Comparison of the Data-Driven Random Forests Model and a Knowledge-Driven Method for Mineral Prospectivity Mapping: A Case Study for Gold Deposits Around the Huritz Group and Nueltin Suite,Nunavut, Canada

This paper outlines the process taken to create two separate gold prospectivity maps. The first was created using a combination of several knowledge-driven (KD) techniques. The second was created using a relatively new classification method called random forests (RF). The purpose of this study was to examine the results of the RF technique and to compare the results to that of the KD model. The datasets used for the creation of evidence maps for the gold prospectivity mapping include a comprehensive lake sediment geochemical dataset, interpreted geological structures (form lines), mapped and interpreted faults, lithology, topographic features (lakes), and known Au occurrences. The RF method performed well in that the gold prospectivity map created was a better predictor of the known Au occurrences than the KD gold prospectivity map. This was further validated by a fivefold repetition using a subset of the input training areas. Several advantages to the use of RF include (1) the ability to take both continuous and/or categorical data as variable inputs, (2) an internal, unbiased estimation of the mapping error (out-of-bag error) removing the need for a cross-validation of the final outputs to determine accuracy, and (3) the estimation of importance of each input variable. Efficiency of prediction curves illustrates that the RF method performs better than the KD method. The success rate is significantly higher for the RF method than for the KD method.     

The Influence of Benthic Macrofauna on the Erodibility of Intertidal Sediments with Varying mud Content in Three New Zealand Estuaries

Fine sediment inputs can alter estuarine ecosystem structure and function. However, natural variations in the processes that regulate sediment transport make it difficult to predict their fate. In this study, sediments were sampled at different times (2011–2012) from 45 points across intertidal sandflat transects in three New Zealand estuaries (Whitford, Whangamata, and Kawhia) encompassing a wide range in mud (≤63 μm) content (0–56 %) and macrofaunal community structure. Using a core-based erosion measurement device (EROMES), we calculated three distinct measures of sediment erosion potential: erosion threshold (? _c ; N m^?2), erosion rate (ER; g m^?2 s^?1), and change in erosion rate with increasing bed shear stress (m _e ; g N^?1 s^?1). Collectively, these measures characterized surface (? _c and ER) and sub-surface (m _e ) erosion. Benthic macrofauna were grouped by functional traits (size and motility) and data pooled across estuaries to determine relationships between abiotic (mud content, mean grain size) and biotic (benthic macrofauna, microbial biomass) variables and erosion measures. Results indicated that small bioturbating macrofauna (predominantly freely motile species <5 mm in size) destabilized surface sediments, explaining 23 % of the variation in ? _c (p ≤ 0.01) and 59 % of the variation in ER (p ≤ 0.01). Alternatively, mud content and mean grain size cumulatively explained 61 % of the variation in m _e (p ≤ 0.01), where increasing mud and grain size stabilized sub-surface sediments. These results highlight that the importance of biotic and abiotic predictors vary with erosion stage and that functional group classifications are a useful way to determine the impact of benthic macrofauna on sediment erodibility across communities with different species composition.     

Climate change scepticism and public support for mitigation: Evidence from an Australian choice experiment

Public scepticism surrounding climate change is an obstacle for implementing climate change mitigation measures in many countries. However, very little is known about: (1) the nature and sources of climate change scepticism; and (2) its influence on preferences for climate change mitigation policies. In this paper, we investigate these two issues using evidence and analysis from an Australian public survey and choice experiment. The study has three key findings. First, the intensity of scepticism varies depending on its type; we observed little scepticism over the cause, trend and impact of climate change and widespread scepticism over the effectiveness of mitigation measures and global co-operation. Second, cause and mitigation scepticism play significant roles in determining public support for climate change abatement. Respondents who believed in human-induced climate change were significantly more supportive of mitigation. Likewise, respondents who believed that mitigation would be successful in slowing down climate change were significantly more likely to be supportive. Third, the general public tend to give the benefit of the doubt to supporting mitigation. Those who expressed higher uncertainty about climate outcomes were more supportive of mitigation than others with similar expectations but lower uncertainty.     

