Mineralogy, geochemistry and uses of the mordenite–bentonite ash-tuff beds of Los Escullos, Almería, Spain

The mordenite ore deposit of Los Escullos has a surface area of 10⁶ m² with an average thickness of 5 m and estimated reserves of 7,500,000 tons of mordenite–bentonite. It is made up of horizontal layers of interbedded epiclastic tuffs with volcanic bentonitised materials which have been subjected to hydromagmatic activity. The layers are essentially composed of bentonite and mordenite with lesser amounts of quartz, cristobalite, biotite, plagioclase, chlorite, amphiboles, titanomagnetite, ilmenite and calcite. The harder layers display a higher proportion of plagioclase crystals and are enriched in Al₂O₃, CaO, Fe₂O₃, TiO₂, P₂O₅, Cu, Zn, Co, Cr, Ni and V, while the more altered layers contain larger contents of SiO₂, K₂O and Y. The amount of sodium increases (from 2% to 4%) relative to depth. Alteration processes resulted in a reduction in the contents of CaO, K₂O and MnO and increase in Na₂O and MgO. The beds of volcanic ash-tuffs have been devitrified by hydrothermal solutions giving rise to bentonites and sodium- and silica-rich residual fluids which have partly crystallized as mordenite and cristobalite. The raw material (mordenite–bentonite) can be improved removing biotite (magnetic separation) and plagioclase and quartz (by floating methods); however, the mordenite–bentonite mineral assemblage is practically impossible to separate due to the size of the crystals (average 0.5 μm under SEM–EDAX). In turn, this upgraded raw material has very useful properties (total area=520 m²/g and cation exchange capacity=70 meq/100 g) which may make it suitable for use in absorption processes (e.g. deodorization, cationic exchange), catalysis and molecular sieving.     

Implications of stress-drop models of earthquakes for the inversion of stress drop from seismic observations

We discuss the inversion of stress drops from seismic observations on the basis of crack or stress-drop models of earthquake mechanism. Since a formal inverse problem cannot be posed at present we discuss implications of solutions to direct problems. We first discuss the static approximations used to obtain stress drop from seismic moment and source dimensions. We show that the geometrical effects are quite significant if only one source dimension has been retrieved from seismic observations. The effect of variable stress drop is discussed and we show that the inverted stress drop is not a simple average of the actual stress drops on the fault. We discuss the energy release during faulting and show that the apparent stress has a complicated relation to the stress drop on the fault. We also show that the static stress drops obtained by seismologists are a lower bound to the actual dynamic stress drops on the fault. This may in part explain disagreements with laboratory results. Finally, we discuss the inversion of source dimensions from the far-field radiation. We analyse two extreme, simple dynamical source models, a circular fault and a rectangular fault and show that geometry has a much more pronounced effect on radiation than is usually acknowledged.     

The helium abundance and ΔY/ΔZ in lower main-sequence stars

We use nearby K dwarf stars to measure the helium-to-metal enrichment ratio  Δ Y /Δ Z   , a diagnostic of the chemical history of the solar neighbourhood. Our sample of K dwarfs has homogeneously determined effective temperatures, bolometric luminosities and metallicities, allowing us to fit each star to the appropriate stellar isochrone and determine its helium content indirectly. We use a newly computed set of Padova isochrones which cover a wide range of helium and metal content.
Our theoretical isochrones have been checked against a congruous set of main-sequence binaries with accurately measured masses, to discuss and validate their range of applicability. We find that the stellar masses deduced from the isochrones are usually in excellent agreement with empirical measurements. Good agreement is also found with empirical mass-luminosity relations.
Despite fitting the masses of the stars very well, we find that anomalously low helium content (lower than primordial helium) is required to fit the luminosities and temperatures of the metal-poor K dwarfs, while more conventional values of the helium content are derived for the stars around solar metallicity.
We have investigated the effect of diffusion in stellar models and the assumption of local thermodynamic equilibrium (LTE) in deriving metallicities. Neither of these is able to resolve the low-helium problem alone and only marginally if the cumulated effects are included, unless we assume a mixing-length which is strongly decreasing with metallicity. Further work in stellar models is urgently needed.
The helium-to-metal enrichment ratio is found to be  Δ Y /Δ Z = 2.1 ± 0.9  around and above solar metallicity, consistent with previous studies, whereas open problems still remain at the lowest metallicities. Finally, we determine the helium content for a set of planetary host stars.     

