Microbiological response to well pumping

To better constrain sampling strategies for observing biologically sensitive parameters in ground water, we vigorously pumped for 120 h a lightly pumped well completed in a confined glacial aquifer while observing how various physical and chemical parameters evolve in the water produced. The parameters commonly monitored when sampling a well stabilized within about an hour, after 5 wellbore volumes were produced; these parameters include temperature, pH, dissolved oxygen, oxidation-reduction potential (Eh), and electrical conductivity. The concentrations of ferrous iron, sulfide, and sulfate and various biological or biologically sensitive parameters, including the concentrations of dissolved hydrogen and methane, direct cell counts, and the microbial community profile, in contrast, required more than 8 h or 36 well volumes to stabilize. We interpret this result to mean that the zone of influence of the wellbore on biologic processes in the aquifer extends beyond the commonly recognized zone where physical properties are affected. A second period of adjustment of these biologically sensitive parameters began after about 50 h of pumping, following displacement of 230 wellbore volumes, and continued to the end of the experiment. During this period, the cell density and the composition of the microbial community suspended in the water samples changed. This finding indicates that the microbial community in and near the wellbore changed in response to pumping and the changes affected aspects of the composition of water produced from the well. The study demonstrates the importance of allowing adequate pumping time when sampling ground water for the analysis of biologically sensitive parameters.     

Estimating Flow Using Tracers and Hydraulics in Synthetic Heterogeneous Aquifers

Regional ground water flow is most usually estimated using Darcy's law, with hydraulic conductivities estimated from pumping tests, but can also be estimated using ground water residence times derived from radioactive tracers. The two methods agree reasonably well in relatively homogeneous aquifers but it is not clear which is likely to produce more reliable estimates of ground water flow rates in heterogeneous systems. The aim of this paper is to compare bias and uncertainty of tracer and hydraulic approaches to assess ground water flow in heterogeneous aquifers. Synthetic two-dimensional aquifers with different levels of heterogeneity (correlation lengths, variances) are used to simulate ground water flow, pumping tests, and transport of radioactive tracers. Results show that bias and uncertainty of flow rates increase with the variance of the hydraulic conductivity for both methods. The bias resulting from the nonlinearity of the concentration–time relationship can be reduced by choosing a tracer with a decay rate similar to the mean ground water residence time. The bias on flow rates estimated from pumping tests is reduced when performing long duration tests. The uncertainty on ground water flow is minimized when the sampling volume is large compared to the correlation length. For tracers, the uncertainty is related to the ratio of correlation length to the distance between sampling wells. For pumping tests, it is related to the ratio of correlation length to the pumping test's radius of influence. In regional systems, it may be easier to minimize this ratio for tracers than for pumping tests.     

Coordinate mapping of analytical contaminant transport solutions to non-uniform flow fields

Existing analytical solutions to 2D and 3D contaminant transport problems are limited by the mathematically convenient assumption of uniform flow. An approximate method is developed herein for coordinate mapping of 2D (vertically-averaged) transport solutions to non-uniform steady-state irrotational and divergence-free flow fields in single-layer aquifers. The method enables existing analytical transport solutions to be applied to aquifer systems with wells, non-uniform saturated thickness, surface water features, and (to a limited degree) heterogeneous hydraulic conductivity and recharge. This mass-conservative coordinate mapping approach is inexact in its approximation of the dispersion process but is still sufficiently accurate for many simple flow systems. The degree of model error is directly proportional to the variation of velocity magnitude within the domain. These mapped analytical solutions are compared to numerical simulation results and the coordinate mapping errors are investigated. The methods described herein may be used in the traditional capacity of analytical transport models, i.e., screening and preliminary site assessment, without sacrificing accuracy by assuming locally uniform flow conditions or applying an ad-hoc coordinate transformation. The solutions benefit from the traditional advantages of analytical methods, particularly the removal of artifacts due to spatial and temporal discretization: no time-stepping or numerical discretization is required.     

