Hydrologic variation during the last 170,000 years in the southern hemisphere tropics of South America

Despite the hypothesized importance of the tropics in the global climate system, few tropical paleoclimatic records extend to periods earlier than the last glacial maximum (LGM), about 20,000 years before present. We present a well-dated 170,000-year time series of hydrologic variation from the southern hemisphere tropics of South America that extends from modern times through most of the penultimate glacial period. Alternating mud and salt units in a core from Salar de Uyuni, Bolivia reflect alternations between wet and dry periods. The most striking feature of the sequence is that the duration of paleolakes increased in the late Quaternary. This change may reflect increased precipitation, geomorphic or tectonic processes that affected basin hydrology, or some combination of both. The dominance of salt between 170,000 and 140,000 yr ago indicates that much of the penultimate glacial period was dry, in contrast to wet conditions in the LGM. Our analyses also suggest that the relative influence of insolation forcing on regional moisture budgets may have been stronger during the past 50,000 years than in earlier times.     

Tectonic reconstruction of the northern Andean blocks: Oblique convergence and rotations derived from the kinematics of the Piedras–Girardot area, Colombia

A detailed kinematic study in the Piedras–Girardot area reveals that approximately 32 km of ENE–WSW oblique convergence is accommodated within a northeast-trending transpressional shear zone with a shear strain of 0.8 and a convergence factor of 2. Early Campanian deformation is marked by the incipient propagation of northeast-trending faults that uplifted gentle domes where the accumulation of sandy units did not take place. Maastrichtian unroofing of a metamorphic terrane to the west is documented by a conglomerate that was deformed shortly after deposition developing a conspicuous intragranular fabric of microscopic veins that accommodates less than 5% extension. This extensional fabric, distortion of fossil molds, and a moderate cleavage accommodating less than 5% contraction, developed concurrently, but before large-scale faulting and folding. Paleogene folding and southwestward thrust sheet propagation are recorded by syntectonic strata. Neogene deformation took place only in the western flank of this foldbelt. The amount, direction, and timing of deformation documented here contradict current tectonic models for the Cordillera Oriental and demand a new tectonic framework to approach the study of the structure of the northern Andes. Thus, an alternative model was constructed by defining three continental blocks: the Maracaibo, Cordillera Central, and Cordillera Oriental blocks. Oblique deformation imposed by the relative eastward and northeastward motion of the Caribbean Plate was modeled as rigid-body rotation and translation for rigid blocks (derived from published paleomagnetic and kinematic data), and as internal distortion and dilation for weak blocks (derived from the Piedras–Girardot area). This model explains not only coeval dextral and sinistral transpression and transtension, but also large clockwise rotation documented by paleomagnetic studies in the Caribbean–northern Andean region.     

Geomorphology and geochronology of sackung features (uphill-facing scarps) in the Central Spanish Pyrenees

The paper analyses uphill-facing scarps and associated troughs developed in the oversteepened slopes of two neighbouring glacial valleys in the central Spanish Pyrenees. Previous studies of sackung landforms in the Pyrenees have argued for deglacial unloading as the genetic mechanism, but this causal and temporal relationship has not been proved due to the lack of chronological data. The antislope scarps in the two studied locations, Vallibierna and Estós, are developed in Palaeozoic metasedimentary rocks (parallel to the contour lines and the structural grain), occur in the intermediate sector of the hillslope, and are up to 0.5 km long and several meters high. A trench was excavated in a sackung trough fill in each of the valleys in order to gain information about their chronology and genesis. Charcoal from the lowermost unit in Vallibierna provided an age of 5.9 cal. ka for the sackung and extrapolation of the three dates obtained in Estós indicates that the trough formed ca. 7.6–7.8 cal. ka. Deglaciation of the studied sectors of the valleys occurred between 16 and 13 ka. The time lag of >5 ka suggests that glacial erosion and the subsequent debutressing of the oversteepened valley walls created slopes predisposed to sackung development, but did not initiate the movement. Seismic shaking is proposed as a probable triggering factor. This hypothesis, although supported by the sudden deformation event recorded by a failure plane exposed in Vallibierna trench, and by the seismic and neotectonic activity of the area, cannot be proved due to the lack of chronological information about paleoearthquakes.     

