Die Rheingrabenrandverwerfung im Wattkopftunnel bei Ettlingen (Nordschwarzwald)

The Wattkopftunnel, near Ettlingen (Nordschwarzwald), drives through the eastern margin of the Rheingraben. The tunnel passes cenozoic and mesozoic sediments. Early quarternary and tertiary beds are situated west of the main thrust of the Rheingraben. Fossil record indicates upper Oligocene age (Chatt) for parts of the tertiary sediments. At the eastern border of the Rheingraben, wedges of jurassic and middle triassic series are squeezed. East of the Rheingraben the tunnel drives in the lower triassic Bausandstein. The eastern margin of the Rheingraben was investigated in detail during tunneling. Faults of the Rheingraben margin are distributed in an 130 meter wide fault zone in the tunnel. Total stratigraphic separation by the normal faults reaches more than 2 000 meters. The cenozoic sequence suffered synsedimentary to early diagenetic deformation, while the mesozoic series are characterized by ruptural deformation. The fault- and joint system is directed in the rheinische Richtung (SSW-NNE). East of the Rheingraben a second direction occur, running parallel to the lower Albtal (W-E).

     

Die Bodenstruktur des Indischen Ozeans und dessen Geschichte

Zusammenfassung Grundzüge des Bodenreliefs und geophysikalisch-geotektonische Kenntnisse im Bereiche des Indischen Ozeans ermöglichen es, Art und Reihenfolge seiner Entwicklung zu skizzieren. Eine erste, parallel den Breitengraden während der Alttrias-Zeit aufgerissene Tiefspaltenzone unter dem Riesenkontinent Gondwanaland trennte die Antarktis von Südamerika-Afrika-Indien-Australien. Durch Querdehnung der Spalten drangen gewaltige basaltische Magmamassen empor. Sie erweiterten wie in Island die aufklaffenden Brüche und drängten die Kontinente auseinander, so daß die vier genannten Großschollen bis über die heutige Lage des 50.° Süd nordwärts verlagert wurden. Hinter ihnen blieb ihre alte, basische und vulkanisch tätige Unterlage zurück als erster Südteil des Indischen Neu-Ozeans. Unregelmäßige Hemmungen bei der Norddrift der Teilschollen dürften zwischen diesen méridionale Blattspalten erzwungen haben.Deren östlichste trennte zunächst jungtriassisch Australien ab von Indien und den anderen westlichen Kontinentalschollen. Diese méridionale Blattspalte wurde zu einer mittelozeanischen Schwelle und drängte einerseits Australien an seinen Platz gegen Osten, andererseits Indien zusammen mit Lemurien gegen Westen. Dann riß die Carlsberg-Mittelindische Schwelle auf und rückte Lemurien westwärts, Indien ostwärts bis zum 90.° Ost. Von der Mittelkreidezeit an wurde die Indische Scholle gegen Norden bis vor den Himalaya verlagert. Sie kam in der Oberkreidezeit an.Dies bewirkte keine neue Mittelozeanische Spaltenschwelle mehr. Vielmehr hatte sich eine regional das gesamte Untergrundsgebiet des Indischen Ozeans erfassende Unterströmung gegen Norden entwickelt. Sie floß unter Himalaya und Tibet noch weiter gegen N und E, wo sie das bekannte Dach der Erde im Tertiär emporstemmte.Die möglichen Begründungen enthält der nachfolgende Text.

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It is possible to reconstruct the nature and sequence of development of the Indian Ocean through knowledge of the topology and through geophysical-geotectonic research.The first deep fault zone situated under the great continent Gondwanaland, went parallel to the latitude during the lower Triassic Period and separated the Antarctic from South America, Africa, India and Australia. The basaltic magma was pushed up through the transverse expansion of the crevices. The opened cracks were widened like in Iceland and presed the continents apart. In this way the 4 great continents mentioned above, were pushed northwards farther than the 50° lat. S of today. Behind them remained the old, basic, and volcanicaly active foundation as the first southern floor of the Indian Ocean. Irregular retardations during the northern drift of parts of the continents probably had caused meridial fissures (Blatt-Spalten).The eastern most part of the fissures first divided in the Upper Triassic Period Australia from India and the other western continental blocks. These meridial fissures grew to a middle ocean rise and pushed on one side Australia to the east, and on the other side India together with Lemur to the west.The Carlsberg-Middle-Ocean Rise then shoved Lemur westward and India eastward to 90° E. Beginning in the Middle Cretaceous Period, the Indian block moved to the north and reached the Himalayas in the Upper Cretaceous Period. This did not cause any new middle ocean Spaltenschwelle. On the contrary, in the underground region of the Indian Ocean an underflow to the north had developed. It flowed under the Himalaya and Tibet and even more to the north and east where the famous roof of the Earth originated.The possible reasons are given in the following text.

