Coalification history of the Stephanian Ciñera-Matallana pull-apart basin,NW Spain: Combining anisotropy of vitrinite reflectance and thermal modelling

The Stephanian Ciñera-Matallana Basin of NW Spain comprises 1,500 m of alluvial to lacustrine coal-bearing sediments, which were deposited in a late Variscan transtensional/transpressional pull-apart setting. The relationship between coalification pattern and rock deformation was evaluated by measurements of the anisotropy of vitrinite reflectance (AVR). The AVR ellipsoids reveal both pre-tectonic elements related to the bedding fabric and syn-tectonic elements related to folding, producing biaxial ellipsoid shapes with the maximum reflectance parallel to fold axes. The mean coalification gradient for the Stephanian succession is about 0.62 %Rr/km. Calculations of the mean palaeo-geothermal gradient are presented on the basis of three different empirical equations. A palaeo-geothermal gradient of 85 °C/km is considered the most realistic, with an overburden of about 1,000 m. 1-D numerical modelling of the burial history results in two possible scenarios, the most preferable involving a palaeo-heat flow of 150 mW/m² and an overburden of ca. 1,050 m. These results indicate that maximum coalification was related to a localised but high palaeo-heat flow/-geothermal gradient. The anisotropy of vitrinite reflectance highlights the interactive and transitional nature of sedimentary compaction and rock deformation on the maturation of organic material within strike-slip fault zones.     

Hydrogen Dimer Features in the 2-μm Spectra of Saturn and Neptune

We report the detection of the (H₂)₂dimer in the atmospheres of Saturn and Neptune based on spectra of the fundamentalS₁(1) collision-induced band of H₂. The lines of this dimer are potentially useful for probing the (H₂)₂ortho–para ratio and its implications for atmospheric dynamical processes. We also report the detection of the (1–0)S₁(1) quadrupole absorption line of monomeric H₂in these spectra.     

Stratigraphic simulations of the shelf of the Gulf of Lions: testing subsidence rates and sea‐level curves during the Pliocene and Quaternary

Determining the relative importance of factors interacting to control stratigraphic organization is a key issue in sedimentology. The Pliocene‐Quaternary chronostratigraphy on the Gulf of Lions platform is still poorly constrained, giving rise to different interpretations of the evolution of its subsidence through time. This paper examines the Pliocene‐Quaternary sedimentary filling of the Gulf of Lion's shelf with Dionisos, a numerical stratigraphic model. Our results show that a constant subsidence rate accurately reproduces the observed geometries, whereas a varying subsidence rate reproduces them only if the acceleration of subsidence is limited. At this time‐scale, a third‐order eustatic curve is also reappraised: a higher resolution curve (built using δ¹⁸O measurements) gives a more realistic restitution of our stratigraphic markers. Finally, the constant subsidence rate and sediment fluxes implied in these modellings are discussed relative to climate and local factors of sedimentation.     

Cl and Na Fluxes in an Andean Foreland Basin of the Peruvian Amazon: An Anthropogenic Impact Evidence

The dissolved load of the Amazon River is generally considered to be lowly impacted by anthropogenic activities. In this work, based on the chemical and hydrological database of the Environmental Research Observatory—HYBAM (http://www.ore-hybam.org), we explore the importance of the Peruvian Foreland petroleum activity on the dissolved Na and Cl fluxes of the Amazon River. The main result of this study allows us suggesting that oil extraction activity, concentrated in the El Tigre River basin, a small foreland watershed in the Peruvian Amazon, influenced drastically the Na and Cl exportation of the Amazon River during the 2006–2007 period. During these years,  the dissolved exportations of this basin represented almost 20 % of the annual dissolved Cl Amazon flux and almost 12 % of the annual dissolved Na Amazon flux for a mean annual discharge <1 % of the Amazon River discharge. Since the last decades, the anthropogenic activities are increasing over the whole Amazon basin, especially in Andean countries. In this context, our results demonstrate that extractive activity cannot be considered as negligible on the hydro-chemistry of the Amazonian Rivers especially for the weathering budget estimation based on river-dissolved loads. Moreover, Cl and Na can be used to trace the formation waters derived from oil extraction at a large spatial scale. The environmental impacts of contaminants associated with deep water released to the hydrosystem (polycyclic aromatics hydrocarbons, metallic trace elements, etc.) at local and regional scales are still underestimated and should be monitored to map their local and regional influence and to prevent their risks on human health.     

Organic Pollutants in Coastal Waters,Sediments, and Biota: A Relevant Driver for Ecosystems During the Anthropocene?

The total number of synthetic organic chemicals introduced to the environment by humans has never been quantified, but it is not lower than thousands. A fraction of these chemicals have toxic effects to coastal organisms and presumably affect ecosystems structure and function. During the last decades, some of the processes affecting the transport, degradation, and fate of a limited number of chemicals have been studied, and the rising concern for environmental risk of organic chemical has lead to the regulation of a few of them by national and international organisms. However, the environmental inventory of organic pollutants is far from being quantified, and current methodologies used in most toxicological tests only allow to determine effects of individual chemicals to organisms. There are major limitations on appropriate methodologies to assess the effects of organic pollutants at population and ecosystem levels and the effects induced by complex mixtures of organic pollutants present in natural environments. The modification of the composition of the biosphere by a myriad of organic pollutants at ultra-trace levels is not yet regarded as another vector of environmental change which is irreversible due to the persistent character of many of these chemicals and due to its global coverage. Here, we claim that the modification of the atmosphere, water, sediments, and biota composition is a factor to be taken into account in coastal ecosystems, and that its pressure on the environment has been exponentially increasing during the last six decades of the anthropocene.     

On the water and energy cycles in the Tropics

The water and energy cycles are major elements of the Earth climate. These cycles are especially active in the intertropical belt where satellites provide the most suitable observational platform. The history of Earth observations of the water cycle and of the radiation budget viewed from space reveals that the fundamental questions from the early times are still relevant for today's research. The last 2 decades have seen a number of milestones regarding the documentation of rainfall, mesoscale convective systems (MCS), water vapour and radiation at the top of the atmosphere (TOA). Beyond dedicated missions that provided enhanced characterizations of some elements of the atmospheric water cycle and field campaigns that allowed the gathering of validation data, the advent of the long record of meteorological satellites lead to new questioning on the homogenisation of the data time series, etc. The use of this record to document the tropical climate brought new results of the distribution of humidity and reinforced the understanding of some robust features of the African monsoon. Challenges for the immediate future concerns the deepening of the understanding of the role of cloud systems in the monsoon circulation, the downscaling of the documentation of the water and energy cycle at the scale of these cloud systems, the research of better adequation between the users and the satellite estimate of rainfall and finally a much needed methodological effort to build exploitable time series for the estimation of climatic trends in the water and energy cycle in the Tropics. The required observations to address these challenges are rapidly presented with emphasis on the upcoming Megha-Tropiques (MT) mission.