Web-GIS tool for the management of rural land markets

Land abandonment and stagnation of rural markets in the last few years have become one of the main concerns of rural administrations. The use of Web and GIS (Geographic Information System) technologies can help to mitigate the effects of these problems. This paper pro-poses a novel Web-GIS tool with spatial capabilities for the dynamization of rural land markets by encouraging the transfer of land from owners to farmers through the leasing of plots. The system, based on open source software, offers information about the properties, their environment and their owners. It uses standards for handling the geographic information and for communicating with external data sources. This system was used as the basis for the development of SITEGAL, the tool for the management of the Land Bank of Galicia (www.bantegal.com/sitegal). SITEGAL has been operational since 2007 obtaining benefits for both administration and users (farmers and land owners), and promoting the e-Government.     

Seismic,petrologic, and geodetic analyses of the 1999 dome-forming eruption of Guagua Pichincha volcano,Ecuador

Guagua Pichincha, located 14 km west of Quito, Ecuador, is a stratovolcano bisected by a horseshoe-shaped caldera. In 1999, after some months of phreatic activity, Guagua Pichincha entered into an eruptive period characterized by the extrusion of several dacitic domes, vulcanian eruptions, and pyroclastic flows. We estimated the three-dimensional (3-D) P-wave velocity structure beneath Guagua Pichincha using a tomographic inversion method based on finite-difference calculations of first-arrival times. Hypocenters of volcano-tectonic (VT) earthquakes and long-period (LP) events were relocated using the 3-D P-wave velocity model. A low-velocity anomaly exists beneath the caldera and may represent an active volcanic conduit. Petrologic analysis of eruptive products indicates a magma storage region beneath the caldera, having a vertical extent of 7–8 km with the upper boundary at about sea level. This zone coincides with the source region of deeper VT earthquakes, indicating that a primary magma body exists in this region. LP swarms occurred in a cyclic pattern synchronous with ground deformation during magma extrusions. The correlation between seismicity and ground deformation suggests that both respond to pressure changes caused by the cyclic eruptive behavior of lava domes.     

Evolving metasomatic agent in the Northern Andean subduction zone, deduced from magma composition of the long-lived Pichincha volcanic complex (Ecuador)

Geochemical studies of long-lived volcanic complexes are crucial for the understanding of the nature and composition of the subduction component of arc magmatism. The Pichincha Volcanic Complex (Northern Andean Volcanic Zone) consists of: (1) an old, highly eroded edifice, the Rucu Pichincha, whose lavas are mostly andesites, erupted from 1,100 to 150 ka; and (2) a younger, essentially dacitic, Guagua Pichincha composite edifice, with three main construction phases (Basal Guagua Pichincha, Toaza, and Cristal) which developed over the last 60 ka. This structural evolution was accompanied by a progressive increase of most incompatible trace element abundances and ratios, as well as by a sharp decrease of fluid-mobile to fluid-immobile element ratios. Geochemical data indicate that fractional crystallization of an amphibole-rich cumulate may account for the evolution from the Guagua Pichincha andesites to dacites. However, in order to explain the transition between the Rucu Pichincha andesites and Guagua Pichincha dacites, the mineralogical and geochemical data indicate the predominance of magma mixing processes between a mafic, trace-element depleted, mantle-derived end-member, and a siliceous, trace-element enriched, adakitic end-member. The systematic variation of trace element abundances and ratios in primitive samples leads us to propose that the Rucu Pichincha magmas came from a hydrous-fluid metasomatized mantle wedge, whereas Guagua Pichincha magmas are related to partial melting of a siliceous-melt metasomatized mantle. This temporal evolution implies a change from dehydration to partial melting of the slab, which may be associated with an increase in the geothermal gradient along the slab due to the presence of the subducted Carnegie Ridge at the subduction system. This work emphasizes the importance of studying arc-magma systems over long periods of time (of at least 1 million of years), in order to evaluate the potential variations of the slab contribution into the mantle source of the arc magmatism.     

