundary fault in the Indo-Burmese wedge, rate and mode of strain accumulation and its spatial variation in the Garhwal-Kumaun and Kashmir region of the Himalayan arc, the influence of non-tectonic deformation on tectonic deformation in the Himalayan arc, nature of crustal deformation through earthquake cycle in the Andaman Sumatra subduction zone, and localised deformation in the intraplate region and across the paleo rift regions. Besides these, GNSS measurements initiated in the Antarctica region have helped in understanding the plate motion and influence of seasonal variations on deformation. Another important by-product of the GNSS observations is the capabilities of these observations in understanding the ionospheric variations due to earthquake processes and also due to solar eclipse. We summarize these outcomes in this article.
Climatic and hydrological variability as a driver of the Lake Gościąż biota during the Younger Dryas
(2022)
The Younger Dryas (YD) is a roughly 1,100-year cold period marking the end of the last glaciation. Climate modelling for northern Europe indicates high summer temperatures and strong continentality. In eastern Europe, the scale of temperature variation and its influence on ecosystems is weakly recognised. Here, we present a multi-proxy reconstruction of YD conditions from Lake Gos ' ciaz (central Poland). The decadal-resolution analysis of its annually varved sediments indicates an initial decrease in Chironomidae-inferred mean July air temperature followed by steady warming. The pollen-inferred winter-to-summer temperature amplitude and annual precip-itation is highest at the Allerod/YD transition and the early YD (ca. 12.7-12.4 ky cal BP) and YD/Holocene (11.7-11.4 ka cal BP) transition. Temperature and precipitation were the main reasons for lake level fluctuations as reflected in the planktonic/littoral Cladocera ratio. The lake's diatom-inferred total phosphorus decreased with increasing summer temperature from about mid YD. Windy conditions in the early YD until ~12.3 ka cal BP caused water mixing and a short-lived/temporary increase in nutrient availability for phytoplankton. The Chironomidae-inferred summer temperature and pollen inferred summer temperature, winter temperature and annual precipitation herein are one of only a few in eastern Europe conducted with such high resolution.
Understanding eastern African paleoclimate is critical for contextualizing early human evolution, adaptation, and dispersal, yet Pleistocene climate of this region and its governing mechanisms remain poorly understood due to the lack of long, orbitally-resolved, terrestrial paleoclimate records. Here we present leaf wax hydrogen isotope records of rainfall from paleolake sediment cores from key time windows that resolve long-term trends, variations, and high-latitude effects on tropical African precipitation. Eastern African rainfall was dominantly controlled by variations in low-latitude summer insolation during most of the early and middle Pleistocene, with little evidence that glacial-interglacial cycles impacted rainfall until the late Pleistocene. We observe the influence of high-latitude-driven climate processes emerging from the last interglacial (Marine Isotope Stage 5) to the present, an interval when glacial-interglacial cycles were strong and insolation forcing was weak. Our results demonstrate a variable response of eastern African rainfall to low-latitude insolation forcing and high-latitude-driven climate change, likely related to the relative strengths of these forcings through time and a threshold in monsoon sensitivity. We observe little difference in mean rainfall between the early, middle, and late Pleistocene, which suggests that orbitally-driven climate variations likely played a more significant role than gradual change in the relationship between early humans and their environment.
The immense advances in computer power achieved in the last decades have had a significant impact in Earth science, providing valuable research outputs that allow the simulation of complex natural processes and systems, and generating improved forecasts. The development and implementation of innovative geoscientific software is currently evolving towards a sustainable and efficient development by integrating models of different aspects of the Earth system. This will set the foundation for a future digital twin of the Earth. The codification and update of this software require great effort from research groups and therefore, it needs to be preserved for its reuse by future generations of geoscientists. Here, we report on Geo-Soft-CoRe, a Geoscientific Software & Code Repository, hosted at the archive DIGITAL.CSIC. This is an open source, multidisciplinary and multiscale collection of software and code developed to analyze different aspects of the Earth system, encompassing tools to: 1) analyze climate variability; 2) assess hazards, and 3) characterize the structure and dynamics of the solid Earth. Due to the broad range of applications of these software packages, this collection is useful not only for basic research in Earth science, but also for applied research and educational purposes, reducing the gap between the geosciences and the society. By providing each software and code with a permanent identifier (DOI), we ensure its self-sustainability and accomplish the FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable and Reusable) principles. Therefore, we aim for a more transparent science, transferring knowledge in an easier way to the geoscience community, and encouraging an integrated use of computational infrastructure.
The martensitic transformation is a fundamental physical phenomenon at the origin of important industrial applications. However, the underlying microscopic mechanism, which is of critical importance to explain the outstanding mechanical properties of martensitic materials, is still not fully understood. This is because for most martensitic materials the transformation is a fast process that makes in situ studies extremely challenging. Noble solids krypton and xenon undergo a progressive pressure-induced face-centered cubic (fcc) to hexagonal close-packed (hcp) martensitic transition with a very wide coexistence domain. Here, we took advantage of this unique feature to study the detailed transformation progress at the atomic level by employing in situ x-ray diffraction and absorption spectroscopy. We evidenced a four-stage pathway and suggest that the lattice mismatch between the fcc and hcp forms plays a key role in the generation of strain. We also determined precisely the effect of the transformation on the compression behavior of these materials.
Raman spectroscopic quantification of tetrahedral boron in synthetic aluminum-rich tourmaline
(2021)
The Raman spectra of five B-[4]-bearing tourmalines of different composition synthesized at 700 degrees C/4.0 GPa (including first-time synthesis of Na-Li-B-[4]-tourmaline, Ca-Li-B-[4]-tourmaline, and Ca-bearing square-B-[4]-tourmaline) reveal a strong correlation between the tetrahedral boron content and the summed relative intensity of all OH-stretching bands between 3300-3430 cm(-1). The band shift to low wavenumbers is explained by strong O3-H center dot center dot center dot O5 hydrogen bridge bonding. Applying the regression equation to natural B-[4]-bearing tourmaline from the Koralpe (Austria) reproduces the EMPA-derived value perfectly [EMPA: 0.67(12) B-[4] pfu vs. Raman: 0.66(13) B-[4] pfu]. This demonstrates that Raman spectroscopy provides a fast and easy-to-use tool for the quantification of tetrahedral boron in tourmaline. The knowledge of the amount of tetrahedral boron in tourmaline has important implications for the better understanding and modeling of B-isotope fractionation between tourmaline and fluid/melt, widely used as a tracer of mass transfer processes.
In this study, we investigate numerically the hydro-mechanical behavior of fractured crystalline rock due to one of the five hydraulic stimulations at the Pohang Enhanced Geothermal site in South Korea. We use the commercial code FracMan (Golder Associates) that enables studying hydro-mechanical coupled processes in fractured media in three dimensions combining the finite element method with a discrete fracture network. The software is used to simulate fluid pressure perturbation at fractures during hydraulic stimulation. Our numerical simulation shows that pressure history matching can be obtained by partitioning the treatment into separate phases. This results in adjusted stress-aperture relationships. The evolution of aperture adjustment implies that the stimulation mechanism could be a combination of hydraulic fracturing and shearing. The simulated extent of the 0.01 MPa overpressure contour at the end of the treatment equals to similar to 180 m around the injection point.