Sub-weekly to interannual variability of a high-energy shoreline

Sixty-one Global Positioning System (GPS), sub-aerial beach surveys were completed at 7 km long Ocean Beach, San Francisco, CA (USA), between April 2004 and March 2009. The five-year time series contains over 1 million beach elevation measurements and documents detailed changes in beach morphology over a variety of spatial, temporal, and physical forcing scales. Results show that seasonal processes dominate at Ocean Beach, with the seasonal increase and decrease in wave height being the primary driver of shoreline change. Storm events, while capable of causing large short-term changes in the shoreline, did not singularly account for a large percentage of the overall observed change. Empirical orthogonal function (EOF) analysis shows that the first two modes account for approximately three-quarters of the variance in the data set and are represented by the seasonal onshore/offshore movement of sediment (60%) and the multi-year trend of shoreline rotation (14%). The longer-term trend of shoreline rotation appears to be related to larger-scale bathymetric change. An EOF-based decomposition technique is developed that is capable of estimating the shoreline position to within one standard deviation of the range of shoreline positions observed at most locations along the beach. The foundation of the model is the observed relationship between the temporal amplitudes of the first EOF mode and seasonally-averaged offshore wave height as well as the linear trend of shoreline rotation. This technique, while not truly predictive because of the requirement of real-time wave data, is useful because it can predict shoreline position to within reasonable confidence given the absence of field data once the model is developed at a particular site.     

山东诸城盆地下白垩统莱阳群的非鸟恐龙与鸟足迹化石组合（英文）

中国山东省诸城盆地张祝河湾村下白垩统杨家庄组发现了非鸟恐龙（蜥脚类和鸟脚类）与古鸟类足迹。该足迹点的非鸟恐龙足迹深受水浸沉积物的影响,发生了强烈变形。蜥脚类足迹的前后足迹面积相近,造迹者行进缓慢。鸟脚类足迹属于禽龙-鸭嘴龙类型的足迹。古鸟类足迹并不类似于中国以往发现的中生代鸟类足迹,而类似于韩国滨水鸟类足迹的金东鸟足迹（Jin-dongornipes）。讨论了莱阳足迹（Laiyangpus）和拟跷脚龙足迹（Paragrallator,亦译为拟似鹬龙足迹）,前者因模式标本遗失而不明确,后者可归入安琪龙足迹未定种（Anchisauripus isp）。这批足迹的发现大大增加了山东省东部恐龙的多样性。     

Fragility of a dark gray shale in northeastern Jamaica: effects and implications of landslip exposure

Rapid weathering of strong, hitherto un-weathered shale rocks was fast enough to have been measurable weekly (>4 mm depth per week). Regular early morning rain showers followed by hot, dry afternoons caused frequent wet/dry cycles which facilitated rapid slaking of the shale. Other landslips occurred concurrently on the south bank of the Wild Cane River, where the rock beds dip towards lower ground. Resistance to impacts in the rock fabric was equally low after decades, or weeks of exposure. It was concluded that the combination of high frequency wet/dry cycles on steeply dipping shale beds, and rock attitude caused very rapid weathering. Rapid slaking of the illitic shales could cause high turbidity levels in contiguous aquatic environments. Building foundations and roads could be rapidly de-stabilized even on such freshly exposed, apparently consolidated sites.     

