Recent Dasycladales (Chlorophyta) in Okinawa Jima in the Central Ryukyus,southwestern Japan: Paleontological implications

Recent dasycladalean algae (Dasycladales, Chlorophyta) are classified into two families, 11 genera, and 44 species, and inhabit the tropical to warm‐temperate waters of the world. Twelve species of dasycladalean algae occur in Okinawa Jima, Ryukyu Islands. In this paper, the present‐day dasycladalean species and their distributions in Okinawa Jima are reported and their paleontological implications are discussed. Dasycladalean algae grow mainly on coral rubble and rocks, often forming large meadows in calm shallow lagoons. However, Dasycladus vermicularis occurs in deeper waters, at depths of 15–89 m, around Okinawa Jima. Neomeris annulata is found at water depths of 0–30 m. These data throw doubt on the interpretation that the occurrence of dasycladalean algae is linked to warm shallow habitats.     

Pumpellyite from zeolite facies metabasites of the Horokanai ophiolite in the Kamuikotan zone,Hokkaido, Japan

Pumpellyite occures in zeolite facies metabasites of the Horokanai ophiolite in the Kamuikotan zone, Hokkaido, Japan, filling veins or amygdules, replacing igneous plagioclase or clinopyroxene or olivine, and occupying the matrix. Its composition and pleochroism vary greatly even within a single sample, but appear to be related to its mode of occurrence. Thus, the most Al-rich pumpellyite with pale green to green pleochroism develops in pseudomorphs after plagioclase, whereas the most Fe^*-rich variety with deep green to brown pleochroism occurs in the matrix. In low-grade metamorphic rocks which commonly contain relict minerals, chemical equilibrium is attained only locally. This results in the correlation of the composition of pumpellyite with its mode of occurrence, such as the precursor phases which are replaced by pumpellyite. On the other hand, among pumpellyites occurring in similar mode and coexisting with Ca-zeolite (laumontite or wairakite), epidote, chlorite and quartz, the Al content tends to be enriched in the wairakite-bearing metabasites over the laumontite-bearing metabasites. It follows that the composition of pumpellyite is also dependent upon the temperature of metamorphism.     

Probabilistic estimates of recent changes in temperature: a multi-scale attribution analysis

The role of anthropogenic forcings in temperature changes during recent decades is investigated over a range of spatial scales. Changes in the annual mean surface temperature and also in the warmest night of the year, which has implications for human health, are considered. Distributions of regional trends with and without the effect of human activity are produced, using constraints from a global optimal detection analysis. Anthropogenic forcings are estimated to have more than doubled the likelihood of mean warming in all regions considered except central North America, where results are more model dependent. The likelihood of warming of the warmest night has also increased, but the estimated change is more uncertain. Inferences on sub-continental scales are indicative rather than definitive because of the absence of locally important forcings and processes in model simulations, as well as model biases. As model inconsistencies may impact regional analyses, a multi-model approach is essential.     

Adaptation to climate change impacts on urban storm water: a case study in Arvika, Sweden

Already today, the functionality of many sewer and storm water systems are not up to the required standards and consequently flooding problems are experienced in case of heavy storms. System upgrades are required, which are however complicated by the expected future increase in short-term rainfall intensities as a result of climate change. In this case study, focusing on the town of Arvika, Sweden, this issue is investigated in three main steps. In the first, extreme value analyses of 30-min rainfall from an ensemble of climate projections are carried out to estimate the future increase and generate a future design storm. In the second, the existing system’s response to both today’s and future design storms are simulated by a coarse sewer model setup (MOUSE) and a detailed coupled surface-sewer model setup (TSR). In the third and final step, system upgrades are designed and evaluated by both models. The results indicate an increase by 10–30 % of today’s short-term rainfall extremes by the end of the century. Upgrading the system to achieve a satisfactory performance for the future design storm would cost approximately twice as much as an upgrade based on today’s design storm.     

Reliability and importance of structural diversity of climate model ensembles

We investigate the performance of the newest generation multi-model ensemble (MME) from the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP5). We compare the ensemble to the previous generation models (CMIP3) as well as several single model ensembles (SMEs), which are constructed by varying components of single models. These SMEs range from ensembles where parameter uncertainties are sampled (perturbed physics ensembles) through to an ensemble where a number of the physical schemes are switched (multi-physics ensemble). We focus on assessing reliability against present-day climatology with rank histograms, but also investigate the effective degrees of freedom (EDoF) of the fields of variables which makes the statistical test of reliability more rigorous, and consider the distances between the observation and ensemble members. We find that the features of the CMIP5 rank histograms, of general reliability on broad scales, are consistent with those of CMIP3, suggesting a similar level of performance for present-day climatology. The spread of MMEs tends towards being “over-dispersed” rather than “under-dispersed”. In general, the SMEs examined tend towards insufficient dispersion and the rank histogram analysis identifies them as being statistically distinguishable from many of the observations. The EDoFs of the MMEs are generally greater than those of SMEs, suggesting that structural changes lead to a characteristically richer range of model behaviours than is obtained with parametric/physical-scheme-switching ensembles. For distance measures, the observations and models ensemble members are similarly spaced from each other for MMEs, whereas for the SMEs, the observations are generally well outside the ensemble. We suggest that multi-model ensembles should represent an important component of uncertainty analysis.     

