Textural trend analysis of coastal barrier sediments along the Middle Atlantic Bight,North Carolina

Comparative polynomial trend analyses of textural parameters were conducted on adjacent foreshore, berm, and dune sediment populations along a coastal barrier chain of the Middle Atlantic Bight. The analyses indicate that systematic textural patterns exhibited by the barrier sediments consist of both regional trends and local cyclicity.The regional trends appear to reflect progressive variability of both the hydraulic and aeolian regimes. Variability of the hydraulic regime consists of a progressive southward increase in average wave energy, with a concomitant decrease in energy consistency; this is attributed to the coastal wave refraction pattern, and to a progressive southward decrease in shelf width. The aeolian regime is characterized by a constant average energy level along the barrier chain, but exhibits a progressive northward decrease in wind energy consistency, and a corresponding increase in winnowing efficiency. Local cyclicity along the barrier appears to reflect textural variations in the barrier source materials excavated from a heterogeneous Pleistocene substrate. The cyclic patterns suggest the presence of a buried ancestral Albemarle fluvial channel near the present mouth of Albemarle Sound.In developing systematic textural variations along the barrier, size characteristics of the source material appear to be the most influential factor, while the influences of both the hydraulic and aeolian regimes are subordinate. The berm and dune field environments are most amenable to the development of systematic variation, while the foreshore is most susceptible to random component variation.     

Modeling the earth's climate

Mathematical models of the earth's climate provide intriguing opportunities to study a wide range of interdisciplinary problems involving processes within the climate system in a controlled and systematic manner. This paper is intended as a nontechnical review of climate modeling to enable researchers who are unfamiliar with the topic to better evaluate and judge the credibility of the model results. The types of climate models available for climate research are reviewed here, and four broad categories of climate models are identified. These range from the more simple energy balance models (EBMs) and radiative-convective models (RCMs), to the more complex statistical-dynamical models (SDMs), to the most powerful tools yet available for studying climate, the general circulation models (GCMs). This last category includes gridpoint and spectral GCMs. Four representations of the oceans which can be coupled to GCMs are described and include prescribed sea surface temperatures, an energy balance or swamp ocean, a mixed layer or slab ocean, or a fully computed ocean general circulation model. Selected examples considered representative of the types of studies possible with the various classes of models are given. Taken together, the spectrum of climate models provides a hierarchy of learning and research tools with which to effectively study the extremes of past climates, the vagaries of present-day climate, and possible climatic fluctuations well into the future.The National Center for Atmospheric Research is sponsored by the National Science Foundation.     

Two New Carbonate Stable-Isotope Standards

Two new carbonate isotope standards have been prepared for distribution by the IAEA and NBS. The first, TS limestone, NBS #19, will substitute for PDB, while the second carbonate, NBS #18 is depleted in ¹⁸O and ¹³C compared to the first.     

The effects of alongshore variation in bottom topography on a boundary current—(topographically induced upwelling)

A theory which describes the constant f-plane flow of a steady inviscid baroclinic boundary current over a continental margin with a bathymetry that varies slowly in the alongshore but rapidly in the offshore directions is developed in the parameter regime (L_D/L)² ≤ Ro 1, where L_D is the internal deformation radius, L the horizontal length scale, and Ro the Rossby number. To lowest order in the Rossby number the flow is along isobaths with speed q_o = V_u(h,z)|Vh|/α, where V_u(h,z) is the upstream speed, α the upstream bottom slope at depth h, and Vh the bottom slope downstream at depth h. The lowest order flow produces a variation in the vertical component of relative vorticity along the isobath as the magnitude and direction of Vh vary in the downstream direction. The variation of vorticity requires a vertical as well as a cross-isobath flow at first order in the Rossby number. The first order vertical velocity is computed from the vorticity equation in terms of upstream conditions and downstream variations of the bathymetry. The density, pressure, and cross-isobath flow at first order in the Rossby number are then calculated. It is shown that in the cyclonic region of current (d/dh(V_u/α) > 0), if the isobaths diverge in the downstream direction ((∂/∂s)|Vh| < 0), then upwelling and onshore flow occur. The theory is applied to the northeastern Florida shelf to explain bottom temperature observations.     

