THE DEL RIO ATAXITE,TEXAS

Del Rio is a new ataxite from Texas that is not related to either Monahans or Nordheim, the only previously known ataxites from Texas. Del Rio has a nickel content of approximately 12.9 weight percent, apparently has been shocked prior to its fall, and contains minor inclusions of daubreelite, schreibersite and troilite.     

Wideband monopulse sonar performance: cylindrical target simulationusing an acoustic scattering center model

A time-domain simulation that lends itself to the study of complex ocean environments, including complex seafloor shapes and suspended objects, has been developed. This simulation is used to study the response of a monopulse sonar to the presence of rigid cylinders near the seafloor. An acoustic-scattering-center model is developed to represent the cylinders, and several examples are presented and discussed     

Structure-composition relations and Raman spectroscopy of high-pressure sodium silicates

?-Na₂Si₂O₅, ζ-Na₂Si₂O₅, Na₂Si[Si₂O₇], and Na₆Si₃[Si₉O₂₇] have been synthesized using an MA6/8 superpress. Densification in high-pressure sodium silicates is effected largely by changes in packing. In the relaxed (1 bar) structures, cation polyhedra and thermal/displacement parameters are similar to those of low-pressure silicates, but the extra-framework cation positions are oversized. The two mixed ^[4]Si and ^[6]Si framework silicates of known structure (Na₂Si[Si₂O₇] and Na₆Si₃[Si₉O₂₇]) belong to the limited homologous series Na_2mSi_m[Si_n–mO_2n+m], with m<n. The structure-composition relationships of wadeite-type, A₂Ge₄O₉-type, and Na₆Si₃[Si₉O₂₇] silicates and germanates depend on T-O distance and size of the large extra-framework cation. Characteristic features of the SiO₄ tetrahedral units are present in micro-Raman spectra of mixed ^[4]Si and ^[6]Si framework silicates, but bands uniquely attributable to SiO₆ octahedra are weak or obscured. However, ^[6]Si has a profound indirect influence on the Raman spectra, resulting in intense and complex low-frequency bands, assigned to symmetric bending modes with coupled displacements at both bridging oxygens and nonbridging oxygens bonded to ^[6]Si, and a shift to higher frequency and reduction in intensity of the high-frequency bands assigned to symmetric ^[4]Si-O_nbr stretching vibrations. Raman spectroscopy does not appear to be a useful structural probe for small amounts of ^[6]Si in silicate glasses and melts.     

Temperature, CO2 and the growth and development of wheat: Changes in the mean and variability of growing conditions

The experiment described here resulted from simulation analyses of climate-change studies that highlighted the relative importance of changes in the mean and variance of climatic conditions in the prediction of crop development and yield. Growth and physiological responses of four old cultivars of winter wheat, to three temperature and two carbon dioxide (CO₂) regimes (350 or 700 ppmv) were studied in controlled environment chambers. Experimental results supported the previous simulation analyses. For plants experiencing a 3 °C increase in day and night temperatures, relative to local long-term mean temperatures (control treatment), anthesis and the end of grain filling were advanced, and grain and dry matter yields were reduced by 27% and 18%, respectively. Increasing the diurnal temperature range, but maintaining the same mean temperature as the control, reduced the maximum leaf area (27%) and grain yield (13%) but did not affect plant development. Differences among the temperature treatments in both phyllochron interval and anthesis date may have resulted from differences between measured air, and unmeasured plant, temperatures, caused by evaporative cooling of the plants. Thermal time (base = 0 °C), calculated from air temperature, from anthesis to the end of grain filling was about 650 °C d for all cultivars and treatments. Doubling ambient CO₂ concentration to 700 ppmv reduced maximum leaf area (21%) but did not influence plant development or tiller numbers.     

Self-organised criticality and fluid-rock interactions in the brittle field

The concept of self-organised criticality (SOC) has recently been suggested as a paradigm for the long-term behaviour of earthquakes, even though many of the currently-proposed models require some tuning of the state variables or local conservation rules to produce the universally-observed Gutenberg-Richter frequency-magnitude distribution witha b value near 1. For example, a systematic negative correlation is predicted between modelb values and the degree of conservation of local force after the slip of a single element in an elastic spring/block/frictional slider model. A similar relation is described here for a cellular automaton model with constitutive laws based on fracture mechanics. Such systems, although critical phenomena in the sense of producing order on all scales, are clearly not universal, and may not in general even be true examples of SOC. Nevertheless they adequately reproduce both the observed power-law (fractal or multifractal) scaling and its reported short-term fluctuation.We also present experimental and field evidence for similar systematic variations inb value with the degree of force conservation (expressed in terms of a normalised crack extension force) during subcritical crack growth involving the physical and chemical influence of pore fluids during a single cycle of failure both in tension and compression. We find that the level of conservation is strongly influenced by fluid-rock interaction under stress, allowing energy partition into processes such as: physico-chemical stress corrosion reactions; the dissolution and precipitation of mineral species on crack surfaces; and the purely mechnical phenomenon of dilatant hardening. All of these are known to occur in the Earth on a local scale, but few have been explicitly included in automaton models of seismicity. The implication is that over long time periods pore fluids may exert a strong physical and chemical influence on the universal state of SOC which the system evolves in a complex interplay of local feedback mechanisms keeping the system near criticality, perhaps most strikingly due to the valve action of faults. In the short term, crustal fluids might nevertheless be responsible for systematic local fluctuations about this average state.     

