Ferrobasalts from the Central Indian Ocean Basin

 We report the occurrence of ferrobasalts recovered from the Central Indian Ocean Basin crust generated at the Southeast Indian Ridge during a phase of moderate to fast spreading accretion (∼110–190 mm/yr, full rate).The rocks are rich in plagioclase, FeO^* (13–19%), and TiO₂ (2.27–2.76%), poor in olivine and MgO (3.44–6.20%), and associated with topographic highs and increased amplitude magnetic anomalies corresponding to chrons A25 and A24. We suggest that secon dary eruptions from ancient N-MORB magma, which may have been trapped at a shallow depth in a horizon of neutral buoyancy, could have produced the ferrobasalts. Received: 27 January 1998 / Revision received: 25 May 1998     

Significance of mineral chemistry of syenites and associated rocks of Elagiri complex,Southern Granulite Terrane of the Indian shield

The Elagiri complex (12°31′ N: 78°35′ E) represents one of the important silica — oversaturated syenite plutons of the Southern Granulite Terrane of the Indian shield. This article for the first time reports the mineral chemistry of the Elagiri complex and brings out important petrogenetic significance. The litho-members of Elagiri complex are intrusive into high grade country rocks viz. granite gneiss, amphibolite and pyroxene granulite. The country rocks are foliated bearing evidences of multiple folding and deformation. On the other hand, the constituent litho members of the Elagiri complex (syenites, gabbro and later intrusives marked by lamprophyre and carbonatite) show preservation of igneous layering in terms of discernible parallelism of the constituent minerals. The Elagiri complex shows presence of sharp contacts among litho members and marked absence of chilled facies peripheral to the margin. Electron microprobe data have been critically used to systematize the constituent mineral-phases of the different lithomembers of the complex. Geothermobarometric data indicate a temperature of equilibration in the range of ∼700° to 500°C at ∼2.0 to 5.2 kb which corresponds to shallow level (cf. 18.2 km) equilibration-depth of the complex. Field observations and mineral chemistry data suggest that liquid immiscibility plays an important role during the evolution of the Elagiri complex.     

Potential source zones for Himalayan earthquakes: constraints from spatial�Ctemporal clusters

The Himalayan fold-thrust belt has been visited by many disastrous earthquakes (magnitude > 6) time and again. This active collisional orogen bordering Indian subcontinent in the north remains a potential seismic threat of similar magnitude in the adjoining countries like India, Pakistan, Nepal, Bhutan and China. Though earthquake forecasting is riddled with all conjectures and still not a proven presumption, identifying likely source zones of such disastrous earthquakes would be an important contribution to seismic hazard assessment. In this study, we have worked out spatio-temporal clustering of earthquakes (Mb ?? 4.5; 1964?C2006) in the Himalayas. ??Point density?? spatial statistics has helped in detecting 22 spatial seismicity clusters. Earthquake catalog is then treated with a moving time-distance window technique (inter-event time 35 days and distance 100 ± 20 km) to bring out temporal clusters by recognizing several foreshock-main shock-aftershock (FMA) sequences. A total of 53 such temporal sequences identified in the process are confined within the 22 spatial clusters. Though each of these spatio-temporal clusters deserves in-depth analysis, we short-listed only eight such clusters that are dissected by active tectonic discontinuities like MBT/MCT for detail study. Spatio-temporal clusters have been used to constrain the potential source zones. These eight well-defined spatio-temporal clusters demonstrate recurrent moderate to large earthquakes. We assumed that the length of these clusters are indicating the possible maximum rupture lengths and thus empirically estimated the maximum possible magnitudes of eight clusters that can be generated from them (from west to east) as 8.0, 8.3, 8.2, 8.3, 8.2, 8.4, 8.0 and 7.7. Based on comparative study of the eight cluster zones contemplating with their temporal recurrences, historical seismic records, presence of intersecting faults and estimated magnitudes, we have guessed the possibility that Kangra, East Nepal, Garhwal and Kumaun?CWest Nepal clusters, in decreasing order of earthquake threat, are potential source zones for large earthquakes (??7.7 M) in future.     

Microbial mat structures in profile: The Neoproterozoic Sonia Sandstone,Rajasthan, India

Ubiquitous microorganisms, especially cyanobacteria preferably grow on the sediment surface thereby producing microbial mats. In the absence of grazers and bioturbators, microbial mat is a unique feature of the Proterozoic. Most of the papers so far published described a wide variety of bed surface microbial mat structures with rare illustrations from sections perpendicular to bedding. Nonetheless, bed surface exposures are relatively rare in rock records. This limitation of bed surface exposures in rock records suggest that a study of microbial mats in bed-across sections is needed. The 60 m thick coastal marine interval of the Sonia Sandstone Formation is bounded between two terrestrial intervals, a transgressive lag at the base and an unconformity at the top, and has been chosen for exploration of microbial mat structures in bed-across sections. A wide variety of microbial mat-induced structures in bed-across sections are preserved within the coastal interval of the Sonia Sandstone. Though many of these structures are similar in some aspects with bed surface structures, some of those presented here are new. The palaeogeographic range of these microbial structures extends from supralittoral to neritic. Diagenetic alterations of microbial mats produce pyrite and those zones are suitable for the preservation of microbial remains. SEM and EDAX analyses show fossil preservation of filamentous microbial remains that confirm the presence of microbial mats within the coastal interval of the Sonia Sandstone. Effects of proliferation of microbial mats in the siliciclastic depositional setting are numerous. The mat-cover on sediment surfaces hinders reworking and/or erosion of the sediments thereby increases the net sedimentation rate. Successive deposition and preservation of thick microbial mat layer under reducing environments should have a great potential for hydrocarbon production and preservation and therefore these Proterozoic formations could be a target for exploration.     

