Segmentation and kinematics of the North America‐Caribbean plate boundary offshore Hispaniola

We explored the submarine portions of the Enriquillo–Plantain Garden Fault zone (EPGFZ) and the Septentrional–Oriente Fault zone (SOFZ) along the Northern Caribbean plate boundary using high‐resolution multibeam echo‐sounding and shallow seismic reflection. The bathymetric data shed light on poorly documented or previously unknown submarine fault zones running over 200 km between Haiti and Jamaica (EPGFZ) and 300 km between the Dominican Republic and Cuba (SOFZ). The primary plate‐boundary structures are a series of strike‐slip fault segments associated with pressure ridges, restraining bends, step overs and dogleg offsets indicating very active tectonics. Several distinct segments 50–100 km long cut across pre‐existing structures inherited from former tectonic regimes or bypass recent morphologies formed under the current strike‐slip regime. Along the most recent trace of the SOFZ, we measured a strike‐slip offset of 16.5 km, which indicates steady activity for the past ~1.8 Ma if its current GPS‐derived motion of 9.8 ± 2 mm a^?1 has remained stable during the entire Quaternary.     

Aspects of wave behaviour in the mid‐ and upper troposphere of the southern Hemisphere

Abstract

The zonal wavenumber spectra of the geopotential heights of the 300‐ and 500‐mb surfaces in the Southern Hemisphere were determined for each month between May 1972 and November 1979 using daily operational analyses produced by the Australian Bureau of Meteorology. During over one‐quarter of the “summer” months (November through March) there are very prominent peaks at zonal wavenumber five in the region of the mid‐latitude jet (～35–60°S). Frequently wavenumber five totally dominates the eddy fields in individual daily maps so that height contours in mid‐latitudes take on virtually pentagonal shapes. During periods when wavenumber 5 is prominent, it is observed to propagate eastward in a very regular manner with a period of about eleven days. All these findings are consistent with Salby's (1982) earlier results concerning the Southern Hemisphere height fields during the first few months of the FGGE experiment.

There is little evidence for a similar phenomenon in the winter circulation of the Southern Hemisphere.     

Dissolved nitrous oxide (N2O) dynamics in agricultural field drains and headwater streams in an intensive arable catchment

Indirect nitrous oxide (N₂O) emissions produced by nitrogen (N) leaching into surface water and groundwater bodies are poorly understood in comparison to direct N₂O emissions from soils. In this study, dissolved N₂O concentrations were measured weekly in both lowland headwater streams and subsurface agricultural field drain discharges over a 2‐year period (2013–2015) in an intensive arable catchment, Norfolk, UK. All field drain and stream water samples were found to have dissolved N₂O concentrations higher than the water–air equilibrium concentration, illustrating that all sites were acting as a net source of N₂O emissions to the atmosphere. Soil texture was found to significantly influence field drain N₂O dynamics, with mean concentrations from drains in clay loam soils (5.3 μg N L^?1) being greater than drains in sandy loam soils (4.0 μg N L^?1). Soil texture also impacted upon the relationships between field drain N₂O concentrations and other water quality parameters (pH, flow rate, and nitrate (NO₃) and nitrite (NO₂) concentrations), highlighting possible differences in N₂O production mechanisms in different soil types. Catchment antecedent moisture conditions influenced the storm event mobilisation of N₂O in both field drains and streams, with the greatest concentration increases recorded during precipitation events preceded by prolonged wet conditions. N₂O concentrations also varied seasonally, with the lowest mean concentrations typically occurring during the summer months (JJA). Nitrogen fertiliser application rates and different soil inversion regimes were found to have no effect on dissolved N₂O concentrations, whereas higher N₂O concentrations recorded in field drains under a winter cover crop compared to fallow fields revealed cover crops are an ineffective greenhouse gas emission mitigation strategy. Overall, this study highlights the complex interactions governing the dynamics of dissolved N₂O concentrations in field drains and headwater streams in a lowland intensive agricultural catchment.     

Hydrology and geomorphology of the Upper White Nile lakes and their relevance for water resources management in the Nile basin

Remote sensing data and digital elevation models were utilized to extract the catchment hydrological parameters and to delineate storage areas for the Ugandan Equatorial Lakes region. Available rainfall/discharge data are integrated with these morphometric data to construct a hydrological model that simulates the water balance of the different interconnected basins and enables the impact of potential management options to be examined. The total annual discharges of the basins are generally very low (less than 7% of the total annual rainfall). The basin of the shallow (5 m deep) Lake Kioga makes only a minor hydrological contribution compared with other Equatorial Lakes, because most of the overflow from Lake Victoria basin into Lake Kioga is lost by evaporation and evapotranspiration. The discharge from Lake Kioga could be significantly increased by draining the swamps through dredging and deepening certain channel reaches. Development of hydropower dams on the Equatorial Lakes will have an adverse impact on the annual water discharge downstream, including the occasional reduction of flow required for filling up to designed storage capacities and permanently increasing the surface areas of water that is exposed to evaporation. On the basis of modelling studies, alternative sites are proposed for hydropower development and water storage schemes. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

U–Pb dating of silicic lavas,sills and syneruptive resedimented volcaniclastic deposits of the Lower Devonian Crudine Group,Hill End Trough,New South Wales

The Hill End Trough of central‐western New South Wales was an elongate deep marine basin that existed in the Lachlan Fold Belt from the early Late Silurian to late Early Devonian. It is represented by a regionally extensive, unfossiliferous sequence of interbedded turbidites and hemipelagites of substantially silicic volcanic derivation, which passes laterally into contemporaneous shallow‐water sedimentary rocks. The Turondale and Merrions Formations of the Lower Devonian Crudine Group are two prominent volcanogenic formations in the predominantly sedimentary trough sequence. They contain a range of primary and resedimented volcanic facies suitable for U–Pb dating. These include widespread subaqueous silicic lavas and/or lava cryptodomes, and thick sequences of crystal‐rich volcaniclastic sandstone emplaced by a succession of mass‐flows that were generated by interaction between contemporaneous subaerial pyroclastic flows and the sea. Ion microprobe dating of the two volcanogenic formations by means of the commonly used SL 13 zircon standard yields ages ranging between 411.3 ± 5.1 and 404.8 ± 4.8 Ma. Normalising the data against a different zircon standard (QGNG) yields preferred slightly older mean ages that range between 413.4 ± 6.6 and 407.1 ± 6.9 Ma. These ages broadly approximate the Early Devonian age that has been historically associated with the Crudine Group. However, the biostratigraphically inferred late Lochkovian ‐ early Emsian (mid‐Early Devonian) age for the Merrions Formation is inconsistent with the current Australian Phanerozoic Timescale, which assigns an age of 410 Ma to the Silurian‐Devonian boundary, and ages of 404.5 Ma and 395.5 Ma to the base and top of the Pragian, respectively. There is, however, good agreement if the new ages are compared with the most recently published revision of the Devonian time‐scale. This suggests that the Early Devonian stage boundaries of the Australian Phanerozoic Timescale need to be revised downward. The new ages for the Merrions Formation could also provide a time point on this time‐scale for the Pragian to early Emsian, for which no data are presently available.