Dynamics of a Prorocentrum minimum bloom along the northern coast of Sinaloa,Mexico

To investigate the relative importance of mesoscale physical events, such as upwellings and physical and chemical variables during an algae bloom of Prorocentrum minimum, 25 sampling sites were established offshore of the Navachiste Lagoon Complex on the east side of the Gulf of California. Samples were analyzed for phytoplankton concentration, water chemistry, and temperature during November 1999, January, March, April, May, and August 2000. Satellite imagery of sea surface temperature (SST) for April 2000 was processed to obtain a synoptic view of the area during the extraordinary bloom of P. minimum in the open waters of the Gulf of California. The bloom was associated with change of oceanographic conditions from moderate winds to calm period, temperature increase and high nitrate (NO₃⁻-N) and ammonia (NH₄⁺-N) content in the offshore waters. Depletion of these nutrients during the bloom suggests that this species uses both types of nitrogen substrates. Cysts in the northernmost sampling stations in January and March indicate that upwelling water, rich in nitrates, also carried a seed stock population of P. minimum. SST patterns in the satellite imagery suggest wind-forcing as the responsible mechanisms triggering the algal bloom offshore of the Navachiste Lagoon Complex.     

Massive lossless data compression and multiple parameter estimation from galaxy spectra

We present a method for radical linear compression of data sets where the data are dependent on some number M of parameters. We show that, if the noise in the data is independent of the parameters, we can form M linear combinations of the data which contain as much information about all the parameters as the entire data set, in the sense that the Fisher information matrices are identical; i.e. the method is lossless. We explore how these compressed numbers fare when the noise is dependent on the parameters, and show that the method, though not precisely lossless, increases errors by a very modest factor. The method is general, but we illustrate it with a problem for which it is well-suited: galaxy spectra, the data for which typically consist of ∼10³ fluxes, and the properties of which are set by a handful of parameters such as age, and a parametrized star formation history. The spectra are reduced to a small number of data, which are connected to the physical processes entering the problem. This data compression offers the possibility of a large increase in the speed of determining physical parameters. This is an important consideration as data sets of galaxy spectra reach 10⁶ in size, and the complexity of model spectra increases. In addition to this practical advantage, the compressed data may offer a classification scheme for galaxy spectra which is based rather directly on physical processes.     

Shoreline relaxation at pocket beaches

A new physical concept of relaxation time is introduced in this research as the time required for the beach to dissipate its initial perturbation. This concept is investigated using a simple beach-evolution model of shoreline rotation at pocket beaches, based on the assumption that the instantaneous change of the shoreline plan-view shape depends on the long-term equilibrium plan-view shape. The expression of relaxation time is developed function of the energy conditions and the physical characteristics of the beach; it increases at longer beaches having coarse sediments and experiencing low-energy conditions. The relaxation time, calculated by the developed model, is validated by the shoreline observations extracted from video images at two artificially embayed beaches of Barcelona (NW Mediterranean) suffering from perturbations of sand movement and a nourishment project. This finding is promising to estimate the shoreline response and useful to improve our understanding of the dynamic of pocket beaches and their stability.     

Diversity of the 2014 Iquique’s foreshocks and aftershocks: clues about the complex rupture process of a Mw 8.1 earthquake

We study the foreshocks and aftershocks of the 1 April 2014 Iquique earthquake of Mw 8.1. Most of these events were recorded by a large digital seismic network that included the Northern Chile permanent network and up to 26 temporary broadband digital stations. We relocated and computed moment tensors for 151 events of magnitude Mw?≥?4.5. Most of the foreshocks and aftershocks of the Iquique earthquake are distributed to the southwest of the rupture zone. These events are located in a band of about 50 km from the trench, an area where few earthquakes occur elsewhere in Chile. Another important group of aftershocks is located above the plate interface, similar to those observed during the foreshock sequence. The depths of these events were constrained by regional moment tensor (RMT) solutions obtained using the records of the dense broad band network. The majority of the foreshocks and aftershocks were associated to the interplate contact, with dip and strike angles in good agreement with the characteristics of horst and graben structures (>2000 m offset) typical of the oceanic Nazca Plate at the trench and in the outer rise region. We propose that the spatial distribution of foreshocks and aftershocks, and its seismological characteristics were strongly controlled by the rheological and tectonics conditions of the extreme erosive margin of Northern Chile.     

Tests for primordial non-Gaussianity

We investigate the relative sensitivities of several tests for deviations from Gaussianity in the primordial distribution of density perturbations. We consider models for non-Gaussianity that mimic that which comes from inflation as well as that which comes from topological defects. The tests we consider involve the cosmic microwave background (CMB), large-scale structure, high-redshift galaxies, and the abundances and properties of clusters. We find that the CMB is superior at finding non-Gaussianity in the primordial gravitational potential (as inflation would produce), while observations of high-redshift galaxies are much better suited to find non-Gaussianity that resembles that expected from topological defects. We derive a simple expression that relates the abundance of high-redshift objects in non-Gaussian models to the primordial skewness.