Rising and falling river flows: contrasting signals of climate change and glacier mass balance from the eastern and western Karakoram

Abstract

Field observations and geodetic measurements suggest that in the Karakoram Mountains, glaciers are either stable or have expanded since 1990, in sharp contrast to glacier retreats that are prevalently observed in the Himalayas and adjoining high-altitude terrains of central Asia. Decreased discharge in the rivers originating from this region is cited as a supporting evidence for this somewhat anomalous phenomenon. Here, we show that river discharge during the melting season of the glaciers in the eastern and western Karakoram, respectively, exhibits rising and falling trends. We have implemented a statistical procedure involving non-parametric tests combined with a benchmark smoothing technique that has proven to be a powerful method for separating the stochastic component from the trend component in a time series. Precipitation patterns determined from ERA-40 and GPCP data indicate that summer-monsoonal precipitation has increased over the Karakoram Mountains in recent decades. Increasing flows in June and July in the eastern Karakoram are due to an increase in summer-monsoonal precipitation. The rising trend of August discharge is due to an increase in the loss of glacier storage at an approximate average rate of 0.186–0.217 mm d^-1 year^-1 during the period 1973–2010. Moreover, this rate is higher than the rate of increase in monsoonal snowfall during the months of August and September. Therefore, most plausibly, glacier mass balance in the eastern Karakoram is negative. In the western Karakoram, river flows show declining trends for all summer months for the period 1966–2010, corresponding to a rate of increase of glacier storage by approximately 0.552–0.644 mm d^-1 year^-1, which is also higher than the rate of increase in summer-monsoonal precipitation. The gain of the cryospheric mass in the western Karakoram is in the form of increased thickness of the glaciers and perennial snowpacks instead of areal expansion. This investigation shows two contrasting patterns of trends of river flows that signify both negative and positive mass balance of the Karakoram glaciers. Trends of river flows are spatially and temporally integrated responses of a watershed to changing climate and thereby are important signals of the conditions of the cryospheric component of a watershed where it is highly significant. However, they cannot unequivocally provide indications of the state and fate of the glaciers in the complex hydrometeorological setting of the Karakoram. Extreme caution and care must be exercised in interpreting trends of river discharge in conjunction with climatic data.     

Potential CO<Subscript>2</Subscript> Emission Due to Loss of Above Ground Biomass from the Indian Sundarban Mangroves During the Last Four Decades

Sundarban, the largest single patch of mangrove forest of the world is shared by Bangladesh (~ 60 %) and India (~ 40 %). Loss of mangrove biomass and subsequent potential emission of carbon dioxide is reported from different parts of the world. We estimated the loss of above ground mangrove biomass and subsequent potential emission of carbon dioxide in the Indian part of the Sundarban during the last four decades. The loss of mangrove area has been estimated with the help of remotely sensed data and potential emission of carbon dioxide has been evaluated with the help of published above ground biomass data of Indian Sundarban. Total loss of mangrove area was found to be 107 km² between the year 1975 and 2013. Amongst the total loss ~60 % was washed away in the water by erosion, ~ 23 % was converted into barren lands and the rest were anthropogenically transformed into other landforms. The potential carbon dioxide emission due to the degradation of above ground biomass was estimated to be 1567.98 ± 551.69 Gg during this period, which may account to 64.29 million $ in terms of the social cost of carbon. About three-forth of the total mangrove loss was found in the peripheral islands which are much more prone to erosion. Climate induced changes and anthropogenic land use change could be the major driving force behind this loss of ‘blue carbon’.     

Seismicity, gravity anomalies and lithospheric structure of the Andaman arc, NE Indian Ocean

The Andaman arc in the northeastern Indian Ocean defines nearly 1100 km long active plate margin between the India and Burma plates where an oblique Benioff zone develops down to 200 km depth. Several east-trending seismologic sections taken across the Andaman Benioff Zone (ABZ) are presented here to detail the subduction zone geometry in a 3-D perspective. The slab gravity anomaly, computed from the 3-D ABZ configuration, is a smooth, long-wavelength and symmetric gravity high of 85 mGal amplitude centering to the immediate east of the Nicobar Island, where, a prominent gravity “high” follows the Nicobar Deep. The Slab-Residual Gravity Anomaly (SRGA) and Mantle Bouguer Anomaly (MBA) maps prepared for the Andaman plate margin bring out a double-peaked SRGA “low” in the range of − 150 to − 240 mGal and a wider-cum-larger MBA “low” having the amplitude of − 280 to − 315 mGal demarcating the Andaman arc–trench system. The gravity models provide evidences for structural control in propagating the rupture within the lithosphere. The plate margin configuration below the Andaman arc is sliced by the West Andaman Fault (WAF) as well as by a set of sympathetic faults of various proportions, often cutting across the fore-arc sediment package. Some of these fore-arc thrust faults clearly give rise to considerably high post-seismic activity, but the seismic incidence along the WAF further east is comparatively much less particularly in the north, although, the lack of depth resolution for many of the events prohibits tracing the downward continuity of these faults. Tectonic correlation of the gravity-derived models presented here tends to favour the presence of oceanic crust below the Andaman–Nicobar Outer Arc Ridge.