Quantum-thermodynamic treatment of intrinsic anharmonicity; Wallace’s theorem revisited

Wallace (in Thermodynamics of crystals, 1972) developed a theorem, rooted in rigid lattice dynamics, which incorporates intrinsic anharmonic effects in solids. The practical application of this theorem in mineral physics is computationally involved and this is the main reason for the theorem not getting the attention it deserves. Because intrinsic anharmonicity is an important issue at the extreme conditions in planetary mantles, we derived a method which removes the computational obstacles in applying this theorem. We extended the theorem to incorporate details of the phonon spectrum and tested our algorithm on forsterite (Mg₂SiO₄). Using a least squares inversion technique applied to all available experimental data, we show that it results in an accurate representation of thermodynamic properties and sound wave velocities of Mg₂SiO₄ in its complete pressure–temperature stability range. We also show that the accuracy of our results is not significantly affected by the use of a different equation of state.     

Stochastic Modelling of the Impact of Flood Protection Measures Along the River Waal in the Netherlands

River flooding is a problem of international interest. In the past few years many countries suffered from severe floods. A large part of the Netherlands is below sea level and river levels. The Dutch flood defences along the river Rhine are designed for water levels with a probability of exceedance of 1/1250 per year. These water levels are computed with a hydrodynamic model using a deterministic bed level and a deterministic design discharge. Traditionally, the safety against flooding in the Netherlands is obtained by building and reinforcing dikes. Recently, a new policy was proposed to cope with increasing design discharges in the Rhine and Meuse rivers. This policy is known as the Room for the River (RfR) policy, in which a reduction of flood levels is achieved by measures creating space for the river, such as dike replacement, side channels and floodplain lowering. As compared with dike reinforcement, these measures may have a stronger impact on flow and sediment transport fields, probably leading to stronger morphological effects. As a result of the latter the flood conveyance capacity may decrease over time. An a priori judgement of safety against flooding on the basis of an increased conveyance capacity of the river can be quite misleading. Therefore, the determination of design water levels using a fixed-bed hydrodynamic model may not be justified and the use of a mobile-bed approach may be more appropriate. This problem is addressed in this paper, using a case study of the river Waal (one of the Rhine branches in the Netherlands). The morphological response of the river Waal to a flood protection measure (floodplain lowering in combination with summer levee removal) is analysed. The effect of this measure is subject to various sources of uncertainty. Monte Carlo simulations are applied to calculate the impact of uncertainties in the river discharge on the bed levels. The impact of the “uncertain” morphological response on design flood level predictions is analysed for three phenomena, viz. the impact of the spatial morphological variation over years, the impact of the seasonal morphological variation and the impact of the morphological variability around bifurcation points. The impact of seasonal morphological variations turns out to be negligible, but the other two phenomena appear to have each an appreciable impact (order of magnitude 0.05–0.1 m) on the computed design water levels. We have to note however, that other sources of uncertainty (e.g. uncertainty in hydraulic roughness predictor), which may be of influence, are not taken into consideration. In fact, the present investigation is limited to the sensitivity of the design water levels to uncertainties in the predicted bed level.     

The Globalization of a Panethnopolis: Richmond District as the New Chinatown in San Francisco

This paper briefly reviews the sociological literature on the “New” Chinatown phenomenon stressing its structural location vis-à-vis the “Old” Chinatown and the homeland. It defines the New Chinatown as a panethnopolis, that is a global neighborhood with a majority population of Chinese immigrants and of other ethnic groups of mostly Asian descent. It analyzes more particularly the formation, development, and integration of San Francisco’s Richmond District’s New Chinatown into both the city where it is located and the network of transglobal sites to which it belongs. It provides an interpretation of the New Chinatown as a cultural enclave within the context of globalization theory.     

