Effects of nitrogen and sulphide on macroinfaunal community: a microcosm study

A microcosm experiment was conducted to test the short-term effects of nitrogen (as TKN, total Kjeldahl nitrogen) and sulphide (as AVS, acid volatile sulphide) on macrobenthic infauna over a period of 8 weeks. The experiment consisted of four treatments using sediment cores (D: 8 cm, H: 20 cm) with addition of: I, nitrogen (N) to an in situ mean level of 0.48 mg Ng(-1) dw; II, sulphidic solution (S) to an in situ mean level of 318.8 microM S g(-1) dw; III, nitrogen and sulphidic solution (NS) to in situ mean levels of 0.45 mg Ng(-1) dw and 329.0 microM S g(-1) dw, respectively, and IV, control with no addition of N and S. Sediment cores were retrieved for analysis of infaunal composition after weeks 2, 4 and 8. A total of 646 specimens of macrobenthic infauna belonging to 27 species were recorded from the cores, in which polychaetes were the most abundant with respect to species and individual numbers. Mean species number and diversity H' of the control and N treatment was statistically higher than S and NS treatments, mean individual number of the S treatment was larger than the NS treatment, and mean evenness J of the S treatment was lower than the N and NS treatments as well as the control. Individual numbers also showed a significant increase from weeks 2 to 8, whereas evenness J decreased in weeks 4 and 8. Multivariate analyses of the faunal data suggested that benthic composition of the N treatment and control did not differ during the experimental period, but changes in benthic structure in S and NS treatments were evident. The present findings demonstrated the dose-response relationship of benthic species changes under controlled addition of N and S. The response to N and S additions in the sediment microcosms was in agreement with the general effects of organic enrichment on macrobenthic communities along a spatial gradient of organic pollution as described by Pearson and Rosenberg [Pearson, T.H., Rosenberg, R., 1978. Macrobenthic succession in relation to organic enrichment and pollution of the marine environment. Oceanography and Marine Biology Annual Review 16, 229-311]. However, in the present experiment, community changes in the treatments were observable in a short, temporal scale.     

Multi-product splitting and Runge-Kutta-Nyström integrators

The splitting of e^h(A+B) into a single product of e ^{h A} and e ^hB results in symplectic integrators when A and B are classical Lie operators. However, at high orders, a single product splitting, with exponentially growing number of operators, is very difficult to derive. This work shows that, if the splitting is generalized to a sum of products, then a simple choice of the basis product reduces the problem to that of extrapolation, with analytically known coefficients and only quadratically growing number of operators. When a multi-product splitting is applied to classical Hamiltonian systems, the resulting algorithm is no longer symplectic but is of the Runge-Kutta-Nyström (RKN) type. Multi-product splitting, in conjunction with a special force-reduction process, explains why at orders p = 4 and 6, RKN integrators only need p ? 1 force evaluations.     

Exceedance probability of multiple natural hazards: risk assessment in China’s Yangtze River Delta

Natural Hazards - In recent years, greater attention has been given to advancing the theory and practice of assessing risk from multiple hazards. Most approaches calculate multi-hazard risk by...     

Spatial pattern of global submarine cable network and identification of strategic pivot and strategic channel

As a kind of large-scale connectivity infrastructure, submarine cables play a vital role in international telecommunication, socio-economic development and national defense security. However, the current understanding about the spatial pattern of global submarine cable network is relatively limited. In this article, we analyze the spatial distribution and connectivity pattern of global submarine cables, and identify their strategic pivots and strategic channels. The main conclusions are as follo...     

山西断陷带地壳结构的接收函数研究

利用2006年8月到2008年3月北京大学在山西断陷带南部架设的两条东西向流动观测地震台阵记录的远震资料,提取各台站接收函数,然后进行倾斜叠加(Slant stack)和台阵偏移成像,获得了沿台阵横穿山西断陷带的地壳和上地幔的精细结构变化.研究结果显示,山西断陷带下面莫霍面存在明显不连续,莫霍面上隆约4~6 km,纵横波速比从两侧的1.75上升为山西断陷带内部2.0左右,且中、下地壳可能存在一个低速层.山西断陷带的构造模式沿相距140 km的两条剖面表现出明显差异:南端的临汾盆地为拉张作用下的纯剪切模式,向北转化为太原盆地的简单剪切模式.     

Inversion of ocean-bottom seismometer (OBS) waveforms for oceanic crust structure: a synthetic study

The waveform inversion method is applied—using synthetic ocean-bottom seismometer(OBS) data—to study oceanic crust structure. A niching genetic algorithm(NGA) is used to implement the inversion for the thickness and P-wave velocity of each layer, and to update the model by minimizing the objective function, which consists of the misfit and cross-correlation of observed and synthetic waveforms. The influence of specific NGA method parameters is discussed, and suitable values are presented.The NGA method works well for various observation systems, such as those with irregular and sparse distribution of receivers as well as single receiver systems. A strategy is proposed to accelerate the convergence rate by a factor of five with no increase in computational complexity; this is achieved using a first inversion with several generations to impose a restriction on the preset range of each parameter and then conducting a second inversion with the new range. Despite the successes of this method,its usage is limited. A shallow water layer is not favored because the direct wave in water will suppress the useful reflection signals from the crust. A more precise calculation of the air-gun source signal should be considered in order to better simulate waveforms generated in realistic situations; further studies are required to investigate this issue.     

塔里木东南缘阿克塔什塔格地区古元古代壳源碳酸岩的特征及其地质意义

塔里木盆地东南缘的阿克塔什塔格地区,变质基底杂岩中发育火成碳酸岩侵入体,呈似层状侵入于米兰岩群和新太古代TTG花岗片麻岩中。碳酸岩主要由方解石(45%~90%)、透辉石(15%)和含量不等的石英、长石等矿物组成,可见少量金云母、方柱石,矿物组成较为简单。常量元素中Fe、Mg、Mn、Ti、P等元素低于世界已知幔源碳酸岩10个数量级之上,而Si、Al含量较高;微量元素富集大离子亲石元素Rb、Th、K和轻稀土元素,亏损高场强元素Nb、Ta、Sr、Ti, 并且稀土总量仅为(25.74~63.01)×10-6,锆石Th/U比为0.04~0.36。上述特征明显有别于幔源成因的碳酸岩,可能指示米兰岩群大理岩在古元古代的深熔作用,即由米兰岩群中的大理岩在古元古代深熔作用条件下形成。挑选其中的锆石利用U Pb SHRIMP法测年,获得年龄为(1 931±18) Ma。该碳酸岩体的发现不仅丰富了壳源碳酸岩的成因类型,也暗示塔里木克拉通的新太古代基底变质岩在古元古代末期发生过深熔作用和混合岩化,是塔里木克拉通对全球哥伦比亚超大陆的汇聚事件的响应。