Observations of Thin Layers in Coastal Hawaiian Waters

Thin layers of plankton have been documented in a wide variety of environments. The growing body of observations indicates that these features are a critical component of marine ecosystem dynamics and functioning. In the past two decades, much of the research on thin layers was undertaken in temperate coastal waters. Here, we report the first known observations of thin layers of phytoplankton in tropical Hawaiian waters. We conducted an overnight shipboard study during which time we made high-resolution observations of physical and optical structure in the water column. During the overnight cruise, we observed the greatest number of thin layers in the early evening hours when thermal stratification was strongest and most persistent due to a combination of warm air and surface water, as well as light winds. A comparison of these observations with those from temperate regions leads us to hypothesize that the nature and persistence of the physical structure is very important in determining the persistence of thin layered structures. Because plankton biomass is generally lower in tropical regions, the heterogeneous aggregation of food in thin subsurface layers may be more critical to the marine ecosystem than it is in temperate regions where plankton are generally more abundant.     

Hydraulic Performance of the Horizontal Reactive Media Treatment Well: Pilot and Numerical Study

This study is focused on a passive treatment system known as the horizontal reactive treatment well (HRX Well®) installed parallel to groundwater flow, which operates on the principle of flow focusing that results from the hydraulic conductivity (K) ratio of the well and aquifer media. Passive flow and capture in the HRX Well are described by simplified equations adapted from Darcy's Law. A field pilot-scale study (PSS) and numerical simulations using a finite element method (FEM) were conducted to verify the HRX Well concept and test the validity of the HRX Well-simplified equations. The hydraulic performance results from both studies were observed to be within a close agreement to the simplified equations and their hydraulic capture width approximately five times greater than the well diameter (0.20 m). Key parameters affecting capture included the aquifer thickness, well diameter, and permeability ratio of the HRX Well treatment media and aquifer material. During pilot testing, the HRX Well captured 39% of flow while representing 0.5% of the test pit cross-sectional volume, indicating that the well captures a substantial amount of surrounding groundwater. While uncertainty in the aquifer and well properties (porosity, K, well losses), including the effects of boundary conditions, may have caused minor differences in the results, data from this study indicate that the simplified equations are valid for the conceptual design of a field study. A full-scale HRX Well was installed at Site SS003 at Vanderberg Air Force Base, California, in July/August 2018 based on outcomes from this study.     

Time–space continuity of daily maps of fractional snow cover and albedo from MODIS

Using reflectance values from the seven MODIS “land” bands with 250 or 500 m resolution, along with a corresponding cloud product, we estimate the fraction of each 500 m pixel that snow covers, along with the albedo of that snow. The daily products have data gaps and errors because of cloud cover and sensor viewing geometry. Rather than make users interpolate and filter these patchy daily maps without completely understanding the retrieval algorithm and instrument properties, we use the daily time series to improve the estimate of the measured snow properties for a particular day. We use a combination of noise filtering, snow/cloud discrimination, and interpolation and smoothing to produce our best estimate of the daily snow cover and albedo. We consider two modes: one is the “predictive” mode, whereby we estimate the snow-covered area and albedo on that day using only the data up to that day; the other is the “retrospective” mode, whereby we reconstruct the history of the snow properties for a previous period.     

Separation of pedogenic and lithogenic components of magnetic susceptibility in the Chinese loess/palaeosol sequence as determined by the CBD procedure and a mixing analysis

Magnetic susceptibility variations in the Chinese loess/palaeosol sequences have been used extensively for palaeoclimatic interpretations. The magnetic signal of these sequences must be divided into lithogenic and pedogenic components because the palaeoclimatic record is primarily reflected in the pedogenic component. In this paper we compare two methods for separating the pedogenic and lithogenic components of the magnetic susceptibility signal: the citrate-bicarbonate-dithionite (CBD) extraction procedure, and a mixing analysis. Both methods yield good estimates of the pedogenic component, especially for the palaeosols. The CBD procedure underestimates the lithogenic component and overestimates the pedogenic component. The magnitude of this effect is moderately high in loess layers but almost negligible in palaeosols. The mixing model overestimates the lithogenic component and underestimates the pedogenic component. Both methods can be adjusted to yield better estimates of both components. The lithogenic susceptibility, as determined by either method, suggests that palaeoclimatic interpretations based only on total susceptibility will be in error and that a single estimate of the average lithogenic susceptibility is not an accurate basis for adjusting the total susceptibility. A long-term decline in lithogenic susceptibility with depth in the section suggests more intense or prolonged periods of weathering associated with the formation of the older palaeosols.
The CBD procedure provides the most comprehensive information on the magnitude of the components and magnetic mineralogy of loess and palaeosols. However, the mixing analysis provides a sensitive, rapid, and easily applied alternative to the CBD procedure. A combination of the two approaches provides the most powerful and perhaps the most accurate way of separating the magnetic susceptibility components.     

Assessing the hydrological and geomorphic behaviour of a landscape evolution model within a limits-of-acceptability uncertainty analysis framework

Landscape evolution models (LEMs) have the capability to characterize key aspects of geomorphological and hydrological processes. However, their usefulness is hindered by model equifinality and paucity of available calibration data. Estimating uncertainty in the parameter space and resultant model predictions is rarely achieved as this is computationally intensive and the uncertainties inherent in the observed data are large. Therefore, a limits-of-acceptability (LoA) uncertainty analysis approach was adopted in this study to assess the value of uncertain hydrological and geomorphic data. These were used to constrain simulations of catchment responses and to explore the parameter uncertainty in model predictions. We applied this approach to the River Derwent and Cocker catchments in the UK using a LEM CAESAR-Lisflood. Results show that the model was generally able to produce behavioural simulations within the uncertainty limits of the streamflow. Reliability metrics ranged from 24.4% to 41.2% and captured the high-magnitude low-frequency sediment events. Since different sets of behavioural simulations were found across different parts of the catchment, evaluating LEM performance, in quantifying and assessing both at-a-point behaviour and spatial catchment response, remains a challenge. Our results show that evaluating LEMs within uncertainty analyses framework while taking into account the varying quality of different observations constrains behavioural simulations and parameter distributions and is a step towards a full-ensemble uncertainty evaluation of such models. We believe that this approach will have benefits for reflecting uncertainties in flooding events where channel morphological changes are occurring and various diverse (and yet often sparse) data have been collected over such events.