Vietnamese activity in the Adelaide real estate market

Significant real estate activity by Vietnamese households in Adelaide did not occur until 1979, and since then the groups buying activity has been heavily concentrated in the northwest region of the metropolitan area. Therefore, the median housing price paid by Vietnamese buyers has not kept pace with the median price paid by all buyers. Concentration also causes Vietnamese buyers to be disproportionately active in the middle‐to‐lower end of the market, within which there has been a strong preference for rural properties and for houses rather than home units and maisonettes. Amongst Vietnamese buyers who subsequently sell their properties, the majority have not re‐entered the market and their capital gain from ownership has been marginal.     

A laboratory simulation of rock breakdown due to freeze-thaw in a maritime Antarctic environment

Results of freeze-thaw simulations on three large blocks of quartz-micaschist are presented. Three types of water to ice phase change were identified from temperature and ultrasonic measurements. It is suggested that the type of phase change results from a particular combination of rock moisture content, solute concentration, freeze amplitude, and rate of fall of temperature. The temperature at which ice thawed inside the rock (?0.7 to ?1.9°C) was also found, and this indicates the possibility of freeze-thaw effects without positive temperatures. Approximately 80 per cent of the water that will freeze under natural conditions, in the Maritime Antarctic environment under study, appears to have done so by ?6°.     

Collisional plateaus

In the fifteen years since the importance of collisional plateaus with thickened continental crust began to be recognized as one of the inevitable consequences of the processes of plate tectonics, rapid progress in their understanding has come from studies of the world's only active terminal collision zones in the Himalayan-Tibetan and Turkish-Iranian plateaus.Ancient collisional plateaus are being recognized throughout the geological record (back to 3.8 Ga) from the occurrence of extensive areas (typically > 500,000 km²) of 8 kbar metamorphism in granulite facies or from the occurrence of extensive areas of higher level minimum-melt composition granite rocks whose isotopic signatures indicate reactivation of existing continental crust rather than addition of new crust from the mantle at the time of collision. Recognition of strike-slip faulting in the ancient collisional plateau areas indicates that “tectonic escape” may have been as important in the past as it is today.Earth may not be the only planet on which collisional plateaus are important. The highlands of Venus (approximately 7% of the surface with elevations over 1.5 km above mean planetary radius) can only exist as a result of crustal thickening, and not as a product of lithospheric thinning. Most of these highlands can be explained by models involving volcanic construction. However, the highest peaks, including Maxwell Montes, the highest mapped area of Venus rising over 10 km above mean planetary radius, require much greater crustal thickening to support them than can reasonably be explained by a volcanic mechanism. Geological features of Maxwell Montes inferred from radar images suggest some analogy between Maxwell Montes and the Tibetan plateau.It is somewhat paradoxical that extensional tectonics are commonly associated with continental collision, and that collision-related rifts may be the only sites where the uppermost layers of a collision-thickened crust are preserved from erosion. Extensional stress fields are generated during continental collision, primarily in areas associated with strike-slip faulting and “tectonic escape”. Additional extensional stresses are gravitationally generated associated with the topography and thickened crust in a collision zone. Tectonically thickened crust is particularly susceptible to rifting as its lithosphere is weak as a result of heating associated with magmatism. This lithosphere is also compositionally weak because of the relatively thick crust, dominated by a weak quartz rheology, and thin mantle lithosphere, dominated by a strong olivine rheology, in comparison with a lithosphere with a more normal crustal thickness. Thus, the common association of rifts and collision zones may be a consequence of both stresses generated during collision and modification of the lithosphere by collision.     