Pedogenic carbonate is widespread at mid latitudes where warm and dry conditions favor soil carbonate growth from spring to fall. The mechanisms and timing of pedogenic carbonate formation are more ambiguous in the tropical domain, where long periods of soil water saturation and high soil respiration enhance calcite dissolution. This paper provides stable carbon, oxygen and clumped isotope values from Quaternary and Miocene pedogenic carbonates in the tropical domain of Myanmar, in areas characterized by warm (>18°C) winters and annual rainfall up to 1,700 mm. We show that carbonate growth in Myanmar is delayed to the driest and coldest months of the year by sustained monsoonal rainfall from mid spring to late fall. The range of isotopic variability in Quaternary pedogenic carbonates can be solely explained by temporal changes of carbonate growth within the dry season, from winter to early spring. We propose that high soil moisture year-round in the tropical domain narrows carbonate growth to the driest months and makes it particularly sensitive to the seasonal distribution of rainfall. This sensitivity is also enabled by high winter temperatures, allowing carbonate growth to occur outside the warmest months of the year. This high sensitivity is expected to be more prominent in the geological record during times with higher temperatures and greater expansion of the tropical realm. Clumped isotope temperatures, δ13C and δ18O values of tropical pedogenic carbonates are impacted by changes of both rainfall seasonality and surface temperatures; this sensitivity can potentially be used to track past tropical rainfall distribution.
The Gutenberg-Richter (GR) and the Omori-Utsu (OU) law describe the earthquakes' energy release and temporal clustering and are thus of great importance for seismic hazard assessment. Motivated by experimental results, which indicate stress-dependent parameters, we consider a combined global data set of 127 main shock-aftershock sequences and perform a systematic study of the relationship between main shock-induced stress changes and associated seismicity patterns. For this purpose, we calculate space-dependent Coulomb Stress (& UDelta;CFS) and alternative receiver-independent stress metrics in the surrounding of the main shocks. Our results indicate a clear positive correlation between the GR b-value and the induced stress, contrasting expectations from laboratory experiments and suggesting a crucial role of structural heterogeneity and strength variations. Furthermore, we demonstrate that the aftershock productivity increases nonlinearly with stress, while the OU parameters c and p systematically decrease for increasing stress changes. Our partly unexpected findings can have an important impact on future estimations of the aftershock hazard.
Large earthquakes are usually modeled with simple planar fault surfaces or a combination of several planar fault segments. However, in general, earthquakes occur on faults that are non-planar and exhibit significant geometrical variations in both the along-strike and down-dip directions at all spatial scales. Mapping of surface fault ruptures and high-resolution geodetic observations are increasingly revealing complex fault geometries near the surface and accurate locations of aftershocks often indicate geometrical complexities at depth. With better geodetic data and observations of fault ruptures, more details of complex fault geometries can be estimated resulting in more realistic fault models of large earthquakes. To address this topic, we here parametrize non-planar fault geometries with a set of polynomial parameters that allow for both along-strike and down-dip variations in the fault geometry. Our methodology uses Bayesian inference to estimate the non-planar fault parameters from geodetic data, yielding an ensemble of plausible models that characterize the uncertainties of the non-planar fault geometry and the fault slip. The method is demonstrated using synthetic tests considering slip spatially distributed on a single continuous finite non-planar fault surface with varying dip and strike angles both in the down-dip and along-strike directions. The results show that fault-slip estimations can be biased when a simple planar fault geometry is assumed in presence of significant non-planar geometrical variations. Our method can help to model earthquake fault sources in a more realistic way and may be extended to include multiple non-planar fault segments or other geometrical fault complexities.
Earthquake source parameters such as seismic stress drop and corner frequency are observed to vary widely, leading to persistent discussion on potential scaling of stress drop and event size. Physical mechanisms that govern stress drop variations arc difficult to evaluate in nature and are more readily studied in controlled laboratory experiments. We perform two stick-slip experiments on fractured (rough) and cut (smooth) Westerly granite samples to explore fault roughness effects on acoustic emission (AE) source parameters. We separate large stick-slip events that generally saturate the seismic recording system from populations of smaller AE events which are sensitive to fault stresses prior to slip. AE event populations show many similarities to natural seismicity and may be interpreted as laboratory equivalent of natural microseismic events. We then compare the temporal evolution of mechanical data such as measured stress release during slip to temporal changes in stress drops derived from Alis using the spectral ratio technique. We report on two primary observations: (1) In contrast to most case studies for natural earthquakes, we observe a strong increase in seismic stress drop with AE size. (2) The scaling of stress drop with magnitude is governed by fault roughness, whereby the rough fault shows a more rapid increase of the stress drop magnitude relation with progressing large stick-slip events than the smooth fault. The overall range of AE sizes on the rough surface is influenced by both the average grain size and the width of the fault core. The magnitudes of the smallest AE events on smooth faults may also be governed by grain size. However, AEs significantly grow beyond peak roughness and the width of the fault core. Our laboratory tests highlight that source parameters vary substantially in the presence of fault zone heterogeneity (i.e. roughness and narrow grain size distribution), which may affect seismic energy partitioning and static stress drops of small and large AE events.
The West Burma Terrane (WBT) is a small terrane bounded to the east by the Asian Sibumasu Block and to the west by the Indo-Burman Ranges (IBR), the latter being an exhumed accretionary prism that formed during subduction of Indian oceanic lithosphere beneath Asia. Understanding the geological history of the WBT is important for reconstruction of the closure history of the Tethys Ocean and India-Asia collision. Currently there are major discrepancies in the proposed timings of collision between the WBT with both India and Asia; whether the WBT collided with India or Asia first is debated, and proposed timings of collisions stretch from the Mesozoic to the Cenozoic. We undertook a multi-technique provenance study involving petrography, detrital zircon U-Pb and Hf analyses, rutile U-Pb analyses and Sr-Nd bulk rock analyses on sediments of the Central Myanmar Basins of the WBT. We determined that the first arrival of Asian material into the basin occurred after the earliest late Eocene and by the early Oligocene, thus placing a minimum constraint on the timing of WBT-Asia collision. Our low temperature thermochronological study of the IBR records two periods of exhumation, in the early-middle Eocene, and at the Oligo-Miocene boundary. The Eocene event may be associated with the collision of the WBT with India. The later event at the Oligo-Miocene boundary may be associated with changes in wedge dynamics resulting from increased sediment supply to the system; however a number of other possible causes provide equally plausible explanations for both events.
At the junction of greenhouse and icehouse climate states, the Eocene-Oligocene Transition (EOT) is a key moment in Cenozoic climate history. While it is associated with severe extinctions and biodiversity turnovers on land, the role of terrestrial climate evolution remains poorly resolved, especially the associated changes in seasonality. Some paleobotanical and geochemical continental records in parts of the Northern Hemisphere suggest the EOT is associated with a marked cooling in winter, leading to the development of more pronounced seasons (i.e., an increase in the mean annual range of temperature, MATR). However, the MATR increase has been barely studied by climate models and large uncertainties remain on its origin, geographical extent and impact. In order to better understand and describe temperature seasonality changes between the middle Eocene and the early Oligocene, we use the Earth system model IPSL-CM5A2 and a set of simulations reconstructing the EOT through three major climate forcings: pCO(2) decrease (1120, 840 and 560 ppm), the Antarctic ice-sheet (AIS) formation and the associated sea-level decrease. Our simulations suggest that pCO(2) lowering alone is not sufficient to explain the seasonality evolution described by the data through the EOT but rather that the combined effects of pCO(2) , AIS formation and increased continentality provide the best data-model agreement.pCO(2) decrease induces a zonal pattern with alternating increasing and decreasing seasonality bands particularly strong in the northern high latitudes (up to 8 degrees C MATR increase) due to sea-ice and surface albedo feedback. Conversely, the onset of the AIS is responsible for a more constant surface albedo yearly, which leads to a strong decrease in seasonality in the southern midlatitudes to high latitudes (> 40 degrees S). Finally, continental areas that emerged due to the sea-level lowering cause the largest increase in seasonality and explain most of the global heterogeneity in MATR changes (1MATR) patterns. The Delta MATR patterns we reconstruct are generally consistent with the variability of the EOT biotic crisis intensity across the Northern Hemisphere and provide insights on their underlying mechanisms.
