Oxygen Abundances in Solar-Type Stars

The absolute solar oxygen abundance,ε ⊙ = 8.80± 0.06, has been determined from various oxygen abundance indicators in different solar atlases, and a new method is proposed to test collision rate coefficientsfor the NLTE model of OI.Using effective temperatures derived from Balmer lines, oxygen abundances from O triplets in 83 solar-type stars within the solar neighborhood spanning a metallicity range of [Fe/H] = −2.3 ... +0.4 have been determined.NLTE effects are not negligible, especially in warm stars(T_eff ≥ 5800) with [Fe/H] ≥ −0.5. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

A new method to estimate ice age temperatures

On glacial time scales, the waxing and waning of the Eurasian and North American ice sheets depend largely on variations in atmospheric temperature. As global sea level is primarily determined by the volume of these ice sheets, there is a direct (yet complex) relation between global sea level and the northern hemispheric (NH) temperature. This relation is essentially represented by a model of the NH ice sheets. We use a thermomechanical ice-sheet–ice shelf–bedrock model in conjunction with an inverse method to deduce a time series of NH temperature (from 120 kyr BP until present) that is consistent with the observed global sea level record. The advantage of this method is that it provides the annual mean surface air temperature averaged over the NH continents north of 40°N. The results reveal that ice age temperatures were 4–10°C lower than today, which agrees with other temperature reconstructions. However, reconstructed temperatures are comparitively low during the early stages of the glacial, a feature that is consistent with the rapid growth of the ice sheets. The sensitivity of the results for uncertainties in precipitation rate, in observed sea level and in some other model parameters is examined to quantify the error in reconstructed temperature. During the glacial period (120–15 kyr BP), surface air temperatures in the NH (north of 40°N) were 7.2±1.5°C lower than todays (interglacial) temperatures.     

Arctic climate change in 21st century CMIP5 simulations with EC-Earth

The Arctic climate change is analyzed in an ensemble of future projection simulations performed with the global coupled climate model EC-Earth2.3. EC-Earth simulates the twentieth century Arctic climate relatively well but the Arctic is about 2 K too cold and the sea ice thickness and extent are overestimated. In the twenty-first century, the results show a continuation and strengthening of the Arctic trends observed over the recent decades, which leads to a dramatically changed Arctic climate, especially in the high emission scenario RCP8.5. The annually averaged Arctic mean near-surface temperature increases by 12 K in RCP8.5, with largest warming in the Barents Sea region. The warming is most pronounced in winter and autumn and in the lower atmosphere. The Arctic winter temperature inversion is reduced in all scenarios and disappears in RCP8.5. The Arctic becomes ice free in September in all RCP8.5 simulations after a rapid reduction event without recovery around year 2060. Taking into account the overestimation of ice in the twentieth century, our model results indicate a likely ice-free Arctic in September around 2040. Sea ice reductions are most pronounced in the Barents Sea in all RCPs, which lead to the most dramatic changes in this region. Here, surface heat fluxes are strongly enhanced and the cloudiness is substantially decreased. The meridional heat flux into the Arctic is reduced in the atmosphere but increases in the ocean. This oceanic increase is dominated by an enhanced heat flux into the Barents Sea, which strongly contributes to the large sea ice reduction and surface-air warming in this region. Increased precipitation and river runoff lead to more freshwater input into the Arctic Ocean. However, most of the additional freshwater is stored in the Arctic Ocean while the total Arctic freshwater export only slightly increases.     

