Speckle interferometry of asteroids: I. 433 eros

Analytic expressions for the semimajor and semiminor axes and an orientation angle of the ellipse projected by a triaxial ellipsoid (an asteroid) and of the ellipse segment cast by a terminator across the ellipsoid as functions of the dimensions and pole of the body and the asterocenteric position of the Earth and Sun are derived. Applying these formulae to observations of the Earth-approaching asteroid 433 Eros obtained with the speckle interferometry system of Steward Observatory on December 17–18, 1981, and January 17–18, 1982, the following dimensions are derived: (40.5 ± 3.1 km) × (14.5 ± 2.3 km) × (14.1 ± 2.4 km) Eros' north pole is found to lie within 14° of RA = 0^h16^m Dec. = +43° (ecliptic longitude 23°, latitude +37°). Other than knowing the rotation period of Eros, these results are completely independent of any other data, and in the main confirm the results obtained in the 1974–1975 apparition by other methods. These dimensions, together with a lightcurve from December 18, 1981, lead to a geometric albedo of 0.156 ± 0.010. A series of two-dimensional power spectra and autocorrelation functions of the resolved asteroid clearly show it spinning in space.     

Analytical and numerical solutions for carbonated waterflooding

We develop a Riemann solver for transport problems including geochemistry related to oil recovery. The example considered here concerns one-dimensional incompressible flow in porous media and the transport for several chemical components, namely H₂O, H⁺, OH^?, CO₂, \(\text {CO}_{3}^{2-}\), \(\text {HCO}_{3}^{-}\), and decane; they are in chemical equilibrium in the aqueous and oleic phases, leading to mass transfer of CO₂ between the oleic and aqueous phases. In our ionic model, we employ equations with zero diffusion coefficients. We do so because it is well known that for upscaled equations, the convection terms dominate the diffusion terms. The Riemann solution for this model can therefore be applied for upscaled transport processes in enhanced oil recovery involving geochemical aspects. In our example, we formulate the conservation equations of hydrogen, oxygen, hydrogen, and decane, in which we substitute regression expressions that are obtained by geochemical software. This can be readily done because Gibbs phase rule together with charge balance shows that all compositions can be rewritten in terms of a single composition, which we choose to be the hydrogen ion concentration (p H). In our example, we use the initial and boundary conditions for the carbonated aqueous phase injection in an oil reservoir containing connate water with some carbon dioxide. We compare the Riemann solution with a numerical solution, which includes capillary and diffusion effects. The significant new contribution is the effective Riemann solver we developed to obtain solutions for oil recovery problems including geochemistry and a variable total Darcy velocity, a situation in which fractional flow theory does not readily apply. We thus obtain an accurate solution for a carbonated waterflood, which elucidates some mechanisms of low salinity carbonated waterflooding.     

Responding to flood risk in Louisiana: the roles of place attachment,emotions, and location

Natural Hazards - Drawing from protection motivation theory (PMT), we examined how place attachment and negative emotions, alongside threat and coping appraisals, personal experiences, and...     

Climate change effects on landslides along the southwest coast of British Columbia

Antecedent rainfall and short-term intense rainfall both contribute to the temporal occurrence of landslides in British Columbia. These two quantities can be extracted from the precipitation regimes simulated by climate models. This makes such models an attractive tool for use in the investigation of the effect of global warming on landslide frequencies.In order to provide some measure of the reliability of models used to address the landslide question, the present-day simulation of the antecedent precipitation and short-term rainfall using the daily data from the Canadian Centre for Climate Modelling and Analysis model (CGCM) is compared to observations along the south coast of British Columbia. This evaluation showed that the model was reasonably successful in simulating statistics of the antecedent rainfall but was less successful in simulating the short-term rainfall.The monthly mean precipitation data from an ensemble of 19 of the world's global climate models were available to study potential changes in landslide frequencies with global warming. Most of the models were used to produce simulations with three scenarios with different levels of prescribed greenhouse gas concentrations during the twenty-first century. The changes in the antecedent precipitation were computed from the resulting monthly and seasonal means. In order to deal with models' suspected difficulties in simulating the short-term precipitation and lack of daily data, a statistical procedure was used to relate the short-term precipitation to the monthly means.The qualitative model results agree reasonably well, and when averaged over all models and the three scenarios, the change in the antecedent precipitation is predicted to be about 10% and the change in the short-term precipitation about 6%. Because the antecedent precipitation and the short-term precipitation contribute to the occurrence of landslides, the results of this study support the prediction of increased landslide frequency along the British Columbia south coast during the twenty-first century.     