Quantifying the resilience of vegetated ecosystems is key to constraining both present-day and future global impacts of anthropogenic climate change. Here we apply both empirical and theoretical resilience metrics to remotely-sensed vegetation data in order to examine the role of water availability and variability in controlling vegetation resilience at the global scale. We find a concise global relationship where vegetation resilience is greater in regions with higher water availability. We also reveal that resilience is lower in regions with more pronounced inter-annual precipitation variability, but find less concise relationships between vegetation resilience and intra-annual precipitation variability. Our results thus imply that the resilience of vegetation responds differently to water deficits at varying time scales. In view of projected increases in precipitation variability, our findings highlight the risk of ecosystem degradation under ongoing climate change.
Vegetation dynamics depend on both the amount of precipitation and its variability over time. Here, the authors show that vegetation resilience is greater where water availability is higher and where precipitation is more stable from year to year.
Rivers regulate the global carbon cycle by transferring particulate organic carbon (POC) from terrestrial landscapes to marine sedimentary basins, but the processes controlling the amount and composition of fluvially exported POC are poorly understood. We propose that hydrodynamic sorting processes modify POC fluxes during fluvial transit. We test this hypothesis by studying POC transported along a similar to 1,200 km reach of the Rio Bermejo, Argentina. Nanoscale secondary ion mass spectrometry revealed that POC was either fine, mineral-associated organic matter, or coarse discrete organic particles. Mineral-associated POC is more resistant to oxidation and has a lower particle settling velocity than discrete POC. Consequently, hydraulic sorting and downstream fining amplify the proportion of fine, mineral-associated POC from similar to 55% to similar to 78% over 1,220 km of downstream transit. This suggests that mineral-associated POC has a greater probability of export and preservation in marine basins than plant detritus, which may be oxidized to CO2 during transit.
Changes in snowpack associated with climatic warming has drastic impacts on surface energy balance in the cryosphere. Yet, traditional monitoring techniques, such as punctual measurements in the field, do not cover the full snowpack spatial and temporal variability, which hampers efforts to upscale measurements to the global scale. This variability is one of the primary constraints in model development. In terms of spatial resolution, active microwaves (synthetic aperture radar - SAR) can address the issue and outperform methods based on passive microwaves. Thus, high-spatial-resolution monitoring of snow depth (SD) would allow for better parameterization of local processes that drive the spatial variability of snow. The overall objective of this study is to evaluate the potential of the TerraSAR-X (TSX) SAR sensor and the wave co-polar phase difference (CPD) method for characterizing snow cover at high spatial resolution. Consequently, we first (1) investigate SD and depth hoar fraction (DHF) variability between different vegetation classes in the Ice Creek catchment (Qikiqtaruk/Herschel Island, Yukon, Canada) using in situ measurements collected over the course of a field campaign in 2019; (2) evaluate linkages between snow characteristics and CPD distribution over the 2019 dataset; and (3) determine CPD seasonality considering meteorological data over the 2015-2019 period. SD could be extracted using the CPD when certain conditions are met. A high incidence angle (>30 circle) with a high topographic wetness index (TWI) (>7.0) showed correlation between SD and CPD (R2 up to 0.72). Further, future work should address a threshold of sensitivity to TWI and incidence angle to map snow depth in such environments and assess the potential of using interpolation tools to fill in gaps in SD information on drier vegetation types.
Organic carbon (OC) stored in Arctic permafrost represents one of Earth's largest and most vulnerable terrestrial carbon pools. Amplified climate warming across the Arctic results in widespread permafrost thaw. Permafrost deposits exposed at river cliffs and coasts are particularly susceptible to thawing processes. Accelerating erosion of terrestrial permafrost along shorelines leads to increased transfer of organic matter (OM) to nearshore waters. However, the amount of terrestrial permafrost carbon and nitrogen as well as the OM quality in these deposits is still poorly quantified. We define the OM quality as the intrinsic potential for further transformation, decomposition and mineralisation. Here, we characterise the sources and the quality of OM supplied to the Lena River at a rapidly eroding permafrost river shoreline cliff in the eastern part of the delta (Sobo-Sise Island). Our multi-proxy approach captures bulk elemental, molecu- lar geochemical and carbon isotopic analyses of Late Pleistocene Yedoma permafrost and Holocene cover deposits, discontinuously spanning the last similar to 52 kyr. We showed that the ancient permafrost exposed in the Sobo-Sise cliff has a high organic carbon content (mean of about 5 wt %). The oldest sediments stem from Marine Isotope Stage (MIS) 3 interstadial deposits (dated to 52 to 28 cal ka BP) and are overlaid by last glacial MIS 2 (dated to 28 to 15 cal ka BP) and Holocene MIS 1 (dated to 7-0 cal ka BP) deposits. The relatively high average chain length (ACL) index of n-alkanes along the cliff profile indicates a predominant contribution of vascular plants to the OM composition. The elevated ratio of isoand anteiso-branched fatty acids (FAs) relative to mid- and long-chain (C >= 20) n-FAs in the interstadial MIS 3 and the interglacial MIS 1 deposits suggests stronger microbial activity and consequently higher input of bacterial biomass during these climatically warmer periods. The overall high carbon preference index (CPI) and higher plant fatty acid (HPFA) values as well as high C/N ratios point to a good quality of the preserved OM and thus to a high potential of the OM for decomposition upon thaw. A decrease in HPFA values downwards along the profile probably indicates stronger OM decomposition in the oldest (MIS 3) deposits of the cliff. The characterisation of OM from eroding permafrost leads to a better assessment of the greenhouse gas potential of the OC released into river and nearshore waters in the future.
Arctic river deltas and deltaic near-shore zones represent important land-ocean transition zones influencing sediment dynamics and nutrient fluxes from permafrost-affected terrestrial ecosystems into the coastal Arctic Ocean. To accurately model fluvial carbon and freshwater export from rapidly changing river catchments as well as assess impacts of future change on the Arctic shelf and coastal ecosystems, we need to understand the sea floor characteristics and topographic variety of the coastal zones. To date, digital bathymetrical data from the poorly accessible, shallow, and large areas of the eastern Siberian Arctic shelves are sparse. We have digitized bathymetrical information for nearly 75 000 locations from large-scale (1 V 25000-1 V 500000) current and historical nautical maps of the Lena Delta and the Kolyma Gulf region in northeastern Siberia. We present the first detailed and seamless digital models of coastal zone bathymetry for both delta and gulf regions in 50 and 200m spatial resolution. We validated the resulting bathymetry layers using a combination of our own water depth measurements and a collection of available depth measurements, which showed a strong correlation (r>0.9). Our bathymetrical models will serve as an input for a high-resolution coupled hydrodynamic-ecosystem model to better quantify fluvial and coastal carbon fluxes to the Arctic Ocean, but they may be useful for a range of other studies related to Arctic delta and near-shore dynamics such as modeling of submarine permafrost, near-shore sea ice, or shelf sediment transport. The new digital high-resolution bathymetry products are available on the PANGAEA data set repository for the Lena Delta (https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.934045; Fuchs et al., 2021a) and Kolyma Gulf region (https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.934049; Fuchs et al., 2021b), respectively. Likewise, the depth validation data are available on PANGAEA as well (https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.933187; Fuchs et al., 2021c).
The formation, growth and drainage of lakes in Arctic and boreal lowland permafrost regions influence landscape and ecosystem processes. These lake and drained lake basin (L-DLB) systems occupy >20% of the circumpolar Northern Hemisphere permafrost region and similar to 50% of the area below 300 m above sea level. Climate change is causing drastic impacts to L-DLB systems, with implications for permafrost dynamics, ecosystem functioning, biogeochemical processes and human livelihoods in lowland permafrost regions. In this Review, we discuss how an increase in the number of lakes as a result of permafrost thaw and an intensifying hydrologic regime are not currently offsetting the land area gained through lake drainage, enhancing the dominance of drained lake basins (DLBs).The contemporary transition from lakes to DLBs decreases hydrologic storage, leads to permafrost aggradation, increases carbon sequestration and diversifies the shifting habitat mosaic in Arctic and boreal regions. However, further warming could inhibit permafrost aggradation in DLBs, disrupting the trajectory of important microtopographic controls on carbon fluxes and ecosystem processes in permafrost-region L-DLB systems. Further research is needed to understand the future dynamics of L-DLB systems to improve Earth system models, permafrost carbon feedback assessments, permafrost hydrology linkages, infrastructure development in permafrost regions and the well-being of northern socio-ecological systems.
