Enhancing the management response to oil spills in the Tuscany Archipelago through operational modelling

A new approach towards the management of oil pollution accidents in marine sensitive areas is presented in this work. A set of nested models in a downscaling philosophy was implemented, externally forced by existing regional operational products. The 3D hydrodynamics, turbulence and the oil transport/weathering models are all linked in the same system, sharing the same code, exchanging information in real time and improving its ability to correctly reproduce the spill. A wind-generated wave model is also implemented using the same downscaling philosophy. Observations from several sources validated the numerical components of the system. The results obtained highlight the good performance of the system and its ability to be applied for oil spill forecasts in the region. The success of the methodology described in this paper was underline during the Costa Concordia accident, where a high resolution domain was rapidly created and deployed inside the system covering the accident site.     

Characterization of Quaternary faults by electric resistivity tomography in the Andean Precordillera of Western Argentina

El río San Juan, situado en la Provincia de San Juan (Argentina) cruza la Precordillera y otras unidades geológicas incluyendo la Depresión de Ullum y la Zona de La Laja, entre las latitudes 31°S y 32°S. El curso del río tiene un cierto caracter antecedente como puede deducirse por sus dos trazas perpendiculares unidas por otra casi paralela a las alineaciones estructurales principales. En la zona de la Precordillera, el valle del río San Juan muestra numerosos abanicos aluviales, situados en las zonas de confluencia entre el río principal y sus tributarios. Las superficies de los abanicos aluviales cuaternarios estan cortadas por una serie de escalones que consideramos como terrazas aluviales generadas por episodios repetitivos de agradación y degradación. El sector estudiado incluye una zona con una importante actividad sísmica reciente(La Laja), otra sin una importante actividad sísmica reciente (Precordillera), y una zona subsidente (Ullum) donde se formó un gran lago natural hace unos 6500 años. El antiguo río San Juan fue capturado por el valle de la Quebrada de Ullum mediante una incisión del orden de 25 m, que implicó una nueva adecuación del gradiente del río mediante los efectos de la erosión remontante. El gradiente del río San Juan muestra algunas irregularidades que, aunque no se presenten relacionadas directamente con las estructuras principales, estan relacionadas con la propia dinámica fluvial que acentúa la diferenciación litológica. La anchura del valle del río principal, la geometria y el gradiente de cada tributario, junto a las litologias del basamento y a las dimensiones de cada area fuente local, son los factores principales que controlan los procesos de la generación de las terrazas aluviales. En la zona de La Laja, donde la terraza mas alta soporta un nivel de travertino, la datación de los depósitos travertínicos proporciona datos como para suponer una tasa de incisión del orden de 0,9–1 mm/año, asociada a la actuación periódica de la falla de La Laja.

Accretion of dust by chondrules in a MHD-turbulent solar nebula

Numerical magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) simulations of a turbulent solar nebula are used to study the growth of dust mantles swept up by chondrules. A small neighborhood of the solar nebula is represented by an orbiting patch of gas at a radius of 3 AU, and includes vertical stratification of the gas density. The differential rotation of the nebular gas is replaced by a shear flow. Turbulence is driven by destabilization of the flow as a result of the magnetorotational instability (MRI), whereby magnetic field lines anchored to the gas are continuously stretched by the shearing motion. A passive contaminant mimics small dust grains that are aerodynamically well coupled to the gas, and chondrules are modeled by Lagrangian particles that interact with the gas through drag. Whenever a chondrule enters a region permeated by dust, its radius grows at a rate that depends on the local dust density and the relative velocity between itself and the dust. The local dust abundance decreases accordingly. Compaction and fragmentation of dust aggregates are not included. Different chondrule volume densities ρ_c lead to varying depletion and rimmed-chondrule size growth times. Most of the dust sweep-up occurs within ～1 gas scale-height of the nebula midplane. Chondrules can reach their asymptotic radius in 10–800 years, although short growth times due to very high ρ_c may not be altogether realistic. If the sticking efficiency Q of dust to chondrules depends on their relative speed δv, such that Q < 10^?2 whenever δv > v_stick ≈ 34 cm/s (with v_stick a critical sticking velocity), then longer growth times result due to the prevalence of high MRI-turbulent relative velocities. The vertical variation of nebula turbulent intensity results in a moderate dependence of mean rimmed-chondrule size with nebula height, and in a ～20% dispersion in radius values at every height bin. The technique used here could be combined with Monte Carlo (MC) methods that include the physics of dust compaction, in a self-consistent MHD-MC model of dust rim growth around chondrules in the solar nebula.     