Submarine and vadose cements in Pleistocene Bermuda reef rock

Well-rounded pebbles and cobbles of reef rock, which in bio- and lithofacies closely resembles the Recent algal cup reefs, occur in the basal conglomerate of the Pleistocene Devonshire Formation cropping out along Grape Bay on the south shore of Bermuda. The framebuilders of this rock include coralline red algae, vermetid gastropods, and barnacles. Study by petrographic microscope, electron microprobe, and SEM revealed aragonite-needle and spherulitic cements, high-Mg calcite micrite and palisade cements including calcified algal filaments. Two or three generations of these may occur in a given pore. By analogy with the Recent cup-reef material, on the basis of their composition (high strontium content of aragonite, high magnesium content of calcite) and of circumstantial evidence, these are considered submarine cements.In addition, a vadose blocky low-Mg calcite cement occurs, which never precedes any, but frequently succeedes one, two, or three of the above cements. Its fabrics vary: it may exhibit an increase in crystal size toward the center or not, it may or may not be bounded by the meniscus outline characteristic of the vadose diagenetic environment. The limitation of cement precipitation by a meniscus gives rise to a large diversity of forms determined by respective combinations of solution supply, permeability of the micro-environment, and substrate morphology. To illustrate the diversity, the meniscus cement is shown in relation to sediment particles, aragonite-needle cement, and calcified filaments.From the blocky low-Mg cement, selective neomorphism extends into some aragonitic gastropod shells; it is controlled, in part, by original shell structure. The resulting low-Mg calcite mosaic is characterized by relic structures and plane crystalline boundaries. Aragonite needles between blocky calcite cement and neomorphic calcite were not affected by the process of mineralogic alteration.This study shows that cements recognized earlier in Recent Bermuda cup reefs can be traced into the past and that additions to the diagenetic sequence can be distinguished. Knowledge of these features and their sequences should help decipher the diagenetic history of other fossil reefs.     

Experimental study of a biotite-bearing granitic system under water-saturated and water-undersaturated conditions

Phase relationships in haplogranitic melts containing ferromagnesian minerals were investigated in the temperature range 760–850°C, atP _total=2 kbar, =0.25 1.00, and at NNO buffer conditions. The compositions of coexisting biotite, orthopyroxene, magnetite and granitic melt were determined by electron microprobe. Biotite was the only Fe–Mg mineral in the starting material. It disappeared in water-undersaturated melts at temperatures above 830°C and in melts saturated with water above 810°C. Magnetite was present in all runs. Orthopyroxene became stable between 780 and 800°C. The Mg/(Mg+Fe) ratios of biotite (0,63–0,72) and orthopyroxene (0,63–0,71) are similar in water-saturated and undersaturated melts at comparable temperatures and increase slightly with increasing temperature. The solubility of Mg in haplogranitic melts is very low (0,07–0,24 wt% MgO). It increases slightly with temperature and is independent of the prevailing water activity. The solubility of Fe is low (0,91–1,37 wt% FeO); it also increases with increasing temperature, and it is higher in water-saturated than in water-undersaturated melts.     

Tracing the emerald origin by oxygen isotope data: the case of Sandawana,Zimbabwe

Given the wide range of oxygen isotopic composition of emerald from all over the world (δ¹⁸O between +6.2 and +24.7‰), the δ¹⁸O_V-SMOW values of emeralds from the Sandawana mines in Zimbabwe (δ¹⁸O‰=+6.6 to +8.0), are relatively constant, among the lowest ever measured. These consistently low values can be explained by host-rock buffering in a very narrow emerald-bearing reaction zone between ultrabasic greenstones (metamorphosed komatiites) and albitised pegmatites. δ¹⁸O values of Sandawana emeralds overlap those of emeralds from Brazil, Austria, Australia and Madagascar, a fact indicating that, in these cases, oxygen isotope composition alone is not sufficient to determine the geographic origin of commercially available emeralds. However, stones with overlapping δ¹⁸O values may eventually be identified using a combination of physical properties, inclusion characteristics and chemical composition. To cite this article: J.C. Zwaan et al., C. R. Geoscience 336 (2004).     

On grain-size-dependent chemical fractionation in the early proto-solar cloud

The fractionation problem of minerals in a turbulent protosolar disk is extended to a non-constant grain size due to evaporation and recondensation. Numerical and approximate analytical solutions are given.     

On the r-mode spectrum of relativistic stars in the low-frequency approximation

The axial modes for non-barotropic relativistic rotating neutron stars with uniform angular velocity are studied, using the slow-rotation formalism together with the low-frequency approximation, first investigated by Kojima. The time-independent form of the equations leads to a singular eigenvalue problem, which admits a continuous spectrum. We show that for     , it is nevertheless also possible to find discrete mode solutions (the r modes). However, under certain conditions related to the equation of state and the compactness of the stellar model, the eigenfrequency lies inside the continuous band and the associated velocity perturbation is divergent; hence these solutions have to be discarded as being unphysical. We corroborate our results by explicitly integrating the time-dependent equations. For stellar models admitting a physical r-mode solution, it can indeed be excited by arbitrary initial data. For models admitting only an unphysical mode solution, the evolutions do not show any tendency to oscillate with the respective frequency. For higher values of l it seems that in certain cases there are no mode solutions at all.     