The drivers of the evolution of the South Asian Monsoon remain widely debated. An intensification of monsoonal rainfall recorded in terrestrial and marine sediment archives from the earliest Miocene (23-20 million years ago (Ma)) is generally attributed to Himalayan uplift. However, Indian Ocean palaeorecords place the onset of a strong monsoon around 13 Ma, linked to strengthening of the southwesterly winds of the Somali Jet that also force Arabian Sea upwelling. Here we reconcile these divergent records using Earth system model simulations to evaluate the interactions between palaeogeography and ocean-atmosphere dynamics. We show that factors forcing the South Asian Monsoon circulation versus rainfall are decoupled and diachronous. Himalayan and Tibetan Plateau topography predominantly controlled early Miocene rainfall patterns, with limited impact on ocean-atmosphere circulation. The uplift of the East African and Middle Eastern topography played a pivotal role in the establishment of the modern Somali Jet structure above the western Indian Ocean, while strong upwelling initiated as a direct consequence of the emergence of the Arabian Peninsula and the onset of modern-like atmospheric circulation. Our results emphasize that although elevated rainfall seasonality was probably a persistent feature since the India-Asia collision in the Paleogene, modern-like monsoonal atmospheric circulation only emerged in the late Neogene.
Understanding and constraining the source of geodetic deformation in volcanic areas is an important component of hazard assessment. Here, we analyse deformation and seismicity for one year before the March 2021 Fagradalsfjall eruption in Iceland. We generate a high-resolution catalogue of 39,500 earthquakes using optical cable recordings and develop a poroelastic model to describe three pre-eruptional uplift and subsidence cycles at the Svartsengi geothermal field, 8 km west of the eruption site. We find the observed deformation is best explained by cyclic intrusions into a permeable aquifer by a fluid injected at 4 km depth below the geothermal field, with a total volume of 0.11 ± 0.05 km3 and a density of 850 ± 350 kg m–3. We therefore suggest that ingression of magmatic CO2 can explain the geodetic, gravity and seismic data, although some contribution of magma cannot be excluded.
The Palaeocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum (ca. 56 million years ago) offers a primary analogue for future global warming and carbon cycle recovery. Yet, where and how massive carbon emissions were mitigated during this climate warming event remains largely unknown. Here we show that organic carbon burial in the vast epicontinental seaways that extended over Eurasia provided a major carbon sink during the Palaeocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum. We coupled new and existing stratigraphic analyses to a detailed paleogeographic framework and using spatiotemporal interpolation calculated ca. 720–1300 Gt organic carbon excess burial, focused in the eastern parts of the Eurasian epicontinental seaways. A much larger amount (2160–3900 Gt C, and when accounting for the increase in inundated shelf area 7400–10300 Gt C) could have been sequestered in similar environments globally. With the disappearance of most epicontinental seas since the Oligocene-Miocene, an effective negative carbon cycle feedback also disappeared making the modern carbon cycle critically dependent on the slower silicate weathering feedback.
Many geophysical inverse problems are known to be ill-posed and, thus, requiring some kind of regularization in order to provide a unique and stable solution. A possible approach to overcome the inversion ill-posedness consists in constraining the position of the model interfaces. For a grid-based parameterization, such a structurally constrained inversion can be implemented by adopting the usual smooth regularization scheme in which the local weight of the regularization is reduced where an interface is expected. By doing so, sharp contrasts are promoted at interface locations while standard smoothness constraints keep affecting the other regions of the model. In this work, we present a structurally constrained approach and test it on the inversion of frequency-domain electromagnetic induction (FD-EMI) data using a regularization approach based on the Minimum Gradient Support stabilizer, which is capable to promote sharp transitions everywhere in the model, i.e., also in areas where no structural a prioriinformation is available. Using 1D and 2D synthetic data examples, we compare the proposed approach to a structurally constrained smooth inversion as well as to more standard (i.e., not structurally constrained) smooth and sharp inversions. Our results demonstrate that the proposed approach helps in finding a better and more reliable reconstruction of the subsurface electrical conductivity distribution, including its structural characteristics. Furthermore, we demonstrate that it allows to promote sharp parameter variations in areas where no structural information are available. Lastly, we apply our structurally constrained scheme to FD-EMI field data collected at a field site in Eastern Germany to image the thickness of peat deposits along two selected profiles. In this field example, we use collocated constant offset ground-penetrating radar (GPR) data to derive structural a priori information to constrain the inversion of the FD-EMI data. The results of this case study demonstrate the effectiveness and flexibility of the proposed approach.
An earthquake swarm affected the Bransfield Strait, Antarctica, a unique rift basin in transition from intra-arc rifting to ocean spreading. The swarm, counting similar to 85,000 volcano-tectonic earthquakes since August 2020, is located close to the Orca submarine volcano, previously considered inactive. Simultaneously, geodetic data reported up to similar to 11 cm north-westward displacement over King George Island. We use a broad variety of geophysical data and methods to reveal the complex migration of seismicity, accompanying the intrusion of 0.26-0.56 km(3) of magma. Strike-slip earthquakes mark the intrusion at depth, while shallower normal faulting the similar to 20 km long lateral growth of a dike. Seismicity abruptly decreased after a Mw 6.0 earthquake, suggesting the magmatic dike lost pressure with the slipping of a large fault. A seafloor eruption is likely, but not confirmed by sea surface temperature anomalies. The unrest documents episodic magmatic intrusion in the Bransfield Strait, providing unique insights into active continental rifting.
Arctic coasts are vulnerable to the effects of climate change, including rising sea levels and the loss of permafrost, sea ice and glaciers. Assessing the influence of anthropogenic warming on Arctic coastal dynamics, however, is challenged by the limited availability of observational, oceanographic and environmental data. Yet, with the majority of permafrost coasts being erosive, coupled with projected intensification of erosion and flooding, understanding these changes is critical. In this Review, we describe the morphological diversity of Arctic coasts, discuss important drivers of coastal change, explain the specific sensitivity of Arctic coasts to climate change and provide an overview of pan-Arctic shoreline change and its multifaceted impacts. Arctic coastal changes impact the human environment by threatening coastal settlements, infrastructure, cultural sites and archaeological remains. Changing sediment fluxes also impact the natural environment through carbon, nutrient and pollutant release on a magnitude that remains difficult to predict. Increasing transdisciplinary and interdisciplinary collaboration efforts will build the foundation for identifying sustainable solutions and adaptation strategies to reduce future risks for those living on, working at and visiting the rapidly changing Arctic coast.
Oxygen (O-2) availability in soils is vital for plant growth and productivity. The transport and consumption of O-2 in the root zone is closely linked to soil moisture content, the spatial distribution of roots, as well as structure and heterogeneity of the surrounding soil. In this study, we measure three-dimensional root system architecture and the spatiotemporal dynamics of soil moisture (& theta;) and O-2 concentrations in the root zone of maize (Zea mays) via non-invasive imaging, and then construct and parameterize a reactive transport model based on the experimental data. The combination of three non-invasive imaging methods allowed for a direct comparison of simulation results with observations at high spatial and temporal resolution. In three different modeling scenarios, we investigated how the results obtained for different levels of conceptual complexity in the model were able to match measured & theta; and O-2 concentration patterns. We found that the modeling scenario that considers heterogeneous soil structure and spatial variability of hydraulic parameters (permeability, porosity, and van Genuchten & alpha; and n), better reproduced the measured & theta; and O-2 patterns relative to a simple model with a homogenous soil domain. The results from our combined imaging and modeling analysis reveal that experimental O-2 and water dynamics can be reproduced quantitatively in a reactive transport model, and that O-2 and water dynamics are best characterized when conditions unique to the specific system beyond the distribution of roots, such as soil structure and its effect on water saturation and macroscopic gas transport pathways, are considered.
