Evaluating severity–area–frequency (SAF) of seasonal droughts in Bangladesh under climate change scenarios

Stochastic Environmental Research and Risk Assessment - Drought is considered to be one of the most devastating natural hazards, causing widespread environmental and social damage in many parts of...     

尼日利亚西部大陆边缘海底峡谷下部结构研究

Multi-beam,sub-bottom and multichannel seismic data acquired from the western Nigerian continental margin are analysed and interpreted to examine the architectural characteristics of the lower parts of the submarine canyons on the margin.The presence of four canyons: Avon,Mahin,Benin,and Escravos,are confirmed from the multi-beam data map and identified as cutting across the shelf and slope areas,with morphological features ranging from axial channels,moderate to high sinuosity indices,scarps,terraces and nickpoints which are interpreted as resulting from erosional and depositional activities within and around the canyons.The Avon Canyon,in particular,is characterised by various branches and sub-branches with complex morphologies.The canyons are mostly U-shaped in these lower parts with occasional V-shapes down their courses.Their typical orientation is NE–SW.Sedimentary processes are proposed as being a major controlling factor in these canyons.Sediments appear to have been discharged directly into the canyons by rivers during the late Quaternary low sea level which allows river mouths to extend as far as the shelf edge.The current sediment supply is still primarily sourced from these rivers in the case of the Benin and Escravos Canyons,but indirectly in the case of the Avon and Mahin Canyons where the rivers discharge sediments into the lagoons and the lagoons bring the sediments on to the continental shelf before they are dispersed into the canyon heads.Ancient canyons that have long been buried underneath the Avon Canyon are identified in the multichannel seismic profile across the head of the Avon Canyon,while a number of normal faults around the walls of the Avon and Mahin Canyons are observed in the selected sub-bottom profiles.The occurrence of these faults,especially in the irregular portions of the canyon walls,suggests that they also have some effect on the canyon architecture.The formation of the canyons is attributed to the exposure of the upper marginal area to incisions from erosion during the sea level lowstand of the glacial period.The incisions are widened and lengthened by contouric currents,turbidity currents and slope failures resulting in the canyons.     

Electromagnetic wave instability in a relativistic electron-positron-ion plasma

By employing the anisotropic plasma distribution function, the stability of circularly polarized electromagnetic (EM) waves is studied in a relativistically hot electron-positron-ion (e-p-i) plasma, investigating two specific scenarios. First, linear dispersion relations associated with the transverse EM waves are analyzed in different possible frequency regimes. The expression of the aperiodic hydrodynamic instability is obtained and numerically the transverse EM modes are shown to grow exponentially. Secondly, we have found that the transverse electromagnetic wave interact with a collisionless anisotropic e-p-i plasma and damp through the nonlinear Landau damping phenomena. Taking the effects of the latter into consideration, a kinetic nonlinear Schrödinger equation is derived with local and nonlocal nonlinearities, computing the damping rates. The present work should be helpful to understand the linear and nonlinear properties of the intense EM waves in hot relativistically astrophysical plasmas, e.g., pulsars, black holes, neutron stars, etc.     

Spatial modeling of Dengue prevalence and kriging prediction of Dengue outbreak in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (Pakistan) using presence only data

Stochastic Environmental Research and Risk Assessment - During the span of August–October, 2017 a major outbreak of Dengue fever happened in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan. Cases...     

Nutrient fluxes from deep sediment support nutrient budget in the oligotrophic waters of the Gulf of Aqaba

The role of deep sediment in supporting nutrient budget in the Gulf of Aqaba has been investigated by estimating the flux of inorganic nitrogen, phosphate and silicate. Fluxes were calculated directly by pore water profiles and indirectly by chamber incubations carried out onboard the RV Meteor cruise. The results showed that maximum potential fluxes calculated by chamber incubations were higher than those calculated by porewater profiles for all nutrients (6.4–28.5 fold). This has been attributed to the additional flux due to bioturbation and flux from advective porewater exchange in the case of chamber incubation, while porewater fluxes represent diffusive ones. Using a rough estimation considering flux results in addition to the sediment area and water mass of the Gulf of Aqaba, we estimate that 3.3 × 10⁵, 6.4 × 10⁴ and 6.5 × 10⁶ kg year⁻¹ of inorganic nitrogen, phosphate and silicate respectively are effused from deep sediments to the water column. This quanitity would certainly support the primary productivity in the oligotrophic water in the Gulf of Aqaba.     

Effect of increasing temperatures on cooling systems. A case of study: European greenhouse sector

The work attempts to assess the effects of global warming on the efficacy of current greenhouse cooling methods following a methodology previously proved for other agricultural buildings. The cooling potential of four greenhouse cooling techniques (natural ventilation, forced ventilation, fogging and shading) were simulated by computer modelling for five European locations, calculating the greenhouse internal air temperature from measured external climate data. Four 2080s scenarios were analysed in these five locations. They were constructed as a combination of General Circulation Models (Had CM3 and ECHAM4) downscaled for Europe with the HIRHAM and RCA3 regional models and driven by the A2 and B2 socio-economic scenarios. The crop considered as reference was tomato. The results showed that, in locations in southern Europe, adding evaporative cooling methods to ventilation and/or shading will be indispensable. In some areas of northern Europe, natural ventilation will no longer be sufficient, and shading or fogging will also be necessary. The economic consequences will be important, over all in the southern locations where water consumption, investment and working costs will be higher and necessary to ensure the crop production.