Crustal velocity structures beneath North China revealed by ambient noise tomography

We collected continuous noise waveform data from January 2007 to February 2008 recorded by 190 broadband and 10 very broadband stations of the North China Seismic Array.The study region is divided into grid with interval 0.25°×0.25°,and group velocity distribution maps between 4 s and 30 s are obtained using ambient noise tomography method.The lateral resolution is estimated to be 20-50 km for most of the study area.We construct a 3-D S wave velocity model by inverting the pure path dispersion curve at each grid using a genetic algorithm with smoothing constraint.The crustal structure observed in the model includes sedimentary basins such as North China basin,Yanqing-Huailai basin and Datong basin.A well-defined low velocity zone is observed in the Beijing-Tianjin-Tangshan region in 22-30 km depth range,which may be related to the upwelling of hot mantle material.The high velocity zone near Datong,Shuozhou and Qingshuihe within the depth range of 1-23 km reveals stable characteristics of Ordos block.The Taihangshan front fault extends to 12 km depth at least.     

Patterns of variation of serum oxidative stress markers in two seabird species

Variation in oxidative stress markers in natural populations may provide a useful background for understanding variation in life history strategies. In this study, we seek to evaluate patterns of variation in levels of reactive oxygen metabolites (markers of oxidative damage), serum antioxidant capacity, and serum concentration of thiols (antioxidants endogenously synthesized) in nestling and breeding blue petrels ( Halobaena caerulea ) and in breeding Antarctic prions ( Pachyptila desolata ). Male and female prions and nestling petrels did not differ in any of the oxidative stress markers. The serum antioxidant capacity positively correlated with the sample time in nestling blue petrels. Breeding petrels with higher body condition index had higher serum antioxidant capacity and circulating thiols. Finally, both seabird species showed lower levels of reactive oxygen metabolites and higher levels of serum antioxidant capacity than previously studied bird species.     

Bed evolution measurement with flowing water in morphodynamics experiments

A new approach for the profiling of movable sediment beds in laboratory experiments is presented. It couples a triangulation laser sensor and an ultrasonic level transmitter, and allows a non‐intrusive, fast and accurate measurement of bed topography without stopping the experimental runs. The distortion of the laser beam due to the refraction at the water surface is corrected by contemporaneously measuring the elevation of the water surface through the ultrasonic level transmitter and taking advantage of geometrical relations involving the water depth, distance of the sensors from the water surface, and the angles that the emitted laser beam forms with the vertical before and after refraction. Several tests, under either still‐ or flowing‐water conditions, as well as increasing/decreasing water surface elevation, were carried out to evaluate the accuracy of the measurements. These tests indicate that good‐quality measurements are obtained for flow depths in the range 0 < D < 60 mm, typical of morphodynamic laboratory experiments. Finally, two relevant applications to movable bed experiments carried out under either lagoonal or fluvial conditions are presented that show the effectiveness of the proposed profiling technique. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Sediment transport mechanics

The Editor of Acta Geophysica and the Guest Editors wish to dedicate this Topical Issue on Sediment Transport Mechanics to the memory of Stephen Coleman, who died recently. During his career, Stephen had made an outstanding scientific contribution to the topic of Sediment Transport. The level of his contribution is demonstrated in the paper by Aberle, Coleman, and Nikora included in this issue, on which he started working before becoming aware of the illness that led to his untimely death. For scholars and colleagues Stephen remains an example of intellectual honesty and scientific insight.     

