An assessment of the climate change impacts on groundwater recharge at a continental scale using a probabilistic approach with an ensemble of GCMs

This study used 16 Global Climate Models and three global warming scenarios to make projections of recharge under a 2050 climate for the entire Australian continent at a 0.05° grid resolution. The results from these 48 future climate variants have been fitted to a probability distribution to enable the results to be summarised and uncertainty quantified. The median results project a reduction in recharge across the west, centre and south of Australia and an increase in recharge across the north and a small area in the east of the continent. The range of results is quite large and for large parts of the continent encompasses both increases and decreases in recharge. This makes it difficult to utilise for water resources management so the results have been analysed with a risk analysis framework; this enables the future projections for groundwater recharge to be communicated to water managers in terms of likelihood and consequence of a reduction in recharge. This highlights an important message for water resource managers that in most areas of Australia they will be making decisions on water allocations under considerable uncertainty as to the direction and magnitude of recharge change under a future climate and that this uncertainty may be irreducible.     

The finest white-light coronal features

An attempt to detect the finest white-light coronal features observed with a large optical telescope was made at the July 11, 1991 Solar Total Eclipse. A few selected results taken from the video-CCD high speed observations obtained at the prime focus of the Canada-France-Hawaï-Telescope (CFHT) with a red coronal interference filter are presented. The smallest (sub-arsec) detected and/or resolved coronal features are shown. The methods that were used to extract them from the noisy and seeing-limited images taken from video frames are described.     

Factors and mechanisms of chemical composition formation of saline lakes in West Mongolia

正All the lakes are accumulative systems for the various chemical elements.However,the ratios of the elements in different lake types are very different.It is generally accepted that the composition of lake water determined by     

Heavy metals in the air and snow cover of Ulan Bator

Field observations have been used to characterize air pollution in Ulan Bator by heavy metals during the 2008/2009 heating season. The degree of technogenicity of emissions and their main sources are determined. The diurnal and seasonal dynamics of atmospheric pollution are considered. It is found that many pollutants exceed maximum permissible concentrations (MPC). The most dangerous components in the urban atmosphere include Pb (up to 26 mean daily maximum permissible concentrations (MPCmd) and airborne particles (up to 21 MPCmd). The study revealed very high levels of total air pollution, especially in the center of the city (air pollution index (API) > 50)). Soluble forms of heavy metals as contained in the snow are characterized by a maximally high degree of pollution hazard for the urban environment, with a low degree corresponding to solid-phase depositions. Snow cover pollution decreases as follows: yurt districts > industrial zone > multi-storey districts.     

Observing Gravity Change in the Fennoscandian Uplift Area with the Hanover Absolute Gravimeter

The Nordic countries Norway, Sweden, Finland and Denmark are a key study region for research of glacial isostasy. In addition, such research offers a unique opportunity for absolute gravimetry to show its capability as a geodetic tool for geophysical research. Within a multi-national cooperation, annual absolute gravity measurements have been performed in Fennoscandia by IfE since 2003. For the Hanover gravimeter FG5-220, overall accuracy of ±30?nm/s² is indicated for a single station determination. First results of linear gravity changes are derived for ten stations in the central and southern part of the uplift area. Comparing with the rates predicted by glacial rebound modelling, the gravity trends of the absolute measurements differ by 3.8?nm/s² per year (root-mean-square discrepancy) from the uplift model. The mean difference between observed and predicted rates is 0.8?nm/s² per year only. A proportionality factor of ?1.63?±?0.20?nm/s² per mm has been obtained, which describes the mean ratio between the observational gravity and height rates.     

Modelling and optimization of processes for removal of dissolved heavy-metal compounds from drinking water by microbiological methods

The results of laboratory modelling of microbiological removal of soluble compounds of Fe, Mn, and other heavy metals (Al, Cr, Zn, Co, Cu, Pb, Cd) with the use of a laboratory bioreactor. The results have shown that the main method of optimization of conditions facilitating the removal of dissolved metal compounds from drinking water consisted in creating and maintaining an oxygen aeration regime favorable for bacterial oxidation processes and, which is especially important, in preventing stagnancy in the sand filter of bioreactor during its shutoff. The latter was accompanied by an acceleration of bacterial reduction processes of precipitated heavy metals, resulting in their dissolution, hence secondary water pollution.     