Ore precipitation in porphyry copper systems is generally characterized by metal zoning (Cu-Mo to Zn-Pb-Ag), which is suggested to be variably related to solubility decreases during fluid cooling, fluid-rock interactions, partitioning during fluid phase separation and mixing with external fluids. Here, we present new advances of a numerical process model by considering published constraints on the temperature- and salinity-dependent solubility of Cu, Pb and Zn in the ore fluid. We quantitatively investigate the roles of vapor-brine separation, halite saturation, initial metal contents, fluid mixing and remobilization as first-order controls of the physical hydrology on ore formation. The results show that the magmatic vapor and brine phases ascend with different residence times but as miscible fluid mixtures, with salinity increases generating metal-undersaturated bulk fluids. The release rates of magmatic fluids affect the location of the thermohaline fronts, leading to contrasting mechanisms for ore precipitation: higher rates result in halite saturation without significant metal zoning, lower rates produce zoned ore shells due to mixing with meteoric water. Varying metal contents can affect the order of the final metal precipitation sequence. Redissolution of precipitated metals results in zoned ore shell patterns in more peripheral locations and also decouples halite saturation from ore precipitation.
Knowledge on the response of sediment export to recent climate change in glacierized areas in the European Alps is limited, primarily because long-term records of suspended sediment concentrations (SSCs) are scarce. Here we tested the estimation of sediment export of the past five decades using quantile regression forest (QRF), a nonparametric, multivariate regression based on random forest. The regression builds on short-term records of SSCs and long records of the most important hydroclimatic drivers (discharge, precipitation and air temperature - QPT). We trained independent models for two nested and partially glacier-covered catchments, Vent (98 km(2)) and Vernagt (11.4 km(2)), in the upper otztal in Tyrol, Austria (1891 to 3772 m a.s.l.), where available QPT records start in 1967 and 1975. To assess temporal extrapolation ability, we used two 2-year SSC datasets at gauge Vernagt, which are almost 20 years apart, for a validation. For Vent, we performed a five-fold cross-validation on the 15 years of SSC measurements. Further, we quantified the number of days where predictors exceeded the range represented in the training dataset, as the inability to extrapolate beyond this range is a known limitation of QRF. Finally, we compared QRF performance to sediment rating curves (SRCs). We analyzed the modeled sediment export time series, the predictors and glacier mass balance data for trends (Mann-Kendall test and Sen's slope estimator) and step-like changes (using the widely applied Pettitt test and a complementary Bayesian approach).Our validation at gauge Vernagt demonstrated that QRF performs well in estimating past daily sediment export (Nash-Sutcliffe efficiency (NSE) of 0.73) and satisfactorily for SSCs (NSE of 0.51), despite the small training dataset. The temporal extrapolation ability of QRF was superior to SRCs, especially in periods with high-SSC events, which demonstrated the ability of QRF to model threshold effects. Days with high SSCs tended to be underestimated, but the effect on annual yields was small. Days with predictor exceedances were rare, indicating a good representativity of the training dataset. Finally, the QRF reconstruction models outperformed SRCs by about 20 percent points of the explained variance.Significant positive trends in the reconstructed annual suspended sediment yields were found at both gauges, with distinct step-like increases around 1981. This was linked to increased glacier melt, which became apparent through step-like increases in discharge at both gauges as well as change points in mass balances of the two largest glaciers in the Vent catchment. We identified exceptionally high July temperatures in 1982 and 1983 as a likely cause. In contrast, we did not find coinciding change points in precipitation. Opposing trends at the two gauges after 1981 suggest different timings of "peak sediment". We conclude that, given large-enough training datasets, the presented QRF approach is a promising tool with the ability to deepen our understanding of the response of high-alpine areas to decadal climate change.
Integrated Seismic Program (ISP) is a graphical user interface designed to facilitate and provide a user-friendly framework for performing diverse common and advanced tasks in seismological research. ISP is composed of five main modules for earthquake location, time-frequency analysis and advanced signal processing, implementation of array techniques to estimate the slowness vector, seismic moment tensor inversion, and receiver function computation and analysis. In addition, several support tools are available, allowing the user to create an event database, download data from International Federation of Digital Seismograph Networks services, inspect the background noise, and compute synthetic seismograms. ISP is written in Python3, supported by several open-source and/or publicly available tools. Its modular design allows for new features to be added in a collaborative development environment.
High pressure and high temperature experiments performed with laser-heated diamond anvil cells (LH-DAC) are being extensively used in geosciences to study matter at conditions prevailing in planetary interiors. Due to the size of the apparatus itself, the samples that are produced are extremely small, on the order of few tens of micrometers. There are several ways to analyze the samples and extract physical, chemical or structural information, using either in situ or ex situ methods. In this paper, we compare two nanoprobe techniques, namely nano-XRF and NanoSIMS, that can be used to analyze recovered samples synthetized in a LH-DAC. With these techniques, it is possible to extract the spatial distribution of chemical elements in the samples. We show the results for several standards and discuss the importance of proper calibration for the acquisition of quantifiable results. We used these two nanoprobe techniques to retrieve elemental ratios of dilute species (few tens of ppm) in quenched experimental molten samples relevant for the formation of the iron-rich core of the Earth. We finally discuss the applications of such probes to constrain the partitioning of trace elements between metal and silicate phases, with a focus on moderately siderophile elements, tungsten and molybdenum.
A 3-D crustal shear wave velocity model and Moho map below the Semail Ophiolite, eastern Arabia
(2022)
The Semail Ophiolite in eastern Arabia is the largest and best-exposed slice of oceanic lithosphere on land. Detailed knowledge of the tectonic evolution of the shallow crust, in particular during and after ophiolite obduction in Late Cretaceous times is contrasted by few constraints on physical and compositional properties of the middle and lower continental crust below the obducted units. The role of inherited, pre-obduction crustal architecture remains therefore unaccounted for in our understanding of crustal evolution and the present-day geology. Based on seismological data acquired during a 27-month campaign in northern Oman, Ambient Seismic Noise Tomography and Receiver Function analysis provide for the first time a 3-D radially anisotropic shear wave velocity (V-S) model and a consistent Moho map below the iconic Semail Ophiolite. The model highlights deep crustal boundaries that segment the eastern Arabian basement in two distinct units. The previously undescribed Western Jabal Akhdar Zone separates Arabian crust with typical continental properties and a thickness of similar to 40-45 km in the northwest from a compositionally different terrane in the southeast that is interpreted as a terrane accreted during the Pan-African orogeny in Neoproterozoic times. East of the Ibra Zone, another deep crustal boundary, crustal thickness decreases to 30-35 km and very high lower crustal V-S suggest large-scale mafic intrusions into, and possible underplating of the Arabian continental crust that occurred most likely during Permian breakup of Pangea. Mafic reworking is sharply bounded by the (upper crustal) Semail Gap Fault Zone, northwest of which no such high velocities are found in the crust. Topography of the Oman Mountains is supported by a mild crustal root and Moho depth below the highest topography, the Jabal Akhdar Dome, is similar to 42 km. Radial anisotropy is robustly resolved in the upper crust and aids in discriminating dipping allochthonous units from autochthonous sedimentary rocks that are indistinguishable by isotropic V-S alone. Lateral thickness variations of the ophiolite highlight the Haylayn Ophiolite Massif on the northern flank of Jabal Akhdar Dome and the Hawasina Window as the deepest reaching unit. Ophiolite thickness is similar to 10 km in the southern and northern massifs, and <= 5 km elsewhere.