Analyzing ice dynamics using Sentinel-1 data at the Solheimajoküll Glacier,Iceland

ABSTRACT

The climate in southern Iceland has warmed over the last 70 years, resulting in accelerated glacier dynamics at the Solheimajoküll glacier. In this study, we compare glacier terminus locations from 1973 to 2018, to changes in climate across the study area, and we derive ice-surface velocities (2015–2018) from satellite remote-sensing imagery (Sentinel-1) using the offset-tracking method. There have been two regional temperature trends in the study period: cooling (1973–1979) and warming (1980–2018). Our results indicate a time lag of about 20 years between the onset of glacier retreat (?53 m/year since 2000) and the inception of the warming period. Seasonally, the velocity time series suggest acceleration during the summer melt season since 2016, whereas glacier velocities during accumulation months were constant. The highest velocities were observed at high elevations where the ice-surface slope is the steepest. We tested several scenarios to assess the hydrological time response to glacier accelerations, with the highest correlations being found between one and 30 days after the velocity estimates. Monthly correlation analyses indicated inter-annual and intra-annual variability in the glacier dynamics. Additionally, we investigate the linkage between glacier velocities and meltwater outflow parameters as they provide useful information about internal processes in the glacier. Velocity estimates positively correlate with water level and negatively correlate with water conductivity between April and August. There is also a disruption in the correlation trend between water conductivity and ice velocity in June, potentially due to a seasonal release of geothermal water.     

Influence of Outcrop Scale Fractures on the Effective Stiffness of Fault Damage Zone Rocks

We combine detailed mapping and microstructural analyses of small fault zones in granodiorite with numerical mechanical models to estimate the effect of mesoscopic (outcrop-scale) damage zone fractures on the effective stiffness of the fault zone rocks. The Bear Creek fault zones were active at depths between 4 and 15 km and localize mesoscopic off-fault damage into tabular zones between two subparallel boundary faults, producing a fracture-induced material contrast across the boundary faults with softer rocks between the boundary faults and intact granodiorite outside the boundary faults. Using digitized fault zone fracture maps as the modeled fault geometries, we conduct nonlinear uniaxial compression tests using a novel finite-element method code as the experimental “laboratory” apparatus. Map measurements show that the fault zones have high nondimensional facture densities (>1), and damage zone fractures anastamose and intersect, making existing analytical effective medium models inadequate for estimation of the effective elastic properties. Numerical experiments show that the damage zone is strongly anisotropic and the bulk response of the fault zone is strain-weakening. Normal strains as small as 2% can induce a reduction of the overall stiffness of up to 75%. Fracture-induced effective stiffness changes are large enough to locally be greater than intact modulus changes across the fault due to juxtaposition of rocks of different lithologies; therefore mesoscopic fracturing is as important as rock type when considering material or bimaterial effects on earthquake mechanics. These results have important implications for earthquake rupture mechanics models, because mesoscopic damage zone fractures can cause a material contrast across the faults as large as any lithology-based material contrast at seismogenic depths, and the effective moduli can be highly variable during a single rupture event.     

Rural Social Networks along Amazonian Rivers: Seeds,Labor and Soccer among Communities on the Napo River,Peru

Research on Amazonian communities has focussed more often on rural‐urban linkages than on links among rural communities. This is unsurprising, given the low density of population, limited intercommunity commerce, and importance of direct city‐market relations. Social relations among rural communities are also important in shaping rural livelihoods and lifeways. We report on the findings of a large‐scale census of communities in the Napo River basin in northeastern Peru (n=174). Data were gathered on intervillage crop seed acquisition and cooperative labor sharing as two key inputs in agriculture, and on intervillage soccer matches, which are integral to rural social life. We analyze the socio‐spatial networks of each practice, paying attention to settlement patterns, community ethnicity, and differential access to the uplands. We find that seeds and labor flow along soccer network lines. Rural social networks appear to be structured strongly by ethnicity (homophily) and reflect important complementarities between upland and lowland communities (weak ties).     

Trends in the frequency of synoptic types in central-southern Chile in the period 1961–2012 using the Jenkinson and Collison synoptic classification

Atmospheric circulation patterns in southern Chile (42° 30′ S) were studied in order to determine and analyse the most characteristic synoptic types and their recent trends, as well as to gain an understanding of how they are associated with low-frequency variability patterns. According to the Jenkinson and Collison (J&C) classification method, a 16-point grid of sea-level pressure data was employed. The findings reveal that some synoptic types show statistically significant trends with a 95% confidence level, positively for anticyclonic westerly hybrids (AW) and advective types for third and fourth quadrant wind flows (W, NW, and N) and negatively for SW and cyclonic hybrids (CS and CSW). A model has been constructed of the linear regression of some weather types with teleconnections that most affect Chile: the undetermined types (U), AW were associated with El Niño or the warm phase of the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO), whereas the cyclonic northerly and cyclonic northeasterly types (CN and CNE) were associated with La Niña or cool phase of the PDO. The weather types associated with Antarctic Oscillation (AAO) in its positive phase are anticyclonic northerly and northeasterly and northerly advection types, while in its negative phase are cyclonic southwesterly and advection types.