An AHP–TOPSIS Predictive Model for District-Scale Mapping of Porphyry Cu–Au Potential: A Case Study from Salafchegan Area (Central Iran)

The Salafchegan area in central Iran is a greenfield region of high porphyry Cu–Au potential, for which a sound prospectivity model is required to guide mineral exploration. Satellite imagery, geological geochemical, geophysical, and mineral occurrence datasets of the area were used to run an innovative integration model for porphyry Cu–Au exploration. Five favorable multi-class evidence maps, representing diagnostic porphyry Cu–Au recognition criteria (intermediate igneous intrusive and sub-volcanic host rocks, structural controls, hydrothermal alterations, stream sediment Cu anomalies, magnetic signatures), were combined using analytic hierarchy process and technique for order preference by similarity to ideal solution to calculate a final map of porphyry Cu–Au potential in the Salafchegan area.     

Microfacies and geochemistry of the Ilam Formation in the Tang-E Rashid area, Izeh, S.W. Iran

The Ilam Formation (Santonian–Campanian in age), part of the Bangestan Group, is disconformably overlain by the Sarvak Formation and underlain by the Gurpi Formation in the Tang-E Rashid, Peyon area, Izeh (Zagros), southwest of Iran.Facies analyses indicate that the Ilam carbonates formed in four microfacies belts: tidal flat, lagoon, shoal and open marine, in a platform ramp environment. Major and minor elements and carbon and oxygen isotope values were used to determine the original carbonate mineralogy of the Ilam Formation. Petrographic evidence and elemental and oxygen and carbon isotope values indicate that aragonite was the original carbonate mineralogy in the Ilam Formation. The elemental and isotopic compositions of the Ilam carbonates also illustrate that they have stabilized in the marine phreatic environment. Variations of Sr/Ca and δ¹⁸O values versus Mn suggest that diagenetic alteration occurred in a closed system. Temperature calculation based on the oxygen isotope value of the least-altered sample indicates that the very early shallow burial fluid temperature was around 28 °C.Recognition of the exact boundary between the Ilam and Sarvak Formations is difficult, due to similar lithologies and the absence of the Surgah Formation in the study area. However, elemental and oxygen and carbon isotope analysis were used to determine the boundary between these formations. The δ¹⁸O and δ¹³C values, along with elemental results, clearly indicate a subaerial exposure surface, below which meteoric diagenesis affected the sediments.     

Numerical and intelligent modeling of triaxial strength of anisotropic jointed rock specimens

The strength of anisotropic rock masses can be evaluated through either theoretical or experimental methods. The latter is more precise but also more expensive and time-consuming especially due to difficulties of preparing high-quality samples. Numerical methods, such as finite element method (FEM), finite difference method (FDM), distinct element method (DEM), etc. have been regarded as precise and low-cost theoretical approaches in different fields of rock engineering. On the other hand, applicability of intelligent approaches such as fuzzy systems, neural networks and decision trees in rock mechanics problems has been recognized through numerous published papers. In current study, it is aimed to theoretically evaluate the strength of anisotropic rocks with through-going discontinuity using numerical and intelligent methods. In order to do this, first, strength data of such rocks are collected from the literature. Then FlAC, a commercially well-known software for FDM analysis, is applied to simulate the situation of triaxial test on anisotropic jointed specimens. Reliability of this simulation in predicting the strength of jointed specimens has been verified by previous researches. Therefore, the few gaps of the experimental data are filled by numerical simulation to prevent unexpected learning errors. Furthermore, a sensitivity analysis is carried out based on the numerical process applied herein. Finally, two intelligent methods namely feed forward neural network and a newly developed fuzzy modeling approach are utilized to predict the strength of above-mentioned specimens. Comparison of the results with experimental data demonstrates that the intelligent models result in desirable prediction accuracy.     