Neotectonics of Hispaniola: plate motion, sedimentation, and seismicity at a restraining bend

A series of different plutons from the Lhasa-Xigaze segment of the Gangdese (Transhimalaya) belt has been studied by high-resolution UPb analyses of zircon (using zircon fractions of 5–100 grains each, selected upon specific grain characteristics). For two diorites, located east of Xigaze (Dazhuka), the zircons yield concordant ages of 93.4 ± 1.0 and 94.2 ± 1.0 m.y., respectively. Also concordant ages of 41.1 ± 0.4 and 41.7 ± 0.4 m.y. have been obtained for two granodiorites, collected southwest of Lhasa (Qushui). The precision on the ages of two granites from the Xigaze and Lhasa area, is limited by two factors: the presence of inherited radiogenic lead and the occurrence of subsequent lead loss. However, some concordant zircons, detected in both granites, define approximate ages of about 67 and 53 m.y., respectively. The inherited lead components show that melting of Precambrian material was involved in magma genesis.The UPb ages substantiate a magmatic activity lasting from mid-Cretceous (Cenomanian) to Eocene (Lutetian) time. Such a period of plutonism at the southern margin of Eurasia, as well as the occurrence of magma generation from continental crust, suggest that the Gangdese range results from the subduction of Tethys oceanic lithosphere (Indian plate) underneath Eurasia (Eurasian plate). If this model is true, the collision of India with Eurasia (along the Lhasa-Xigaze sector) postdates the emplacement of the 41 m.y. old Gangdese granodiorites, i.e. the collision occurred after Lutetian time.     

Experimental and model transport and diffusion studies in complex terrain with emphasis on tracer studies

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Atmospheric Studies in Complex Terrain (ASCOT) program began in the fall of 1978 as a multiple DOE and other Federal Laboratory program devoted to developing a better physical understanding of atmospheric boundary layer flows in areas of complex terrain. The first technical challenge undertaken by the program was an investigation of atmospheric boundary layer phenomena associated with the development, continuation and breakup of nocturnal drainage wind flows. This paper discusses the general objectives the program has addressed during the past several years and focuses on results from a major field experiment conducted in 1980 in The Geysers area of northern California. Specifically, results from measurements of simultaneous tracer releases are compared to calculations from a mass-consistent wind field model coupled to a particle-in-cell transport and diffusion model. Results of these comparisons show that model calculations agree with measurements within a factor of 5 approximately 50 percent of the time. Part of the difficulty faced by the models in these comparison studies is associated with large variabilities between measurements made by samplers located one or two x apart when compared to the resolution of the models. Space and time averaging improves the comparisons considerably, although the design of the field experiment did not allow the determination of optimum spacial and temporal averages.     

Results of Seepage Meter and Mini-Piezometer Study, Lake Mead, Nevada

The seepage meter and the mini-piezometer were utilized in an attempt to evaluate ground-water reservoir interactions over a 12-month period at Echo Bay in Lake Mead. In conjunction with these techniques three standard piezometers, refraction seismic data, and water chemistry data were utilized to interpret seepage device results. During a four-month period, from December 1979 to March 1980, an 8 ft (2.5 m) rise in reservoir stage, the reservoir contributed water to Echo Wash bank storage at rates of up to 0.29 gpd/ft² (12 lpd/m²). Ground-water discharge occurred for the remainder of the project, during a stage decline from April 1980 to May 1980, a rise in June 1980, and leveling off and slight decline for the remainder of the year, July 1980 to December 1980. The maximum seepage meter ground-water discharge rate of 3.0 gpd/ft² (122 lpd/m²) was recorded in December 1980. Seepage meter water chemistry data for June were similar to Lake Mead water chemistry and were interpreted to be previously recharged Lake Mead water. September water chemistry data showed two possible components of ground-water discharge, a high SpC calcium sulfate Echo Wash ground water and a lower SpC Lake Mead recharged bank storage water. December ground-water chemistry data showed discharge to be a high SpC calcium sulfate water similar to Echo Wash ground-water quality which was apparently unaffected by Lake Mead inflow. Mini-piezometer data were collected at each seepage meter site. However, these data usually did not provide correlative results with seepage meter data probably because of suspended sediment in the piezometer water column and plugging of the perforated tip. Seepage meters were successfully utilized to characterize reservoir ground-water interaction in Echo Bay.     

