Near‐surface hydraulic conductivity of northern hemisphere glaciers

The hydrology of near‐surface glacier ice remains a neglected aspect of glacier hydrology despite its role in modulating meltwater delivery to downstream environments. To elucidate the hydrological characteristics of this near‐surface glacial weathering crust, we describe the design and operation of a capacitance‐based piezometer that enables rapid, economical deployment across multiple sites and provides an accurate, high‐resolution record of near‐surface water‐level fluctuations. Piezometers were employed at 10 northern hemisphere glaciers, and through the application of standard bail–recharge techniques, we derive hydraulic conductivity (K) values from 0.003 to 3.519 m day^?1, with a mean of 0.185 ± 0.019 m day^?1. These results are comparable to those obtained in other discrete studies of glacier near‐surface ice, and for firn, and indicate that the weathering crust represents a hydrologically inefficient aquifer. Hydraulic conductivity correlated positively with water table height but negatively with altitude and cumulative short‐wave radiation since the last synoptic period of either negative air temperatures or turbulent energy flux dominance. The large range of K observed suggests complex interactions between meteorological influences and differences arising from variability in ice structure and crystallography. Our data demonstrate a greater complexity of near‐surface ice hydrology than hitherto appreciated and support the notion that the weathering crust can regulate the supraglacial discharge response to melt production. The conductivities reported here, coupled with typical supraglacial channel spacing, suggest that meltwater can be retained within the weathering crust for at least several days. Not only does this have implications for the accuracy of predictive meltwater run‐off models, but we also argue for biogeochemical processes and transfers that are strongly conditioned by water residence time and the efficacy of the cascade of sediments, impurities, microbes, and nutrients to downstream ecosystems. Because continued atmospheric warming will incur rising snowline elevations and glacier thinning, the supraglacial hydrological system may assume greater importance in many mountainous regions, and consequently, detailing weathering crust hydraulics represents a research priority because the flow path it represents remains poorly constrained.     

Investigating the scale of structural controls on chlorinated hydrocarbon distributions in the fractured-porous unsaturated zone of a sandstone aquifer in the UK

Contaminant migration behaviour in the unsaturated zone of a fractured porous aquifer is discussed in the context of a study site in Cheshire, UK. The site is situated on gently dipping sandstones, adjacent to a linear lagoon historically used to dispose of industrial wastes containing chlorinated solvents. Two cores of more than 100 m length were recovered and measurements of chlorinated hydrocarbons (CHCs), inorganic chemistry, lithology, fracturing and aquifer properties were made. The results show that selecting an appropriate vertical sampling density is crucial both to providing an understanding of contaminant pathways and distinguishing whether CHCs are present in the aqueous or non-aqueous phase. The spacing of such sampling should be on a similar scale to the heterogeneity that controls water and contaminant movement. For some sections of the Permo-Triassic aquifer, significant changes in lithology and permeability occur over vertical distances of less than 1 m and samples need to be collected at this interval, otherwise considerable resolution is lost, potentially leading to erroneous interpretation of data. At this site, although CHC concentrations were high, the consistent ratio of the two main components of the plume (tetrachloroethene and trichloroethene) provided evidence of movement in the aqueous phase rather than in dense non-aqueous phase liquid (DNAPL).     

Evidence from the Trent terrace archive, Lincolnshire, UK, for lowland glaciation of Britain during the Middle and Late Pleistocene

