Tectonics of southwestern Mexico,isotopic evidence,nuclear Central America,Late Cretaceous break up

In the paleogeographic reconstruction of Mexico and northern Central America, an ever-increasing amount of evidence shows that the entire region is a collage of suspect terranes transported from abroad, whose timing and sense of motion are now beginning to be understood. Among these, the Chortis block (nuclear Central America) and the Baja California Peninsula have been proposed as pieces of continent separated from the Pacific coast of southwestern Mexico, that have moved either southeastward by the Farallon plate or northwestward by the Kula plate. Previous studies mainly confined to the northern margin of the Chortis block, confirmed a left-lateral displacement of 130 km in Neogene time. Further studies made northwestward along the Mexican coast provided a better understanding of magmatic and metamorphic processes in the area, and suggested times of detachment increased to 30 Ma, 40 Ma, and 66 Ma. The pre-detachment westernmost position of the block has changed, depending on the model chosen, from Puerto Vallarta and beyond, to the current position. Here we show that the isotopic mineral ages from coastal granites along the coast from Puerto Vallarta, Jalisco (80 Ma) to Puerto Angel, Oaxaca (11 Ma) record systematic decrease of cooling ages from NW to SE. This pattern is interpreted to result from the progressive uplift of rocks exposed at the present-day coast in that direction, such uplift occurred in response to the development of the Middle America Trench at the newly formed continental margin when the Chortis block was sliding at an average rate of 1.5 cm/year in a sinistral sense to its present position. Our results also constrain the position of the Kula-Farallon spreading axis north of Puerto Vallarta. These observations led us to conclude that several indicators point to this time and region for the onset of strike-slip drifting of the Chortis block toward its current position. Here, we also present several view points in terms of other possilble interpretations to different tectonic, geologic and isotopic data sets published recently by different authors.     

Integration of reflection seismic and sediment grain-size data from Lake Khubsugul (Northern Mongolia): a reply to Prokopenko and Kendall

Prokopenko and Kendall (J Paleolimnol doi:, 2008) criticise the work presented in Fedotov et al. (J Paleolimnol 39:335–348, 2008), and instead propose an alternative interpretation for the grain-size evolution recorded in the KDP-01 core, retrieved from the central part of Lake Khubsugul. Their interpretation is based (i) on a seismic-stratigraphic re-interpretation of sparker seismic profile khub012 (which they copied from Fedotov et al. (EOS Trans 87:246–250, 2006)), (ii) on the presupposition that changes in lake level are the dominant control on facies distribution in Lake Khubsugul, and (iii) on the invalidation of our age-depth model. In this reply to their comment, we demonstrate that they interpreted seismic artefacts and geometries caused by changes in profile orientation as true stratigraphic features and that the lake-level reconstruction they derive from this interpretation is therefore incorrect. We also demonstrate that their grain-size predictions, which they consider to be predominantly driven by changes in lake level, are inconsistent with the measured sulphate concentration, which is a demonstrated proxy of lake level in Lake Khubsugul, and with the measured grain-size record. Finally, we point out that even if there would be a problem with the age-depth model, this problem would not affect the part of the sedimentary sequence discussed in Fedotov et al. (J Paleolimnol 39:335–348, 2008).     

鄂尔多斯盆地南部延长组富铀凝灰岩地球化学特征及形成机制

本文系统地研究了鄂尔多斯盆地南部延长组凝灰岩元素和同位素地球化学特征。结果表明：凝灰岩主量元素具有高K、高Al、Si中等至高、低Na的特征; REE总体特征为轻稀土富集、重稀土亏损,∑REE在4857～40212 μg/g 之间变化,Eu呈现出负异常,在034～082内变化,δCe范围在080～208之间; 微量元素中U含量在312～144 μg/g 之间,Ba、U、Th、Hf和Ce呈明显正异常,Nb、P、Ti和Rb呈现负异常。详细的分析表明：U的富集和一些微量元素如Ta、Dy、Lu等相关,Th与∑REE存在明显的正相关性,这些变化可能和盆地中铀矿的富集有关; 凝灰岩的硫同位素总体呈现深源特征。根据以上的研究对凝灰岩的形成原因及形成环境进行了探讨。鄂尔多斯盆地南部延长组凝灰岩来源于秦岭造山带火山作用,其中的铀元素富集是由于砂岩型铀矿中铀向凝灰岩迁移而被还原所致。本研究对盆地砂岩型铀矿的铀运移和富集机理认识具有一定指导意义。     

The Upper Middle Rhine Valley as a risk area

The Upper Middle Rhine Valley, granted the status of a World Heritage site, is well known for its unique inner narrow valley of Quaternary age with its historical legacy of numerous medieval castles and old towns. Less known is that this has always been a risk area of floods and gravitative mass movements. Up to the recent past, mainly ice floods caused enormous damage. The inhabitants of the valley were well aware that they lived in a risk area, but they had learned to handle the flood hazard. With the demise of ice floods over the last 40 years, due to climate change and because of the additional heating of the river water by power plants, the awareness of flood hazards has been much diminished, in contrast to that of potential damage by rockfalls and landslides which were also much feared in the past, though at the local level only. Still in the people’s memory is the Kaub catastrophe of March 10, 1876, when 28 persons were killed by a landslide. Nowadays, even minor rockfalls are a major threat, as they will affect the much-used traffic lines on both banks of the river, in particular the railroads. Therefore, since 2002, on behalf of German Rail (Deutsche Bahn, DB), all problematic slopes have been protected by costly steel-ring nets, although they are an aesthetic problem by UNESCO standards. The feeling of absolute safety created among the public is only subjective, though, as planners are well aware of. Moreover, the impact of modern climate change on slope stability is nearly unknown. Therefore, it is still necessary to develop a risk map for the narrow valley, with emphasis on gravitational hazards.     

