Dust Trails of 8P/Tuttle and the Unusual Outbursts of the Ursid Shower

We calculate the position of dust trails from comet 8P/Tuttle, in an effort to explain unusual Ursid meteor shower outbursts that were seen when the comet was near aphelion. Comet 8P/Tuttle is a Halley-type comet in a 13.6-year orbit, passing just outside of Earth's orbit. We find that the meteoroids tend to be trapped in the 12:14 mean motion resonance with Jupiter, while the comet librates in a slightly shorter period orbit around the 13:15 resonance. It takes 6 centuries to decrease the perihelion of the meteoroid orbits enough to intersect Earth's orbit, during which time the meteoroids and comet separate in mean anomaly by 6 years, thus explaining the 6-year lag between the comet's return and Ursid outbursts. The resonances also prevent dispersion along the comet orbit and limit viewing to only one year in each return. We identified past dust trail encounters with dust trails from 1392 (Dec. 1945) and 1378 (Dec. 1986) and predicted another outburst on 2000 December 22 at around 7:29 and 8:35 UT, respectively, from dust trails dating to the 1405 and 1392 returns. This event was observed from California using video and photographic techniques. At the same time, five Global-MS-Net stations in Finland, Japan, and Belgium counted meteors using forward meteor scatter. The outburst peaked at 8:06±07 UT, December 22, at zenith hourly rate ∼90 per hour, and the Ursid rates were above half peak intensity during 4.2 h. We find that most Ursid orbits do scatter around the anticipated positions, confirming the link with comet 8P/Tuttle and the epoch of ejection. The 1405 and 1392 dust trails appear to have contributed similar amounts to the activity profile. Some orbits provide a hint of much older debris being present as well. This work is the strongest evidence yet for the relevance of mean motion resonances in Halley-type comet dust trail evolution.     

Morphology of HCN and CN in Comet Hale-Bopp (1995 O1)

We compare images of Comet Hale-Bopp (1995 O1) in HCN and CN taken near perihelion (April 1, 1997) to determine the origin of CN in comets. We imaged the J=1→0 transition of HCN at λ=3 mm with the BIMA Array. Data from two weeks around perihelion were summed within four phase bins based on the rotational period of the comet. This increases both the signal-to-noise ratio and the u-v coverage while decreasing the smearing of the spatial features. The similarly phased narrowband CN images were taken at Lowell Observatory within the same range of dates as the HCN images. We find that there is a better correlation between HCN and CN than between HCN and the optically dominant dust. If the CN in jets does have a dust source it would have to have a very low albedo and/or small particle size. The production rates are consistent with HCN being a primary parent of CN, although there are discrepancies between the HCN destruction scalelength and the CN production scalelength which we discuss.     

High-Resolution Keck Adaptive Optics Imaging of Violent Volcanic Activity on Io

Io, the innermost Galilean satellite of Jupiter, is a fascinating world. Data taken by Voyager and Galileo instruments have established that it is by far the most volcanic body in the Solar System and suggest that the nature of this volcanism could radically differ from volcanism on Earth. We report on near-IR observations taken in February 2001 from the Earth-based 10-m W. M. Keck II telescope using its adaptive optics system. After application of an appropriate deconvolution technique (MISTRAL), the resolution, ∼100 km on Io's disk, compares well with the best Galileo/NIMS resolution for global imaging and allows us for the first time to investigate the very nature of individual eruptions. On 19 February, we detected two volcanoes, Amirani and Tvashtar, with temperatures differing from the Galileo observations. On 20 February, we noticed a slight brightening near the Surt volcano. Two days later it had turned into an extremely bright volcanic outburst. The hot spot temperatures (>1400 K) are consistent with a basaltic eruption and, being lower limits, do not exclude an ultramafic eruption. These outburst data have been fitted with a silicate-cooling model, which indicates that this is a highly vigorous eruption with a highly dynamic emplacement mechanism, akin to fire-fountaining. Its integrated thermal output was close to the total estimated output of Io, making this the largest ionian thermal outburst yet witnessed.     