The application of an indirect electromagnetic geothermometer to temperature extrapolation in depth

We study the feasibility of the application of an indirect EM geothermometer, developed recently, to the temperature extrapolation in depth using magnetotelluric data collected in the seismically active northern Tien Shan faulted area (Bishkek Geodynamic Test Site, Kyrgyzstan) and Hengill geothermal zone (Iceland). The approach used is based on the artificial neural network technique, which does not imply the prior knowledge of the electrical conductivity mechanisms on the one hand and provides temperature estimates based on the analysis of the implicit conductivity-temperature relations, on the other.
The samples for neuronet teaching consisted in the well temperature records and electrical conductivity values determined for the same depths from the magnetotelluric data measured in the vicinities of eight boreholes in each testing area. The testing of the taught neuronets was carried out using the temperature records not involved in the teaching process. The results indicate that the temperature extrapolation accuracy essentially depends on the ratio between the well length and the extrapolation depth. In particular, in extrapolation to a depth twice as large as the well depth the relative error is 5–6% and in case of threefold excess, the error is around 20%. This result makes it possible to increase significantly the depth of indirect temperature estimation in the Earth's interior (in particular, for geothermal exploration) based on the available temperature logs.
The practical application of an indirect electromagnetic geothermometer could provide the following facilities: 1) more exact temperature estimation in the extrapolation mode; 2) remote temperature estimates in the boreholes in areas characterized by extreme conditions for conventional geothermometers.     

Do Cloud Properties in a Puerto Rican Tropical Montane Cloud Forest Depend on Occurrence of Long-Range Transported African Dust?

We investigated cloud properties of warm clouds in a tropical montane cloud forest at Pico del Este (1,051 m a.s.l.) in the northeastern part of Puerto Rico to address the question of whether cloud properties in the Caribbean could potentially be affected by African dust transported across the Atlantic Ocean. We analyzed data collected during 12 days in July 2011. Cloud droplet size spectra were measured using the FM-100 fog droplet spectrometer that measured droplet size distributions in the range from 2 to 49 µm, primarily during fog events. The droplet size spectra revealed a bimodal structure, with the first peak (D < 6 µm) being more pronounced in terms of droplet number concentrations, whereas the second peak (10 µm < D < 20 µm) was found to be the one relevant for total liquid water content (LWC) of the cloud. We identified three major clusters of characteristic droplet size spectra by means of hierarchical clustering. All clusters differed significantly from each other in droplet number concentration ( \(N_{\rm tot}\) ), effective diameter (ED), and median volume diameter (MVD). For the cluster comprising the largest droplets and the lowest droplet number concentrations, we found evidence of inhomogeneous mixing in the cloud. Contrastingly, the other two clusters revealed microphysical behavior, which could be expected under homogeneous mixing conditions. For those conditions, an increase in cloud condensation nuclei—e.g., from processed African dust transported to the site—is supposed to lead to an increased droplet concentration. In fact, one of these two clusters showed a clear shift of cloud droplet size spectra towards smaller droplet diameters. Since this cluster occurred during periods with strong evidence for the presence of long-range transported African dust, we hypothesize a link between the observed dust episodes and cloud characteristics in the Caribbean at our site, which is similar to the anthropogenic aerosol indirect effect.     

Trace elements in tissues of cetacean species rarely stranded along the Israeli Mediterranean coast

In this paper we present the concentrations of Hg, Cd, Se, Pb, Cu, Mn, Zn and Fe in organs of 6 non-common specimens of cetaceans that were stranded along the Israeli Mediterranean coast (IMC), during 2002–2010: two fin whales, one minke whale, one Cuvier’s beaked whale, one rough-toothed dolphin, and one Risso’s dolphin. Most of the specimens were calves stranded by accident. Concentrations of Hg and Cd were low in tissues of the baleen whales and higher in the toothed whales, with maximum concentrations of 1067 mg kg⁻¹ Hg in the liver of the Risso’s dolphin and 29 mg kg⁻¹ Cd in the kidney of the Cuvier’s beaked whale. As far as we are aware, this is the first report of trace elements in baleen whales in the Eastern Mediterranean, and the first report of trace elements in minke whale and rough-toothed dolphin in the Mediterranean.