The geometry and petrogenesis of hydrothermal dolomites at Navan, Ireland

The dolomites at Navan, Ireland, formed in Courceyan peritidal and shallow-shelf limestones. The dolomite body has a plume-like geometry, cross-cutting both lithological boundaries and diagenetic barriers generated by sea-floor cementation and emergence. The dolomitizing fluids rose parallel to major faults to diffuse laterally through the succession, controlled by variations in permeability that reflect both facies variation on deposition and pre-dolomitization diagenesis. Cathodoluminescent zones reveal three principal stages of dolomite emplacement, separated by dissolution surfaces, with each stage reflecting several changes in the character of dolomitizing solutions. The predominance of dull zones indicates burial rather than surface conditions. The dolomites formed some time after burial in response to an areally limited hydrothermally-driven flow. Isotope values (σ¹⁸O of — 6σ6 to — 10.4%_δ and σ¹³C of — 0σ2 to +2σ5%_δ PDB), and fluid inclusion data, suggest that these fluids had compositions similar to those of Carboniferous seawater. However, these became hotter with time, with temperature increasing from 60 to 160δC. The Navan dolomites are closely associated with Europe's largest zinc-lead deposit. The distribution of the ores follows the same trend as that of the dolomites and paragenetic relationships indicate that dolomitization and mineralization were temporally and genetically related.     

Pillow talk

Three distinct types of pillows and pillow lava sequences with different modes of origin have been recognized in the extrusive sequences comprising the upper parts of ophiolite complexes that represent the mafic portion of the floor of an Early Cretaceous back-arc basin in southern Chile. One type of pillow formed by non-explosive submarine effusion. A second type formed by magmatic intrusion into pre-existing aquagene tuff formed by explosive eruption. The third type of pillow occurs within dikes, forming pillowed dikes, possibly as a result of vapor streaming within a cooling dike. Where studied in southern Chile, aquagene tuffs and intrusive pillows decrease and water-lain pillows increase in relative abundance from north to south. This variation corresponds with a north-to-south decrease in both the relative volume of extrusives to extensional dikes and the range and volume of differentiated rocks, suggesting a southward increase in rate of extension relative to rate of magma supply within the spreading ridges at which the ophiolites formed. In the northern part of the original basin where the rate of extension was small relative to the rate of magma supply, magma remained in magma chambers longer, resulting in a greater range and volume of differentiated rocks. The larger volume of more differentiated, cooler and more viscous magmas, in conjunction with the likelihood of more violent eruption of volatile-rich differentiates, may have been responsible for the large volume of aquagene tuff in the northern part of the original basin. These observations in southern Chile suggest that ophiolites which contain a great abundance of aquagene tuffs and intrusive pillow lavas formed in tectonic environments in which the rate of extension was small relative to the rate of magma supply (island arcs, embryonic marginal basins). Ophiolites with predominantly water-lain pillowed and massive lavas formed in tectonic environments in which the rate of extension was large relative to the rate of magma supply (mid-ocean ridges, mature back-arc basins). Thus geologic field data may supplement geochemical data as a tool in distinguishing the original igneous-tectonic environments in which ophiolites originate.     

Intraplate deformation and 3D rheological structure of the Rhine Rift System and adjacent areas of the northern Alpine foreland

The lithosphere of the Northern Alpine foreland has undergone a polyphase evolution during which interacting stress-induced intraplate deformation and upper mantle thermal perturbations controlled folding of the thermally weakened lithosphere. In this paper we address relationships among deeper lithospheric processes, neotectonics and surface processes in the Northern Alpine foreland with special emphasis on tectonically induced topography. We focus on lithosphere memory and neotectonics, paying special attention to the thermo-mechanical structure of the Rhine Graben System and adjacent areas of the northern Alpine foreland lithosphere. We discuss implications for mechanisms of large-scale intraplate deformation and links with surface processes and topography evolution.     

Inverse Analysis of Deep Excavation Using Differential Evolution Algorithm

This paper presents the applications of the differential evolution (DE) algorithm in back analysis of soil parameters for deep excavation problems. A computer code, named Python‐based DE, is developed and incorporated into the commercial finite element software ABAQUS, with a parallel computing technique to run an FE analysis for all trail vectors of one generation in DE in multiple cores of a cluster, which dramatically reduces the computational time. A synthetic case and a well‐instrumented real case, that is, the Taipei National Enterprise Center (TNEC) project, are used to demonstrate the capability of the proposed back‐analysis procedure. Results show that multiple soil parameters are well identified by back analysis using a DE optimization algorithm for highly nonlinear problems. For the synthetic excavation case, the back‐analyzed parameters are basically identical to the input parameters that are used to generate synthetic response of wall deflection. For the TNEC case with a total of nine parameters to be back analyzed, the relative errors of wall deflection for the last three stages are 2.2, 1.1, and 1.0%, respectively. Robustness of the back‐estimated parameters is further illustrated by a forward prediction. The wall deflection in the subsequent stages can be satisfactorily predicted using the back‐analyzed soil parameters at early stages. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Silica depleted melting of pelites. Petrogenetic grid and application to the Susqueda Aureole, Spain