Trace-element and isotopic constraints on the source of magmas in the active volcano and Mariana island arcs, Western Pacific

Analytical results of the relative and absolute abundance of LIL-incompatible trace elements (K, Rb, Cs, Sr, and Ba) and isotopic compositions ( , , and ) are summarized for fresh samples from active and dormant volcanoes of the Volcano and Mariana island arcs. The presence of thickened oceanic crust (T 15–20 km) beneath the arc indicates that while hybridization processes resulting in the modification of primitive magmas by anatectic mixing at shallow crustal levels cannot be neglected, the extent and effects of these processes on this arc's magmas are minimized. All components of the subducted plate disappear at the trench. This observation is used to reconstruct the composition of the crust in the Wadati-Benioff zone by estimating proportions of various lithologies in the crust of the subducted plate coupled with analyses from DSDP sites. Over 90% of the mass of the subducted crust consists of basaltic Layers II and III. Sediments and seamounts, containing the bulk of the incompatible elements, make up the rest. Bulk Western Pacific seafloor has , δ ¹⁸O +7.2, K/Rb 510, K/Ba 46, and K/Cs 13,500. Consideration of trace-element data and combined systematics limits the participation of sediments in magmagenesis to less than 1%, in accord with the earlier results of Pb-isotopic studies. Combined data indicate little, if any, involvement of altered basaltic seafloor in magmagenesis. Perhaps more important than mean isotopic and LIL-element ratios is the restricted range for lavas from along over 1000 km of this arc. Mixtures of mantle with either the subducted crust or derivative fluids should result in strong heterogeneities in the sources of individual volcanoes along the arc. Such heterogeneities would be due to: (1) gross variations of crustal materials supplied to the subduction zone; and (2) lesser efficiency of mixing processes accompanying induced convection between arc segments (parallel to the arc) as compared to that perpendicular to the arc. The absence of these heterogeneities indicates that either some process exists for the efficient mixing of mantle and subducted material parallel to the arc or that subducted materials play a negligible role in the generation of Mariana-Volcano arc melts.Consideration of plausible sources in the mantle indicates that (1) an unmodified MORB-like mantle cannot have generated the observed trace-element and isotopic composition of this arc's magmas, while (2) a mantle similar to that which has produced alkali-olivine basalts (AOB) of north Pacific “hot spot” chains is indistinguishable in many respects spects from the source of these arc lavas.     

Detrital zircon provenance evidence for an early Permian longitudinal river flowing into the Midland Basin of west Texas

ABSTRACT

Collision of Gondwana and Laurentia in the late Palaeozoic created new topography, drainages, and foreland basin systems that controlled sediment dispersal patterns on southern Laurentia. We utilize sedimentological and detrital zircon data from early Permian (Cisuralian/Leonardian) submarine-fan deposits in the Midland Basin of west Texas to reconstruct sediment dispersal pathways and palaeogeography. New sedimentological data and wire-line log correlation suggest a portion of the early Permian deposits have a southern entry point. A total of 3259 detrital zircon U-Pb and 357 εHf data from 12 samples show prominent groups of zircon grains derived from the Appalachian (500–270 Ma) and Grenville (1250–950 Ma) provinces in eastern Laurentia and the peri-Gondwana terranes (800–500 Ma) incorporated in the Alleghanian-Ouachita-Marathon orogen. Other common zircon groups of Mesoproterozoic-Archaean age are also present in the samples. The detrital zircon data suggest throughout the early Permian, Appalachia and Gondwana detritus was delivered by a longitudinal river system that flowed along the Appalachian-Ouachita-Marathon foreland into the Midland Basin. Tributary channels draining the uplifted Ouachita-Marathon hinterland brought Gondwana detritus into the longitudinal river with headwaters in the Appalachians or farther northeast. This drainage extended downstream westward and delivered sediments into the Permian Basin near the west terminus of the Laurentia-Gondwana suture. Estimated rates of deposition and proportions of zircons from more local (Grenville) versus more distal (Pan-African) sources indicate that river strength decreased throughout early Permian time. Primary sediment delivery pathway was augmented by minor input from the Ancestral Rocky Mountains and wind deflation of fluvial sediments north and east of the basin. Slope failure associated with early Permian deposition in the southeastern margin of the Midland Basin triggered gravity flows leading to submarine fan deposition.     

