LA CHINE EST-ELLE PLACEE ENTRE DEUX GRANDES FRACTURES DE LA CROUTE TERRESTRE ?

Hest bien clair que toute reponse a cette question, sera du plus haut interet pour les geologues de la Chine, vu que les resultats de la geodesie semblent bien indiquer que la croute terrestre est divisee en plusieurs blocs independants, juxtaposes et equilibres isostatiquement.     

Pumpellyite in Low-grade Metamorphism

The regional metamorphism of the Kant? Mountains in Japan producedrocks of the following facies, with rising temperature: chloritefacies, pumpellyite-chlorite facies, glauco-phane-schist facies,and greenschist facies. This relationship is compared with theprogressive metamorphic zones in other regions where pumpellyitehas been found. Almost similar relations appear to hold in manymetamorphic terrains. Pumpellyites in glaucophanitic metamorphicterrains have, generally, low Fe'/R'R ratios. Physical andchemical conditions responsible for the formation of pumpellyiteare also discussed.     

Impact of soil moisture and winter wheat height from the Loess Plateau in Northwest China on surface spectral albedo

The understanding of surface spectral radiation and reflected radiation characteristics of different surfaces in different climate zones aids in the interpretation of regional surface energy transfers and the development of land surface models. This study analysed surface spectral radiation variations and corresponding surface albedo characteristics at different wavelengths as well as the relationship between 5-cm soil moisture and surface albedo on typical sunny days during the winter wheat growth period. The analysis was conducted using observational Loess Plateau winter wheat data from 2015. The results show that the ratio of atmospheric downward radiation to global radiation on typical sunny days is highest for near-infrared wavelengths, followed by visible wavelengths and ultraviolet wavelengths, with values of 57.3, 38.7 and 4.0%, respectively. The ratio of reflected spectral radiation to global radiation varies based on land surface type. The visible radiation reflected by vegetated surfaces is far less than that reflected by bare ground, with surface albedos of 0.045 and 0.27, respectively. Thus, vegetated surfaces absorb more visible radiation than bare ground. The atmospheric downward spectral radiation to global radiation diurnal variation ratios vary for near-infrared wavelengths versus visible and ultraviolet wavelengths on typical sunny days. The near-infrared wavelengths ratio is higher in the morning and evening and lower at noon. The visible and ultraviolet wavelengths ratios are lower in the morning and evening and higher at noon. Visible and ultraviolet wavelength surface albedo is affected by 5-cm soil moisture, demonstrating a significant negative correlation. Excluding near-infrared wavelengths, correlations between surface albedo and 5-cm soil moisture pass the 99% confidence test at each wavelength. The correlation with 5-cm soil moisture is more significant at shorter wavelengths. However, this study obtained surface spectral radiation characteristics that were affected by land surface vegetation coverage as well as by soil physical properties.     

Climate and climate change in the Austrian–Swiss region of the European Alps during the twentieth century according to Feddema

We present a 1-km² gridded German dataset of hourly surface climate variables covering the period 1995 to 2012. The dataset comprises 12 variables including temperature, dew point, cloud cover, wind speed and direction, global and direct shortwave radiation, down- and up-welling longwave radiation, sea level pressure, relative humidity and vapour pressure. This dataset was constructed statistically from station data, satellite observations and model data. It is outstanding in terms of spatial and temporal resolution and in the number of climate variables. For each variable, we employed the most suitable gridding method and combined the best of several information sources, including station records, satellite-derived data and data from a regional climate model. A module to estimate urban heat island intensity was integrated for air and dew point temperature. Owing to the low density of available synop stations, the gridded dataset does not capture all variations that may occur at a resolution of 1 km². This applies to areas of complex terrain (all the variables), and in particular to wind speed and the radiation parameters. To achieve maximum precision, we used all observational information when it was available. This, however, leads to inhomogeneities in station network density and affects the long-term consistency of the dataset. A first climate analysis for Germany was conducted. The Rhine River Valley, for example, exhibited more than 100 summer days in 2003, whereas in 1996, the number was low everywhere in Germany. The dataset is useful for applications in various climate-related studies, hazard management and for solar or wind energy applications and it is available via doi: 10.5676/DWD_CDC/TRY_Basis_v001.     

Urban-rural fog differences in Belgrade area,Serbia

Urban/rural fog appearance during the last 27 years in the Belgrade region is analysed using hourly meteorological records from two meteorological stations: an urban station at Belgrade-Vra?ar (BV) and a rural station at Belgrade-Airport (BA). The effects of urban development on fog formation are discussed through analysis of fog frequency trends and comparison with a number of meteorological parameters. The mean annual and the mean annual minimum temperatures were greater at the urban BV station than at the rural BA station. The mean monthly relative humidity and the mean monthly water vapour pressure were greater at the rural than urban station. During the period of research (1988–2014), BA experiences 425 more days with fog than BV, which means that BV experiences fog for 62.68% of foggy days at BA. Trends in the number of days with fog were statistically non-significant. We analysed the fog occurrence during different types of weather. Fog in urban BV occurred more frequently during cyclonal circulation (in 52.75% of cases). In rural BA, the trend was the opposite and fog appeared more frequently during anticyclonic circulation (in 53.58% of cases). Fog at BV occurred most frequently in stable anticyclonic weather with light wind, when a temperature inversion existed (21.86% of cases). Most frequently, fog at BA occurred in the morning and only lasted a short time, followed by clearer skies during the anticyclonic warm and dry weather (22.55% of cases).     

