Crystallization temperature determination of Itokawa particles by plagioclase thermometry with X‐ray diffraction data obtained by a high‐resolution synchrotron Gandolfi camera

The crystallization temperatures of Itokawa surface particles recovered by the space probe Hayabusa were estimated by a plagioclase geothermometer using sodic plagioclase triclinicity. The Δ131‐index required for the thermometer, which is the difference in X‐ray diffraction peak positions between the 131 and 11 reflections of plagioclase, was obtained by a high‐resolution synchrotron Gandolfi camera developed for the third generation synchrotron radiation beamline, BL15XU at SPring‐8. Crystallization temperatures were successfully determined from the Δ131‐indices for four particles. The observed plagioclase crystallization temperatures were in a range from 655 to 660 °C. The temperatures indicate crystallization temperatures of plagioclases in the process of prograde metamorphism before the peak metamorphic stage.     

Development of polygon shift method for generating 3D view map of buildings

The authors have developed a new method termed “Polygon Shift Method” that enables the generation of a 3D view map of a city with tall buildings with a simplified procedure to shift a polygon and check the overlap between the original and shifted polygon. Boolean operations are applied with a newly defined “Fore or Aft” side and a “Depth Distance” that functionally express the visibility criteria or hidden point processing in the 3D view. Since the polygon shift method can be operated with a raster-based structure, the computer processing for generation of a 3D view map of buildings with shadow is simple and efficient.     

Au–Ag–Te Mineralization of the Low‐Sulfidation Epithermal Aginskoe Deposit,Central Kamchatka,Russia

Mineralogic studies of major ore minerals and fluid inclusion analysis in gangue quartz were carried out for the for the two largest veins, the Aginskoe and Surprise, in the Late Miocene Aginskoe Au–Ag–Te deposit in central Kamchatka, Russia. The veins consist of quartz–adularia–calcite gangue, which are hosted by Late Miocene andesitic and basaltic rocks of the Alnei Formation. The major ore minerals in these veins are native gold, altaite, petzite, hessite, calaverite, sphalerite, and chalcopyrite. Minor and trace minerals are pyrite, galena, and acanthine. Primary gold occurs as free grains, inclusions in sulfides, and constituent in tellurides. Secondary gold is present in form of native mustard gold that usually occur in Fe‐hydroxides and accumulates on the decomposed primary Au‐bearing tellurides such as calaverite, krennerite, and sylvanite. K–Ar dating on vein adularia yielded age of mineralization 7.1–6.9 Ma. Mineralization of the deposit is divided into barren massive quartz (stage I), Au–Ag–Te mineralization occurring in quartz‐adularia‐clays banded ore (Stage II), intensive brecciation (Stage III), post‐ore coarse amethyst (Stage IV), carbonate (Stage V), and supergene stages (Stage VI). In the supergene stage various secondary minerals, including rare bilibinskite, bogdanovite, bessmertnovite metallic alloys, secondary gold, and various oxides, formed under intensely oxidized conditions. Despite heavy oxidation of the ores in the deposit, Te and S fugacities are estimated as Stage II tellurides precipitated at the log f Te₂ values ?9 and at log fS₂ ?13 based on the chemical compositions of hypogene tellurides and sphalerite. Homogenization temperature of fluid inclusions in quartz broadly ranges from 200 to 300°C. Ore texture, fluid inclusions, gangue, and vein mineral assemblages indicate that the Aginskoe deposit is a low‐sulfidation (quartz–adularia–sericite) vein system.     

Cross-Validation of Open-Path and Closed-Path Eddy-Covariance Techniques for Observing Methane Fluxes

Methane ( ${\mathrm {CH}}_{4}$ ) fluxes observed with the eddy-covariance technique using an open-path ${\mathrm {CH}}_{4}$ analyzer and a closed-path ${\mathrm {CH}}_{4}$ analyzer in a rice paddy field were evaluated with an emphasis on the flux correction methodology. A comparison of the fluxes obtained by the analyzers revealed that both the open-path and closed-path techniques were reliable, provided that appropriate corrections were applied. For the open-path approach, the influence of fluctuations in air density and the line shape variation in laser absorption spectroscopy (hereafter, spectroscopic effect) was significant, and the relative importance of these corrections would increase when observing small ${\mathrm {CH}}_{4}$ fluxes. A new procedure proposed by Li-Cor Inc. enabled us to accurately adjust for these effects. The high-frequency loss of the open-path ${\mathrm {CH}}_{4}$ analyzer was relatively large (11 % of the uncorrected covariance) at an observation height of 2.5 m above the canopy owing to its longer physical path length, and this correction should be carefully applied before correcting for the influence of fluctuations in air density and the spectroscopic effect. Uncorrected ${\mathrm {CH}}_{4}$ fluxes observed with the closed-path analyzer were substantially underestimated (37 %) due to high-frequency loss because an undersized pump was used in the observation. Both the bandpass and transfer function approaches successfully corrected this flux loss. Careful determination of the bandpass frequency range or the transfer function and the cospectral model is required for the accurate calculation of ${\mathrm {CH}}_{4}$ fluxes with the closed-path technique.     