The Kolumbo submarine volcano in the southern Aegean (Greece) is associated with repeated seismic unrest since at least two decades and the causes of this unrest are poorly understood. We present a ten-month long microseismicity data set for the period 2006-2007. The majority of earthquakes cluster in a cone-shaped portion of the crust below Kolumbo. The tip of this cone coincides with a low Vp-anomaly at 2-4 km depth, which is interpreted as a crustal melt reservoir. Our data set includes several earthquake swarms, of which we analyze the four with the highest events numbers in detail. Together the swarms form a zone of fracturing elongated in the SW-NE direction, parallel to major regional faults. All four swarms show a general upward migration of hypocenters and the cracking front propagates unusually fast, compared to swarms in other volcanic areas. We conclude that the swarm seismicity is most likely triggered by a combination of pore-pressure perturbations and the re-distribution of elastic stresses. Fluid pressure perturbations are induced likely by obstructions in the melt conduits in a rheologically strong layer between 6 and 9 km depth. We conclude that the zone of fractures below Kolumbo is exploited by melts ascending from the mantle and filling the crustal melt reservoir. Together with the recurring seismic unrest, our study suggests that a future eruption is probable and monitoring of the Kolumbo volcanic system is highly advisable.
Granitoids of the Slavkov Domain of the Brunovistulian microcontinent (BVM) in the Czech Republic have Ediacaran U-Pb zircon crystallization ages with the dominant magmatic activity occurring between ca. 597 and 595 Ma. The ages overlap published ages for the adjacent Thaya Domain, showing that both domains formed coevally in the same subduction setting. The data support published models in which the Slavkov Domain formed as arc crust. The main stage of magmatism stopped after ca. 595-590 Ma and was quickly followed by cooling accompanied by intrusion of small volumes of rhyolite dykes at ca. 594 Ma. Slavkov Domain metasedimentary rocks are dominated by Cryogenian-Ediacaran detrital zircon populations and their protoliths were locally derived erosional products of Cryogenian to Ediacaran arc rocks of the Thaya and Slavkov domains. Metasedi-mentary rocks from the NE part of the BVM contain younger, ca. 550 Ma zircons indicating that the BVM grew northeastward by accretion of progressively younger material derived from magmatic rocks with latest Ediacaran crystallization ages. In contrast to the Thaya and Slavkov domains, the Metavolcanic Zone that lies between them formed between ca. 740 and 725 Ma in the late Tonian to early Cryogenian. It predates the main stage magmatic activity in the BVM by 135 to 150 Ma and is probably a relic of older crust that formed during rifting of the Rodinia supercontinent. At ca. 552-551 Ma in the latest Ediacaran, parts of the BVM were exposed at the surface, during which time red, terrestrial siliciclastic sediments (Basal Clastics) were deposited. These largely had (very) proximal sources such as the main stage granitoids of the Thaya and Slavkov domains. Clasts of (meta)sandstones contain much older zircon populations and provide evidence that Neoarchaean and Palaeo-, meso- and early Neoproterozoic crustal rocks were exposed in erosional position nearby.
Wildfires play an essential role in the ecology of boreal forests.
In eastern Siberia, fire activity has been increasing in recent years, challenging the livelihoods of local communities. Intensifying fire regimes also increase disturbance pressure on the boreal forests, which currently protect the permafrost beneath from accelerated degradation.
However, long-term relationships between changes in fire regime and forest structure remain largely unknown.
We assess past fire-vegetation feedbacks using sedimentary proxy records from Lake Satagay, Central Yakutia, Siberia, covering the past c. 10,800 years.
Results from macroscopic and microscopic charcoal analyses indicate high amounts of burnt biomass during the Early Holocene, and that the present-day, low-severity surface fire regime has been in place since c. 4,500 years before present.
A pollen-based quantitative reconstruction of vegetation cover and a terrestrial plant record based on sedimentary ancient DNA metabarcoding suggest a pronounced shift in forest structure toward the Late Holocene.
Whereas the Early Holocene was characterized by postglacial open larch-birch woodlands, forest structure changed toward the modern, mixed larch-dominated closed-canopy forest during the Mid-Holocene.
We propose a potential relationship between open woodlands and high amounts of burnt biomass, as well as a mediating effect of dense larch forest on the climate-driven intensification of fire regimes.
Considering the anticipated increase in forest disturbances (droughts, insect invasions, and wildfires), higher tree mortality may force the modern state of the forest to shift toward an open woodland state comparable to the Early Holocene.
Such a shift in forest structure may result in a positive feedback on currently intensifying wildfires.
These new long-term data improve our understanding of millennial-scale fire regime changes and their relationships to changes of vegetation in Central Yakutia, where the local population is already being confronted with intensifying wildfire seasons.
Through its magnetic activity, the Sun governs the conditions in Earth's vicinity, creating space weather events, which have drastic effects on our space- and ground-based technology.
One of the most important solar magnetic features creating the space weather is the solar wind that originates from the coronal holes (CHs).
The identification of the CHs on the Sun as one of the source regions of the solar wind is therefore crucial to achieve predictive capabilities.
In this study, we used an unsupervised machine-learning method, k-means, to pixel-wise cluster the passband images of the Sun taken by the Atmospheric Imaging Assembly on the Solar Dynamics Observatory in 171, 193, and 211 angstrom in different combinations.
Our results show that the pixel-wise k-means clustering together with systematic pre- and postprocessing steps provides compatible results with those from complex methods, such as convolutional neural networks.
More importantly, our study shows that there is a need for a CH database where a consensus about the CH boundaries is reached by observers independently.
This database then can be used as the "ground truth," when using a supervised method or just to evaluate the goodness of the models.
Modern pollen-vegetation-climate relationships underpin palaeovegetation and palaeoclimate reconstructions from fossil pollen records. East Siberia is an ideal area for investigating the relationships between modern pollen assemblages and near natural vegetation under cold continental climate conditions. Reliable pollen-based quantitative vegetation and climate reconstructions are still scarce due to the limited number of modern pollen datasets. Furthermore, differences in pollen representation of samples from lake sediments and soils are not well understood. Here, we present a new pollen dataset of 48 moss/soil and 24 lake surface-sediment samples collected in Chukotka and central Yakutia in East Siberia. The pollen-vegetation-climate relationships were investigated by ordination analyses. Generally, tundra and taiga vegetation types can be well distinguished in the surface pollen assemblages. Moss/soil and lake samples contain generally similar pollen assemblages as revealed by a Procrustes comparison with some exceptions. Overall, modern pollen assemblages reflect the temperature and precipitation gradients in the study areas as revealed by constrained ordination analysis. We estimate the relative pollen productivity (RPP) of major taxa and the relevant source area of pollen (RSAP) for moss/soil samples from Chukotka and central Yakutia using Extended R-Value (ERV) analysis. The RSAP of the tundra-forest transition area in Chukotka and taiga area in central Yakutia are ca. 1300 and 360 m, respectively. For Chukotka, RPPs relative to both Poaceae and Ericaceae were estimated while RPPs for central Yakutia were relative only to Ericaceae. Relative to Ericaceae (reference taxon, RPP = 1), Larix, Betula, Picea, and Pinus are overrepresented while Alnus, Cyperaceae, Poaceae, and Salix are underrepresented in the pollen spectra. Our estimates are in general agreement with previously published values and provide the basis for reliable quantitative reconstructions of East Siberian vegetation.
