竺可桢先生对气候变迁研究的贡献

1972年,竺可桢先生发表了《中国近五千年来气候变迁的初步研究》著名论文。这是他在文化革命动乱年代发表的唯一的论文,也是他的最后一篇论文,然而却又是他最为光彩影响最大的学术论文之一。竺可桢先生在一九六六年就写成了《中国近五千年来气候变迁的初步研究》初稿,并在他参加的罗马尼亚科学院一百周年纪念会上散发。回国后,他又进一步补充、修改。     

基于FY-3/MERSI数据的北冰洋流冰自动提取与跟踪方法

北冰洋航路是未来全球航运的重点开拓领域,海冰运动对北冰洋航路开发有重要影响。本文利用风云三号卫星中分辨率光谱成像仪(FY-3/MERSI)数据的特点和优势,研究北冰洋流冰自动提取和运动跟踪的方法。首先在分析流冰灰度分布特征的基础上,提出分区域阈值分割与梯度差分相结合的方法实现块状流冰提取,然后根据块状流冰的多种几何特征匹配同名流冰并计算其运动速度。应用这种方法跟踪2011年6月弗雷姆海峡流冰运动,跟踪结果与美国国家冰雪数据中心提供的极地网格化日均海冰运动矢量整体趋势一致,验证了方法的有效性。这种方法获取各块流冰实际运动速度,可以有效弥补网格化海冰运动平均速度场分布和细节的不足,为北冰洋航路开发提供更详细的流冰运动信息。     

Inferring trip purposes and uncovering travel patterns from taxi trajectory data

Global positioning system-enabled vehicles provide an efficient way to obtain large quantities of movement data for individuals. However, the raw data usually lack activity information, which is highly valuable for a range of applications and services. This study provides a novel and practical framework for inferring the trip purposes of taxi passengers such that the semantics of taxi trajectory data can be enriched. The probability of points of interest to be visited is modeled by Bayes’ rules, which take both spatial and temporal constraints into consideration. Combining this approach with Monte Carlo simulations, we conduct a study on Shanghai taxi trajectory data. Our results closely approximate the residents’ travel survey data in Shanghai. Furthermore, we reveal the spatiotemporal characteristics of nine daily activity types based on inference results, including their temporal regularities, spatial dynamics, and distributions of trip lengths and directions. In the era of big data, we encounter the dilemma of “trajectory data rich but activity information poor” when investigating human movements from various data sources. This study presents a promising step toward mining abundant activity information from individuals’ trajectories.     

The comparative study of multi‐site uncertainty evaluation method based on SWAT model

With the recent development of distributed hydrological models, the use of multi‐site observed data to evaluate model performance is becoming more common. Distributed hydrological model have many advantages, and at the same time, it also faces the challenge to calibrate over‐do parameters. As a typical distributed hydrological model, problems also exist in Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) parameter calibration. In the paper, four different uncertainty approaches – Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) techniques, Generalized Likelihood Uncertainty Estimation (GLUE), Sequential Uncertainty Fitting algorithm (SUFI‐2) and Parameter Solution (PARASOL) – are taken to a comparative study with the SWAT model applied in Peace River Basin, central Florida. In our study, the observed river discharge data used in SWAT model calibration were collected from the three gauging stations at the main tributary of the Peace River. Behind these approaches, there is a shared philosophy; all methods seek out many parameter set to fit the uncertainties due to the non‐uniqueness in model parameter evaluation. On the basis of the statistical results of four uncertainty methods, difficulty level of each method, the number of runs and theoretical basis, the reasons that affected the accuracy of simulation were analysed and compared. Furthermore, for the four uncertainty method with SWAT model in the study area, the pairwise correlation between parameters and the distributions of model fit summary statistics computed from the sampling over the behavioural parameter and the entire model calibration parameter feasible spaces were identified and examined. It provided additional insight into the relative identifiability of the four uncertainty methods Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Controls of 234Th removal from the oligotrophic ocean by polyuronic acids and modification by microbial activity