Performance of CMORPH,TMPA, and PERSIANN rainfall datasets over plain,mountainous, and glacial regions of Pakistan

The present study aims at the assessment of six satellite rainfall estimates (SREs) in Pakistan. For each assessed products, both real-time (RT) and post adjusted (Adj) versions are considered to highlight their potential benefits in the rainfall estimation at annual, monthly, and daily temporal scales. Three geomorphological climatic zones, i.e., plain, mountainous, and glacial are taken under considerations for the determination of relative potentials of these SREs over Pakistan at global and regional scales. All SREs, in general, have well captured the annual north-south rainfall decreasing patterns and rainfall amounts over the typical arid regions of the country. Regarding the zonal approach, the performance of all SREs has remained good over mountainous region comparative to arid regions. This poor performance in accurate rainfall estimation of all the six SREs over arid regions has made their use questionable in these regions. Over glacier region, all SREs have highly overestimated the rainfall. One possible cause of this overestimation may be due to the low surface temperature and radiation absorption over snow and ice cover, resulting in their misidentification with rainy clouds as daily false alarm ratio has increased from mountainous to glacial regions. Among RT products, CMORPH-RT is the most biased product. The Bias was almost removed on CMORPH-Adj thanks to the gauge adjustment. On a general way, all Adj versions outperformed their respective RT versions at all considered temporal scales and have confirmed the positive effects of gauge adjustment. CMORPH-Adj and TMPA-Adj have shown the best agreement with in situ data in terms of Bias, RMSE, and CC over the entire study area.     

Drivers of long-term precipitation and runoff variability in the southeastern USA

The hydroclimatology of the southeastern USA (AL, GA, NC, SC, and TN) is analyzed from a holistic perspective, including multiple climate drivers. Monthly precipitation modeled by the PRISM group and runoff data (1952–2011) from 18 basins are analyzed using a single-field based principal component’s analysis. Results indicate that the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation and El Niño-Southern Oscillation are the main atmospheric drivers of hydroclimate variability in the region, sometimes operating at several months’ lag. Their influence is the strongest in the fall through spring, which corresponds with the dry season in the southern parts of the study area thereby increasing pressure on already limited water resources. The Arctic Oscillation, North Atlantic Oscillation, and Pacific-North American patterns vary on shorter-term bases, and also show a significant, but temporally more sporadic influence. Insight is also brought to the ongoing discussion, confirming the disassociation of the Arctic and North Atlantic Oscillation. Findings can be used in water resources forecasting, giving an indication of expected water volumes several months ahead.     

Regional intensity–duration–frequency analysis in the Eastern Black Sea Basin,Turkey, by using L-moments and regression analysis

The analysis of rainfall frequency is an important step in hydrology and water resources engineering. However, a lack of measuring stations, short duration of statistical periods, and unreliable outliers are among the most important problems when designing hydrology projects. In this study, regional rainfall analysis based on L-moments was used to overcome these problems in the Eastern Black Sea Basin (EBSB) of Turkey. The L-moments technique was applied at all stages of the regional analysis, including determining homogeneous regions, in addition to fitting and estimating parameters from appropriate distribution functions in each homogeneous region. We studied annual maximum rainfall height values of various durations (5 min to 24 h) from seven rain gauge stations located in the EBSB in Turkey, which have gauging periods of 39 to 70 years. Homogeneity of the region was evaluated by using L-moments. The goodness-of-fit criterion for each distribution was defined as the Z^DIST statistics, depending on various distributions, including generalized logistic (GLO), generalized extreme value (GEV), generalized normal (GNO), Pearson type 3 (PE3), and generalized Pareto (GPA). GLO and GEV determined the best distributions for short (5 to 30 min) and long (1 to 24 h) period data, respectively. Based on the distribution functions, the governing equations were extracted for calculation of intensities of 2, 5, 25, 50, 100, 250, and 500 years return periods (T). Subsequently, the T values for different rainfall intensities were estimated using data quantifying maximum amount of rainfall at different times. Using these T values, duration, altitude, latitude, and longitude values were used as independent variables in a regression model of the data. The determination coefficient (R ²) value indicated that the model yields suitable results for the regional relationship of intensity–duration–frequency (IDF), which is necessary for the design of hydraulic structures in small and medium sized catchments.