Factors influencing the high fluoride concentration in groundwater of Vellore District,South India

Most of the arid and semi-arid zones of the Indian subcontinent experience serious health problems due to high concentration of fluoride in drinking water. The Vellore District of Tamil Nadu suffers from high concentration of fluoride in water. However, most of the past studies in this region focused on tannery-related pollution and not on fluoride contamination. The present study attempts to identify the factors influencing the origin and spatial distribution of fluoride in the district. From the observed hydrochemical results of 68 well samples in the context of water level, well depth and hydrochemical parameters, F^? concentration showed increasing trend in the presence of Na⁺ and HCO₃ ^?. This is due to the alkaline nature of groundwater that favors the dissolution of F^?-rich minerals. The occurrence of high fluoride in Na–HCO₃ type of water confirmed this hypothesis. However, Ca²⁺ showed an insignificant correlation with F^?. The high Na/Ca ratio (>1) in 73 % of the samples and the result of Na/Na+Cl plot suggest the occurrence of cation exchange in the study area. The major source of F^? was identified as products of the weathering and the dissolution of fluorites, amphiboles and micas present in the geological formations in the study area. The positive relationship between NO₃ ^? and F^? in few wells located in agricultural fields suggest possible source of F^? from the application of fertilizers. More than 25 % of the samples had higher values of fluoride than the permissible limit of drinking water according to Indian standards. Spatial distribution of fluoride showed a higher concentration in the southwest part of the study area, namely, Thirupathur and Vaniyambadi. This study shows that contamination was high in certain parts of Vellore District and the quality of water must be maintained by resorting to appropriate treatment and management strategies.     

Palaeoenvironmental significance of fluvial facies and archives of Late Quaternary deposits in the floodplain of Damodar River,India

Statigraphic exposures, fluvial archives and borehole data have been allowed to reconstruct the alluvial history of Late Pleistocene to Early Holocene and climate changes in the monsoonal wet–dry region of lower Damodar Basin (West Bengal, India). The facies architectures and climate proxies suggest that five to six climate changes occurred in between ～14 and 6 kiloannum (ka). Supporting evidence from the floodplain of Damodar River demonstrates that the successive phases of aggradation and incision were linked to the south-west monsoonal variability of Late Quaternary period. The onset of semi-arid climate was associated with caliches, pond and backswamp deposits of waning low-energy floods. The relatively warm-humid climate was associated with sandy bedforms, valley fills, slack water deposits and ferruginous nodules. This paper presents a synthesis of the available palaeoclimatic records from the lower Ganga Basin and the rivers of western and central India for the palaeoenvironmental significance of Late Quaternary deposits and discusses the influence of palaeoclimatic controls on the fluvial architectures and archives that developed below the floodplain of Damodar River. We have taken some representative studies from the region to reveal the spatial variability in fluvial successions in response to climate changes during this period.     

Chloritization and its bearing on uranium mineralization in Madyalabodu area,Cuddapah district,Andhra Pradesh

Uranium mineralization in Madyalabodu area, Cuddapah district, Andhra Pradesh, is spatially related to chloritized and brecciated quartzite of the Gulcheru Formation in the immediate vicinity of E-W to ESE-WNW trending basic dyke. Chloritization transgresses the lithological boundaries. Whole-rock geochemical data indicate enrichment of MgO and Al₂O₃ coupled with depletion of SiO₂, Na₂O, K₂O, CaO and TiO₂ in the chlorite-rich zone. Fe₂O₃ and FeO do not vary significantly in the altered and the unaltered zones. Electron Probe Microanalysis (EPMA) data reveal that the chlorites in contact with uranium minerals are enriched in MgO and depleted in FeO than in the others. Considering the petrological evidence, geochemical signature and structural constraints, it appears that chlorite acted more as an adsorbent rather than as a reductant in facilitating uranium mineralization. Uraninite crystallized later from the uranium originally adsorbed on chlorites. Chloritization might also have facilitated mineralization through the generation of nascent hydrogen, H₂S and lowering pH of uranium-bearing solution.     

