Properties of optical fibres at cryogenic temperatures

A perhaps surprising property of optical fibres is that they remain flexible at cryogenic temperatures. This implies that they may be used for multiple-object and integral field spectroscopy in the thermal infrared in cryogenic instrumentation. In this paper the results of performance tests of optical fibres (silica and zirconium fluoride) at cryogenic temperatures are presented. By mounting the fibres in glass tubes with the appropriate adhesive, it was found that only negligible focal ratio degradation occurs when the fibre is cooled to 77 K.     

Probabilistic domain decomposition for the solution of the two-dimensional magnetotelluric problem

Probabilistic domain decomposition is proposed as a novel method for solving the two-dimensional Maxwell’s equations as used in the magnetotelluric method. The domain is split into non-overlapping sub-domains and the solution on the sub-domain boundaries is obtained by evaluating the stochastic form of the exact solution of Maxwell’s equations by a Monte-Carlo approach. These sub-domains can be naturally chosen by splitting the sub-surface domain into regions of constant (or at least continuous) conductivity. The solution over each sub-domain is obtained by solving Maxwell’s equations in the strong form. The sub-domain solver used for this purpose is a meshless method resting on radial basis function-based finite differences. The method is demonstrated by solving a number of classical magnetotelluric problems, including the quarter-space problem, the block-in-half-space problem and the triangle-in-half-space problem.     

Method for calibrating a theoretical model in karst springs: an example for a hydropower station in South China

A theoretical, dimensionless rainfall–runoff model was used to simulate the discharge of Wulongdong spring in western Hubei province, South China. The single parameter (time constant τ) in the model is easy to obtain by fitting the recession rate of the observed hydrographs. The model was scaled by simply matching the total annual flow volume of the model to the observed value. Annual distribution of actual evapotranspiration was embedded in the model input to calculate the accumulated deficit of soil moisture before each rain event. Hourly precipitation input data performed better than daily data, defining τ of 0.85 days and returning a Nash–Sutcliffe efficiency of 0.89 and the root mean square error of 0.07. This model offers an effective way to simulate the discharge of karst springs that respond sensitively to rainfall events. The model parameters of a successful simulation can be used to estimate the recharge area and indicate the intrinsic response time of the basin. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Water Quality in the Great Barrier Reef World Heritage Area: Past Perspectives, Current Issues and New Research Directions

Elevated sediment and nutrient concentrations have long been regarded as the pre-eminent water quality threats to the Great Barrier Reef, with the potential risk posed by other pollutants such as heavy metals, persistent chlorohydrocarbons, PCBs and petroleum related compounds considered to be of lesser consequence. However, the management focus on these latter types of pollutants has recently shifted to acknowledge the potential impact posed by diuron, dioxins, dieldrin, and mercury and cadmium concentrations detected in sediments and biota along the Great Barrier Reef and southern Queensland coastline. In general, these threats originate from areas dominated by intensive cropping agriculture and are exacerbated by high rainfall and erosion rates in the wet tropics region of the Queensland coast. Maintenance of long-term monitoring programmes, which utilize innovative data acquisition techniques will enable assessment of change in environmentally relevant pollutant concentrations over time. However, improved land management practices, which include an immediate minimization of vegetation clearance and responsible use of pesticides and fertilizers in Queensland are essential if water quality in the Great Barrier Reef World Heritage Area is to be maintained and protected.     

PHYSIOGRAPHY,FORAMINIFERA AND SEDIMENTATION IN THE Dovey Estuary (Wales)

A study of the chemistry, circulation and sedimentation is followed by an outline account of the living and dead communities (particularly foraminifera) characteristic of the main physiographic subenvironments. On the basis of the relationships established these results are used in an interpretation of the vertical sequence.     