The late Middle Pleistocene fluvial terrace sequence of the lower Trent system, Lincolnshire (eastern England), provides an excellent record of environmental change, including evidence for the last two interglacial episodes. It also provides important stratigraphical evidence for the timing and extent of three separate glaciations. Two of these, the Anglian and Devensian, are well-established correlatives of Marine Isotope Stages (MIS) 12 and 2 respectively; the third is a hitherto un-named post-Anglian-pre-Devensian glaciation in eastern England that has been the subject of much previous speculation, but can now be attributed with some confidence to MIS 8. Crucially, the recognition of MIS 7 interglacial deposits within the Balderton-Southrey terrace of the proto-Trent indicates that the underlying Wragby Till, which is ascribed to this additional glaciation, was emplaced no later than MIS 8. The oldest terrace preserved within the lower Trent staircase, the Eagle Moor-Martin Terrace, is considered to be a complex glacial outwash terrace related to the Wragby Till glaciation. It is suggested that deposits representing MIS 11-9, which are conspicuously absent throughout the Trent system, were removed by this glaciation. This is a departure from previous interpretations, which have suggested MIS 10 or MIS 6 as the most likely stages in which an extensive post-Anglian-pre-Devensian lowland glaciation might have occurred in Britain. However, the widespread preservation of undisrupted post-MIS 8 fluvial sequences throughout the Trent valley and in neighbouring systems, within which MIS 7 interglacial deposits have now been recognized at a number of localities, indicates that ice sheets are unlikely to have advanced further into this catchment during MIS 6 than during the Devensian (MIS 2). Recognition of a British glaciation during MIS 8 corresponds with widespread evidence in Europe, which suggests that glacial deposits classified as ‘Saalian’ represent both MIS 8 and MIS 6; in many areas, distinguishing these remains controversial, as confident correlation with either stage is often only possible where glacial sediments interdigitate with well-constrained fluvial records.     

Use of a shared tuned mass damper (STMD) to reduce vibration and pounding in adjacent structures

The dynamic response of tall civil structures due to earthquakes is very important to civil engineers. Structures exposed to earthquakes experience vibrations that are detrimental to their structural components. Structural pounding is an additional problem that occurs when buildings experience earthquake excitation. This phenomena occurs when adjacent structures collide from their out‐of‐phase vibrations. Many energy dissipation devices are presently being used to reduce the system response. Tuned mass dampers (TMD) are commonly used to improve the response of structures. The stiffness and damping properties of the TMD are designed to be a function of the natural frequency of the building to which it is connected. This research involves attaching adjacent structures with a shared tuned mass damper (STMD) to reduce both the structures vibration and probability of pounding. Because the STMD is connected to both buildings, the problem of tuning the STMD stiffness and damping parameters becomes an issue. A design procedure utilizing a performance function is used to obtain the STMD parameters to result in the best overall system response. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Corrections for Wind-Speed Errors from Sodar and Lidar in Complex Terrain

The quality of lidar and sodar wind estimates is generally judged through comparisons with mast-mounted instruments, and the resulting regressions. Evaluation of the relative merits of lidars versus sodars is complicated by the fact that lidars are generally placed close to a mast whereas sodars are generally placed some distance from a mast so that acoustic reflections off the mast are reduced. This leads to the two technologies, lidar and sodar, not being compared in similar situations. Differences arising from the two geometries can be expected to be larger in complex terrain, where the wind regime can vary significantly spatially. The current work explores these differences in moderately complex terrain. Lidar–mast comparisons are performed with the lidar close to an 80 m mast, and sodar–mast comparisons performed with the sodar 300 m from the mast. Systematic variations in estimated wind speed are found to occur with height, consistent with predictions from a simple flow model. When the lidar was moved to the sodar location, further from the mast, there were significant changes in the estimated wind speeds and a reduction in correlation with the mast-based wind speeds, as expected. However, the correlation between collocated lidar and sodar winds was high. This finding emphasizes that any comparison of two remote sensing instruments needs to be through similar experiments, and that differences in accuracy often reported for the lidar and sodar technologies are likely to be contaminated due to poor comparison configurations. A method was devised to simulate the sodar being collocated with the mast, by using the lidar–sodar measurements and the lidar–mast measurements. It was found that there was then no statistically detectable difference between lidar–mast regressions and sodar–mast regressions for the particular lidar and sodar tested. Both remote sensing instruments were also found to be good estimators of Weibull parameters, as compared with those derived from mast data. The conclusion is that the sodar measured the winds above the sodar with a similar accuracy to the lidar measuring winds above the lidar.     