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Résumé Le relief du fond de la mer et des faits géophysicaux et géotectoniques dans la région de l'Océan Indien rendent possible d'esquisser la façon de laquelle cet Océan s'est formé. Une zone primaire de fissures profondes formée pendant le Trias inférieur et située parallèle aux degrés de latitude au-dessous du continent gigantesque Gondwanaland séparait la région antarctique d'une part et l'Amérique du Sud, l'Afrique, les Indes et l'Australie d'autre part. A la suite d'une expansion de fissures d'énormes masses basaltiques se levèrent. Celles-ci élargirent les fentes, comme en Islande, et renforcèrent la séparation des continents. C'est pourquoi les quatre boucliers cités furent poussés au-delà de 50° degré de latitude vers le Nord. Leur soubassement basique et volcanique restait à sa place et formait la première partie méridionale du nouvel Océan Indien. Des obstacles irréguliers freinèrent le mouvement vers le Nord des divers boucliers, ce qui peut avoir causé les décrochements parallèles aux méridians.Le décrochement le plus oriental séparait d'abord, au Trias supérieur, l'Australie des Indes et des autres boucliers continentaux à l'Ouest. Le linéament décroché se transforma en un seuil au milieu de l'Océan et poussa d'une part l'Australie vers sa place orientale, d'autre part les Indes avec la Lémurie vers l'Ouest. Puis le linéament Carlsberg au milieu de l'Océan Indien s'ouvrit et transporta la Lémurie vers l'Ouest, les Indes vers l'Est. Dès le Crétacé moyen le bouclier indien a été transporté vers le Nord jusqu'au Himalaya. Il y arriva pendant le Crétacé supérieur.Ceci ne causa plus une nouvelle élévation au milieu de l'Océan. Plutôt il s'était produit une subfluence générale dirigée vers le Nord et emportant le soussol entier de l'Océan Indien. Cette subfluence se prolongea au-dessous de l'Himalaya et du Tibet vers le NE, soulevant au Tertiaire le célèbre Toit de la Terre.Dans la suite les raisons de cette opinion seront exposées.

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New P–T constraints on the Tamayen glaucophane‐bearing rocks,eastern Taiwan: Perple_X modelling results and geodynamic implications

New pseudosection modelling was applied to better constrain the P–T conditions and evolution of glaucophane‐bearing rocks in the Tamayen block of the Yuli belt, recognized as the world's youngest known blueschist complex. Based on the predominant clinoamphibole, textural relationships, and mineral compositions, these glaucophane‐bearing high‐P rocks can be divided into four types. We focused on the three containing garnet. The chief phase assemblages are (in decreasing mode): amphibole + quartz + epidote + garnet + chlorite + rutile/titanite (Type‐I), phengite + amphibole + quartz + garnet + chlorite + epidote + titanite + biotite + magnetite (Type‐II), and amphibole + quartz + albite + epidote + garnet + rutile + hematite + titanite (Type‐III). Amphibole exhibits compositional zoning from core to rim as follows: glaucophane → pargasitic amphibole → actinolite (Type‐I), barroisite → Mg‐katophorite/taramite → Fe‐glaucophane (Type‐II), glaucophane → winchite (Type‐III). Using petrographic data, mineral compositions and Perple_X modelling (pseudosections and superimposed isopleths), peak P–T conditions were determined as 13 ± 1 kbar and 550 ± 40 °C for Type‐I, 10.5 ± 0.5 kbar and 560 ± 30 °C for Type‐II (thermal peak) and 11 ± 1 kbar and 530 ± 30 °C for Type‐III. The calculations yield higher pressures and temperatures than previously thought; the difference is ~1–6 kbar and 50–200 °C. The three rock types record similar P–T retrograde paths with clockwise trajectories; all rocks followed trajectories with substantial pressure decrease under near‐isothermal conditions (Type‐I and Type‐III), with the probable exception of Type‐II where decompression followed colder geotherms. The P–T paths suggest a tectonic environment in which the rocks were exhumed from maximum depths of ~45 km within a subduction channel along a relative cold geothermal gradient of ~11–14 °C km^?1.     

