Impact of climate-related disasters on human migration in Mexico: a spatial model

The great human-environmental diversity of Mexico provides a framework for an initial understanding of the wide disparities between rich and poor. Mexico is still dominated in many regions by agriculture, and during the last 25 years, weather-related disasters have accounted for about 80% of economic losses. This is dramatic, especially considering that this sector produces only ca. 4% of GDP while providing a livelihood to one-quarter of the country’s population. Based on a spatial model, this paper tests the contribution of natural disasters to catalyzing the emigration process in vulnerable regions throughout Mexico. Besides coping and adaptive capacity, we assess the effect of economic losses from disasters in combination with adverse production and trade conditions during the 1990s in triggering out-migration.     

Tectonic, sea-level, and climatic controls on Late Paleozoic sedimentation in the western basins of Argentina

Tectonic activity, sea-level changes, and the climate controlled sedimentation in Late Paleozoic basins of western Argentina. The role of each factor is investigated from the geologic record of the Río Blanco and Paganzo basins using three hierarchical orders of stratigraphic bounding surfaces. First-order surfaces correspond to regional unconformities, second-order ones to local unconformities with a lesser regional extent, and third-order surfaces represent locally extended sedimentary truncation. Using this methodology, the Carboniferous–Permian record of the Paganzo and Río Blanco basins may be divided into two megasequences, four sequences, and 12 stratigraphic sections. Megasequences are bounded by regional unconformities that result from tectonic events important enough to cause regional paleogeographic changes. Sequences are limited by minor regional extension surfaces related to local tectonic movements or significant sea-level falls. Finally, stratigraphic sections correspond to extended sedimentary truncations produced by transgressive events or major climatic changes. Sequence I is mainly composed of marine deposits divided into basal infill of the basin (Section 1) and Tournaisian–Visean transgressive deposits (Section 2). Sequence II is bounded by a sharp erosional surface and begins with coarse conglomerates (Section 3), followed by fluvial and shallow marine sedimentary rocks (Section 4) that pass upward into shales and diamictites (Section 5). The base of Sequence III is marked by an extended unconformity covered by Early Pennsylvanian glacial sedimentary rocks (Section 6) that represent the most important glacial event along the western margin of Gondwana. Postglacial deposits (Section 7) occur in the two basins and comprise both glaciolacustrine (eastern region) and transgressive marine (central and western regions) deposits. By the Moscovian–Kasimovian, fluvial sandstones and conglomerates were deposited in most of the Paganzo Basin (Section 8), while localized volcanic activity took place in the Río Blanco Basin. Near the end of the Carboniferous, an important transgression is recorded in the major part of the Río Blanco Basin (Section 9), reaching the westernmost portion area of the Paganzo Basin. Finally, Sequence IV shows important differences between the Paganzo and Río Blanco basins; fluvial red beds (Section 10), eolian sandstones (Section 11), and low-energy fluvial deposits (Section 12) prevailed in the Paganzo Basin whereas volcaniclastic sedimentation and volcanism dominated in the Río Blanco Basin. Thus, tectonic events, sea-level changes and climate exerted a strong and complex control on the evolution of the Río Blanco and Paganzo basins. The interaction of these allocyclic controls produced not only characteristic facies association patterns but also different kinds of stratigraphic bounding surfaces.     

High spatial resolution sampling of metals in the sediment and water column in Port Jefferson Harbor, New York

Eighteen sediment samples and six water-column samples were collected in a small (6 km²), coastal embayment (Port Jefferson Harbor, New York) to define a high-resolution spatial distribution of metals and to elucidate sources of contaminants to the harbor. Sediment metal (Ag, Cu, Fe, Ni, Pb, V, and Zn) concentrations varied widely, reflecting differences in sediment grain size, with higher metal concentrations located in the fine-grained inner harbor sediments. Calculated enrichment factors for these sediments show that Ag, Pb, Cu, and Zn are elevated relative to both crustal abundances and their respective abundances in sediments in central Long Island Sound. Metal concentrations were 1.2 to 10 fold greater in water from the inner harbor compared to water from Long Island Sound collected outside the mouth of the harbor. Spatial variations in trace metals in surface waters within the bay parallel the spatial variations of trace metals in sediments within the harbor. Elevated water-column metal concentrations appear to be partially derived from a combination of diagenetic remobilization from contaminated sediments (e.g., Ag) and anthropogenic sources (e.g., Cu and Zn) within the southern portions of the harbor. Although the National Status and Trends Program had reported previously that sediment metal concentrations in Port Jefferson Harbor were low, the results of this study show sediment metals have high spatial variability and are enriched in the inner harbor sediments at levels comparable to more urbanized western north shore Long Island harbors.     