Properties of a Diffusive Hydrograph and the Interpretation of Its Single Parameter

The mathematical properties of the normalized diffusive hydrograph allow for easy determination of intrinsic basin characteristics. These include lag times between storm events and peak flow, recession rate, and the total, temporally integrated flow volume, all in terms of a single parameter, the basin time constant “b”. This simple function displays surprising fidelity to measured hydrographs of springs and hundreds of streams and small rivers. We explain this fidelity by showing that the curvature of the theoretical hydrograph matches that of the natural hydrographs better than several alternate models, and by demonstrating that the simple hydrograph function can be integrated over a range of time constants (0 to b _max) to represent the hierarchy of flow paths of varying lengths that exist in real watersheds. Surprisingly, the unwieldy analytical results from this integration are almost numerically indistinguishable from a simple hydrograph using a single, suitably-weighted average for the time constant. The peak flow times are shifted slightly. The accuracy with which the simple hydrograph approximates the integrated results for hierarchies of hydrographs representing individual flow paths explains why the former can realistically describe the discharge behaviors of complex natural watersheds.     

Terra Populus’ architecture for integrated big geospatial services

Big geospatial data is an emerging sub‐area of geographic information science, big data, and cyberinfrastructure. Big geospatial data poses two unique challenges. First, raster and vector data structures and analyses have developed on largely separate paths for the last 20 years. This is creating an impediment to geospatial researchers seeking to utilize big data platforms that do not promote heterogeneous data types. Second, big spatial data repositories have yet to be integrated with big data computation platforms in ways that allow researchers to spatio‐temporally analyze big geospatial datasets. IPUMS‐Terra, a National Science Foundation cyberInfrastructure project, addresses these challenges by providing a unified framework of integrated geospatial services which access, analyze, and transform big heterogeneous spatio‐temporal data. As IPUMS‐Terra's data volume grows, we seek to integrate geospatial platforms that will scale geospatial analyses and address current bottlenecks within our system. However, our work shows that there are still unresolved challenges for big geospatial analysis. The most pertinent is that there is a lack of a unified framework for conducting scalable integrated vector and raster data analysis. We conducted a comparative analysis between PostgreSQL with PostGIS and SciDB and concluded that SciDB is the superior platform for scalable raster zonal analyses.     

Oxygen isotope map of the giant metamorphic-hydrothermal system around the northern part of the Idaho batholith, U.S.A.

Determinations of δ¹⁸O values from 100 outcrops of Belt Supergroup (Wallace Fm.) metasedimentary rocks in the Idaho panhandle reveal a regular regional pattern that was produced by pervasive fluid infiltration and isotopic exchange. Low grade argillites at large distances (60 km) from the Idaho batholith have high δ¹⁸O values +15, compatible with their probable primary values. Pelitic rocks with anomalously low δ¹⁸O values of + 8.7 to + 12.7‰ occur in the following zones: (1) in a 5000 km² zone of schist and gneiss peripheral to the Idaho batholith, generally coincident with high-grade (sillimanite-bearing) assemblages; (2) in high-grade metasedimentary roof pendants within the Idaho batholith; (3) peripheral to small Cretaceous stocks; and (4) within and near the scapolite-bearing zone south-west of St. Regis. On δ¹⁸O−δ¹⁸O plots, data from coexisting minerals define trends with unit slopes, indicating that the reductions in ¹⁸O occurred under high-grade metamorphic conditions. This metamorphism culminated in the emplacement of the Idaho batholith, probably as a consequence of profound crustal thickening associated with the Cretaceous accretion of the Wallowa-Seven Devils arc terranes with North America. The huge low-¹⁸O region is bounded by a “steep” δ¹⁸O gradient (0.1–0.5‰/km) that occurs in low-grade rocks along and near the Lewis and Clark Line, well below the biotite isograd. This boundary zone may be analogous to, but is not nearly as sharp as, those of meteoric-hydrothermal systems in many regions. The important ore deposits of the Coeur d'Alene district are located in this peripheral zone, suggesting that the metamorphic-hydrothermal system may have been intimately involved in their formation. In addition, the metamorphic-hydrotermal system in Idaho is larger, deeper and higher in temperature than typical meteoric-hydrothermal systems, and it involved fluids with much higher δ¹⁸O values that were probably dominantly derived from formation waters. Accordingly, this system produced rocks with δ¹⁸O values similar to those of the Idaho batholith, and mineral assemblages that approach isotopic equilibrium under high temperature conditions.