Testing for Trends in Data Unevenly Distributed in Time

Summary  The question discussed in this study is how to calculate linear trends in data that are not distributed evenly in time. This is examined with time series of ten climate elements at a single station, stratified according to a classification based on daily circulation patterns. Trends are calculated in three different ways: (i) from seasonal means, which is a common approach, (ii) from means of individual events, the event being defined as a sequence of days classified as one particular type, preceded and succeeded by another type, and (iii) from individual daily values. The most common method of estimating trend significance, i.e. the t-test of the Pearson correlation coefficient, has been shown to be applicable to seasonal and event-mean trends for all variables. For daily trends, the Monte Carlo test should be used instead. The daily, event-mean and seasonal trends differ from each other considerably for many combinations of climate variable and circulation type. The reason for this difference is identified. Received December 3, 1998 Revised June 21, 1999     

The structure of benthic communities in an area of thermal discharge from a coastal power station

The area of sea subjected to heated effluent discharged from the power station at Piombino is very suitable for the study of problems connected with thermal pollution of the nearshore environment. Construction of the power station is planned to go ahead by successive operational stages, producing correspondingly increased amounts of heat discharged into the marine environment. At present it produces 640 MW and discharges 190 Mcal s^?1 into the sea.This paper studies the benthic communities after the power station had been operating for about 1 yr. Comparison of these data with those about subsequent operational stages will presumably allow to establish to what extent the environment can receive, without damage, increasing amounts of heat.     

Dynamical studies of cluster pairs in the Magellanic Clouds

We performed N -body simulations of star cluster encounters with Hernquist's TREECODE in a CRAY YMP-2E computer under different initial conditions (relative positions and velocities, cluster sizes, masses and concentration degrees). The total number of particles per simulation ranged from 1024 to 20480. These models are compared with a series of isodensity maps of cluster pairs in the Magellanic Clouds. Evidence is found that during the interactions, transient morphological effects such as an expanded halo, isophotal deformation and isophotal twisting can occur as a result of tidal effects and dynamical friction. The simulations also show that different outcomes are possible depending on the initial parameters: (i) long-standing changes of concentration degree can occur after the collision; (ii) one member can disaggregate; or (iii) the pair can coalesce into a single cluster with a distinct structure compared with the original ones. These simulations can reproduce a wide range of morphological structures in observed cluster pairs.     

Climatic and geographic factors affect ecosystem multifunctionality through biodiversity in the Tibetan alpine grasslands

Ecosystem multifunctionality(EMF), the simultaneous provision of multiple ecosystem functions, is often affected by biodiversity and environmental factors. We know little about how the interactions between biodiversity and environmental factors affect EMF. In this case study, a structural equation model was used to clarify climatic and geographic pathways that affect EMF by varying biodiversity in the Tibetan alpine grasslands. In addition to services related to carbon, nitrogen, and water cycling, forage supply, which is related to plantproductivity and palatability, was included in the EMF index. The results showed that 72% of the variation in EMF could be explained by biodiversity and other environmental factors. The ratio of palatable richness to all species richness explained 8.3% of the EMF variation. We found that air temperature, elevation, and latitude all affected EMF, but in different ways. Air temperature and elevation impacted the aboveground parts of the ecosystem, which included plant height, aboveground biomass, richness of palatable species, and ratio of palatable richness to all species richness. Latitude affected EMF by varying both aboveground and belowground parts of the ecosystem, which included palatable speciesrichness and belowground biomass. Our results indicated that there are still uncertainties in the biodiversity–EMF relationships related to the variable components of EMF, and climatic and geographic factors. Clarification of pathways that affect EMF using structural equation modeling techniques could elucidate the mechanisms by which environmental changes affect EMF.     