Petrological evidences of impact-induced shock metamorphism in the basement granitoids and rhyolitic melt breccia of Mohar area,Shivpuri district,Madhya Pradesh

The circular structure at Mohar (Dhala structure) in the western part of Bundelkhand Gneissic Complex, is marked by a prominent outlier of Kaimur sediments surrounded by low lying concentric sequence of sediments of Dhala Formation and basement granite breccia. This has been interpreted as a volcanic eruption related cauldron structure and meteoritic impact crater structure by various authors, on the basis of absence or presence of shock indicators in the clasts of a rhyolite-like rock that crops out scantily in the north western part of the structure. During the course of extensive sub-surface uranium exploration in this structure, the geoscientists of Atomic Minerals Directorate for Exploration and Research observed unequivocal and rampant evidences of shock metamorphic features for the first time in drill core samples of basement granitoids which constitute the bed rock for the rhyolite-like melt breccia, which overlies it. Published data of shock metamorphic features from this area are largely confined to the surface samples of the rhyolite-like melt rock, exposed in sparse outcrops. The shock metamorphic features recorded in the sub-surface granitoid bed rock samples during the present study, comprise planar deformation features (PDF) in quartz, feldspar, apatite and zircon, toasted, diaplectic, ladder-textured feldspars, selectively shock-melted feldspars and melt-veined quartz. The shock metamorphic features recorded in surface and sub-surface samples of the melt rock include ballen quartz, PDF in quartz clasts, toasted and diaplectic feldspar clasts shocked basic rock fragments with isotropised feldspars. Both the shocked bedrock granitoid and the melt rock bear uncharacteristic geochemical signatures with elevated K₂O, MgO and depleted CaO. The study also observes that the melt breccia overlying the granitoid bedrock also occurs as pocket-like patches at various depths within the granitoids. Thus, the present findings have helped in understanding the attributes of the basement granitoid and associated melt breccia, thereby linking the genesis of the latter by selective melting of the former, due to the process of impact. It reinforces the already propounded theory of impact as the likely cause for the development of the structure in the basement Bundelkhand granitoid that was later filled by sediments standing out presently as a mesa.     

Use of site amplification and anelastic attenuation for the determination of source parameters of the Sikkim earthquake of September 18, 2011, using far-field strong-motion data

An earthquake of magnitude 6.9 (M _w) occurred in the Sikkim region of India on September 18, 2011. This earthquake is recorded on strong-motion network in Uttarakhand Himalaya located about 900 km away from the epicenter of this earthquake. In this paper acceleration record from six far-field stations has been used to compute the source parameters of this earthquake. The acceleration spectra of ground motion at these far-field stations are strongly affected by both local site effects and near-site anelastic attenuation. In the present work the spectrum of S-phase recorded at these far-field stations has been corrected for anelastic attenuation at both source and site and the site amplification terms. Site amplifications at different stations and near-site shear wave attenuation factor have been computed by the technique of inversion of acceleration spectra given by Joshi et al. (Pure Appl Geophys 169:1821–1845, 2012a). For estimation of site amplification and shear wave quality factor [Q _β (f)] at the recording sites, ten local events recorded at various stations between July 2011 and December 2011 have been used. The obtained source spectrum from acceleration records is compared with the theoretical source spectrum defined by Brune (J Geophys Res 76:5002, 1970) at each station for both horizontal components of the records. Iterative forward modeling of theoretical source spectrum gives the average estimate of seismic moment (M _o), source radius (r _o) and stress drop (Δσ) as (3.2 ± 0.8) × 10²⁶ dyne cm, 13.3 ± 0.8 km and 59.2 ± 8.8 bars, respectively, for the Sikkim earthquake of September 18, 2011.     

