Autumn atmospheric preconditioning for interannual variability of wintertime sea-ice in the Okhotsk Sea

Relations in year-to-year variability between wintertime Sea-Ice Concentrations (SICs) in the Okhotsk Sea and atmospheric anomalies consisting of zonal and meridional 1000-hPa wind speeds and 850-hPa air temperatures are studied using a singular value decomposition analysis. It is revealed that the late autumn (October–November) atmospheric conditions strongly influence sea-ice variability from the same season (late autumn) through late winter (February—March), in which sea-ice extent is at its maximum. The autumn atmospheric conditions for the positive sea-ice anomalies exhibit cold air temperature anomalies over the Okhotsk Sea and wind anomalies blowing into the Okhotsk Sea from Siberia. These atmospheric conditions yield anomalous ocean-to-atmosphere heat fluxes and cold sea surface temperature anomalies in the Okhotsk Sea. Hence, these results suggest that the atmospheric conditions affect the sea-ice through heat anomalies stored in sea-ice and oceanic fields. The late autumn atmosphere conditions are related to large 700-hPa geopotential height anomalies over the Bering Sea and northern Eurasia, which are related to a stationary Rossby wave propagation over the North Pacific and that from the North Atlantic to Eurasia, respectively. In addition, the late autumn atmospheric preconditioning also plays an important role in the decreasing trend in the Okhotsk sea-ice extent observed from 1980 to the mid-1990s. Based on the lagged sea-ice response to the late autumn atmosphere, a simple seasonal prediction scheme is proposed for the February–March sea-ice extent using four-month leading atmospheric conditions. This scheme explains 45% of the variance of the Okhotsk sea-ice extent.     

Physical control of sediment carbon content in an estuarine tidal flat system (Nanakita River, Japan): A mechanistic case study

Temporal variations in sediment carbon content were tracked by sampling every 2 weeks for 6 to 33 months at 6 tidal flat stations with different carbon content levels (0.05–1.64%) in a single estuary. Three temporal series of current velocity at 5 cm above the sediment were also obtained. Non-cohesive and cohesive sediment stations differed in patterns of temporal variation in sediment carbon content, suggesting the difference in processes controlling sediment carbon content. In the stations of non-cohesive sandy sediment with relatively low carbon content (0.05–0.15%), sediment carbon content fluctuated within ranges specific to each station. In these stations, current velocity data suggested that frequency of sand resuspension washing out sediment carbon controls sediment carbon content level. In the stations of cohesive sediment with relatively high carbon content (0.77–1.64%), sediment carbon contents showed some unusual upward and downward peaks, recovered to usual levels specific to the stations, and was always kept higher than that in the non-cohesive sediment stations. We speculate that in the cohesive sediment stations, sand inputs may significantly control processes establishing the consolidated sediments with various carbon content levels. Spatial transitions from non-cohesive to cohesive sediments and from low to high sediment carbon contents likely occur as sand resuspension at spring tides become more irregular and less frequent. Based on these results, conceptual models describing physical processes controlling sediment carbon content at the studied stations were proposed.     

Estimating the impact parameters of cosmic dust particles using a piezoelectric lead zirconate titanate detector

A cosmic dust detector for installation on a satellite is currently being developed using piezoelectric lead zirconate titanate (PZT), which can possess both functions of the collector and the transducer. The characteristics of the PZT detector have been studied by bombarding it with hypervelocity particles supplied by a Van de Graaff accelerator. The front surface of the detector used in this study was covered with a white paint to reduce any increase in the temperature due to the solar radiation. There was a linear relationship between the rise time of the signal produced by the detector and the particle's velocities, which were above 10 km/s on impact. This implies that individual particle velocities on impact can be inferred through the empirical formula derived from the data obtained from the PZT detector.     

Interannual fluctuations in recruitment of walleye pollock in the Oyashio region related to environmental changes

The Japanese Pacific walleye pollock (Theragra chalcogramma) stock is the largest stock of this species in Japanese waters. It is a key component of the Oyashio ecosystem. In southern Hokkaido waters, these fish spawn mainly during January and February near the mouth of Funka Bay (FB), and most eggs and larvae are transported into FB. During midsummer juvenile pollock migrate along the southern coast of Hokkaido to a nursery ground on the continental shelf off eastern Hokkaido (Doto area). However, some eggs and larvae are transported southward to the Tohoku region (TR). Transport depends largely on the Oyashio, which generally flows southward along the eastern coasts of Hokkaido and Tohoku. Thus, this stock has two different recruitment routes: FB–Doto and FB–TR. In the 1980s, when the southward flow of the Oyashio was strong, the number of age-2 pollock estimated from a virtual population analysis (VPA) indicated that recruitment to the entire stock remained at a medium level. In the 1990s, when the Oyashio weakened, strong year-classes occurred in 1991, 1994, and 1995, but not in the latter half of the 1990s. Juvenile catches in the TR by commercial fisheries, which can be taken as indices of recruitment level via FB–TR, were high during the 1980s and decreased in the 1990s. Although there was no significant difference in the average number of recruits between the 1980s and the 1990s as estimated from a VPA, the recruitment patterns differed between the two decades. Here, we propose that recruitment routes of this stock shifted in response to environmental changes.     