Low-frequency microtremor anomalies at an oil and gas field in Voitsdorf, Austria

Results of a passive microtremor survey at an oil and gas field in Voitsdorf, Austria, are presented. The survey consists in six parallel profiles approximately 9 km long over two hydrocarbon reservoirs. For each profile the seismic wavefield was recorded synchronously at 11 in-line stations. The measurements were conducted with broadband seismometers and lasted, for each profile, at least 12 hours overnight. Data interpretation is based on a comprehensive data set and on the analysis of four different spectral attributes. These attributes quantify the characteristic features of the wavefield's Fourier spectra in the low-frequency range (<10Hz). One attribute quantifies the spectral energy in the vertical wavefield component, another attribute quantifies the maxima in vertical-to-horizontal spectral ratios and two attributes describe the frequency shifts of peaks within the spectra of vertical and horizontal wavefield components. Due to temporal variations of the signals we combine the long-term measurements (several hours of continuous records) of multiple profiles. This procedure considerably enhances the consistency of each spectral attribute and makes them suitable to quantify lateral variations of the wavefield. The results show that using a combination of several attributes significantly increases the reliability of detecting anomalies in the microtremor wavefield that are presumably caused by hydrocarbon reservoirs. A numerical study of two-dimensional seismic wave propagation is applied to investigate the peak frequency shift attributes. The results of the study indicate that the attributes may contain information on the depth of hydrocarbon reservoirs, assuming that the reservoir acts as a (secondary) source of low-frequency seismic waves.     

Spectroscopic Characterization of Humic-Like Substances in Airborne Particulate Matter

In a standard reference air dust (NIST 1648 – urban particulate matter) as well as in airborne particulate matter collected in German urban and rural areas (Dortmund, Sauerland) 10% and more of the organic carbon can be attributed to macromolecular substances like humic and fulvic acids (HA, FA). Indirect evidence for the presence of humin was also obtained. HA and FA extracted from NIST 1648 and other urban and rural atmospheric particles using 0.1 m NaOH and isolated by ion-exchangers were characterized by their molecular-size distribution applying multistage ultrafiltration, their carbon content and their UV/VIS, Fourier-transformed infrared (FTIR) and nuclear magnetic resonance (¹H-NMR) spectra. Summarizing, the structural studies exhibit that these humic-like substances (HULIS) contained in air dust samples are small in their molecular size and rich in aliphatic and carbohydrate substructures compared to HA and FA from soils and aquatic systems.     

The petrogenesis of carbonatite, melnoite and kimberlite from the Eastern Goldfields Province, Yilgarn Craton

We have obtained major and trace element data for a suite of rocks emplaced over an area of 45,000 km² in the Eastern Goldfields Province (EGP), Yilgarn Craton, that are petrographically and mineralogically described as kimberlites, melnoites and carbonatites. Kimberlites dominate the rock types found in the west whereas carbonatites and melnoites are common in the east. Compatible element data from the carbonatites and melnoites tend to lie along trends that imply silicate–carbonate fractionation. The kimberlites exhibit a much greater amount of compatible element scatter as a result of the variable contribution from continental lithospheric mantle (CLM). When compared to southern African kimberlites, the EGP kimberlites have consistently lower MgO and Os concentrations at comparable Ni concentrations. The opposite is true for Ti–Ni variation where the EGP kimberlites have higher Ti than the southern African kimberlites at comparable Ni concentrations. These data are interpreted to suggest that the CLM beneath the province was either melt metasomatised some time prior to kimberlite emplacement, or that the EGP CLM is less refractory (melt depleted) than the Kaaapvaal CLM.

In contrast, the incompatible element ratios and initial Nd values are constant throughout the entire rock suite. Carbonate C and O isotope data show a broad positive correlation, consistent with magmatic-hydrothermal trends found in many carbonatite complexes. These incompatible element and isotope data link all of the rocks within the province to the same mantle source that was similar to modern-day mantle plume sources.

Re–Os data for the various samples, including oxide minerals from all of the petrographic types, xenocryst-poor kimberlites and melnoites yield a precise Re–Os isochron of 2025±10 Ma and an initial γOs of 5.3±3.1 (MSWD=5.8). These data support the conclusion based on incompatible element, stable isotope and Sm–Nd isotope data that the rocks are comagmatic.

Initial Os isotopic compositions and Re/Os ratios for the xenocryst-rich kimberlites are also correlated. However, the correlation does not pass through the calculated initial γOs and Re/Os of the isochron. The Re–Os data show that the incompatible element-enriched melt exhibited very little control on the Re–Os variations of the xenocryst-rich kimberlites.