Catastrophic middle Pleistocene jökulhlaups in the upper Susquehanna River: Distinctive landforms from breakout floods in the central Appalachians

Widespread till and moraines record excursions of middle-Pleistocene ice that flowed up-slope into several watersheds of the Valley and Ridge Province along the West Branch of the Susquehanna River. A unique landform assemblage was created by ice-damming and jökulhlaups emanating from high gradient mountain watersheds. This combination of topography formed by multiple eastward-plunging anticlinal ridges, and the upvalley advance of glaciers resulted in an ideal geomorphic condition for the formation of temporary ice-dammed lakes. Extensive low gradient (1°–2° slope) gravel surfaces dominate the mountain front geomorphology in this region and defy simple explanation. The geomorphic circumstances that occurred in tributaries to the West Branch Susquehanna River during middle Pleistocene glaciation are extremely rare and may be unique in the world. Failure of ice dams released sediment-rich water from lakes, entraining cobbles and boulders, and depositing them in elongated debris fans extending up to 9 km downstream from their mountain-front breakout points. Poorly developed imbrication is rare, but occasionally present in matrix-supported sediments resembling debris flow deposits. Clast weathering and soils are consistent with a middle Pleistocene age for the most recent flows, circa the 880-ka paleomagnetic date for glacial lake sediments north of the region on the West Branch Susquehanna River. Post-glacial stream incision has focused along the margins of fan surfaces, resulting in topographic inversion, leaving bouldery jökulhlaup surfaces up to 15 m above Holocene channels. Because of their coarse nature and high water tables, jökulhlaup surfaces are generally forested in contrast to agricultural land use in the valleys and, thus, are readily apparent from orbital imagery.     

Local government, local economic development and quality of life in Poland

The establishment of local self-government was a key part of the post-1989 transformation in East and Central Europe. Local government in both Western and East and Central Europe has increasingly been expected to play a role in local economic development (LED). Local government is one important agent in the complex processes of building 'institutional thickness' to ensure the development of local economies and the quality of life of inhabitants. This paper presents the results of a national postal questionnaire survey of the LED role of the lowest level of local self-government in Poland, the gmina or commune. The paper establishes a baseline of knowledge regarding: the local economic problems faced by communes; their attitudinal, strategic and organisational responses; and the main factors which are hindering the communes' LED role. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Tracking the last sea-level cycle: seafloor morphology and shallow stratigraphy of the latest Quaternary New Jersey middle continental shelf

Seafloor geomorphology and surficial stratigraphy of the New Jersey middle continental shelf provide a detailed record of sea-level change during the last advance and retreat of the Laurentide ice sheet (120 kyr B.P. to Present). A NW–SE-oriented corridor on the middle shelf between water depths of 40 m (the mid-shelf “paleo-shore”) and 100 m (the Franklin “paleo-shore”) encompasses 500 line-km of 2D Huntec boomer profiles (500–3500 Hz), an embedded 4.6 km² 3D volume, and a 490 km² swath bathymetry map. We use these data to develop a relative stratigraphy. Core samples from published studies also provide some chronological and sedimentological constraints on the upper <5 m of the stratigraphic succession.The following stratigraphic units and surfaces occur (from bottom to top): (1) “R”, a high-amplitude reflection that separates sediment >46.5 kyr old (by AMS ¹⁴C dating) from overlying sediment wedges; (2) the outer shelf wedge, a marine unit up to 50 m thick that onlaps “R”; (3) “Channels”, a reflection sub-parallel to the seafloor that incises “R”, and appears as a dendritic system of channels in map view; (4) “Channels” fill, the upper portion of which is sampled and known to represent deepening-upward marine sediments 12.3 kyr in age; (5) the “T” horizon, a seismically discontinuous surface that caps “Channels” fill; (6) oblique ridge deposits, coarse-grained shelly units comprised of km-scale, shallow shelf bedforms; and (7) ribbon-floored swales, bathymetric depressions parallel to modern shelf currents that truncate the oblique ridges and cut into surficial deposits.We interpret this succession of features in light of a global eustatic sea-level curve and the consequent migration of the coastline across the middle shelf during the last 120 kyr. The morphology of the New Jersey middle shelf shows a discrete sequence of stratigraphic elements, and reflects the pulsed episodicity of the last sea-level cycle. “R” is a complicated marine/non-marine erosional surface formed during the last regression, while the outer shelf wedge represents a shelf wedge emplaced during a minor glacial retreat before maximum Wisconsin lowstand (i.e., marine oxygen isotope stage 3.1). “Channels” is a widespread fluvial subarial erosion surface formed at the late Wisconsin glacial maximum 22 kyr B.P. The shoreline migrated back across the mid-shelf corridor non-uniformly during the period represented by “Channels” fill. Oblique ridges are relict features on the New Jersey middle shelf, while the ribbon-floored swales represent modern shelf erosion. There is no systematic relationship between modern seafloor morphology and the very shallowly buried stratigraphic succession.     

