An Investigation on Erodibility and Geotechnical Characteristics of Fine Grained Fluvial Soils from Lower Michigan

Scour and erosion potential of a soil are closely related to each other. Similarities or differences between them have not been defined fully and the terms are often used interchangeably or in association with one another. Erodibility is a property of soil that describes erosion potential. Therefore, a proper understanding of erodibility should help predict scour more accurately. In the past, researchers have looked into erosion of soils with the ultimate objective of understanding the erodibility with respect to the standard geotechnical properties. Most research has shown the difficulties associated with correlating erodibility to any one or more soil properties. The research described in this paper is mainly focused on the relationship between erodibility and dry unit weight of soil with varying fractions of fines. Soils tested using laboratory Jet Erosion Test (JET) indicated that the logarithm of erodibility makes a linear inverse relationship with the dry unit weight. In situ JETs confirmed the range of erodibilities established by the laboratory JETs. The best correlations between erodibility and dry unit weight appeared within a single category of soil as classified by the Unified Soil Classification System. In addition, it was also determined that the logarithm of erodibility is inversely related to the angle of internal friction of the fluvial soils tested during this investigation.     

A Dye Tracer Approach for Quantifying Fluid and Solute Flux Across the Sediment–Water Interface

We propose a dye tracer method to characterize fluid and solute fluxes across the sediment-water interface. Zones of groundwater discharge within the streambed are first identified, and small volume slugs of 0.5 to 1 mL fluorescein dye are released at known subsurface depths. Fluorescein dye allows for visual identification of interface breakthrough locations and times, and dye concentrations at the point of discharge are recorded over time by a fluorometer to generate high resolution breakthrough curves. Groundwater velocities and dispersivities at the demonstration site are estimated by numerically fitting dye breakthroughs to the classical advection-dispersion equation, although the methodology is not limited to a specific transport model. Breakthroughs across the stream-sediment interface at the demonstration site are nonlinear with tracer release depth, and velocity estimates from breakthrough analysis are significantly more reliable than visual dye (time to first dye expression) and Darcy methods which tend to overestimate and underestimate groundwater velocity, respectively. The use of permanent injection points within the streambed and demonstrated reproducibility of dye breakthroughs allow for study of fluid and solute fluxes under seasonally varying hydrologic conditions. The proposed approach also provides a framework for field study of nonconservative, reactive solutes and allows for the determination of characteristic residence times at various depths in the streambed to better understand chemical and nutrient transformations.     

Hydrothermal jarosite and hematite in a pyroxene-hosted melt inclusion in martian meteorite Miller Range (MIL) 03346: Implications for magmatic-hydrothermal fluids on Mars

Low-temperature aqueous processes have been implicated in the generation of jarosite and hematite on the martian surface, but little is known regarding the role that high-temperature magmatic fluids may have played in producing similar assemblages on Mars. We have identified jarosite and hematite in a clinopyroxene-hosted melt inclusion in martian meteorite MIL 03346 that shows evidence of having been hydrothermally precipitated. In addition to jarosite and hematite, the melt inclusion contains titanomagnetite, pyrrhotite, potassic-chlorohastingsite, an iron-rich silicate glass and possibly goethite. These phases were identified and characterized using scanning electron microscopy (SEM), con-focal Raman-spectroscopy and electron probe microanalysis (EPMA).Based on observed textural relationships and the compositions of the hosted phases, we report that the jarosite-bearing melt inclusion in MIL 03346 has recorded a fluid-rich history that began in the magmatic stage and continued to low-temperatures. This history begins at entrapment of a volatile-rich silicate melt that likely reached fluid-saturation after only minor crystallization within the melt inclusion. This fluid, rich in chlorine, reacted with surrounding silicate material to produce the potassic-chlorohastingsite. As cooling proceeded, the liquid phase eventually became more oxidized and reacted with the pyrrhotite. Sulfide oxidation resulted in SO₄²⁻ formation and concomitant acid production, setting the stage for jarosite formation once the fluid cooled beyond the upper thermal stability of jarosite (∼200 °C). As the fluid cooled below 200 °C, jarosite continued to precipitate with hematite and/or goethite until equilibrium was established or reactions became kinetically unfavorable.This work suggests an additional jarosite-hematite formation pathway on Mars; one that may be important wherever magmatic-hydrothermal fluids come into contact with primary sulfide grains at the martian surface or subsurface. Moreover, hydrothermal fluids rich in chlorine, sulfur, and iron are important for ore-forming processes on Earth, and their indirect identification on Mars may have important implications for ore-formation on Mars.     

On the asteroid belt's orbital and size distribution

For absolute magnitudes greater than the current completeness limit of H-magnitude ∼15 the main asteroid belt's size distribution is imperfectly known. We have acquired good-quality orbital and absolute H-magnitude determinations for a sample of small main-belt asteroids in order to study the orbital and size distribution beyond H=15, down to sub-kilometer sizes (H>18). Based on six observing nights over a 11-night baseline we have detected, measured photometry for, and linked observations of 1087 asteroids which have one-week time baselines or more. The linkages allow the computation of full heliocentric orbits (as opposed to statistical distances determined by some past surveys). Judged by known asteroids in the field the typical uncertainty in the (a/e/i) orbital elements is less than 0.03 AU/0.03/0.5°. The distances to the objects are sufficiently well known that photometric uncertainties (of 0.3 magnitudes or better) dominate the error budget of their derived H-magnitudes. The detected asteroids range from HR=12-22 and provide a set of objects down to sizes below 1 km in diameter. We find an on-sky surface density of 210 asteroids per square degree in the ecliptic with opposition magnitudes brighter than mR=23, with the cumulative number of asteroids increasing by a factor of 10^0.27/mag from mR=18 down to the mR?23.5 limit of our survey. In terms of absolute H magnitudes, we find that beyond H=15 the belt exhibits a constant power-law slope with the number increasing proportional to ¹⁰0.30H from H?15 to 18, after which incompleteness begins in the survey. Examining only the subset of detections inside 2.5 AU, we find weak evidence for a mildly shallower slope for H=15-19.5. We provide the information necessary such that anyone wishing to model the main asteroid belt can compare a detailed model to our detected sample.     

