Stony meteorite thermal properties and their relationship with meteorite chemical and physical states

Abstract– In our ongoing survey of meteorite physical properties, we have to date measured the thermal conductivity for seventeen stony meteorites at temperatures ranging from 5 K to 300 K. Here, we report new results for nine ordinary chondrites, one enstatite chondrite, and the basaltic achondrites Frankfort (howardite) and Los Angeles (shergottite). We find that thermal conductivity is significantly lower than would be expected from averaging the laboratory conductivities of their constituent minerals, with a dependence on temperature different from the expected conductivity of pure minerals. In addition, we find a linear relationship between the inverse of the porosity of the samples measured and their thermal conductivity, regardless of meteorite composition or type. We conclude that thermal conductivity is controlled by the presence of shock‐induced microcracks within the meteorites, which provide a barrier to the transmission of thermal energy via phonons. In contrast to conductivity, our first measurement of heat capacity as a function of temperature (on Los Angeles) suggests that heat capacity is primarily a function of oxide composition and is not strongly affected by the physical state of the sample.     

Thread safe astronomy

Observational astronomy is the beneficiary of an ancient chain of apprenticeship. Kepler's laws required Tycho's data. As the pace of discoveries has increased over the centuries, so has the cadence of tutelage (literally, “watching over”). Naked eye astronomy is thousands of years old, the telescope hundreds, digital imaging a few decades, but today's undergraduates will use instrumentation yet unbuilt – and thus, unfamiliar to their professors – to complete their doctoral dissertations. Not only has the quickening cadence of astronomical data‐taking overrun the apprehension of the science within, but the contingent pace of experimental design threatens our capacity to learn new techniques and apply them productively. Virtual technologies are necessary to accelerate our human processes of perception and comprehension to keep up with astronomical instrumentation and pipelined dataflows. Necessary, but not sufficient. Computers can confuse us as efficiently as they illuminate. Rather, as with neural pathways evolved to meet competitive ecological challenges, astronomical software and data must become organized into ever more coherent ‘threads’ of execution. These are the same threaded constructs as understood by computer science. No datum is an island. (© 2008 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)     

Spherulites and thundereggs from pitchstones of the Deccan Traps: geology,petrochemistry, and emplacement environments

Spherulites and thundereggs are rounded, typically spherical, polycrystalline objects found in glassy silicic rocks. Spherulites are dominantly made up of radiating microscopic fibers of alkali feldspar and a silica mineral (commonly quartz). They form due to heterogeneous nucleation in highly supercooled rhyolitic melts or by devitrification of glass. Associated features are lithophysae (“stone bubbles”), which have an exterior (sometimes concentric shells) of fine quartz and feldspar, and internal cavities left by escaping gas; when filled by secondary silica, these are termed thundereggs. Here, we describe four distinct occurrences of spherulites and thundereggs, in pitchstones (mostly rhyolitic, some trachytic) of the Deccan Traps, India. The thundereggs at one locality were previously misidentified as rhyolitic lava bombs and products of pyroclastic extrusive activity. We have characterized the thundereggs petrographically and geochemically and have determined low contents of magmatic water (0.21–0.38 wt.%) in them using Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy. We consider that the spherulite-bearing outcrops at one of the localities are of lava flows, but the other three represent subvolcanic intrusions. Based on the structural disposition of the Deccan sheet intrusions studied here and considerations of regional geology, we suggest that they are cone sheets emplaced from a plutonic center now submerged beneath the Arabian Sea.     

Integrating VOEvent into the ground‐based O/IR system: A case study at NOAO

In this article we describe a case study of how NOAO is considering improving its management of Target‐of‐Opportunity (ToO) observations by integrating VOEvent into the flow of activities. We believe that using VOEvent to help document and track the use of ToO time will improve the user experience of ToOs at NOAO. It will also greatly aid in the management of the process and of the resulting data, allowing us to better track the ownership and provenance of the data and any resulting data products. Finally, it will provide an important method of archival access to the data and data “collections,” which might include not only processed data from a single VOEvent triggered observation but could also include multiple observations traceable to a single (or set of related) VOEvents. (© 2008 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)     

Nonhydrostatic,mesobeta-scale,real-data simulations with the Penn State University/National Center for Atmospheric Research mesoscale model

Summary The Penn State University/National Center for Atmospheric Research (PSU/NCAR) mesoscale model is a widely used research tool that has been applied in a wide variety of real-data, mesoalpha-scale applications. Recently a nonhydrostatic version of this model has been developed by Dudhia (1993). It is the purpose of this paper to illustrate the capabilities of this modeling system by describing four examples of mesobeta-scale simulations: two of the cases involve maritime processes and two deal with continental weather events. All utilize fully three-dimensional sets of initial conditions that are based on real data, both standard data and from special measurements programs. One case employs the model in a data-assimilation configuration, wherein Newtonian relaxation terms are used in the equations to assimilate data from a variety of platforms. This example of nonhydrostatic four-dimensional data assimilation (FDDA) is performed for the purpose of generating a dynamically consistent four-dimensional data-set, however the same procedure can be used for model initialization. The first case, described in section 2, involves the simulation of a coastal front that forms offshore near the western edge of the Gulf Stream. In the second case, described in section 3, the model is used in the FDDA mode to define the mesobeta-scale windfield over the complex terrain of the region around Grand Canyon, Arizona. In sections 4 and 5 will be described the mesobeta-scale structure of cold fronts, one within a marine cyclone, and another near the Rocky Mountains.With 21 FiguresNCAR is sponsored by the National Science Foundation.     

北山柳园地区中志留世埃达克质花岗岩类及其地质意义

北山柳园地区发育的埃达克质片麻状花岗闪长岩为钙碱性岩浆系列,具有较高SiO₂ (>56%),Al₂O₃ (>15%)和较低的MgO (<3%)含量,Na₂O>K₂O; 并且具有高的Sr含量(>400×10^-6)和Sr/Y比值; 样品轻重稀土强烈分异(La/Yb)_N ＝18~86,强烈亏损重稀土Yb与Y,具有不明显的Eu异常(δEu＝0.90~0.95); 富集LREE和大离子亲石元素(LILE),而亏损HREE、高场强元素(HFSE: Nb、Ta),与世界上典型的俯冲洋壳熔融形成的埃达克岩相似。然而样品具有相对高的(⁸⁷Sr/⁸⁶Sr)_I (0.70635~0.70636)和相对低的ε_Nd(t) (-0.8~-0.9),以及锆石具有相对较低的ε_Hf (t) (-0.8~+2.7)同位素特征,比典型的俯冲洋壳熔融形成埃达克岩具有更多的放射成因,推测可能是源区加入了地壳物质/沉积物/或特殊的洋壳(OIB/E-MORB)熔融,以及侵位过程中地壳物质的混染所造成的。埃达克质片麻状黑云母花岗岩锆石LA-ICPMS年龄为424±4Ma,代表了花岗岩埃达克花岗岩的结晶年龄。花牛山岛弧带在中晚志留世时期具有较高的地热梯度,发育了大面积高ε_Nd(t)钙碱性花岗岩和区域围岩发生了高温变质作用。因此,柳园埃达克岩是由于热的洋壳向花牛山岛弧地体俯冲过程中熔融形成的,俯冲洋壳熔融是本地区早古生代大规模地壳增生的重要方式之一。