European VOC Emission Estimates Evaluated by Measurements and Model Calculations

Observations and model calculations of the concentration of hydrocarbonsat five Scandinavian rural sites during March–June 1993are reported.Decreasing concentrations from March to June are observedat all sites. The highest concentrations of hydrocarbons were found in air massescoming in from the southwest to southeast, indicating that long rangetransport fromcontinental Europe and the U.K. is important in pollution episodes. An episode of elevated concentrations of hydrocarbons observed at three of the sites in the middle of Marchis described and discussed in relation to the synoptic situation and thepresenceof other chemical compounds (NO₂, PAN, total nitrate andozone).A Lagrangian numerical model is used to calculate the concentrations of theindividual hydrocarbons at the fivesites and comparison with observations is made.The calculated concentrations for nonmethane hydrocarbons with quite longchemicallifetimes agree well with the observations.For the sum of observed and calculated hydrocarbons the correlationcoefficientsare in the range of 0.65–0.88 for the five sitesand the ratio between calculated and measured concentrations was0.72–0.97, indicating thatthe European VOC emission inventory is quite well estimated.     

The sensitivity of winter evaporation to the formulation of aerodynamic resistance in the ECMWF model

In atmospheric models, the roughness length for momentum, heat and moisture are often taken equal, and tuned to the momentum budget problem. In this paper, it is shown that the roughness lengths have considerable impact on the evaporation in winter. One-column simulations of the land-surface scheme are driven with a long time series of observations for Cabauw in The Netherlands. It is shown that with the operational roughness lengths for this location (as in use at ECMWF in May 1993), evaporation in January, February and March is overestimated by more than a factor 2. More realistic parameters, as documented for this site, virtually eliminate the error. This study shows the importance of the surface roughness lengths in determining evaporation from wet surfaces. It also illustrates the strength of long observational time series in identifying model deficiencies.     

Geodynamic conditions of evolution of the Tunka Branch in the Baikal Rift System

The Cenozoic paleostress state of the Earth’s crust at the southwestern flank of the Baikal Rift System (Tunka system of basins) is reconstructed. With allowance for known facts about the geologic history of the Tunka system of basins, the evolution of the stress field and its formation conditions are established by comparison of the obtained reconstructions, including the dated stress fields, with the Pleistocene-Holocene deformations in active fault zones and the present-day stress state (seismotectonic deformations calculated from the focal mechanisms of earthquakes). The opening of basins in the NW-SE direction was proceeding in the transtensional regime from the Oligocene to the late Miocene or early Pliocene. At the early-late Pliocene boundary, this process was followed by the transpressional regime with compression in the NW direction. In the late Pliocene, the situation at the southwestern flank changed drastically. Since that time, deformation has occurred in the transpressional regime and the compression axis has been oriented in the NE direction. The alternative models of the evolution of the Tunka system of basins—oblique extension, the transform fracture zone, or a pull-apart system—are considered. Both models are combined in the framework of the suggested stress-field reconstruction. The oblique extension (transtension) was related to the early stages of evolution, whereas a possibility of forming pull-apart basin was existent at the late stages.     

Environmental and biological controls on elemental (Mg/Ca, Sr/Ca and Mn/Ca) ratios in shells of the king scallop Pecten maximus

The relationship between potential elemental proxies (Mg/Ca, Sr/Ca and Mn/Ca ratios) and environmental factors was investigated for the bivalve Pecten maximus in a detailed field study undertaken in the Menai Strait, Wales, U.K. An age model constructed for each shell by comparison of measured and predicted oxygen-isotope ratios allowed comparison on a calendar time scale of shell elemental data with environmental variables, as well as estimation of shell growth rates. The seasonal variation of shell Mn/Ca ratios followed a similar pattern to one previously described for dissolved Mn²⁺ in the Menai Strait, although further calibration work is needed to validate such a relationship. Shell Sr/Ca ratios unexpectedly were found to co-vary most significantly with calcification temperature, whilst shell Mg/Ca ratios were the next most significant control. The temporal variation in the factors that control shell Sr/Ca ratios strongly suggest the former observation most likely to be the result of a secondary influence on shell Sr/Ca ratios by kinetic effects, the latter driven by seasonal variation in shell growth rate that is in turn influenced in part by seawater temperature. P. maximus shell Mg/Ca ratio to calcification temperature relationships exhibit an inverse correlation during autumn to early spring (October to March-April) and a positive correlation from late spring through summer (May-June to September). No clear explanation is evident for the former trend, but the similarity of the records from the three shells analysed indicate that it is a real signal and not a spurious observation. These observations confirm that application of the Mg/Ca proxy in P. maximus shells remains problematic, even for seasonal or absolute temperature reconstructions. For the range of calcification temperatures of 5-19 °C, our shell Mg/Ca ratios in P. maximus are approximately one-fourth those in inorganic calcite, half those in the bivalve Pinna nobilis, twice those in the bivalve Mytilus trossulus, and four to five times higher than Mg/Ca ratios in planktonic and benthonic foraminifera. Our findings further support observations that Mg/Ca ratios in bivalve shell calcite are an unreliable temperature proxy, as well as substantial taxon- and species-specific variation in Mg incorporation into bivalves and other calcifying organisms, with profound implications for the application of this geochemical proxy to the bivalve fossil record.