The significance of Cenozoic magmatism from the western margin of the eastern syntaxis, southeast Tibet

The major and trace-element geochemistry, Sr–Nd bulk-rock isotopes, U–Pb zircon chronology and Lu–Hf isotopic compositions are described for three granitic bodies which intrude the Nyingchi gneisses (Lhasa terrane) along the western margin of the eastern Himalayan syntaxis. The Bayi two-mica granite and Lunan granite–granodiorite were intruded at 22 ± 1 and 25.4 ± 0.3 Ma, respectively, whereas the Confluence biotite granite was emplaced at 49.1 ± 0.4 Ma. All share strong depletions in Y and HREE requiring a garnet-bearing source both during and following the Eocene collision of the Indian plate with the Lhasa terrane. The isotope geochemistry of these intrusives (ε _Nd(t) = −3 to −5, ⁸⁷Sr/⁸⁶Sr_(t) = 0.706–0.707) indicates a crustal source within the Lhasa terrane. Sr–Nd systematics of the garnet-bearing Nyingchi gneisses together with the U–Pb and Lu–Hf isotopic ratios of detrital zircons recovered from this unit identifies it as a potential melt source. The combined element and isotope geochemistry of the plutons indicate a mixed source; the gneisses provide the older component whereas the Gangdese batholith provides a younger, siliceous component. The involvement of garnet-bearing crustal material in melt sources from the Cretaceous (80 Ma) to the Miocene (20 Ma) is consistent with the presence of a thicker continental crust in the eastern Lhasa terrane, as is the presence of magmatic epidote in several plutons which indicates a regional deepening level of exposure eastwards. Post-collision crustal melting is synchronous with proposed slab break-off during the early Miocene, suggesting advective heating by rising asthenospheric melts.     

The cool surfaces of binary near-Earth asteroids

Here we show results from thermal-infrared observations of km-sized binary near-Earth asteroids (NEAs). We combine previously published thermal properties for NEAs with newly derived values for three binary NEAs. The η value derived from the near-Earth asteroid thermal model (NEATM) for each object is then used to estimate an average thermal inertia for the population of binary NEAs and compared against similar estimates for the population of non-binaries. We find that these objects have, in general, surface temperatures cooler than the average values for non-binary NEAs as suggested by elevated η values. We discuss how this may be evidence of higher-than-average surface thermal inertia. This latter physical parameter is a sensitive indicator of the presence or absence of regolith: bodies covered with fine regolith, such as the Earth’s moon, have low thermal inertia, whereas a surface with little or no regolith displays high thermal inertia. Our results are suggestive of a binary formation mechanism capable of altering surface properties, possibly removing regolith: an obvious candidate is the YORP effect.We present also newly determined sizes and geometric visible albedos derived from thermal-infrared observations of three binary NEAs: (5381) Sekhmet, (153591) 2001 SN₂₆₃, and (164121) 2003 YT₁. The diameters of these asteroids are 1.41 ± 0.21 km, 1.56 ± 0.31 km, and 2.63 ± 0.40 km, respectively. Their albedos are 0.23 ± 0.13, 0.24 ± 0.16, and 0.048 ± 0.015, respectively.     