A STUDY OF THE SEISMIC SIGNATURES OF SEDIMENTATION MODELS USING SYNTHETIC SEISMOGRAMS*

In modern exploration for hydrocarbons there is a great emphasis on the location of stratigraphic traps and estimation of lithologic information like sand-shale ratios from seismic data. In order to investigate the possibilities of success in this endeavour we have studied the synthetic seismograms for wave form and spectral characteristic for four basic sedimentation models: (I) interbedded sand-shale model representing the sediments of generally fluviatile origin, (2) interbedded coal-shale model representing deltaic deposits, (3) sedimentary models representing transgression and regression of shore lines, and (4) a basal sand model. The results have shown that for the first two models a change in the sand-shale or coal-shale ratio results in a characteristically different seismogram. The nature of the seismogram, however, is also strongly dependent on how the sand-shale or coal shale layers are arranged to ultimately give the same number of total layers, thus implying the same coal-shale or sand-shale ratios. The transgression, regression, and basal sand models also produce characteristically different seismic signatures. The spectra of these seismograms show attendant characteristic changes. However, it seems that in the case of real data which are disturbed by noise and the effects of overlying layers these characteristic features may not always be distinguishable.     

Regularized derivatives of potential fields and their role in semi-automated interpretation methods

Evaluation of higher derivatives (gradients) of potential fields plays an important role in geophysical interpretation (qualitative and/or quantitative), as has been demonstrated in many approaches and methods. On the other hand, numerical evaluation of higher derivatives is an unstable process – it has the tendency to enlarge the noise content in the original data (to degrade the signal-to-noise ratio). One way to stabilize higher derivative evaluation is the utilization of the Tikhonov regularization. In the submitted contribution we present the derivation of the regularized derivative filter in the Fourier domain as a minimization task by means of using the classical calculus of variations. A very important part of the presented approach is the selection of the optimum regularization parameter – we are using the analysis of the C-norm function (constructed from the difference between two adjacent solutions, obtained for different values of regularization parameter). We show the influence of regularized derivatives on the properties of the classical 3D Euler deconvolution algorithm and apply it to high-sensitivity magnetometry data obtained from an unexploded ordnance detection survey. The solution obtained with regularized derivatives gives better focused depth-estimates, which are closer to the real position of sources (verified by excavation of unexploded projectiles).     

The Velocity Field and Kinematics of the Galaxy NGC 784 in the Hα Line

In this paper we present the H map, the 2D velocity field and the rotation curve of the galaxy NGC 784 obtained with the ByuFOSC2 scanning Fabry-Perot interferometer, attached at the prime focus of the 2.6-m telescope of Byurakan Observatory. The H image shows several HII condensations along the major axis of the galaxy. The galaxy has an asymmetric distribution of the H emission. The rotation curve is quite symmetric with a low gradient in the central part of the galaxy.     

Estimating Interannual Variations in Vegetated Areas of Sardinia Island Using SPOT/VEGETATION NDVI Temporal Series

Principal component analysis (PCA) has been applied to a temporal series 1999-2002 of a yearly maximum value composite of the SPOT/VEGETATION normalized difference vegetation index for the Sardinia Island for extracting interannual variations affecting vegetation covers. Both naturally vegetated areas (forest, shrub-land, and herbaceous cover) and agricultural lands have been investigated in order to obtain information on the most prominent natural and/or man-induced alterations affecting vegetation behavior. Although a correct interpretation of PCA results generally requires additional information, such as geographical knowledge, climatological data, and field surveys, the main finding of the current investigation suggests that PCA can be a feasible tool to separately map areas showing different degrees of interannual variability, providing valuable information for discriminating unidirectional changes     

Neutron activation analysis of the 1965 taal volcanic ash

Neutron activation analysis of the Taal volcanic ash revealed the presence of unusual amount of scandium in the volcanic ash as compared to the standard basalt BCR-1. The BCR-1 value for Fe/Sc is 2760 while that of Taal ash is about 2649. It is suggested that the eruption was probably characterized by the ejection of scandium-rich materials. Scandium may be used as supplementary evidence in evaluating an impending future Taal volcanic activity.