Identifying low-temperature hydrothermal karst and palaeowaters using stable isotopes: a case study from an alpine cave,Entrische Kirche,Austria

The area south of the prominent east–west trending Salzach Valley at the northern rim of the Central Alps of Austria has long been known to host anomalously warm springs emerging from a highly deformed calcite marble (Klammkalk). This unit also hosts cavities whose shapes suggest a hydrothermal karst origin and which are lined by calcite spar. We report here petrographic and isotopic evidence suggesting that dissolution by ascending low-temperature thermal waters also played an important role in the origin of a large cave in this region, Entrische Kirche. A paleo cave wall, preserved behind a thick flowstone in the interior of this cave, revealed a brownish bleaching zone which contrasts to the medium grey colour of the unaltered marble beneath. Across this zone the C and O isotope values gradually decrease by 3 and 11‰, respectively. These compositions are very different from those of the speleothem above but are similar to phreatic calcite spar from hydrothermal karst cavities in other outcrops in the area, where the absence of two-phase fluid inclusions suggests a low-temperature (less than ca. 50°C) hydrothermal origin. U/Th dating of the flowstone capping the alteration zone yielded a minimum age of the thermal water invasion in Entrische Kirche of ca. 240 kyr. There is no evidence in Entrische Kirche that these palaeowaters reached the point of calcite precipitation, but it is physically conceivable that higher and as yet unexplored parts of this deep (ca. 900 m) cave contain cavities lined by phreatic cave spar.     

Assessment of water vapor retrievals from a GPS receiver network

We present an assessment of a GPS receiver operational network to produce accurate integrated precipitable water vapour (IPWV) during a two-week field experiment carried out in Central Italy around the city of Rome, where different instruments were operative. This experimental activity provided an excellent opportunity to compare the GPS products with independent measurements provided by ground-based and space-based sensors and to evaluate their quality in terms of absolute accuracy of IPWV, analyzing also the spatial scale of GPS estimates. For instance, the assimilation into Numerical Weather Prediction models of IPWV provided by a GPS network or its exploitation in space geodesy applications to correct tropospheric effects requires an accuracy in the order of 0.1 cm to be ascribed to IPWV observations. In this work, we assessed that the accuracy for GPS IPWV estimates is 0.07 cm. Moreover, this experiment has pointed out strengths and limitations of an operational network for the water vapor estimation, such as a proper receiver distribution to achieve the desired spatial resolution and a coverage of GPS stations in both flat and mountains regions.     

Talc mineralisation associated with soft hematite ore, Gongo Soco deposit, Minas Gerais, Brazil: petrography, mineral chemistry and boron-isotope composition of tourmaline

Talc mineralisation occurs as hematite–talc schist between soft hematite ore and dolomitic itabirite at Gongo Soco, Quadrilátero Ferrífero of Minas Gerais, Brazil. The hematite–talc schist and soft hematite have a prominent tectonic foliation of tabular hematite. Tabular hematite without preferential orientation is superimposed on the tectonic foliation. The talcose schist is enriched in F and has a constant Fe/S ratio. Electron-microprobe analyses indicate trace amounts of S in different generations of hematite. The whole-rock Fe/S ratio possibly represents sulfate S from hematite-hosted fluid inclusions. Fluid inclusions in foliation-overprinting hematite and chlorite geothermometry from talcose rocks suggest, respectively, temperatures from <200°C to ~300°C. Tourmaline, a rarely observed mineral in the hematite–talc schist, belongs to the alkali group and falls in the dravite compositional field. Boron-isotope determinations of tourmaline crystals, using secondary ion mass spectrometry, vary from −20‰ to −12‰ δ¹¹B. This compositional isotopic range and the tourmaline chemical composition suggest a meta-evaporitic origin. A non-marine evaporitic setting is the most likely source of acidic, highly oxidising fluids, which resulted in the abundant F-bearing talc and the presence of otherwise immobile Ti in hematite. Oxidising brines were channelled along shear zones and converted dolomitic itabirite into the Gongo Soco soft hematite and the talc mineralisation. The latter is envisaged as the hydrothermal wall-rock alteration of dolomitic itabirite, which gave rise to the soft hematite ore.     