Temporally varying ethylene emission on Jupiter

Ethylene (C₂H₄) emission has been measured in the poles and equator of Jupiter. The 949 cm⁻¹ spectra were recorded with a high resolution spectrometer at the McMath-Pierce telescope at Kitt Peak in October-November 1998 and at the Infrared Telescope Facility at Mauna Kea in June 2000. C₂H₄ is an important product of methane chemistry in the outer planets. Knowledge of its abundance can help discriminate among the various proposed sets of CH₄ photolysis branching ratios at Ly-α, and determine the relative importance of the reaction pathways that produce C₂H₂ and C₂H₆. In the equatorial region the C₂H₄ emission is weak, and we were only able to detect it at high air-mass, near the limb. We derive a peak equatorial molar abundance of C₂H₄ of 4.5×¹⁰⁻⁷-1.7×¹⁰⁻⁶ near 2.2×¹⁰⁻³ mbar, with a total column of 5.7×¹⁰¹⁴-2.2×¹⁰¹⁵ molecules cm⁻² above 10 mbar depending upon choice of thermal profile. We observed enhanced C₂H₄ emission from the poles in the regions where auroras are seen in X-ray, UV, and near infrared images. In 2000 we measured a short-term change in the distribution of polar C₂H₄ emission; the emission in the north IR auroral “hot spot” decreased by a factor of three over a two-day interval. This transient behavior and the sensitivity of C₂H₄ emission to temperature changes near its contribution peak at 5-10 microbar suggests that the polar enhancement is primarily a thermal effect coupled with vertical transport. Comparing our observations from Kitt Peak and Mauna Kea shows that the C₂H₄ emission of the northern non-“hot spot” auroral regions did not change over the three-year period while that in the southern polar regions decreased.     

Radio galaxies in the 2SLAQ Luminous Red Galaxy survey – II. The stellar populations of radio-loud and radio-quiet LRGs

We present an analysis of the optical spectra of a volume-limited sample of 375 radio galaxies at redshift  0.4 < z < 0.7  from the 2dF-SDSS (Sloan Digital Sky Survey) Luminous Red Galaxy (LRG) and QSO (quasi-stellar object) (2SLAQ) redshift survey. We investigate the evolution of the stellar populations and emission-line properties of these galaxies. By constructing composite spectra and comparing with a matched sample of radio-quiet sources from the same survey, we also investigate the effect on the galaxy of the presence of an active nucleus.
The composite spectra, binned by redshift and radio luminosity, all require two components to describe them, which we interpret as an old and a younger population. We found no evolution with redshift of the age of the younger population in radio galaxies, nor were they different from the radio-quiet comparison sample. Similarly, there is no correlation with radio power, with the exception that the most powerful radio sources  ( P _1.4 > 10²⁶  W Hz⁻¹) have younger stars and stronger emission lines than the less powerful sources. This suggests that we have located the threshold in radio power where strong emission lines 'switch on', at radio powers of around 10²⁶ W Hz⁻¹. Except for the very powerful radio galaxies, the presence of a currently active radio active galactic nucleus (AGN) does not appear to be correlated with any change in the observed stellar population of a luminous red galaxy at   z ∼ 0.5  .     

Narrow associated quasi-stellar object absorbers: clustering, outflows and the line-of-sight proximity effect

Using data from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey data release 3 (SDSS DR3), we investigate how narrow (<700 km s⁻¹) C  iv and Mg  ii quasar absorption-line systems are distributed around quasars. The C  iv absorbers lie in the redshift range 1.6 < z < 4 and the Mg  ii absorbers in the range 0.4 < z < 2.2. By correlating absorbers with quasars on different but neighbouring lines of sight, we measure the clustering of absorbers around quasars on comoving scales between 4 and 30 Mpc. The observed comoving correlation lengths are   r _o∼ 5 h ⁻¹Mpc  , similar to those observed for bright galaxies at these redshifts. Comparing correlations between absorbers and the quasars, in whose spectra they are identified, then implies: (i) that quasars destroy absorbers to comoving distances of ∼300 kpc (C  iv ) and ∼800 kpc (Mg  ii ) along their lines of sight; (ii) that ≳40 per cent of C  iv absorbers within 3000 km s⁻¹ of the quasi-stellar object are not a result of large-scale clustering but rather are directly associated with the quasar itself; (iii) that this intrinsic absorber population extends to outflow velocities of the order of 12 000 km s⁻¹; (iv) that this outflow component is present in both radio-loud and radio-quiet quasars and (v) that a small high-velocity outflow component is also observed in the Mg  ii population. We also find an indication that absorption systems within 3000 km s⁻¹ are more abundant for radio-loud quasars than for radio-quiet quasars. This suggests either that radio-loud objects live in more massive haloes, or that their radio activity generates an additional low-velocity outflow, or both.