Ionospheric disturbances with the time of occurrence, magnitude and location of the earthquake (M6.5) near the Indian subcontinent

The present study purports the analysis of total electron content (TEC, which is one of the major ionosphere anomalies during the earthquake), sea surface temperature (SST) and outgoing long-wave radiation (OLR) during the earthquake event recorded on 10 March 2013 (M = 6.5). Global assimilative ionosphere modelled output TEC values have been used for this present study; the clear signature of TEC during the recorded earthquake has been noticed (i.e. increase in TEC 60–70 TECU during the event). The correlation between the magnitude and location of earthquake with TEC is around 0.9, and the least correlation between SST and OLR is due to concerned atmospheric effects; we tried to study the variations of SST and OLR prior during and after the event from Kalpana satellite image products archived by IMD.     

Flood hazard assessment with multiparameter approach derived from coupled 1D and 2D hydrodynamic flow model

Hydrodynamic flow modeling is carried out using a coupled 1D and 2D hydrodynamic flow model in northern India where an industrial plant is proposed. Two flooding scenarios, one considering the flooding source at regional/catchment level and another considering all flooding sources at local level have been simulated. For simulating flooding scenario due to flooding of the upstream catchment, the probable maximum flood (PMF) in the main river is routed and its flooding impact at the plant site is studied, while at the local level flooding, in addition to PMF in the main river, the probable maximum precipitation at the plant site and breaches in the canals near the plant site have been considered. The flood extent, depth, level, duration and maximum flow velocity have been computed. Three parameters namely the flood depth, cross product of flood depth and velocity and flood duration have been used for assessing the flood hazard, and a flood hazard classification scheme has been proposed. Flood hazard assessment for flooding due to upstream catchment and study on local scale facilitates determination of plinth level for the plant site and helps in identifying the flood protection measures.     

Earthquake damage identification: a case study using soft classification approach

The October 8, 2005, Kashmir earthquake (M _w 7.6) affected the rough mountainous regions of India and Pakistan with poor accessibility, and thus, no proper comprehensive ground survey was possible. However, due to the ability of remote sensing technology to acquire spectral measurements of damaged areas at various spatial and temporal scales, extraction of damaged areas can be carried out quickly and with great reliability. The fuzzy-based classifiers [Possibilistic c-Means (PCM), noise cluster (NC), and NC with entropy (NCE)] were applied to identify 2005 Kashmir earthquake, induced landslides, as well as built-up damage (BD) areas, as soft computing approaches using supervised classification. Results indicate that for the identification of landslides and BD areas, NCE classifier generated the best outputs, while for the identification of built-up undamaged areas, NC classifier generated the best output. Further, it was found that the proposed Class Based Sensor Independent (CBSI) technique can improve spectral information of specific class for better identification.     

Modeling the behaviour of alluvial and blasted quarried rockfill materials

Two types of modeled rockfill materials were collected from Renuka dam site, Himachal Pradesh, India and Salma dam site, Afghanistan. The rockfill material collected from Renuka dam site is rounded to sub-rounded in shape and the rockfill material collected from Salma dam site is angular to sub-angular in shape. The prototype gradation rockfill material consists maximum particle size larger than 1,000 mm. Therefore, for carrying out laboratory testing and modeling the bahaviour, the prototype rockfill material is scaled down to the maximum particle size (d_max) of 25, 50 and 80 mm for both projects material using parallel gradation technique. Triaxial compression and Index properties tests were conducted on both project rockfill materials and are presented. From the triaxial behaviour, it is observed that the stress–strain behaviour is non-linear, inelastic and stress dependent for both the materials. The material compresses during the initial shearing and shows dilation effect with further shearing. It is observed that the ?-value for alluvial rockfill material increases with increase in d_max and reverse trend is observed for blasted quarried rockfill material which shows the importance of the type of material. The stress–strain-volume change behaviour of both projects modeled rockfill material was predicted by using hierarchical single surface (HISS) model based on elasto plasticity and compared with the laboratory test results. From the comparison, it is observed that both results match closely. It is, therefore, suggested that the behaviour of both types of rockfill materials can be characterized successfully using HISS model.