Paleoenvironmental evolution of the Paratethys in the Slovenian Basin during the Late Paleogene

Several sections from the uppermost Eocene and Oligocene of northern Slovenia have been investigated with respect to sedimentary facies, foraminiferal assemblages, stable isotopes, carbonate microfacies, and palynology. The main objective was to reconstruct the paleoenvironmental history of the Paleogene Paratethys in this region of the eastern Alpine realm. The sediments exhibit a transgressive succession beginning with conglomerates, sandstones, and mudstones of fluvial and lacustrine origin followed by carbonates and muddy marls indicating marine conditions. The foraminiferal faunal changes from brackish to shallow marine to deeper marine assemblages and the distribution of the palynofloras corroborate the sedimentological results. Microfacies analysis of the limestones shows a wide variation of shallow water, generally mud-rich facies dominated by coralline algae, foraminifera, and corals. Microfaunas adapted to low-oxygen conditions indicate temporal sluggish bottom-water circulation which can be associated with high fresh-water fluxes. These results are discussed as reflecting both the global sea-level rise during the Early Oligocene and the regional tectonic and climatic evolution.     

Composition and evolution of submarine volcanic rocks from the central and western Canary Islands

Submarine volcanic rocks dredged during RV Meteor cruise M43-1 comprise alkali basalts, basanites, nephelinites and their differentiates representing both basement-shield and young post-shield volcanics of Gran Canaria, Tenerife, La Palma and El Hierro. The primitive lavas vary widely in trace element composition (e.g., Zr/Y=6.6-11.7, (La/Sm)_N=2.3-5.4, and Ba/Yb=71-311), and they are characterized by steep, rare-earth element patterns with mean (La/Yb)_N=16, and by pronounced, positive primitive mantle-normalized Nb and Ta and negative K anomalies similar to HIMU-type basalts. Rocks from the submarine flanks west and north of Gran Canaria are isotopically and geochemically identical to rocks of the subaerial Miocene shield stage, but they are distinct from rocks of the post-shield stages (Zr/Nb=6.3-8.9, ⁸⁷Sr/⁸⁶Sr=0.70327-0.70332, ¹⁴³Nd/¹⁴⁴Nd=0.51289-0.51293, ²⁰⁶Pb/²⁰⁴Pb=19.55-19.88). Most rocks dredged from the submarine flanks of Tenerife are isotopically and geochemically similar to rocks of the adjacent subaerial shield remnants, but a few resemble rocks of the subaerial post-shield stages (total range in Zr/Nb=4.6-6.1, ⁸⁷Sr/⁸⁶Sr=0.70300-0.70329, ¹⁴³Nd/¹⁴⁴Nd=0.51281-0.51292, ²⁰⁶Pb/²⁰⁴Pb=19.51-19.96). Rocks from the southern submarine ridge of La Palma cover the entire compositional range of the subaerial rocks of that ridge. Additionally, they comprise a high Zr/Nb group which resembles rocks of the ca. 1-Ma-old Taburiente shield of northern La Palma (total range in Zr/Nb=3.0-6.4, ⁸⁷Sr/⁸⁶Sr=0.70297-0.70314, ¹⁴³Nd/¹⁴⁴Nd=0.51288-0.51296, ²⁰⁶Pb/²⁰⁴Pb=19.21-19.79). Rocks from the southern submarine ridge of El Hierro compositionally resemble subaerial rocks of the island (Zr/Nb=4.1-6.2, ⁸⁷Sr/⁸⁶Sr=0.70296-0.70314, ¹⁴³Nd/¹⁴⁴Nd=0.51291-0.51297, ²⁰⁶Pb/²⁰⁴Pb=19.25-19.91). The degree of melting in the subcanarian mantle is interpreted to decrease from east to west across the archipelago whereas the proportion of depleted mantle component in the melting anomaly increases, as illustrated by Sr, Nd and Pb isotopes. The isotopic characteristics of the mantle source beneath the Canary Islands represents a mixture of HIMU, DMM and EM I. The overall isotopic signature is intermediate between that of Madeira to the north, which trends towards more depleted compositions, and that of the Cape Verde Islands to the south which shows a pronounced trend towards enriched mantle compositions. A clear trend towards the EM II component is only evident in more evolved rocks dredged from a seamount between Tenerife and Gran Canaria, some of which contain terrigenous sedimentary xenoliths. We propose a genetic model which relates similar mantle source signatures of volcanic archipelagos off West Africa to a common, large-scale lower mantle upwelling which, according to geophysical data, becomes more diffuse in the upper mantle. Narrow plumes or blobs feeding the volcanic centers along the passive margin may rise from this thermal anomaly due to upwelling in small, continent-parallel upper-mantle convection cells.     