Investigating the influence of minor hydraulic structures on modeling flood events in lowland areas

Flood inundation models have been recognized to be a valuable tool to reproduce flow dynamics in a given area and support decision‐making processes on flood management measures. In many cases, in the simulation of flood events, only the main river channel and the associated structures are represented within the model. However, during flood events involving lowland areas, the minor drainage network – and the associated hydraulic structures – may have an important role in conveying flow and determining which areas will be flooded. The objective of this study is to investigate whether – and to what extent – small hydraulic structures in drainage networks have an influence in flooding on lowland areas. The case study for this research is the 1990 flood event which occurred in the lowland plain of the Reno River, in Northern Italy. The study area is mainly used for agricultural purposes and has a drainage system with several small bridges and culverts. The influence of the minor hydraulic structures on flood dynamics was analyzed through a combined use of one‐dimensional (1D) and two‐dimensional (2D) hydraulic models. First, a number of detailed and simplified approaches to represent hydraulic structures in the computational grids were analyzed by means of the HECRAS 1D model. Second, these approaches were implemented and tested in several 2D simulations of the flood event. The simulated inundation extents and flood levels were then compared with the observed data and with each other. The analysis of results showed that simplified schematizations were sufficient to obtain good model predictions of peak inundation extent and flood levels, at least for the present case study. Moreover, the influence of the structures on the peak flood inundation extent and flood levels was found to be limited, whereas it showed to be more significant during the drainage phase of the flood. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The different response of apparently identical structures: a far-field lesson from the Mirandola 20th May 2012 earthquake

Twin structures, that is structures very similar in terms of geometry, materials, mass distribution etc., founded on the same soil and set at very close distance, are rationally expected to have an identical response to earthquakes. When this does not occur, a role is usually played by factors like the interaction with the surrounding structures or by other anomalies hidden behind the apparent similarity. We present the case of two apparently twin towers that showed a very different response to the 2012 Mirandola (Italy) earthquake ground shaking: one remained perfectly intact while the other had a wide set of fractures on secondary walls. This resulted to be the effect of several contributing factors: the stiffness of the two structures, experimentally measured, provided unexpected differences. This reflected into different modal frequencies for the two towers, with the first and second modes of the damaged tower coincident or very close to the soil resonance. The final result was a coupled soil-structure resonance, implying a much higher displacement of one tower compared to the other, under the same input motion. In Italy, insurance against earthquake damage will probably become compulsory in the near future. This case suggests that the specific soil-structure and structure-structure interaction will have to be carefully evaluated since they can critically affect even apparently identical structures.     

A preparatory study on subsurface exploration on Mars using GPR and microwave tomography

The exploitation of ground penetrating radar in Mars subsurface exploration is becoming assessed in remote sensing observations and is of timely interest for high resolution in situ prospecting of the first meters of the underground.In this framework, we deal with a novel processing approach based on microwave tomography. Aiming to achieve accurate and reliable “images” of the investigated subsurface region in order to detect, localize and possibly determine the extent and the geometrical features of the embedded layers while reducing at the minimum possible the “interpretation” of the diagnostics result.The feasibility of the microwave tomographic approach has been tested in realistic cases dealing with conditions analogue to the Mars subsurface ones. In particular, we will present the tomographic reconstruction results achieved by experimental data collected in a field survey at Svalbard Islands (Norway) with a time-domain GPR.     

GeV gamma-ray attenuation and the high-redshift UV background

We present new calculations of the evolving UV background out to the epoch of cosmological reionization and make predictions for the amount of GeV gamma-ray attenuation by electron–positron pair production. Our results are based on recent semi-analytic models of galaxy formation, which provide predictions of the dust-extinguished UV radiation field due to starlight, and empirical estimates of the contribution due to quasars. We account for the reprocessing of ionizing photons by the intergalactic medium. We test whether our models can reproduce estimates of the ionizing background at high redshift from flux decrement analysis and proximity effect measurements from quasar spectra, and identify a range of models that can satisfy these constraints. Pair production against soft diffuse photons leads to a spectral cut-off feature for gamma rays observed between 10 and 100 GeV. This cut-off varies with redshift and the assumed star formation and quasar evolution models. We find only negligible amounts of absorption for gamma rays observed below 10 GeV for any emission redshift. With observations of high-redshift sources in sufficient numbers by the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope and new ground-based instruments, it should be possible to constrain the extragalactic background light in the UV and optical portion of the spectrum.