The Water Budget Myth and Its Recharge Controversy: Linear vs. Nonlinear Models

The water budget myth, which is the idea that safe pumping must not exceed the initial recharge, gave rise to a controversy about the role of recharge in assessing the sustainability of groundwater development. To refute the concept of safe yield, a simplified water budget equation is used, which equals the total pumping rate to the sum of capture and storage change. Since initial recharge and discharge are canceled out from this equation, it is concluded that sustainable pumping has nothing to do with recharge. Investigating the assumptions underlying this equation, it is seen that it expresses the superposition principle, which implicitly assumes the groundwater reservoir can be depleted indefinitely and boundary conditions are an infinite source of water. To evaluate sustainability, however, the limits of the aquifer system must be examined accurately. Theoretically, this can only be accomplished applying nonlinear models, in which case setting up the simplified water budget equation is impossible without knowing the initial conditions. Hence, excluding recharge when assessing sustainable pumping may not be done inconsiderately, which is illustrated by two examples. An analytical solution, developed by Ernst in 1971 to simulate flow to a well in a polder area with a nonlinear function for drainage, even shows that it is not necessarily a misconception to assume the cone of depression stops expanding when the pumping rate is balanced by the infiltration rate.     

Lipid distribution in a subtropical southern China stalagmite as a record of soil ecosystem response to paleoclimate change

Lipid extracts from a 61.7-cm-long subtropical stalagmite in southern China, spanning the period of ca. 10,000–21,000 yr ago as constrained by U–Th dating, were analyzed using gas chromatography–mass spectrometry. The higher plants and microorganisms in the overlying soils contribute a proportion of n-alkanes identified in the stalagmite. The occurrence of LMW (lower molecular weight) n-alkanols and n-alkan-2-ones in the stalagmite was mainly related to the soil microorganisms. We suggest that HMW (higher molecular weight) n-alkanols and n-alkan-2-ones identified in the stalagmite originate from soil organics and reflect input from contemporary vegetation. Shifts in the ratio of LMW to HMW n-alkanols or n-alkan-2-ones indicative of the variation of soil ecosystems (e.g., microbial degradation of organic matter and/or the relative abundance of soil microorganisms to higher plants) are comparable with the subtropical alkenone-SST (sea surface temperature) record of the same period. The similar trends seen in the δ¹³C data and the lipid parameters in this stalagmite imply that the overlying soil ecosystem response to climate might be responsible for the variation of δ¹³C values.     

Parity fluctuations in stellar dynamos

Observations of the solar butterfly diagram from sunspot records suggest persistent fluctuations in parity, away from the overall, approximately dipolar pattern. A simple mean-field dynamo model is used with a solar-like rotation law and perturbed α effect. The parity of the magnetic field relative to the rotational equator can demonstrate can be described as resonance behavior, while the magnetic energy behaves in a more or less expected way. Possible applications of this effect are discussed in the context of various deviations of the solar magnetic field from dipolar symmetry, as reported from analyses of archival sunspot data. The model produces fluctuations in field parity, and hence in the butterfly diagram, that are consistent with observed fluctuaions in solar behavior.     

Detection of mRNA sequences homologous to the human glutathione peroxidase and rat cytochrome P-450IVA1 genes in Mytilus edulis

In this study we have used cloned gene probes for human glutathione peroxidase (GPX), rat cytochrome P-450IVA1 and rat cytochrome P-450IIE1 to detect homologous sequences in RNA from the hepato-pancreas of Mytilus edulis. The presence of sequences hybridising to the GPX and P-450IVA1 probes, but not to the P-450IIE1 probe, confirms the ancient origin of the former genes and indicates that conserved-sequence DNA probes from higher organisms can be used to examine the structure and function of genes of environmental interest in marine organisms.