Genetic environment of germanium-bearing gold-silver vein ores from the Wolyu mine,Republic of Korea

The Wolyu mine is one of the largest vein-type gold-silver-bearing epithermal systems in the Youngdong district and is the first gold-silver deposit in Korea found to contain significant germanium, in the form of argyrodite (Ag₈GeS₆). Mineralized veins (78.9 ± 1.2 Ma) crosscutting Late Cretaceous hostrock tuff and quartz porphyry (81.5 ± 1.8 Ma) consist of three stages of quartz and carbonates, the first of which contains pyrite, basemetal sulfides and Au-Ag-minerals. Stage I Au-Ag-Ge-mineralized veins show a systematic variation of mineral assemblage with time: (1) quartz + pyrite; (2) quartz + pyrite + sphalerite + electrum + argentite; (3) carbonate + quartz + sphalerite + electrum + argentite; (4) carbonate + native silver + argentite + Ag-sulfosalts + argyrodite + sphalerite. Calculated values of temperature and sulfur activity are: assemblage (1), 360-280°C and 10^–7-10^–10; (2), 280-210°C and 10^–10-10^–14; (3), 210-180°C and 10^–14-10^–16; (4), 180-155°C and 10^–17-10^–18. These data, the frequent association of gold with sulfides, and the abundance of pyrite in alteration zones indicate that decreasing sulfur activity and cooling were important in triggering gold deposition. Hydrogen and oxygen isotope compositions of ore fluids display a systematic variation with increasing time. Within the main Ag-Au-Ge mineralization, D and ¹⁸O values decrease with the transition from quartz to carbonate deposition (from -78 and –2.8% to –90 and –8.7%., respectively), indicating increasing involvement (mixing) of less evolved meteoric water which resulted in progressive cooling and dilution of ore fluids in the shallow ( 370–600 m) Wolyu epithermal system.     

Surficial geology of the Chicxulub impact crater,Yucatan, Mexico

The Chicxulub impact crater in northwestern Yucatan, Mexico is the primary candidate for the proposed impact that caused mass extinctions at the end of the Cretaceous Period. The crater is buried by up to a kilometer of Tertiary sediment and the most prominent surface expression is a ring of sink holes, known locally as cenotes, mapped with Landsat imagery. This 165 ± 5 km diameter Cenote Ring demarcates a boundary between unfractured limestones inside the ring, and fractured limestones outside. The boundary forms a barrier to lateral ground water migration, resulting in increased flows, dissolution, and collapse thus forming the cenotes. The subsurface geology indicates that the fracturing that created the Cenote Ring is related to slumping in the rim of the buried crater, differential thicknesses in the rocks overlying the crater, or solution collapse within porous impact deposits. The Cenote Ring provides the most accurate position of the Chicxulub crater's center, and the associated faults, fractures, and stratigraphy indicate that the crater may be 240 km in diameter.     

Rock thermal data at the grain scale: applicability to granular disintegration in cold environments

Consideration of the mechanisms associated with the granular disintegration of rock has been limited by available data. In most instances, both the size of the transducer and the nature of the study have negated any applicability of the resulting data to the understanding of grain‐to‐grain separation within rock. The application of microthermocouples (≤0·15 mm diameter) and high‐frequency logging (20 s intervals) at a taffoni site on southern Alexander Island and from a rock outcrop on Adelaide Island (Antarctica) provide new data pertaining to the thermal conditions, at the grain scale, of the rock surface. The results show that thermal changes (ΔT/t) can be very high, with values of 22 °C min^?1 being recorded. Although available data indicate that there can be differences in frequency and magnitude of ?uctuations as a function of aspect, all aspects experienced some large magnitude (≥2 °C min^?1) ?uctuations. Further, in many instances, large thermal changes in more than one direction could occur within 1 min or in subsequent minutes. These data suggest that the surface grains experience rapidly changing stress ?elds that may, with time, effect fatigue at the grain boundaries; albedo differences between grains and the resulting thermal variations are thought to exacerbate this. The available data failed to show any indication of water freezing (an exotherm) and thus it is suggested that microgelivation may not play as large a role in granular breakdown as is often postulated for cold regions, and that in this dry, Antarctic region thermal stress may play a signi?cant role. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.