As the recent permafrost thawing of northern Asia proceeds due to anthropogenic climate change, precise and detailed palaeoecological records from past warm periods are essential to anticipate the extent of future permafrost variations. Here, based on the modern relationship between permafrost and vegetation (represented by pollen assemblages), we trained a Random Forest model using pollen and permafrost data and verified its reliability to reconstruct the history of permafrost in northern Asia during the Holocene. An early Holocene (12-8 cal ka BP) strong thawing trend, a middle-to-late Holocene (8-2 cal ka BP) relatively slow thawing trend, and a late Holocene freezing trend of permafrost in northern Asia are consistent with climatic proxies such as summer solar radiation and Northern Hemisphere temperature. The extensive distribution of permafrost in northern Asia inhibited the spread of evergreen coniferous trees during the early Holocene warming and might have decelerated the enhancement of the East Asian summer monsoon (EASM) by altering hydrological processes and albedo. Based on these findings, we suggest that studies of the EASM should consider more the state of permafrost and vegetation in northern Asia, which are often overlooked and may have a profound impact on climate change in this region.
Although phytoliths are recognized as an important proxy for paleoenvironmental reconstruction, the quantitative relationship between phytoliths and climate is still debated. In order to provide an improved basis for phytolith-based paleoclimate reconstructions, a representative modern phytolith dataset is essential. Here, we synthesize a modern topsoil phytolith dataset for Northeast China, analyze its climatic significance, and apply it to a fossil phytolith series from the Hani peat core in Northeast China. The dataset comprises 660 topsoil phytolith assemblages from 289 sample sites. We compiled modern meteorological data to assess the quantitative relationship between the phytolith assemblages and climatic variables. Detrended correspondence analysis (DCA) and Redundancy analysis (RDA) were used to determine the dominant climatic variable influencing the phytolith distributions. The results showed that mean annual temperature (MAT) is the dominant variable controlling the spatial distribution of phytoliths, accounting for 8.91% of the total variance. Transfer function based on inverse deshrinking locally-weighted weighted averaging (LWWA_Inv) was developed for MAT (R-_boot(2) = 0.86, RMSEP = 1.02 degrees C). Applying the LWWA_Inv transfer function to fossil phytolith records from the Hani peat core enables quantitative inferences to be made about Holocene climate changes in Northeast China. Overall, combined with the LWWA_Inv method, the topsoil phytolith dataset of Northeast China can be used for reliable quantitative MAT reconstruction.
We investigate whether the distribution of maximum seasonal streamflow is significantly affected by catchment or climate state of the season/month ahead. We fit the Generalized Extreme Value (GEV) distribution to extreme seasonal streamflow for around 600 stations across Europe by conditioning the GEV location and scale parameters on 14 indices, which represent the season-ahead climate or catchment state. The comparison of these climate-informed models with the classical GEV distribution, with time-constant parameters, suggests that there is a substantial potential for seasonal forecasting of flood probabilities. The potential varies between seasons and regions. Overall, the season-ahead catchment wetness shows the highest potential, although climate indices based on large-scale atmospheric circulation, sea surface temperature or sea ice concentration also show some skill for certain regions and seasons. Spatially coherent patterns and a substantial fraction of climate-informed models are promising signs towards early alerts to increase flood preparedness already a season ahead.
Fast Holocene slip and localized strain along the Liquiñe-Ofqui strike-slip fault system, Chile
(2021)
In active tectonic settings dominated by strike-slip kinematics, slip partitioning across subparallel faults is a common feature; therefore, assessing the degree of partitioning and strain localization is paramount for seismic hazard assessments. Here, we estimate a slip rate of 18.8 +/- 2.0 mm/year over the past 9.0 +/- 0.1 ka for a single strand of the Liquirie-Ofqui Fault System, which straddles the Main Cordillera in Southern Chile. This Holocene rate accounts for similar to 82% of the trench-parallel component of oblique plate convergence and is similar to million-year estimates integrated over the entire fault system. Our results imply that strain localizes on a single fault at millennial time scale but over longer time scales strain localization is not sustained. The fast millennial slip rate in the absence of historical Mw> 6.5 earthquakes along the Liquine-Ofqui Fault System implies either a component of aseismic slip or Mw similar to 7 earthquakes involving multi-trace ruptures and > 150-year repeat times. Our results have implications for the understanding of strike-slip fault system dynamics within volcanic arcs and seismic hazard assessments.
Rupture directivity, implying a predominant earthquake rupture propagation direction, is typically inferred upon the identification of 2D azimuthal patterns of seismic observations for weak to large earthquakes using surface-monitoring networks. However, the recent increase of 3D monitoring networks deployed in the shallow subsurface and underground laboratories toward the monitoring of microseismicity allows to extend the directivity analysis to 3D modeling, beyond the usual range of magnitudes. The high-quality full waveforms recorded for the largest, decimeter-scale acoustic emission (AE) events during a meter-scale hydraulic fracturing experiment in granites at similar to 410 m depth allow us to resolve the apparent durations observed at each AE sensor to analyze 3D-directivity effects. Unilateral and (asymmetric) bilateral ruptures are then characterized by the introduction of a parameter kappa, representing the angle between the directivity vector and the station vector. While the cloud of AE activity indicates the planes of the hydrofractures, the resolved directivity vectors show off-plane orientations, indicating that rupture planes of microfractures on a scale of centimeters have different geometries. Our results reveal a general alignment of the rupture directivity with the orientation of the minimum horizontal stress, implying that not only the slip direction but also the fracture growth produced by the fluid injections is controlled by the local stress conditions.
Dispersion-curve inversion of Rayleigh waves to infer subsurface shear-wave velocity is a long-standing problem in seismology. Due to nonlinearity and ill-posedness, sophisticated regularization techniques are required to solve the problem for a stable velocity model. We have formulated the problem as a minimization problem with nonlinear operator constraint and then solve it by using an inexact augmented Lagrangian method, taking advantage of the Haney-Tsai Dix-type relation (a global linear approximation of the nonlinear forward operator). This replaces the original regularized nonlinear problem with iterative minimization of a more tractable regularized linear problem followed by a nonlinear update of the phase velocity (data) in which the update can be performed accurately with any forward modeling engine, for example, the finite-element method. The algorithm allows discretizing the medium with thin layers (for the finite-element method) and thus omitting the layer thicknesses from the unknowns and also allows incorporating arbitrary regularizations to shape the desired velocity model. In this research, we use total variation regularization to retrieve the shear-wave velocity model. We use two synthetic and two real data examples to illustrate the performance of the inversion algorithm with total variation regularization. We find that the method is fast and stable, and it converges to the solution of the original nonlinear problem.
Lithium and boron are trace components of magmas, released during exsolution of a gas phase during volcanic activity.
In this study, we determine the diffusivity and isotopic fractionation of Li and B in hydrous silicate melts.
Two glasses were synthesized with the same rhyolitic composition (4.2 wt% water), having different Li and B contents; these were studied in diffusion-couple experiments that were performed using an internally heated pressure vessel, operated at 300 MPa in the temperature range 700-1250 degrees C for durations from 0 s to 24 h. From this we determined activation energies for Li and B diffusion of 57 +/- 4 kJ/mol and 152 +/- 15 kJ/mol with pre-exponential factors of 1.53 x 10(-7) m(2)/s and 3.80 x 10(-8) m(2)/s, respectively.
Lithium isotopic fractionation during diffusion gave beta values between 0.15 and 0.20, whereas B showed no clear isotopic fractionation.
Our Li diffusivities and isotopic fractionation results differ somewhat from earlier published values, but overall confirm that Li diffusivity increases with water content. Our results on B diffusion show that similarly to Li, B mobility increases in the presence of water.
By applying the Eyring relation, we confirm that B diffusivity is limited by viscous flow in silicate melts.
Our results on Li and B diffusion present a new tool for understanding degassing-related processes, offering a potential geospeedometer to measure volcanic ascent rates.