Metapelitic rocks in the low pressure contact metamorphic aureole around the Susqueda igneous complex, Spain show a number of features that make them an ideal testing ground for the modelling of silica‐undersaturated melting. Rocks in the aureole experienced localized depletion in silica by the segregation of quartz veins during a pre‐anatectic, regional cordierite‐andalusite grade metamorphic event. These rocks were then intruded by gabbroic to dioritic rocks of the Susqueda igneous complex that formed a migmatitic contact metamorphic aureole in the country rocks. This migmatisation event caused quartz‐saturated hornfels and restite formation in rocks that had experienced no quartz vein segregation in the previous regional metamorphic event, but silica‐undersaturated melting in those rocks that were previously depleted in silica. Silica‐undersaturated melting is investigated using a new petrogenetic P–T projection and equilibrium pseudosections calculated in the KFMASH and NCKFMASH systems, respectively. The grid considers quartz absent equilibria and a range of phases that form typically in silica‐undersaturated bulk compositions, for example corundum. It is shown that the quartz‐rich precursors in the Susqueda contact aureole produced about 10% melt during contact metamorphism. However, most of this melt was extracted leaving behind rocks with restitic bulk compositions and minor leucosome segregation. It is suggested that the melt mixed with the host igneous rocks causing an apparent magmatic zoning from diorite in the centre of the complex to tonalite at the margins. In contrast, the quartz‐poor precursors (from which the quartz veins segregated) melted in the silica‐undersaturated field producing a range of assemblages including peritectic corundum and spinel. Melting of the silica‐undersaturated rocks produced only negligible melt and no subsequent melt loss.     

Al,Si ordering in cordierite using “magic angle spinning” NMR

A method of determining the number of Al-O-Al bonds per unit cell from ²⁹Si nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) data of synthetic cordierites with increasing Si, Al order is described. The number of Al-O-Al bonds is found to vary linearly with the logarithm of the annealing time. This may be correlated with previously published heat of solution data on similar samples (Carpenter et al. 1983) to determine the enthalpy change Δh, associated with a single Al?Si interchange in cordierite. Δh is found to be 8.1 kcal/mole. The NMR data show that the short range Al, Si order cannot be described in terms of twin domains of ordered orthorhombic cordierite. An ordering model derived from group theoretical constraints on possible Al, Si distributions within the hexagonal symmetry of the cordierite is found to provide a better fit to the NMR data.     

Coupled changes in sand grain size and sand transport driven by changes in the upstream supply of sand in the Colorado River: Relative importance of changes in bed-sand grain size and bed-sand area

Sand transport in the Colorado River in Marble and Grand canyons was naturally limited by the upstream supply of sand. Prior to the 1963 closure of Glen Canyon Dam, the river exhibited the following four effects of sand supply limitation: (1) hysteresis in sediment concentration, (2) hysteresis in sediment grain size coupled to the hysteresis in sediment concentration, (3) production of inversely graded flood deposits, and (4) development or modification of a lag between the time of a flood peak and the time of either maximum or minimum (depending on reach geometry) bed elevation. Construction and operation of the dam has enhanced the degree to which the first two of these four effects are evident, and has not affected the degree to which the last two effects of sand supply limitation are evident in the Colorado River in Marble and Grand canyons. The first three of the effects involve coupled changes in suspended-sand concentration and grain size that are controlled by changes in the upstream supply of sand. During tributary floods, sand on the bed of the Colorado River fines; this causes the suspended sand to fine and the suspended-sand concentration to increase, even when the discharge of water remains constant. Subsequently, the bed is winnowed of finer sand, the suspended sand coarsens, and the suspended-sand concentration decreases independently of discharge. Also associated with these changes in sand supply are changes in the fraction of the bed that is covered by sand. Thus, suspended-sand concentration in the Colorado River is likely regulated by both changes in the bed-sand grain size and changes in the bed-sand area. A physically based flow and suspended-sediment transport model is developed, tested, and applied to data from the Colorado River to evaluate the relative importance of changes in the bed-sand grain size and changes in the bed-sand area in regulating suspended-sand concentration. Although the model was developed using approximations for steady, uniform flow, and other simplifications that are not met in the Colorado River, the results nevertheless support the idea that changes in bed-sand grain size are much more important than changes in bed-sand area in regulating the concentration of suspended sand.     

Energetic protons from the solar flare of March 24, 1966

Ten to 100 meV protons from the solar flare of March 24, 1966 were observed on the University of California scintillation counter on OGO-I. The short rise and decay times observed in the count rates of the 32 channels of pulse-height analysis show that scattering of the protons by the interplanetary field was much less important in this event than in previously observed proton flares. A diffusion theory in which D = M _r is found to be inadequate to account for the time behavior of the count rates of this event. Small fluctuations of the otherwise smooth decay phase may be due to flare protons reflected from the back of a shock front, which passed the earth on March 23.     

A glancing incidence solar telescope for the soft x-ray region

This paper describes the instrumentation of an Aerobee rocket (NASA 4.95 GS) which was launched from White Sands Missile Range on May 20th 1966, to observe the Sun in the soft X-ray region. The experiment package, which was pointed at the sun by a control system stabilized about all three axes, carried two Wolter type I glancing incidence telescopes to photograph the sun in wavelength regions (determined by bandpass filters) between 3 and 75 Å, and two proportional counters to obtain flux data and rough spectral shapes in the regions 2–11 Å and 8–20 Å. The spatial resolution obtained was about 20 arc seconds. Limb brightening and polar darkening are very pronounced at the longer wavelengths. A tuft of emission was observed at the North Pole in addition to an arch-like structure on the NW limb. Several of the photographs are presented, and some preliminary results are discussed.