Recent increase of DIC in the western North Pacific

The temporal variation of the total dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC) content in the western North Pacific is investigated by comparing the DIC distribution obtained from the data sets of three different periods, the GEOSECS data observed in 1973, the CO₂ dynamics Cruise data observed in 1982, and recent Japanese data sets observed during the early 1990s. The overall feature of the signal of temporal DIC change during 1973 and early 1990s agreed with that of former studies, and did not significantly change with the calculation scheme (the grid-selection method vs. the multiple regression method). The observed increase in DIC among the different time scales showed a good inner consistency, which also indicates the stability of the method used in the DIC change calculation. The apparent rate of increase of the DIC inventory in the upper 1000 m water column, however, differed significantly by the data set used for the calculation: It was 5.6±2.4 g C/m²/year, based on the data comparison between 1982 and the early 1990s, while it became 7.6±2.4 g C/m²/year when based on the data between 1973 and the early 1990s. This result provides us an information about the data-dependency on the former estimation of temporal DIC change.     

Polymetallic and Au-Ag Mineralizations at the Mutnovskoe Deposit in South Kamchatka, Russia

Abstract. The Mutnovskoe deposit located in the Porozhisto‐Asachinskaya metallogenic province of South Kamchatka, Russia, is a polymetallic vein and Au‐Ag quartz vein associated type of hydrothermal deposit. The Mutnovskoe deposit is located inside a paleo‐caldera structure at the center of the Mutnovsko‐Asachinskaya geothermal field of Pliocene ‐ Quaternary age, where active gold deposition is identified in hot spring precipitate. The Mutnovskoe deposit is subdivided into the north flank, the central flank and the south flank based on the vein distributions and mineral parageneses. The mineralized vein system is oriented N‐S hosted in diorite ‐ gabbroic diorite stock, volcanic rocks and sedimentary rocks of Miocene ‐ Pleistocene age. The mineralization stage I (polymetallic vein) mainly in the central and the south flanks is Zn‐Pb‐Cu‐Au‐Ag contained in sphalerite, galena and tetrahedrite‐tennantite group mineral. The stage II (Au‐Ag quartz vein) occurs in the north and the central flanks. The stage III (Mn‐sulfide and Mn‐Ca‐carbonate vein) occurs in the whole deposit area. Stage II is the typical Au‐Ag quartz‐adularia vein of low‐sulfidation type. Stage III is alabandite‐rhodochrosite‐quartz‐calcite vein. The K‐Ar ages are 1.3±0.1 Ma for stage I sericite in alteration zone, and 0.7±0.1 Ma for the stage II adularia in mineralized vein. Based on the fluid inclusion study, range of ore forming temperature of the Mutnovskoe deposit is 200 to 260d?C (av. 230d?C). Salinities of fluid inclusions indicate 2.2 to 5.7 wt% NaCl in sphalerite and 0.8 to 3.3 wt% NaCl in quartz for the stage I. Mineral paragenesis of the polymetallic vein (stage I) is characterized by a district zoning of tennantite and Cd‐rich sphalerite in the south flank and tetrahedrite and Mn‐rich sphalerite in the central flank, which is due to the fractional crystallizations of ore‐forming fluid. Depositional condition of the low sulfidation state is inferred for the Mutnovskoe deposit, where the polymetallic vein of the south flank is in relatively higher sulfidation state than the central flank.     

High sensitivity SiO maser survey for mira variables

Simultaneous observations of the six transitions of SiO for 106 late-type stars were made. The SiO maser emission was detected in 83 stars. Thev=3 maser emission was detected in eight stars, and the²⁹SiOv=0 emission in six stars. The²⁹SiOv=0 emission is stronger and narrower than that of²⁸SiO, suggesting that the²⁹SiO emission is masing.Paper presented at the IAU Third Asian-Pacific Regional Meeting, held in Kyoto, Japan, between 30 September–6 October, 1984.     

Variation of the partial pressure of CO2 in surface water from Kuroshio to Oyashio and the relation between environmental factors and the partial pressure at 144°E off Sanriku, northwestern North Pacific in May, 1997

Partial pressure of CO₂ in surface sea water (pCO₂) was measured continuously off Sanriku in May, 1997 by a new pCO₂ measurement system. We have examined the relation of pCO₂ to physical factors such as temperature, salinity and density, chemical and biological factors such as nutrients and carbonate system and chlorophylla. In the Kuroshio region pCO₂ was not correlated to physical, chemical and biological factors in the range of 260 to 290 μatom. In transition water (Tr1) between Kuroshio and the Oyashio second branch, pCO₂ was weakly correlated to physical factors and strongly correlated to nutrients. In transition water (Tr2) between the Oyashio first and second branches, pCO₂ was highly correlated to temperature (SD: 10.9 μatom) and salinity (SD: 8.6 μatom) and also to nutrients. In transition water (Tr1+Tr2), pCO₂ was highly multivariately correlated to temperature (T), salinity (S), chlorophylla (CH) (or nitrate+nitrite (N)) as follows, pCO₂(μatom)= 10.8×T(°C)+27.7×S+2.57CH(μg/1) −769, R²= 0.86, SD = 20.9, or pCO₂(μatom)= 3.9×T(°C)+25.5×S+16.0NO₃(μM) −686, R²= 0.99, SD = 6.4. Moreover, pCO₂ was predicted by only two factors, one physical (S) and the other chemical/biological (N) as follows: pCO₂ (μatom)=32.8×S+19.4N−908, R²=0.97, SD=8.4. The pH measured at 25°C was well correlated with normalized pCO₂ at a fixed temperature. In the Oyashio region pCO₂ was decreased to 160 μatom, probably because of spring bloom, but was not correlated linearly to chlorophylla. The results obtained showed the possibility of estimating pCO₂ of the Oyashio and transition regions in May by satellite remote sensing of SST, but the problem of estimation of pCO₂ in Kuroshio water remains to be solved.