Ground-motion models (GMMs) are often used to predict the random distribution of Spectral accelerations (SAs) at a site due to a nearby earthquake. In probabilistic seismic hazard and risk assessment, large earthquakes occurring close to a site are considered as critical scenarios. GMMs are expected to predict realistic SAs with low within-model uncertainty (sigma(mu)) for such rare scenarios. However, the datasets used to regress GMMs are usually deficient of data from critical scenarios. The (Kotha et al., A Regionally Adaptable Ground-Motion Model for Shallow Crustal Earthquakes in Europe Bulletin of Earthquake Engineering 18:4091-4125, 2020) GMM developed from the Engineering strong motion (ESM) dataset was found to predict decreasing short-period SAs with increasing M-W >= M-h = 6.2, and with large sigma(mu) at near-source distances <= 30km. In this study, we updated the parametrisation of the GMM based on analyses of ESM and the Near source strong motion (NESS) datasets. With M-h = 5.7, we could rectify the M-W scaling issue, while also reducing sigma(mu). at M-W >= M-h. We then evaluated the GMM against NESS data, and found that the SAs from a few large, thrust-faulting events in California, New Zealand, Japan, and Mexico are significantly higher than GMM median predictions. However, recordings from these events were mostly made on soft-soil geology, and contain anisotropic pulse-like effects. A more thorough non-ergodic treatment of NESS was not possible because most sites sampled unique events in very diverse tectonic environments. We provide an updated set of GMM coefficients,sigma(mu), and heteroscedastic variance models; while also cautioning against its application for M-W <= 4 in low-moderate seismicity regions without evaluating the homogeneity of M-W estimates between pan-European ESM and regional datasets.
Statistical distributions of flood peak discharge often show heavy tail behavior, that is, extreme floods are more likely to occur than would be predicted by commonly used distributions that have exponential asymptotic behavior.
This heavy tail behavior may surprise flood managers and citizens, as human intuition tends to expect light tail behavior, and the heaviness of the tails is very difficult to predict, which may lead to unnecessarily high flood damage.
Despite its high importance, the literature on the heavy tail behavior of flood distributions is rather fragmented.
In this review, we provide a coherent overview of the processes causing heavy flood tails and the implications for science and practice.
Specifically, we propose nine hypotheses on the mechanisms causing heavy tails in flood peak distributions related to processes in the atmosphere, the catchment, and the river system.
We then discuss to which extent the current knowledge supports or contradicts these hypotheses.
We also discuss the statistical conditions for the emergence of heavy tail behavior based on derived distribution theory and relate them to the hypotheses and flood generation mechanisms.
We review the degree to which the heaviness of the tails can be predicted from process knowledge and data. Finally, we recommend further research toward testing the hypotheses and improving the prediction of heavy tails.
Effect of temperature on the densification of silicate melts to lower earth's mantle conditions
(2022)
Physical properties of silicate melts play a key role for global planetary dynamics, controlling for example volcanic eruption styles, mantle convection and elemental cycling in the deep Earth. They are significantly modified by structural changes at the atomic scale due to external parameters such as pressure and temperature or due to chemistry. Structural rearrangements such as 4- to 6-fold coordination change of Si with increasing depth may profoundly influence melt properties, but have so far mostly been studied at ambient temperature due to experimental difficulties. In order to investigate the structural properties of silicate melts and their densification mechanisms at conditions relevant to the deep Earth's interior, we studied haplo basaltic glasses and melts (albite-diopside composition) at high pressure and temperature conditions in resistively and laser-heated diamond anvil cells using X-ray absorption near edge structure spectroscopy. Samples were doped with 10 wt% of Ge, which is accessible with this experimental technique and which commonly serves as a structural analogue for the network forming cation Si. We acquired spectra on the Ge K edge up to 48 GPa and 5000 K and derived the average Ge-O coordination number NGe-O, and bond distance RGe-O as functions of pressure. Our results demonstrate a continuous transformation from tetrahedral to octahedral coordination between ca. 5 and 30 GPa at ambient temperature. Above 1600 K the data reveal a reduction of the pressure needed to complete conversion to octahedral coordination by ca. 30 %. The results allow us to determine the influence of temperature on the Si coordination number changes in natural melts in the Earth's interior. We propose that the complete transition to octahedral coordination in basaltic melts is reached at about 40 GPa, corresponding to a depth of ca. 1200 km in the uppermost lower mantle. At the core-mantle boundary (2900 km, 130 GPa, 3000 K) the existence of non-buoyant melts has been proposed to explain observed low seismic wave velocity features. Our results highlight that the melt composition can affect the melt density at such extreme conditions and may strongly influence the structural response.
Despite advanced seismological techniques, automatic source characterization for microseismic earthquakes remains difficult and challenging since current inversion and modelling of high-frequency signals are complex and time consuming. For real-time applications such as induced seismicity monitoring, the application of standard methods is often not fast enough for true complete real-time information on seismic sources. In this paper, we present an alternative approach based on recent advances in deep learning for rapid source-parameter estimation of microseismic earthquakes. The seismic inversion is represented in compact form by two convolutional neural networks, with individual feature extraction, and a fully connected neural network, for feature aggregation, to simultaneously obtain full moment tensor and spatial location of microseismic sources. Specifically, a multibranch neural network algorithm is trained to encapsulate the information about the relationship between seismic waveforms and underlying point-source mechanisms and locations. The learning-based model allows rapid inversion (within a fraction of second) once input data are available. A key advantage of the algorithm is that it can be trained using synthetic seismic data only, so it is directly applicable to scenarios where there are insufficient real data for training. Moreover, we find that the method is robust with respect to perturbations such as observational noise and data incompleteness (missing stations). We apply the new approach on synthesized and example recorded small magnitude (M <= 1.6) earthquakes at the Hellisheioi geothermal field in the Hengill area, Iceland. For the examined events, the model achieves excellent performance and shows very good agreement with the inverted solutions determined through standard methodology. In this study, we seek to demonstrate that this approach is viable for microseismicity real-time estimation of source parameters and can be integrated into advanced decision-support tools for controlling induced seismicity.
Reconstructing thermal histories in thrust belts is commonly used to infer the age and rates of thrusting and hence the driving mechanisms of orogenesis.
In areas where ancient basins have been incorporated into the orogenic wedge, a quantitative reconstruction of the thermal history helps distinguish among potential mechanisms responsible for heating events.
We present such a reconstruction for the Ischigualasto-Villa Union basin in the western Pampean Ranges of Argentina, where Triassic rifting and late Cretaceous-Cenozoic retroarc foreland basin development has been widely documented, including Miocene flat-slab subduction.
We report results of organic and inorganic thermal indicators acquired along three stratigraphic sections, including vitrinite reflectance and X-ray diffractometry in claystones and new thermochronological [(apatite fission-track and apatite and zircon [U-Th]/He)] analyses.
Despite up to 5 km-thick Cenozoic overburden and unlike previously thought, the thermal peak in the basin is not due to Cenozoic burial but occurred in the Triassic, associated with a high heat flow of up to 90 mWm(-2) and <2 km of burial, which heated the base of the Triassic strata to similar to 160 degrees C. Following exhumation, attested by the development of an unconformity between the Triassic and Late-Cretaceous-Cenozoic sequences, Cenozoic re-burial increased the temperature to similar to 110 degrees C at the base of the Triassic section and only similar to 50 degrees C 7 km upsection, suggesting a dramatic decrease in the thermal gradient.
The onset of Cenozoic cooling occurred at similar to 10(-8) Ma, concomitant with sediment accumulation and thus preceding the latest Miocene onset of thrusting that has been independently documented by stratigraphic-cross-cutting relationships.
We argue that the onset of cooling is associated with lithospheric refrigeration following establishment of flat-slab subduction, leading to the eastward displacement of the asthenospheric wedge beneath the South American plate.
Our study places time and temperature constraints on flat-slab cooling that calls for a careful interpretation of exhumation signals in thrustbelts inferred from thermochronology only.