To gain new insights into the variability of particulate organic carbon (POC) fluxes and to better understand the factors controlling the POC/²³⁴Th ratios in suspended and sinking particulate matter, we investigated the relationships between POC/²³⁴Th ratios and biochemical composition (uronic acids, URA; total carbohydrates, TCHO; acid polysaccharides, APS; and POC) of suspended and sinking matter from the Gulf of Mexico in 2005 and 2006. Our data show that URA/POC in sediment traps (STs), APS/POC in the suspended particles, and turnover times of particulate ²³⁴Th in the water column and those of bacteria in STs inside eddies usually increased with depth, whereas particulate POC/²³⁴Th (10–50 μm) and the sediment-trap parameters (POC flux, POC/²³⁴Th ratio, bacterial biomass, and bacterial production) decreased with depth. However, this trend was not the case for most biological parameters (e.g., phytoplankton and bacterial biomass) or for the other parameters at the edges of eddies or at coastal-upwelling sites.In general, the following relationships were observed: 1) ²³⁴Th/POC ratios in STs were correlated with APS flux, and these ratios in the 10–50 μm suspended particles also correlated with URA/POC ratios; 2) neither URA fluxes nor URA/POC ratios were significantly related to bacterial biomass; 3) the sum of two uronic acids (G2, glucuronic, and galacturonic acid, which composed most of the URA pool) was positively related to bacterial biomass; and 4) the POC/²³⁴Th ratios in intermediate-sized particles (10–50 μm) were close to those in sinking particles but much lower than those in > 50 μm particles. The results indicate that acid polysaccharides, though a minor fraction (~ 1%) of the organic carbon, act more likely as proxy compound classes that might contain the more refractory ²³⁴Th-binding biopolymer, rather than acting as the original ²³⁴Th “scavenger” compound. Moreover, these acid polysaccharides, which might first be produced by phytoplankton and then modified by bacteria, also influence the on-and-off “piggy-back” processes of organic matter and ²³⁴Th, thus causing additional variability of the POC/²³⁴Th in particles of different sizes.     

The response of salt intrusion to changes in river discharge and tidal mixing during the dry season in the Modaomen Estuary,China

The increase of salt intrusion in recent years in the Modaomen Estuary, one of the estuaries of the Pearl River Delta in China, has threatened the freshwater supply in the surrounding regions, especially the cities of Zhongshan, Zhuhai in Guangdong Province and Macau. A numerical modeling system using nested grids was developed to investigate the salt transport mechanisms and the response of salt intrusion to changes in river discharge and tidal mixing. The steady shear transport induced by estuarine circulation reaches maximum and minimum, respectively, during neap and spring tides, while the tidal oscillatory transport shows an opposite pattern. The net transport is landward during neap tides and seaward during spring tides. The salt intrusion length responding to constant river discharges generally follows a power law of ?0.49. The dependence of salt intrusion on tidal velocity is less than that predicted by theoretical models for exchange flow dominated estuaries. The response of salt intrusion to change in tidal velocity depends largely on river discharge. When river flow increases, the impact of tidal velocity increases and the phase lag of response time decreases. The asymmetries of salt intrusion responding to increasing and decreasing river discharge (tidal velocity) are observed in the estuary.     

Evidence of lateral asthenosphere flow beneath the South China craton driven by both Pacific plate subduction and the India–Eurasia continental collision

South China Cenozoic basalts (SCCB) are regionally distributed at the south‐east coastal area and can be grouped into three zones: a western zone (>38 Ma), a central zone (17–8 Ma) and an eastern zone (<8 Ma), leaving a temporal gap at 38–17 Ma between the western and central zones. An eastward migration of the SCCB could therefore be identified by the systematic decrease in the eruption age from the western inland to the eastern coast. We propose that most SCCB were associated with the lateral asthenospheric flows moving along the lithosphere/asthenosphere boundary (LAB) beneath South China and the subsequent decompressional partial melting. The lateral asthenospheric flows had been pulled by the eastward retreat of the pan‐Pacific plate subduction before 38 Ma and have been pushed by the northward indentation of the Indian plate into the Eurasian plate since 17 Ma.     

Rock burst and slabbing failure and its influence on TBM excavation at headrace tunnels in Jinping II hydropower station

Two headrace tunnels and the drainage tunnel were excavated by tunnel boring machines (TBMs) in Jinping II Hydropower Station. During TBM excavation, two types of slabbing failure were encountered in these deep buried marble tunnels. One is rock bursting and the other is non-violent slabbing. In order to study the rock burst and slabbing failure, a unique true triaxial rock burst test was carried out to simulate the rock burst process with different in situ stresses. Four rock samples in different marble layers were obtained in the site, and then four experiments are conducted under the same stressed conditions as the in situ field. The rock burst process and slabbing failure phenomena of the four experiments are in good accordance with the observations of corresponding excavation site. The failure modes of slabbing and rock burst in different rock groups can be predicted based on the experiments. The influence of the slabbing and rock burst failure on TBM excavation is analyzed in depth. Non-violent slabbing is beneficial to the rock breakage process. Rock burst with violent slabbing process greatly affects the tunnel support, cutter and cutterhead damage, gripper movement and force and so on.     

Utilization of an H-reversal trajectory of a solar sail for asteroid deflection

Near Earth Asteroids have a possibility of impacting the Earth and always represent a threat. This paper proposes a way of changing the orbit of the asteroid to avoid an impact. A solar sail evolving in an H-reversal trajectory is utilized for asteroid deflection. Firstly, the dynamics of the solar sail and the characteristics of the H-reversal trajectory are analyzed. Then, the attitude of the solar sail is optimized to guide the sail to impact the target asteroid along an H-reversal trajectory. The impact...