Using sparse photometric data sets for asteroid lightcurve studies

With the advent of wide-field imagers, it has become possible to conduct a photometric lightcurve survey of many asteroids simultaneously, either for that single purpose (e.g., Dermawan, B., Nakamura, T., Yoshida, F. [2011]. Publ. Astron. Soc. Japan 63, S555–S576; Masiero, J., Jedicke, R., ?urech, J., Gwyn, S., Denneau, L., Larsen, J. [2009]. Icarus 204, 145–171), or as a part of a multipurpose survey (e.g., Pan-STARRS, LSST). Such surveys promise to yield photometric data for many thousands of asteroids, but these data sets will be “sparse” compared to most of those taken in a “targeted” mode directed to one asteroid at a time.We consider the potential limitations of sparse data sets using different sampling rates with respect to specific research questions that might be addressed with lightcurve data. For our study we created synthetic sparse data sets similar to those from wide-field surveys by generating more than 380,000 individual lightcurves that were combined into more than 47,000 composite lightcurves. The variables in generating the data included the number of observations per night, number of nights, noise, and the intervals between observations and nights, in addition to periods ranging from 0.1 to 400 h and amplitudes ranging from 0.1 to 2.0 mag.A Fourier analysis pipeline was used to find the period for each composite lightcurve and then review the derived period and period spectrum to gauge how well an automated analysis of sparse data sets would perform in finding the true period. For this part of the analysis, a normally distributed noise level of 0.03 mag was added to the data, regardless of amplitude, thus simulating a relatively high SNR for the observations. For the second part of the analysis, a smaller set of composite curves was generated with fixed core parameters of eight observations per night, 8 nights within a 14-day span, periods ranging from 2 to 6 h, and an amplitude of either 0.3 mag or 0.4 mag. Individual data sets using these fixed parameters added normally-distributed noise of 0.05, 0.1, or 0.2 mag. The analysis examined the success rates for finding the true period as the noise increased towards levels simulating data for objects close to sky background levels.After applying a filter to remove highly-ambiguous solution sets, the best chance for success was found to be when the true period was in the range of P ≈ 2–5 h and amplitudes were A ? 0.5 mag. The solution sets for lightcurves with low amplitude, long periods, and/or those that were sampled too sparsely in comparison to the period were often too ambiguous to be considered reliable for statistical rotation studies. Analysis of slow rotators (P > 24 h) found that somewhat reasonable solutions of P < 6 h could be found for about 15–20% of those objects, even at higher amplitudes, indicating that the Fourier analysis had locked onto the noise in the data.Efforts to produce an automated pipeline to help determine an unambiguous (or nearly so) solution based on the period spectrum from the Fourier analysis were made. These proved unsuccessful because of the number of parameters that must be considered and the difficulties in assigning an objective weight to each one in finding a final result. Despite this initial failure, further attempts will be made to quantify the U rating system.Comparison of the synthetic data analysis results to those from two actual surveys shows a reasonable agreement between the two. A review of the pros and cons of sparse versus dense data sets shows that each has a significant role in future studies and that it will be critical to establish open lines of communications and data exchange between the deep wide-field sparse data surveys and dense data programs.     

Radar observations of Asteroids 64 Angelina and 69 Hesperia

We report new radar observations of E-class Asteroid 64 Angelina and M-class Asteroid 69 Hesperia obtained with the Arecibo Observatory S-band radar (2480 MHz, 12.6 cm). Our measurements of Angelina’s radar bandwidth are consistent with reported diameters and poles. We find Angelina’s circular polarization ratio to be 0.8 ± 0.1, tied with 434 Hungaria for the highest value observed for main-belt asteroids and consistent with the high values observed for all E-class asteroids (Benner, L.A.M., Ostro, S.J., Magri, C., Nolan, M.C., Howell, E.S., Giorgini, J.D., Jurgens, R.F., Margot, J.L., Taylor, P.A., Busch, M.W., Shepard, M.K. [2008]. Icarus 198, 294-304; Shepard, M.K., Kressler, K.M., Clark, B.E., Ockert-Bell, M.E., Nolan, M.C., Howell, E.S., Magri, C., Giorgini, J.D., Benner, L.A.M., Ostro, S.J. [2008b]. Icarus 195, 220-225). Our radar observations of 69 Hesperia, combined with lightcurve-based shape models, lead to a diameter estimate, D_eff = 110 ± 15 km, approximately 20% smaller than the reported IRAS value. We estimate Hesperia to have a radar albedo of , consistent with a high-metal content. We therefore add 69 Hesperia to the Mm-class (high metal M) (Shepard, M.K., Clark, B.E., Ockert-Bell, M., Nolan, M.C., Howell, E.S., Magri, C., Giorgini, J.D., Benner, L.A.M., Ostro, S.J., Harris, A.W., Warner, B.D., Stephens, R.D., Mueller, M. [2010]. Icarus 208, 221-237), bringing the total number of Mm-class objects to eight; this is 40% of all M-class asteroids observed by radar to date.