A survey of temporal and spatial reference crop evapotranspiration trends in Iran from 1960 to 2005

Reference crop evapotranspiration (ET₀) is one of the most important climatic parameters which plays a key role in estimating crop water demand and scheduling irrigation. Under global warming and climate change conditions, it is needed to survey the trend of ET₀ in Iran. In this study, ET₀ values were determined based on FAO-56 Penman-Monteith equation over 32 synoptic meteorological stations during 1960–2005; and analyzed spatially and temporally in monthly, seasonal and annual time scales. After removing the significant lag-1 serial correlation effect by pre-whitening, non-parametric statistical Mann–Kendall (MK) test was used to detect the trends. The slope of the changes was determined by Sen’s slope estimator. In order to facilitate in trend analysis, the 10 moving average low pass filter were also applied on the normalized annual ET₀ time series. Annual ET₀ time series and filtered ones were then classified by hierarchical clustering in three clusters and then mapped in order to show the patterns of different clusters. Results showed that the significant decreasing trends were more considerable than increasing ones. Among surveyed stations, and on an annual time scale, the highest and lowest annual values of Sen’s slope estimator were observed in Tabas with (+) 72.14 mm per decade and Shahrud with (?) 62.22 mm per decade, respectively. Results also indicated that the clustered map based on normalized and filtered annual ET₀ time series is in accordance with another map which showed spatial distribution of increasing, decreasing and non-significant trends of ET₀ on annually time scale. Exploratory and visual analysis of smoothed time series showed increasing trend in recent years especially after 1980 and 1995. In brief, the upward trend of ET₀ in recent years is a crucial issue with regard to the high cost of dam construction for agricultural aims in arid and semi-arid regions e.g. Iran.     

Minimum, maximum, and mean annual temperatures, relative humidity, and precipitation trends in arid and semi-arid regions of Iran

One of the most important scientific concerns of the last few decades is climate change, which is the result of a great many factors like global warming. Although a number of studies have been dedicated to understand the phenomenon of climate change, more attention is required to understand the potential effects of global warming on the ecosystems as well as on human life. The present study was designed to survey the trends of minimum, maximum and mean temperatures, relative humidity, and the time series of annual precipitation and 10-year moving average low-pass filter in the 13 synoptic weather stations of Iran’s arid and semi-arid regions during the last 55 years by using τ Kendall test. The analyses indicate a significantly increasing trend for the minimum and mean temperatures while a decreasing trend for the mean relative humidity in the arid and semi-arid regions, especially during the last few years up to the year 2000. Any clear increasing or decreasing trend was not found for the maximum temperature, while the precipitation did not show any increasing/decreasing trend for most of the surveyed stations. Further studies, with long-term programming, are recommended to be carried out to evaluate the climate change and its effects on such regions.     

New accelerated solutions in a DGP-inspired model

We study the late-time cosmological viability of the solutions in the DGP braneworld scenario. We consider a quintessence field trapped on the normal branch of the DGP model and we suppose this scalar field is both minimally and non-minimally coupled to induced gravity on the brane. Since a successful cosmological model should therefore admit for a sequence of epochs: a radiation era, a sufficiently long matter dominated era and a final stable positively accelerated scaling solution, we analyze the cosmological properties of system in its critical points.     

Moment tensor inversion of nine events in Iran using INSN data

In this research, moment tensor (MT) inversion procedure in frequency domain is applied to nine events in order to evaluate the data efficiencies in computing source parameters of earthquakes in Iran. The events are recorded by Iranian National Seismological Network (INSN) stations, currently comprising 22 broadband stations. For the purpose of this study, first, the inversion procedure is applied to obtain source parameters. Then, the results obtained here are compared with those of Harvard global centroid moment tensors (GCMT) in order to estimate their reliabilities. The results show reasonable consistencies with those of Harvard GCMT within 0.075 uncertainties in logarithmic scalar moment or 0.05 in moment magnitude and 20° in Kagan angle for focal angles. Furthermore, according to the present research, the calculated source parameters are not significantly sensitive to the azimuthal gap.