Phytoreduction and volatilization of mercury by ascorbate in Arabidopsis thaliana, European beech and Norway spruce

Mercury vapor (Hg⁰) emission from plants contributes to the atmospheric Hg cycle. Young barley (Hordeum vulgare L.) plants grown on a hydroponic cultivation medium containing Hg(II) have previously been shown to increase their Hg⁰ emission significantly by reduction of Hg(II) with endogenous ascorbic acid. Regarding the potential contribution to the Hg cycle from the vast forest-covered areas, it was important to investigate this mechanism in trees. The increase in Hg⁰ emission from young European beech plants cultivated on a HgCl₂ medium exceeded that from controls by ca. tenfold and was proportional to the Hg(II) concentration. From these experiments, a flux of 12.8 μg Hg⁰/h/m² was estimated at an exposure of the roots to 20 μM Hg(II). Mercury vapor release from homogenates of Norway spruce needles exceeded that from European beech leaves by a factor of 2.3–4, i.e. in proportion to the reported AA concentrations; the reduction was maximal at alkaline pH which is typical for AA. The 8.4-fold difference in Hg⁰ release between homogenates from wild-type Arabidopsis thaliana and from its AA-deficient mutant vtc 1-1 also paralleled the reported difference in AA levels of both species. It is concluded that the phytoreduction and vaporization of Hg by AA is an important mechanism as much for Hg detoxification in trees as for Hg emission to the atmosphere. The efficiency of this process seems to result from the optimal coordination of transfer and biochemical transformation of mercuric ions and Hg vapor. There is no evidence for a relevant difference in the mechanisms of biogenic Hg(II) reduction between grass plants and trees.     

Presolar spinel grains from the Murray and Murchison carbonaceous chondrites

With a new type of ion microprobe, the NanoSIMS, we determined the oxygen isotopic compositions of small (<1μm) oxide grains in chemical separates from two CM2 carbonaceous meteorites, Murray and Murchison. Among 628 grains from Murray separate CF (mean diameter 0.15 μm) we discovered 15 presolar spinel and 3 presolar corundum grains, among 753 grains from Murray separate CG (mean diameter 0.45 μm) 9 presolar spinel grains, and among 473 grains from Murchison separate KIE (mean diameter 0.5 μm) 2 presolar spinel and 4 presolar corundum grains. The abundance of presolar spinel is highest (2.4%) in the smallest size fraction. The total abundance in the whole meteorite is at least 1 ppm, which makes spinel the third-most abundant presolar grain species after nanodiamonds (if indeed a significant fraction of them are presolar) and silicon carbide. The O-isotopic distribution of the spinel grains is very similar to that of presolar corundum, the only statistically significant difference being that there is a larger fraction of corundum grains with large ¹⁷O excesses (¹⁷O/¹⁶O > 1.5 × 10⁻³), which indicates parent stars with masses between 1.8 and 4.5 M_⊙.     

Neodymium isotopic evidence for the tectonic assembly of Late Archean crust in the Slave Province,northwest Canada

The ca. 2.7–2.5 Ga Slave Province is a granitegreenstone terrane comprising deformed sedimentary and subordinate volcanic belts extensively intruded by granitoid rocks. The Nd isotopic data are reported for 58 samples of supracrustal and granitoid rocks exposed along a 400 km, east-west, transect at 65°N across the structural grain of the province. Initial _Nd values reveal distinctly different crustal sources in the eastern compared to the western parts of the province, as expected from tectonic assembly of the province through accretion of juvenile crust to older continental crust. Supracrustal sequences (ca. 2.71–2.65 Ga) from the central and eastern parts of the province have positive _Nd(1) values (+0.3 to +3.6), consistent with juvenile sources and formation remote from significantly older crust. Syn to late-deformation (ca. 2.63–2.60 Ga), mantle-derived diorites and related tonalites (type I) from the central and eastern parts of the province have similar initial _Nd values (-0.1 to +2.7). In contrast, samples from the westernmost plutons, which intrude exposed pre-3.1 Ga crust, have much lower _Nd(1) values (-1.0 to4.6) suggesting contamination of these magmas by older crust. The _Nd(1) values of post-deformation granites (s.s.) (type II) also vary systematically across the province: values for granites west of longitude 110°30W range from-0.2 to -5.3; those to the east range from +0.6 to +3.7. These data suggest mixed crustal sources dominated by Mid to Early Archean material ( _Nd-2.6 to- 17 at 2.6 Ga) for the western granitoid rocks and juvenile sources for the eastern granites. The Nd isotopic data are consistent with the geology of the province in that exposures of Mid to Early Archean crustal rocks, predating the principal 2.7–2.5 Ga orogenic event are restricted to the western part of the province. The asymmetric pattern defined by the Nd isotopic data indicates the presence of distinct crustal rocks beneath the Slave Province. Similar isotopic variations observed across Phanerozoic collisional orogens have been interpreted to reflect tectonic assembly of crust by accretion of juvenile crustal terranes to an older continental margin. This process may also have been an important mechanism in the cratonization of the Slave Province.