Nouvelles données pour l’histoire des fluctuations holocènes du niveau du lac de Neuchatel (Suisse): la séquence sédimentaire de Marin-Les Piécettes

Resume. Les fouilles archéologiques réalisées de 1998 à 2002 sur le site néolithique de Marin-Les Piécettes sur la rive nord-ouest du lac de Neuchatel ont offert l’opportunité d’observer deux séquences sédimentaires intéressantes pour la reconstitution des variations holocènes du niveau du lac, en particulier au cours de la période correspondant au changement de cours de l’Aar en direction du nord-est, vers 5650–5500 cal BP. La géométrie des corps sédimentaires et les changements lithologiques permettent de reconna?tre plusieurs phases majeures de bas niveaux relatifs du plan d’eau vers 6870, 5660, 5060–3990, 3580, 2280, 1640 et 1170 cal BP. Le site néolithique de Marin-Les Piécettes s’est développé vers 5454–5433 cal BP à la faveur d’un court épisode de bas niveau du lac qui a interrompu une importante phase de haut niveau au début du Subboréal. Les événements paléohydrologiques identifiés à Marin-Les Piécettes apparaissent cohérents avec ceux reconstitués sur le site de Montilier au bord du lac de Morat, ainsi qu’avec les variations paléohydrologiques reconstituées à partir des lacs du Jura, du Plateau suisse et des Préalpes du Nord fran?aises. Ceci suggère qu’ils témoignent d’un signal climatique. La séquence sédimentaire de Marin-Les Piécettes met enfin en évidence la formation d’un cordon littoral sur la rive nord-ouest du lac juste après 5660 cal BP. Manuscrit re?u le 22 septembre 2004 Révision acceptée le 11 mars 2005     

Polymorphic phase transition in Superhydrous Phase B

We synthesized superhydrous phase B (shy-B) at 22 GPa and two different temperatures: 1200°C (LT) and 1400°C (HT) using a multi-anvil apparatus. The samples were investigated by transmission electron microscopy (TEM), single crystal X-ray diffraction, Raman and IR spectroscopy. The IR spectra were collected on polycrystalline thin-films and single crystals using synchrotron radiation, as well as a conventional IR source at ambient conditions and in situ at various pressures (up to 15 GPa) and temperatures (down to −180°C). Our studies show that shy-B exists in two polymorphic forms. As expected from crystal chemistry, the LT polymorph crystallizes in a lower symmetry space group (Pnn2), whereas the HT polymorph assumes a higher symmetry space group (Pnnm). TEM shows that both modifications consist of nearly perfect crystals with almost no lattice defects or inclusions of additional phases. IR spectra taken on polycrystalline thin films exhibit just one symmetric OH band and 29 lattice modes for the HT polymorph in contrast to two intense but asymmetric OH stretching bands and at least 48 lattice modes for the LT sample. The IR spectra differ not only in the number of bands, but also in the response of the bands to changes in pressure. The pressure derivatives for the IR bands are higher for the HT polymorph indicating that the high symmetry form is more compressible than the low symmetry form. Polarized, low-temperature single-crystal IR spectra indicate that in the LT-polymorph extensive ordering occurs not only at the Mg sites but also at the hydrogen sites.     

Tetrahedral Plots of the Phase Relations for Basalts

The phase relations of quaternary systems are generally represented by projections onto ternary compositional planes. Such projections often obscure relationships that would only be evident in a three-dimensional tetrahedral plot. The tetrahedral plot requires that compositions of the minerals and melts be transformed into Cartesian coordinates. It is shown here how this transformation is carried out. The application is demonstrated by tetrahedral plots of experimental melt compositions of partially molten lherzolite. Furthermore, the plot can be used to evaluate whether or not a particular basaltic composition represents a primary melt. The methods are applicable to any four-component system.     