Analysis of spatial clustering optimization

Spatial clustering is widely used in many fields such as WSN (Wireless Sensor Networks), web clustering, remote sensing and so on for discovery groups and to identify interesting distributions in the underlying database. By discussing the relationships between the optimal clustering and the initial seeds, a clustering validity index and the principle of seeking initial seeds were proposed, and on this principle we recommend an initial seed-seeking strategy: SSPG (Single-Shortest-Path Graph). With SSPG strategy used in clustering algorithms, we find that the result of clustering is optimized with more probability. At the end of the paper, according to the combinational theory of optimization, a method is proposed to obtain optimal reference k value of cluster number, and is proven to be efficient.     

浅谈灰土挤密桩与DDC桩在工程实践中应用与发展

DDC桩是挤密桩的一种新型桩。根据宝鸡某大型电厂中DDC桩与灰土挤密桩地基处理工程实例,从挤密机理、挤密效果、复合地基承载力与抗变形性状及复合地基浸水稳定性等诸方面进行了系统地分析对比,进而探讨挤密桩地基的应用与发展。     

RG-1测汞仪软件介绍

RG1测汞仪操作软件使用VC++5.0工具研制,在Windows95下运行。通过AD/DA接口实现对RG1的控制和对基准电压的自动跟踪校正。完全的可视化操作。具有4种可选的标准曲线拟合方法以用于不同浓度样品的峰值和积分值测量,并直接给出汞浓度及各种统计数据     

A Long-Term Decrease of the Mid-Size Segmentation Lengths Observed in the He <Emphasis Type="SmallCaps">ii</Emphasis> (30.4 nm) Solar EUV Emission

Power spectra of segmentation-cell length (a dominant length scale of EUV emission in the transition region) from full-disk He?ii extreme ultraviolet (EUV) images observed by the Extreme ultraviolet Imaging Telescope (EIT) onboard the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) and the Atmospheric Imaging Assembly (AIA) onboard the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) during periods of quiet-Sun conditions for a time interval from 1996 to 2015 were analyzed. The spatial power as a function of the spatial frequency from about 0.04 to 0.27 (EIT) or up to 0.48 (AIA) Mm^?1 depends on the distribution of the observed segmentation-cell dimensions – a structure of the solar EUV network. The temporal variations of the spatial power reported by Didkovsky and Gurman (Solar Phys. 289, 153, 2014) were suggested as decreases at the mid-spatial frequencies for the compared spectra when the power curves at the highest spatial frequencies of 0.5 pix^?1 were adjusted to match each other. This approach has been extended in this work to compare spectral ratios at high spatial frequencies expressed in the solar spatial frequency units of Mm^?1. A model of EIT and AIA spatial responses allowed us to directly compare spatial spectral ratios at high spatial frequencies for five years of joint operation of EIT and AIA, from 2010 to 2015. Based on this approach, we represent these ratio changes as a long-term network transformation that may be interpreted as a continuous dissipation of mid-size network structures to the smaller-size structures in the transition region. In contrast to expected cycling of the segmentation-cell dimension structures and associated spatial power in the spectra with the solar cycle, the spectra demonstrate a significant and steady change of the EUV network. The temporal trend across these structural spectra is not critically sensitive to any long-term instrumental changes, e.g. degradation of sensitivity, but to the change of the segmentation-cell dimensions of the EUV network structure.     

Climatic and geographic factors affect ecosystem multifunctionality through biodiversity in the Tibetan alpine grasslands

Ecosystem multifunctionality(EMF), the simultaneous provision of multiple ecosystem functions, is often affected by biodiversity and environmental factors. We know little about how the interactions between biodiversity and environmental factors affect EMF. In this case study, a structural equation model was used to clarify climatic and geographic pathways that affect EMF by varying biodiversity in the Tibetan alpine grasslands. In addition to services related to carbon, nitrogen, and water cycling, forage supply, which is related to plantproductivity and palatability, was included in the EMF index. The results showed that 72% of the variation in EMF could be explained by biodiversity and other environmental factors. The ratio of palatable richness to all species richness explained 8.3% of the EMF variation. We found that air temperature, elevation, and latitude all affected EMF, but in different ways. Air temperature and elevation impacted the aboveground parts of the ecosystem, which included plant height, aboveground biomass, richness of palatable species, and ratio of palatable richness to all species richness. Latitude affected EMF by varying both aboveground and belowground parts of the ecosystem, which included palatable speciesrichness and belowground biomass. Our results indicated that there are still uncertainties in the biodiversity–EMF relationships related to the variable components of EMF, and climatic and geographic factors. Clarification of pathways that affect EMF using structural equation modeling techniques could elucidate the mechanisms by which environmental changes affect EMF.