Hypothesis for the origin of convergent margin granitoids and Earth’s continental crust by thermal migration zone refining

The production of Earth’s granitoids is generally attributed to magma intrusion, fractional crystallization and assimilation but the details of how granitoid plutons form remains widely debated. In light of recent experimental results which indicate that partially molten wet andesite in a temperature gradient evolves into a granitic bulk composition at the cooler end of the gradient (in a process called thermal migration), I present a model for at least some of Earth’s granitoids forming by a top-down thermal migration zone refining process. According to this model, convergent margin igneous activity builds a thick volcanic pile which becomes a barrier to further ascent of magma, leading to magma underplating by injection of sills at the base of the pile. When magmas arrive at the location of underplating, they react and release heat and water to the overlying materials (previously intruded sills), resulting in a downward moving zone having a near-steady-state temperature gradient. This leads to compositional differentiation by wet thermal migration taking place over million year time scales; this in situ differentiation process occurs in the middle of the underplated region but not on the more rapidly cooled edges of the sills. Modeling using the IRIDIUM program shows this process can produce sequences of granitoid that are kilometer or greater in thickness; regardless of granitoid thickness, the bottom of the system maintains a near constant thickness of hornblende gabbros. The model provides a logical connection between andesitic stratovolcanoes and underlying, more silicic intrusive series plutons—both reflect ascent of andesitic composition magmas, with the implication that convergent margin magmatic systems evolve temporally from stratovolcanoes to plutons once magma ascent is inhibited and underplating begins.The model provides an alternative to the standard view that granitoids result from cooling of large bodies of magma and could help to resolve long-standing questions concerning: geophysical observations of magma chambers; the compositions of minerals in granitoids; and the development of preferred mineral orientations in granitoids. It provides a consistent model in that it explains the systematic normal compositional zoning of plutons within the context of an incremental growth process dictated by geochronology. Most importantly, the model is predictive, emphasizing the importance of examining granitoids in the vertical dimension. The hypothesis that thermal migration plays a role in granitoid formation can be tested by analysis of non-traditional stable isotope systems such as Fe, Mg and Si that should show a signature of thermal diffusion. The model predicts that the tops of overlying granitoids will have relatively heavy isotopic compositions whereas underlying hornblende gabbros will have relatively light isotopic compositions. Examination of existing iron isotope data and new silicon isotope data are consistent with the hypothesis and point to the need for more thorough testing.     

Geologic and geochemical study of the Picacho gold mine, California: gold in a low-angle normal fault environment

The Picacho gold deposit, located in southeasternmost California, is a low-grade gold deposit in a nearly flat-lying denudational fault of regional extent and probable Oligocene age. The deposit is hosted by intensely fractured and faulted Mesozoic leucogranite and by chloritic augen gneiss and schist, and is overlain unconformably and in fault contact by unmineralized late Oligocene Quechan volcanic rocks. The deposit is structurally characterized by normal and normal-oblique faults of low to high dip at shallow depths in the mine, merging downward with a synchronous, low-dipping ore-stage extensional fault system (the Chocolate Mountains/Gatuna Fault) of probable Oligocene age in deeper portions of the deposit. The fault system was infiltrated during much of its active life by hot, dilute, highly exchanged meteoric water having temperatures of 170°–210° C, salinity <2 wt% NaCl equivalent and calculated δ¹⁸O_fluid between −2.6‰ and 5.2‰. This main-stage fluid precipitated quartz, pyrite, and specular hematite, accompanied by silicification and sericitization. Auriferous ore-stage pyrite was precipitated late in the fault evolution probably by mixing of reducing ore fluid with relatively oxidized main-stage fluid during regional Oligocene extension on the Chocolate Mountains/Gatuna Fault. The Picacho deposit is characterized by a gold–arsenic–antimony geochemical signature consistent with bisulfide complexing of gold in reducing fluid, in contrast with typical denudation fault-hosted base-metal-rich deposits associated with high-salinity fluids elsewhere in the southwestern United States. The deposit is overprinted by Miocene normal faults having a wide range of dips. These postore faults are associated with red earthy hematite precipitation, pyrite oxidation, and supergene enrichment of gold. Editorial handling: L. Meinert