Characteristics of alkenones synthesized by a bloom of emiliania huxleyi in the Bering Sea

We investigated the characteristics of the alkenones produced by a bloom of Emiliania huxleyi in the eastern Bering Sea in 2000. Alkenones were detected in surface waters between 57°N and 63°N, where phosphate concentrations were low and the ammonium/nitrate ratio was high. The total alkenone content (C_37:2, C_37:3, and C_37:4) ranged from 22.0 to 349 μg g⁻¹ in suspended particles and from 0.109 to 1.42 μg g⁻¹ in surface sediments. This suggests that a large proportion of the particulate alkenones synthesized in the surface water rapidly degraded within the water column and/or at the water-sediment interface of the Bering Shelf. The change in the stable carbon isotopic composition (δ¹³C) of C_37:3 alkenone could not be explained only by variation in [CO₂(aq)] in the surface water but also depended on the growth rate of E. huxleyi. The alkenone unsaturation index (U^K′₃₇) was converted into an alkenone “temperature” with three equations [Prahl et al 1988], [Sikes et al 1997] and [Müller et al 1998]; Sikes et al.’s (1997) equation gave the best correlation with the observed sea surface temperature (SST) in the eastern Bering Sea. However, some temperatures estimated by Sikes et al.’s (1997) equation from the U^K′₃₇ varied from the observed SST, possibly because of the rapidly changing rate of alkenone synthesis in the logarithmic growth stage or the low rate of alkenone synthesis when nutrients were limiting. Temperatures estimated from U^K′₃₇ in the surface sediments (6.8-8.2°C) matched the observed SST in September (7-8°C) but differed from the annual average SST of 4 to 5°C, suggesting that most of the alkenone in the eastern Bering Sea was synthesized during limited periods, for instance, in September. The relative amounts of C_37:4 alkenone as proportions of the total alkenones (referred to as C_37:4%) were high, ranging from 18.3 to 41.4%. Low-salinity water (<32 psu) within the study area would have contributed to the high C_37:4% because a negative linear relationship between C_37:4% and salinity was found in this study.     

Temperature dependence of δLi, δCa and Li/Ca during growth of calcium carbonate

Lithium and calcium isotope ratios, together with the Li/Ca element ratio, have been measured in calcites precipitated inorganically at temperatures ranging from 5 to 30 °C, and on seasonal growth bands from a coral. These measurements indicate the potential uses of these three environmental proxies. Carbonate Li isotopes are lighter than the solution from which they grow, probably due to equilibrium fractionation. This fractionation is not significantly influenced by temperature and, because Li is not involved in any known biological process, this suggests that carbonates will provide a recorder for the past Li-isotope composition of natural waters and hence for past weathering conditions. As has been observed previously for inorganic aragonite, the Ca-isotopes in inorganic calcite are lighter than the growth solution, and are only weakly dependent on temperature. This confirms that the temperature dependence observed in some species of foraminifera [Geochem. Geophys. Geosyst. 1 (2001)] reflects additional isotope fractionation due to biological processes during mineralization. Ca isotopes may therefore provide a powerful tool with which to investigate the processes of biomineralization. Finally, Li/Ca ratios in inorganic and biogenic carbonates increase as temperatures decrease with a sensitivity of ≈4% per °C. This temperature dependence of Li/Ca may prove useful to assess past temperatures in cold environments such as the deep ocean.     

A computer model for the cubic sodalite structure

A computer model for cubic sodalite structures, general formula M ₈(T ₁₂O₂₄)X ₂ where M, X and T are the cavity cation and anion and framework cation respectively, has been devised. It has been used to determine the effect of changing cavity cation and anion radii on the cell edge, tilt angle of the tetrahedra and T-O-T angle for the following sodalite frameworks: (Al₆Si₆O₂₄)^6?, (Be₆Si₆O₂₄)^12?, (Al₁₂O₂₄)^12?, and (B₁₂O₂₄)^12?. After fixing the T-O distance(s), the cavity cation-framework oxygen distance and taking a value of 1.4 Å for the radius of oxygen the model was used to calculate atomic coordinates and interatomic distances and angles for selected aluminosilicate-sodalites. The structure calculated for Na₈(Al₆Si₆O₂₄)Cl₂ agrees closely with that determined for natural sodalite (Löns and Schulz, 1967). The model is also applied to the estimation of the effective radii of the tetrahedrally-coordinated cavity anions which can be accommodated in natural and synthetic sodalites: OH^? 1.48–1.51, Cl^? 1.78, Br^? 1.93, I^? 2.14–2.17, SO ₄ ^2? 2.37–2.57, MoO ₄ ^2? 2.70 and WO ₄ ^2? 2.79 Å.     

Rare earth element investigation of the Cliefden Outcrop,N.S.W., Australia

The effect of low grade hydrous burial metamorphism (prehnite-pumpellyite facies) upon the rare earth elements (REE) has been studied by using samples from the Cliefden Outcrop, New South Wales. The REE, together with other reputedly immobile elements, have been mobilised during the metamorphism. Although mobile, the REE have behaved remarkably coherently with little light rare earth (LREE) fractionation. This is reflected in the chondrite normalised patterns which are sub-parallel to parallel in shape. High correlations of REE with other elements can be used to predict the maximum likely variation of these elements in the studied outcrop. The high correlations do not necessarily mean that, for similarly metamorphosed terrains, crystallisation-differentiation processes have operated but may rather have resulted from strong geochemical coherence during post-crystallisation elemental redistribution. The REE do not appear to be strongly domain controlled within the Cliefden Outcrop.