British fluvial geomorphology in the 1980s: a review of recent reviews

FLUVIAL FORMS AND PROCESSES by D. Knighton. 218pp. Edward Arnold: London 1984 (ISBN 0 7131 6405 0) $A32.50 (limp).

BRITISH RIVERS edited by J. Lewin. 216pp. George Allen and Unwin: London 1981 (ISBN 0 04 551079 2) $A29.95 (limp).

RIVERS, FORM AND PROCESS IN ALLUVIAL CHANNELS by K. Richards. 358pp. Methuen: London 1982 (ISBN 0 416 74910 0) $A41.95 (limp).     

The Saharan Metacraton

This article introduces the name “Saharan Metacraton” to refer to the pre-Neoproterozoic––but sometimes highly remobilized during Neoproterozoic time––continental crust which occupies the north-central part of Africa and extends in the Saharan Desert in Egypt, Libya, Sudan, Chad and Niger and the Savannah belt in Sudan, Kenya, Uganda, Congo, Central African Republic and Cameroon. This poorly known tract of continental crust occupies 5,000,000 km² and extends from the Arabian-Nubian Shield in the east to the Tuareg Shield to the west and from the Congo craton in the south to the Phanerozoic cover of the northern margin of the African continent in southern Egypt and Libya. The term “metacraton” refers to a craton that has been remobilized during an orogenic event but is still recognizable dominantly through its rheological, geochronological and isotopic characteristics. Neoproterozoic remobilization of the Saharan Metacraton was in the forms of deformation, metamorphism, emplacement of igneous bodies, and probably local episodes of crust formation related to rifting and oceanic basin development. Relics of unaffected or only weakly remobilized old lithosphere are present as exemplified by the Archean to Paleoproterozoic charnockites and anorthosites of the Uweinat massif at the Sudanese/Egyptian/Libyan boarder. The article explains why the name “Saharan Metacraton” should be used, defines the boundaries of the metacraton, reviews geochronological and isotopic data as evidence for the presence of pre-Neoproterozoic continental crust, and discusses what happened to the Saharan Metacraton during the Neoproterozoic. A model combining collisional processes, lithospheric delamination, regional extension, and post-collisional dismembering by horizontal shearing is proposed.     

Geochronology of the mid-German crystalline rise west of the River Rhine

The mid-German crystalline rise has its westernmost exposures at the western margin of the Rhine graben in the southern Pfalz and the northern Alsace. The outcrops are made up of granitoid rocks and minor volcano-sedimentary sequences. Radiometric ages obtained by U/Pb, Pb/Pb, Sm/Nd and Rb/Sr analyses of the igneous rocks from this area range from ∼433 to ∼325 Ma thus covering a time span from the Silurian to the end of the lower Carboniferous. Because the investigated rocks are — according to their chemical composition — largely related to subduction zone environments, the following three geodynamical scenarios are postulated, always taking subduction of oceanic crust beneath the mid-German crystalline rise into account: (a) subduction of the Rheic ocean during the Silurian from the north; (b) subduction of the Rhenohercynian ocean during the late Devonian (∼369 Ma) from the north; (c) subduction of the Saxothuringian ocean during the lower Carboniferous (∼334 Ma) from the south.