Correlations between deep mantle seismic velocities, petrology and whole-rock compatible element geochemistry suggest that the rheology and history of the EGP CLM played a significant role in determining the petrographic characteristics of the magmas that were ultimately emplaced into the EGP crust.     

Linear viscoelastic behavior of asphalt mixes from dynamic frequency response functions

In the small strain domain, asphalt mixes (AM) have a linear viscoelastic (LVE) behavior that is strongly dependent on frequency and temperature. The maximum ratio of modulus values can be up to 1000, and traditional elastic analyses are not pertinent. The possibility to characterize AM from frequency response functions (FRFs) was studied. A new optimization process using the finite element method (FEM) has been developed to back-calculate the LVE properties of AM from FRFs. The numerical optimization process was applied to a reference material with averaged LVE properties determined from tension-compression tests performed on a wide variety of AM types. The LVE properties were modeled considering the 3-Dim version of the model 2S2P1D (2 Springs, 2 Parabolic elements, and 1 Dashpot). Reference FRFs for the considered reference material were obtained from FEM simulations. Three different configurations that may be of interest for practical tests were studied at five different temperatures. The proposed numerical optimization method consists in performing separate optimizations at each temperature to obtain the LVE properties for the considered temperature. Then values obtained at each temperature are considered to optimize 2S2P1D and Williams Landel Ferry (WLF) Equation constants to simulate the global LVE behavior of the material. The accuracy of the process was assessed regarding both the calculated FRFs and the complex modulus evaluation. Results indicate that the proposed optimization process converges almost perfectly towards the reference FRFs. The simulated complex modulus values are also in very good agreement with the values of the reference material.     

Diet of giant kokopu,Galaxias argenteus

The stomach contents of 105 preserved specimens of giant kokopu, Galaxias argenteus (Gmelin 1789), collected from various locations around New Zealand between c. 1963 and 1994, were used to investigate giant kokopu diet. A total of 76 food taxa, predominantly invertebrates, were identified and categorised as either of aquatic or terrestrial origin from the 91 stomachs that contained food items. Aquatic Trichoptera, Gastropoda, and Hemiptera comprised 29.1, 12.6, and 14.4% by abundance respectively, and terrestrial Coleoptera 12.2% by abundance. Adult terrestrial Coleoptera were the most commonly occurring taxa, and were found in 59% of the stomachs that contained food. Food items of aquatic origin occurred in 94.5% of the giant kokopu stomachs that contained food and comprised 74.9% of the items by abundance. Although fewer items of terrestrial origin were encountered, they nevertheless appeared to be a significant component of the diet, and occurred in 83.5% of the giant kokopu stomachs that contained food, and comprised 25.1% of the items by abundance. Items of terrestrial origin occurred slightly more frequently in giant kokopu from lotic habitats than from lentic habitats. The significance of terrestrial food may be associated with giant kokopu preference for habitats with riparian cover. Fish also appeared to be a significant component of the diet, as 26% of the giant kokopu examined contained fish remains. Giant kokopu are probably best described as generalist feeders, as they utilise a wide range of foods of both aquatic and terrestrial origin.     

Mineralogical and chemical Zonation around the Woodlawn Cu‐Pb‐Zn ore deposit,Southeastern New South Wales

The volcanogenic Woodlawn Cu‐Pb‐Zn sulphide mineralization occurs within a low‐grade metamorphosed sequence of Middle to Upper Silurian felsic volcanics and fine‐grained sedimentary rocks. Studies on a total of 234 rock samples from diamond drill holes have delineated zones of hydrothermally altered rocks extending more than ～500 m laterally from the main ore lens, at least ～100 m into the foot wall and up to ～200 m into the hanging wall. These altered rocks contain virtually no remnants of primary feldspars and ferromagnesian minerals, and they are variably chloritized, sericitized and silicified. Chlorite and disseminated sulphide minerals are most abundant in zone I, a restricted zone of intense alteration immediately around the main ore lens, whereas sericitic muscovite is most abundant in the relatively extensive zone II, further from the ore. Silicification is also a feature of volcanics well beyond the limits of observed phyllosilicate‐rich alteration zones. Chemical changes within the hydrothermally altered rocks include major enrichment of Fe, Mg, S, Si and H₂O, more sporadic enrichment of Ag, Ba, Bi, Cd, Cu, Mn, Pb, Sn and Zn, and major depletion of Ca, Na and Sr. K is depleted in zone I and shows considerable variation, but no overall depletion or enrichment, in zone II.

Lithological, mineralogical and geochemical features around the Woodlawn orebody are basically similar to those associated with the younger, unmetamorphosed Kuroko deposits.