GPS monitoring of vertical ground motion in northern Ardenne–Eifel: five campaigns (1999–2003) of the HARD project

We present the HARD project of GPS monitoring of vertical ground motion in NE Ardenne and Eifel (western Europe). Its main purposes are to get a better insight into the present-day rates of vertical ground motion in intraplate settings and to identify the various causes of these motions. Since 1999, we have carried out yearly campaigns of simultaneous GPS measurements at 12 sites situated so as to sample the different tectonic subunits of the study area and especially to record potential displacements across the seismogenic Hockai fault zone. Five campaigns (1999–2003) have been processed currently. Key issues of the data processing with the Gamit software are discussed and first results are presented. Though temporally consistent in many cases, the obtained vertical motion rates are spatially highly variable. They are also much too high (several mm/year) to support a tectonic interpretation, and a long-term influence of groundwater level variations is proposed to account for the observed motions. This influence should be distinguished from seasonal variations and from inter-survey variations linked to the varying degree of soil and subsoil drying off during the successive spring surveys.     

Modeling the impact of microbial activity on redox dynamics in porous media

The present study investigates the interaction between microbial growth and activity and the redox dynamics in natural porous media. The impact the transport regime has on this interaction is also addressed. Expressions for microbial growth are incorporated into a geochemical reaction network linking redox reaction rates to the activity of the microorganisms. A flexible simulation environment, the Biogeochemical Reaction Network Simulator (BRNS) is used for this purpose. Two reactive transport applications relevant to fields of contaminant hydrology and early diagenesis are simulated with the BRNS. Model results are evaluated based on a comparison with comprehensive datasets on the biodegradation of lactate in a sand column experiment and on the distribution of redox-sensitive chemical species in marine sediments of the Skagerrak, Denmark. It is shown that, despite quite different transport regimes, the geomicrobiological model performs equally well in the reproduction of measured chemical species distribution for both applications. This result emphasizes the broad applicability of the proposed approach. Our simulations support that the competitive behavior between various microbial groups is a process controlling the development of redox stratified environments. Furthermore, it is also shown that the transport regime is a key controlling factor for the degree of spatial correlation between microbial biomass distributions and redox reaction rates. Although all our simulations yield a pronounced stratification of the redox processes in the system, the biomass distribution is related to the associated reaction rates only in case of the advection controlled column experiment. In the early diagenetic application, mixing due to bioturbation is the dominant transport process for particulate matter, hence leading to fairly homogeneous distribution of bacterial biomasses which are unrelated to the spatial distribution of redox reaction rates. This homogeneous biomass distribution combined with the 1G carbon degradation model approach might explain why the steady state concentration profiles in such systems can be reproduced by diagenetic models without explicit representation of microbial growth.     

Stratigraphy of Pleistocene glaciations in the St Elias Mountains,southwest Yukon,Canada

At least five Middle to Late Pleistocene advances of the northern Cordilleran Ice Sheet are preserved at Silver Creek, on the northeastern edge of the St Elias Mountains in southwest Yukon, Canada. Silver Creek is located 100 km up‐ice of the Marine Isotope Stage (MIS) 2 McConnell glacial limit of the St Elias lobe. This site contains ~3 km of nearly continuous lateral exposure of glacial and non‐glacial sediments, including multiple tills separated by thick gravel, loess and tilted lake beds. Infrared‐stimulated luminescence (IRSL) and AMS radiocarbon dating constrain the glacial deposits to MIS 2, 4, either MIS 6 or mid‐MIS 7, and two older Middle Pleistocene advances. This chronology and the tilt of the lake beds suggest Pleistocene uplift rates of up to 1.9 mm a^?1 along the Denali Fault since MIS 7. The non‐glacial sediment consists of sand, gravel, loess and organic beds from MIS 7, MIS 3 and the early Holocene. The MIS 3 deposits date to between 30–36 ¹⁴C ka BP, making Silver Creek one of the few well‐constrained MIS 3‐aged sites in Yukon. This confirms that ice receded close to modern limits in MIS 3. Pollen and macrofossil analyses show that a meadow‐tundra to steppe‐tundra mosaic with abundant herbs and forbs and few shrubs or trees, dominated the environment at this time. The stratigraphy at Silver Creek provides a palaeoclimatic record since at least MIS 8 and comprises the oldest direct record of Pleistocene glaciation in southwest Yukon.