Magnetic behavior of trioctahedral micas with different octahedral Fe ordering

This contribution is finalized at the discussion of the magnetic structure of two samples, belonging to phlogopite–annite [sample TK, chemical composition ^IV(Si_2.76Al_1.24) ^VI(Al_0.64Mg_0.72 $ {\text{Fe}}_{1.45}^{2 + } $ Mn_0.03Ti_0.15) (K_0.96Na_0.05) O_10.67 (OH)_1.31 Cl_0.02] and polylithionite–siderophyllite joints [sample PPB, chemical composition ^IV(Si_3.14Al_0.86)^VI(Al_0.75Mg_0.01 $ {\text{Fe}}_{1.03}^{2 + } $ $ {\text{Fe}}_{1.03}^{3 + } $ Mn_0.01Ti_0.01Li_1.09) (K_0.99Na_0.01) O_10.00 (OH)_0.65F_1.35]. Samples differ for Fe ordering in octahedral sites, Fe²⁺/(Fe²⁺?+?Fe³⁺) ratio, octahedral composition, defining a different environment around Fe cations, and layer symmetry. Spin-glass behavior was detected for both samples, as evidenced by the dependency of the temperature giving the peak in the susceptibility curve from the frequency of the applied alternating current magnetic field. The crystal chemical features are associated to the different temperature at which the maximum in magnetic susceptibility is observed: 6?K in TK, where Fe is disordered in all octahedral sites, and 8?K in PPB sample, showing a smaller and more regular coordination polyhedron for Fe, which is ordered in the trans-site and in one of the two cis-sites.     

Engineering geological data in support of municipal land use planning—a case study in Analandia, southeast Brazil

This paper presents a method for transforming the information of an engineering geological map into useful information for non-specialists involved in land-use planning. The method consists of classifying the engineering geological units in terms of land use capability and identifying the legal and the geologic restrictions that apply in the study area. Both informations are then superimposed over the land use and a conflict areas map is created. The analysis of these data leads to the identification of existing and forthcoming land use conflicts and enables the proposal of planning measures on a regional and local scale. The map for the regional planning was compiled at a 1:50,000 scale and encompasses the whole municipal land area where uses are mainly rural. The map for the local planning was compiled at a 1:10,000 scale and encompasses the urban area. Most of the classification and operations on maps used spatial analyst tools available in the Geographical Information System. The regional studies showed that the greater part of Analandia’s territory presents appropriate land uses. The local-scale studies indicate that the majority of the densely occupied urban areas are in suitable land. Although the situation is in general positive, municipal policies should address the identified and expected land use conflicts, so that it can be further improved.     

Effects of the 'Prestige' oil spill on macroalgal assemblages: large-scale comparison

An assessment of the effects of the 'Prestige' oil spill on intertidal, macroalgal assemblages was carried out comparing abundance data obtained before and after the spill. Four zones in the North and Northwest coast of Spain were sampled, one of them located at the immediate vicinity of the spill, the zone most heavily oiled. Macroalgal assemblages had similar structure between years. Neither critical decrease in abundance of the dominant macroalgae, nor increase in opportunistic species were found. Some differences in abundance were observed, but they did not show any pattern, being more likely the result of the natural variability of the assemblage. Extensive, but not intense fuel deposition on the shores and a limited use of aggressive cleanup methods are suggested as possible causes for the lack of the effects in these assemblages after the 'Prestige' oil spill.     

Effect of crab size and habitat type on the locomotory activity of juvenile shore crabs, Carcinus maenas

Post-settlement processes are a major focus in the study of the dynamics of marine populations and communities. Post-settlement movement of juveniles is an important, but often ignored, process which affects local predator–prey and competitive interactions. We used benthic suction sampling and pitfall traps to examine density and locomotory activity of Carcinus maenas juveniles in different intertidal habitat types in the Rio Mira Estuary, Portugal, to better understand intra-specific interactions in a system where density-dependent processes are known to regulate population dynamics. As expected, significantly higher densities of juvenile shore crabs were found from bare mud compared to densely vegetated habitats. At the time of sampling, small and intermediate stages together outnumbered by far the larger juveniles. Conversely, larger crabs were much more frequent than smaller ones in traps. A locomotory index (LI), i.e. the ratio between crab catch in pitfall traps and their density within their moving range, is proposed as a measure of movement. LI analyses indicated that: (1) movement is an order of magnitude higher in large than small juveniles and much higher in sparse than dense vegetation cover; (2) activity of small juveniles is mostly crepuscular, regardless of vegetation cover; and (3) movement of large juveniles is very limited in dense Zostera patches, but very high in sparsely vegetated areas, during the day and night. These results suggest that small juveniles are relatively protected under dense vegetation cover due to lower mobility of larger crabs, and provide evidence of temporal segregation of activity windows between juvenile crabs of different sizes, which may be a key mechanism to reduce cannibalism and therefore increase the carrying capacity of nursery habitats.