Transport von Feldspäten und Quarz im Temperaturgefälle

In the attempt to study the composition and behaviour of metasomatically active solutions we have examined the kind of gaseous solutions which are formed by water in contact with the minerals of a granite under a pressure of 2000 bars at 600° C, and how these solutions behave within a temperature gradient at the same pressure. The temperature ranged from 620° to 180° C. The following minerals were considered: quartz, K-feldspar (adularia), plagioclase (andesine) and mixtures of quartz with adularia, quartz with andesine, quartz with adularia and andesine, quartz mixed with mierokline-perthite, oligoelase and biotite.All these minerals are completely dissolved by water under these physical conditions. The solutions always contain more silica than the minerals, if quartz is present. The dissolved components are transported within the temperature gradient. In the solutions, Ca derived from the anorthite-component of the plagioclase and Mg from the biotite form associations together with silica, which travel tohigher temperatures. There they crystallize in form of wollastonite and/or diopside. On the other hand, Na and K, AI and the Fe from the biotite and the largest part of the silica, travel from the 600° C-region tolower temperatures. There they crystallize in form of quartz, K-feldspar, albite, some muscovite and Mg-free biotite rich in Fe. In experiments of only short duration, metastable analcime instead of albite has been formed. In long lasting experiments of 10 weeks, a separation of Na and K was evident: Albite was formed in the temperature range 470° to 420° C, whereas K-feldspar (with some albite component) and Mg-free biotite crystallize together with quartz in a larger temperature range below 420° C; see figure 6.The different minerals from a mixture influence each other's solubility in such a way that the amount of both feldspars and quartz dissolved and transported within a unit of time is decreased. Compared with the amount obtained when quartz alone constitutes the solid phase, only 40 % of that amount is dissolved and transported when the quartz had been mixed with adularia; the value amounts to only 30% when it was mixed with andesine. When both feldspars. are present together with quartz, the amount of dissolved and transported quartz is decreased to about 20 % of the original amount; see table 7. However, in all cases the amount of dissolved quartz is larger than the sum of the dissolved feldspar substances. Thus, the solution formed from a mixture of quartz and feldspars which is transported to lower temperatures always contains more silica than the mineral mixture. The amount of adularia dissolved and transported is reduced by the presence of quartz to 1/6 of that amount furnished at 6000 C by adularia alone. Under the same conditions the amount of andesine is reduced to one half. — The amount of adularia transported per unit of time is nearly equal to the amount of plagioclase components if quartz is present. However, if no quartz is present, the proportion of dissolved and transported adularia to plagioclase-components is noticeably shifted in favour of adularia. This would be the case with syenite as the source for the solutions.In the attempt to produce skarns in a way closely related to nature, silica-rich solutions from a granite have been brought into contact with dolomite. The contact was situated at 600°, 570° and 500° C. With equal duration of the experiments, the results were similar. With different durations the following effect was observed: at the beginning, the silica-rich solution reacts with the dolomite under formation of forsterite, calcite and C0₂. When more materialis transported into the contact,region diopside (the mineral containing more silica) is formed from calcite, forsterite and additional silica. When the same metasomatically active solution meets a marble, (contact at 600° C) wollastonite is formed. In these metasomatic processes the partial pressure of C0₂ in the gasphase remained low under our experimental conditions.     

Singular points at berm breakwaters: scale effects, rear, round head and longshore transport

Design aspects other than the profile development of the seaward side have been investigated in this paper. Aspects such as scale effects, rear stability, round head design and longshore transport have been treated here, based on extensive test series on two different berm breakwater designs. A first conclusion is that scale effects were not present in a 1:35 scale model compared with a 1:7 large scale model with wave heights up to 1.7 m.A first design rule was assessed on the relationship between damage at the rear of a berm breakwater and the crest height, wave height, wave steepness and rock size. Tests on a berm breakwater head showed that enlarging the berm height at the crest and therefore the amount of rock in the berm was effective with regard to stability.Finally the onset of longshore transport due to oblique wave attack was studied and compared with literature. Formulae were derived for this onset of transport and also for the range of more serious transport up to longshore transport of coarse gravel.