Anomalous deformation of the Earth's bow shock in the lunar wake: Joint measurement by Chang’E-1 and SELENE

Because the solar wind (SW) flow is usually super-sonic, a fast-mode bow shock (BS) is formed in front of the Earth's magnetosphere, and the Moon crosses the BS at both dusk and dawn flanks. On the other hand, behind of the Moon along the SW flow forms a tenuous region called lunar wake, where the flow can be sub-Alfvénic (and thus sub-sonic) because of its low-density status. Here we report, with joint measurement by Chang’E-1 and SELENE, that the Earth's BS surface is drastically deformed in the lunar wake. Despite the quasi-perpendicular shock configuration encountered at dusk flank under the Parker-spiral magnetic field, no clear shock surface can be found in the lunar wake, while instead gradual transition of the magnetic field from the upstream to downstream value was observed for a several-minute interval. This finding suggests that the ‘magnetic ramp’ is highly broadened in the wake where a fast-mode shock is no longer maintained due to the highly reduced density. On the other hand, observations at the 100 km altitude on the dayside show that the fast-mode shock is maintained even when the width of the downstream region is smaller than a typical scale length of a perpendicular shock. Our results suggest that the Moon is not so large to eliminate the BS at 100 km altitude on the dayside, while the magnetic field associated with the shock structure is drastically affected in the lunar wake.     

Summertime land–sea thermal contrast and atmospheric circulation over East Asia in a warming climate—Part II: Importance of CO2-induced continental warming

In this the second of a two-part study, we examine the physical mechanisms responsible for the increasing contrast of the land–sea surface air temperature (SAT) in summertime over the Far East, as observed in recent decades and revealed in future climate projections obtained from a series of transient warming and sensitivity experiments conducted under the umbrella of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project phase 5. On a global perspective, a strengthening of land–sea SAT contrast in the transient warming simulations of coupled atmosphere–ocean general circulation models is attributed to an increase in sea surface temperature (SST). However, in boreal summer, the strengthened contrast over the Far East is reproduced only by increasing atmospheric CO₂ concentration. In response to SST increase alone, the tropospheric warming over the interior of the mid- to high-latitude continents including Eurasia are weaker than those over the surrounding oceans, leading to a weakening of the land–sea SAT contrast over the Far East. Thus, the increasing contrast and associated change in atmospheric circulation over East Asia is explained by CO₂-induced continental warming. The degree of strengthening of the land–sea SAT contrast varies in different transient warming scenarios, but is reproduced through a combination of the CO₂-induced positive and SST-induced negative contributions to the land–sea contrast. These results imply that changes of climate patterns over the land–ocean boundary regions are sensitive to future scenarios of CO₂ concentration pathways including extreme cases.     

Palaeointensities of the Auckland geomagnetic excursions by the LTD-DHT Shaw method

We report new palaeointensity results concerning the Auckland geomagnetic excursions using the double heating technique of the Shaw method with low temperature demagnetisation (LTD-DHT Shaw method). The excursional palaeodirections recorded in six volcanoes of the Auckland volcanic field, New Zealand, have been classified into three groups: north-down (ND), west-up (WU) and south-up (SU) directions. In the present study, five to six consistent palaeointensities have been obtained from each of five volcanoes recording the Auckland geomagnetic excursions. The Wiri (27 ka), Crater Hill and Puketutu volcanoes (ND group) yielded mean palaeointensities of 10.6 ± 1.2 (1σ), 11.8 ± 2.8 and 11.1 ± 0.4 μT, respectively. The Hampton Park volcano (55 ka; WU group) gave 9.5 ± 1.2 μT while the McLennan Hills volcano (SU group) gave 2.5 ± 0.5 μT. It is notable that consistent palaeointensities have been obtained from the three different volcanoes which have almost the same palaeodirections (ND group), possibly supporting the reliability of the palaeointensity data. These five palaeointensities for the Auckland geomagnetic excursions correspond to virtual dipole moments (VDMs) of 0.6-2.1 × 10²² A m², whereas three mean palaeointensities obtained from the Auckland volcanoes having non-excursional palaeodirections are 13.1-40.0 μT giving stronger VDMs of 2.1-6.9 × 10²² A m². These results suggest that the dipole component of the geomagnetic field reduced to about 2 × 10²² A m² or less during the Auckland geomagnetic excursions.