A migration model of magmatism explaining a ridge subduction, and its details on a statistical analysis of the granite ages in Cretaceous Southwest Japan

A migration model of magmatism based on the granite ages in Southwest Japan is proposed to explain the ridge subduction beneath the Eurasia continent as the cause of the along-arc and across-arc youngings of the granite ages and the very high activity of the magmatism in the Cretaceous. For the construction of the magmatic model, the localities of the granite age samples are denoted by the cartesian coordinates X and Y, which are measured along and normal to the Median Tectonic Line (MTL), respectively, and their ages are set corresponding to the coordinate Z vertical to the X–Y plane. The age trend is then formulated by a regression plane of Z on X and Y, which inclines in both directions along and normal to the MTL, and approximates the ages with the very high multiple correlation coefficient 0.91. Evaluating the magmatic trend by such a method, various characteristics of the activities can be taken easily; for example, the isochronous line of the magmatism, which is an intersection of the regression plane and an arbitrary horizontal plane, is found to extend landward obliquely across the continental margin. The migrating rate of the isochronous line along the MTL is also taken to be 2.8 cm/year as a reciprocal of the inclination of the along-arc younging. The isochronous line is speculated to be the out-cropped manifestation of the subcrustal linear heat source. Such a migrating linear heat source is probably due to the subduction of an active ridge, the Kula (or Izanagi)–Pacific ridge in the Cretaceous. The migration model of magmatism harmonizes very well with the plates and the ridge motions in the East Asia area during the late Mesozoic. The ridge subduction is one of the important phenomena that explain the unusually active arc magmatism and the migrating slab window; it is important to grasp dynamically the geological messages issued from the system.     

The dust distribution in some smallHII regions

Based on the calibrated maps in the Hα andV bands, simple shell models for the distributions of ionized gas and dust are calculated for the smallHii regions S237 and S254–S257. In deriving the dust distribution from theV-band maps, it is assumed that scattering particles are made of dirty ice. The results of calculation show that a dust depletion zone should be placed in the central region of each of the observedHii regions. The formation of this dust depletion zone and the evolutionary state of theseHii regions are briefly discussed.     

230Th/234U and 14C dating of a lowstand coral reef beneath the insular shelf off Irabu Island, Ryukyus, southwestern Japan

Abstract   High-resolution seismic reflection profiles delineated the distribution of mound-shaped reflections, which were interpreted as reefs, beneath the insular shelf western off Irabu Island, Ryukyus, southwestern Japan. A sediment core through one of the mounded structures was recovered from the sea floor at a depth of −118.2 m by offshore drilling and was dated by radiometric methods. The lithology and coral fauna of the core indicate that the mounded structure was composed of coral–algal boundstone suggesting a small-scaled coral reef. High-precision α-spectrometric ²³⁰Th/²³⁴U dating coupled with calibrated accelerator mass spectrometric ¹⁴C ages of corals obtained reliable ages of this reef ranging from 22.18 ± 0.63 to 30.47 ± 0.98 ka. This proves that such a submerged reef was formed during the lowstand stage of marine oxygen isotope stages 3–2. The existence of low-Mg calcite in the aragonitic coral skeleton of 22.18 ± 0.63 ka provides evidence that the reef had once been exposed by lowering of the relative sealevel to at least −126 m during the last glacial maximum in the study area. There is no room for doubt that a coral reef grew during the last glacial period on the shelf off Irabu Island of Ryukyus in the subtropical region of western Pacific.     

Petrographic features of a high-temperature granite just newly solidified magma at the Kakkonda geothermal field, Japan

A 3729-m-deep geothermal research well, WD-1a, provides us with a unique opportunity to study initial petrographic features of a high-temperature granite just after solidification of magma. The well succeeded in collecting three spot-cores of the Kakkonda Granite that is a pluton emplaced at a shallow depth and regarded as a heat source of the active Kakkonda geothermal system. The core samples were collected at the present formation temperatures of 370, 410 and over 500°C. These samples are granodiorite to tonalite consisting mainly of plagioclase, quartz, hornblende, biotite and K-feldspar. A sample collected at a formation temperature of over 500°C possesses the following remarkable petrographic features compared to the other two samples. Interstitial spaces are not completely sealed. K-feldspar exhibits no perthite by the exsolution of albite lamella. Quartz includes glassy melt inclusions without devitrification. Hornblende is less intensively altered to actinolite, and biotite is not altered. This study directly confirmed that perthite in K-feldspar is a recrystallization texture formed at 410–500°C based on a comparison of the in situ temperatures of the samples. Chemical compositions of minerals were analyzed to compare temperatures determined from geothermometers in several publications to the in situ temperatures of the samples.