中扬子区海相沉积盆地性质研究

分析了中扬子区海相沉积盆地基底和层序充填特性;研制了M判别图解,研究了沉积盆地的性质,认为盆地基底具有三分性,盆地层序充填具有阶段性和分区性,沉积盆地主体具有克拉通盆地的特点和性质。     

A Measurement of Omega from the North American Test Flight of Boomerang

We use the angular power spectrum of the cosmic microwave background, measured during the North American test flight of the Boomerang experiment, to constrain the geometry of the universe. Within the class of cold dark matter models, we find that the overall fractional energy density of the universe Omega is constrained to be 0.85相似文献   

Influence of uncertain boundary conditions and model structure on flood inundation predictions

In this study, the GLUE methodology is applied to establish the sensitivity of flood inundation predictions to uncertainty of the upstream boundary condition and bridges within the modelled region. An understanding of such uncertainties is essential to improve flood forecasting and floodplain mapping. The model has been evaluated on a large data set. This paper shows uncertainty of the upstream boundary can have significant impact on the model results, exceeding the importance of model parameter uncertainty in some areas. However, this depends on the hydraulic conditions in the reach e.g. internal boundary conditions and, for example, the amount of backwater within the modelled region. The type of bridge implementation can have local effects, which is strongly influenced by the bridge geometry (in this case the area of the culvert). However, the type of bridge will not merely influence the model performance within the region of the structure, but also other evaluation criteria such as the travel time. This also highlights the difficulties in establishing which parameters have to be more closely examined in order to achieve better fits. In this study no parameter set or model implementation that fulfils all evaluation criteria could be established. We propose four different approaches to this problem: closer investigation of anomalies; introduction of local parameters; increasing the size of acceptable error bounds; and resorting to local model evaluation. Moreover, we show that it can be advantageous to decouple the classification into behavioural and non-behavioural model data/parameter sets from the calculation of uncertainty bounds.     

Sediment contamination in floodplains and alluvial terraces as an historical record of gold exploitation in the Carmo River basin,Southeast Quadrilátero Ferrífero,Minas Gerais,Brazil

This paper describes the geochemistry of sediment samples placed in floodplains and alluvial terraces downstream from gold mines in the Carmo River basin, Quadrilátero Ferrífero, Minas Gerais, Brazil. The geochemistry signature Na₂O, K₂O, SiO₂, CaO, MgO, Al₂O₃, Fe₂O₃, TiO₂, P₂O₅, Mn, As, Cu, Zn, Ba, Ni, Cr, S, Co were analyzed in different facies from stratigraphic profiles. As, Cu, Zn, and Mn anomalies are mainly associated with the clayed facies deposited in floodplains and oxbow lakes, and with coarse‐sediment facies deposited in the channel. The facies were accumulated by the gold exploitation activity in the region. The contamination of As, Cu, and Zn was controlled by minerals such as iron oxides and hydroxides (hematite, magnetite, and mainly goethite), manganese oxides, and sulfide‐rich minerals. The As‐bearing sediments of the region characterize one of the most As contaminated area of Brazil. Their main source is associated with gold exploration in the last three centuries.