Sex Offender Residential Movement Patterns: A Markov Chain Analysis

This article introduces a new approach to the analysis of changes in sex offender residences over time. Using a Markov chain framework, we analyze residential movement patterns of registered sex offenders in Hamilton County, Ohio, over a three-year period (2005–2007). Results indicate a 46 percent reduction in offenders violating spatial restriction zone policy as compared to a counterfactual case where offenders move as a function of housing distributions. Strong legacy effects are also found as offenders previously in violation of restriction policies move into other restricted zones at a higher rate than offenders who were previously in compliance with the policy. Parcels that previously were home to registered offenders also continue to attract offenders in future periods. Although we find differences in the probabilities of attracting offenders for parcels outside and inside restricted zones that are consistent with offender restrictive policies, these differences are actually significantly smaller than what holds under the counterfactual. Parcels in restricted zones continue to attract offenders at a higher rate than expected, despite the policy restrictions.     

火山地震活动的实验室模拟

火山体内产生地震活动的物理过程非常复杂,目前仍然没有被完全理解。我们在实验室内用来自埃特纳火山(意大利)的玄武岩做了变形和破碎实验并报道了实验结果。该实验用一组围绕样品的传感器监测,以完成全波形记录及微震事件定位和分析。充满液体的孔隙和损伤区快速破裂后减压激发了许多低频事件,类似于长周期火山地震活动。低频事件与孔隙流体的减压有关,位于破裂样本的损伤区;这些事件都具有一个弱剪切滑动分量(双力偶),与发生在活火山下的流体驱动事件相一致。     

Thermochemistry of strontium incorporation in aragonite from atomistic simulations

We have investigated the thermodynamics of mixing between aragonite (orthorhombic CaCO₃) and strontianite (SrCO₃). In agreement with experiment, our simulations predict that there is a miscibility gap between the two solids at ambient conditions. All Sr_xCa_1−xCO₃ solids with compositions 0.12 < x < 0.87 are metastable with respect to separation into a Ca-rich and a Sr-rich phase. The concentration of Sr in coral aragonites (x ∼ 0.01) lies in the miscibility region of the phase diagram, and therefore formation of separated Sr-rich phases in coral aragonites is not thermodynamically favorable. The miscibility gap disappears at around 380 K. The enthalpy of mixing, which is positive and nearly symmetric with respect to x = 0.5, is the dominant contribution to the excess free energy, while the vibrational and configurational entropic contributions are small and of opposite sign. We provide a detailed comparison of our simulation results with available experimental data.     

Growth discontinuity in males of the deep-water giant red shrimp Aristaeomorpha foliacea in the Mediterranean Sea

The deep-water giant red shrimp, Aristaeomorpha foliacea (Risso, 1827) (Decapoda, Aristeidae), represents a highly valuable resource for bottom trawling in the Mediterranean Sea. Recent assessments have described both a worsening of the status of the traditionally exploited stocks and low levels of annual-based instantaneous natural mortality (M 0.4–0.7 year⁻¹) in the unexploited stocks. The mortality (M) figures, however, are in contrast with the longevity (T_max) of 3–4-year males and 4–5-year females, estimated from classical length frequency distribution analysis. Reduced growth (after the onset of sexual maturity) and pile-up of older individuals in the larger size classes have been considered to be reasonable explanations for the contrast between M and T_max. We propose that a discontinuity of the growth models could address this contrast. Because a clear discontinuity in sexual maturity is evident only in males, length frequency distribution data for different sets of males collected from the South of Sicily and the Maltese Islands deep bottoms (400–800 m) were fitted with both the classic (c) and double-phased (d) von Bertalanffy growth formula (VBGF). According to the dVBGF, adult males sharply reduce their growth rate after reaching an age between 1.2 and 1.5 year, which corresponds to the estimates of age at sexual maturity (t_m between 1 and 1.5 years). The reduction in growth determines a higher T_max (7.3–9.5 year) and lower M (0.4–0.6 year⁻¹) than previously derived on the basis of cVBGF estimates (T_max 3–4 years and M 1.2 year⁻¹). The dVBGF results suggest that sexual dimorphism and length–sex segregation in giant red shrimps reflect an alternative life history strategy that is based mainly on growth reduction in adult males and it might be adopted for implementing more conservative assessments.     

The properties of tests for spatial effects in discrete Markov chain models of regional income distribution dynamics

Discrete Markov chain models (DMCs) have been widely applied to the study of regional income distribution dynamics and convergence. This popularity reflects the rich body of DMC theory on the one hand and the ability of this framework to provide insights on the internal and external properties of regional income distribution dynamics on the other. In this paper we examine the properties of tests for spatial effects in DMC models of regional distribution dynamics. We do so through a series of Monte Carlo simulations designed to examine the size, power and robustness of tests for spatial heterogeneity and spatial dependence in transitional dynamics. This requires that we specify a data generating process for not only the null, but also alternatives when spatial heterogeneity or spatial dependence is present in the transitional dynamics. We are not aware of any work which has examined these types of data generating processes in the spatial distribution dynamics literature. Results indicate that tests for spatial heterogeneity and spatial dependence display good power for the presence of spatial effects. However, tests for spatial heterogeneity are not robust to the presence of strong spatial dependence, while tests for spatial dependence are sensitive to the spatial configuration of heterogeneity. When the spatial configuration can be considered random, dependence tests are robust to the dynamic spatial heterogeneity, but not so to the process mean heterogeneity when the difference in process means is large relative to the variance of the time series.