Indigenous regional systems and Rural Development in Southern India

As a result of critism of the industrial-urban biased paradigm of development, a new social development approach is beginning to emerge. According to this strategy, development must be fitted to ecological constraints, priority attention must be given to rural development, and planning for rural development must be decentralized, participatory, and deeply immersed in the particulars of local settings. Agropolitan districts, or networks of socio-economic and political interaction, have been suggested as a suitable territorial basis for this paradigm. In India, where local planning has not been successful, indigenous regional systems, which correspond closely to criteria suggested to delineate agropolitan districts, have existed for hundreds of years. This is especially true in Tamil Nadu where a hierarchy of nesting socio-spatial units is firmly established in peasant tradition. Information is presented on the positive and negative aspects of the use of such regions for rural planning. It is suggested that these regions may better fulfil the objectives of agropolitan development than sets of functional regions derived from the urban hierarchy.     

Extensional faulting and segmentation of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge north of the Kane Fracture Zone (24° 00′ N to 24° 40′ N)

The combination of multi-beam echo-sounder swath bathymetry and high-resolution deep-towed sidescan sonar provides a powerful database from which to examine mid-ocean ridge processes. We have used such a database, gathered from the Mid-Atlantic Ridge north of the Kane Fracture Zone (the MARNOK area), to examine the relationship between tectonic, volcanic, and bathymetric segmentation. We have identified structural domains, with different fault distributions, and neovolcanic segments that are distinct from the 2nd or 3rd order bathymetric segmentation.From their mutual relationships, a model is proposed for the magmatic accretion of oceanic crust at slow spreading ridges that relates the local melt supply to the tectonic style. We suggest that these are mutually interactive, and determine whether volcanic extrusion along the ridge is continuous and slow, or episodic and rapid.     

A re-evaluation of Late Devensian glacial Lake Humber levels in the Vale of York,UK

Proglacial Lake Humber formed in the Vale of York and Ancholme Valley during the Late Devensian (Weichselian) glaciation, but its lake levels and their precise ages are uncertain. Three-dimensional geological modelling, based on 193 borehole sediment logs from the eastern part of the Vale of York, indicates that glaciolacustrine sediments extend no higher than 10?m O.D. By contrast, recent palaeoenvironmental reconstructions for the region that suggest Lake Humber had eight recessional shorelines, extending from 42?m to 5?m O.D. Above 10?m O.D., the sediments become more discontinuous, and comprise clay with occasional chalk and flint gravel, and matrix-rich diamicton interdigitated with sands and gravels. Sedimentary and geochemical analyses of sands and gravels from one of the putative shorelines, at 25?m O.D., indicate an easterly provenance for these sediments. They are interpreted here as colluvial deposits, sourced largely by periglacial weathering of Jurassic and chalk bedrock. Collectively, the geological evidence suggests that the highest level of Lake Humber during the Late Devensian did not exceed 10?m O.D., and therefore reconstructions invoking higher lake levels are thought to be unlikely.     

Geological evidence for subglacial deformation of Pleistocene permafrost

Recent work in modern and ancient glacial environments has demonstrated the ability of cold-based glaciers to interact with permafrost. Geological evidence for glacier–permafrost interactions is revealed in Arctic regions where permafrost has persisted since deglaciation. Whilst similar interactions probably occurred near the margins of former ice sheets in the mid-latitudes, this interpretation is rarely applied to unfrozen glacigenic sequences. This review considers the extent to which this alternative hypothesis can explain two key aspects of the glaciotectonic sequences of North Norfolk that have traditionally been attributed to the deformation of unfrozen sediment. The substantial thickness (>10 m) of the pervasively deformed sequences and the preservation of stratified sand intraclasts within them are consistent with deformation at temperatures slightly below the pressure melting point (warm permafrost). Such deformation is also consistent with the pre-glacial environment, which was characterised by continuous permafrost. The hypothesis of deformation at sub-freezing temperatures should be considered more widely when interpreting glaciotectonically deformed, ice-marginal sequences in the mid-latitudes. The application of geological evidence to reconstruct basal thermal regimes beneath former glaciers would complement existing geomorphological inverse models and provide additional information to improve the parameterisation of subglacial processes in numerical ice-sheet models.     

A late Middle Pleistocene temperate–periglacial–temperate sequence (Oxygen Isotope Stages 7–5e) near Marsworth, Buckinghamshire, UK

River-channel and colluvial deposits, near Marsworth, Buckinghamshire, record a temperate-periglacial-temperate sequence during the late Middle Pleistocene. The deposits of a lower channel contain tufa clasts bearing leaf impressions that include Acer sp., and Sorbus aucuparia and containing temperate arboreal pollen attributed to ash-dominated woodland. The tufa probably formed at the mouth of a limestone spring before being redeposited in a small river whose deposits contain plant remains, Mollusca, Coleoptera, Ostracoda and vertebrate bones of temperate affinities. The sediments, sedimentary structures and limited biological remains above the Lower Channel deposits indicate that fluvial deposition preceded climatic cooling into periglacial conditions. Fluvial deposition recurred during a later temperate episode, as shown by the mammalian bone assemblage in stratigraphically higher channel deposits. The Upper Channel deposits are confidently attributed to Oxygen Isotope Sub-Stage 5e (Ipswichian) on the basis of their vertebrate remains. However, the age of the Lower Channel deposits is less clear. The mammalian and coleopteran remains in the Lower Channel strongly suggest correlation with Oxygen Isotope Stage 7 on the basis of their similarities to other sites whose stratigraphy is better known and the clear difference of the Lower Channel assemblage from well-established faunas of Ipswichian or any other age. By contrast, U–Th dating of the tufa clasts suggests an age post 160 ka BP, while Aile/Ile ratios on Mollusca point to an Ipswichian age and younger. Four ways of interpreting this age discrepancy are considered, the preferred one correlating the Lower Channel deposits with Oxygen Isotope Stage 7.     

Accretionary processes in the axial valley of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge 27° N–30° N from TOBI side-scan sonar images

We analyse TOBI side-scan sonar images collected during Charles Darwin cruise CD76 in the axial valley of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge (MAR) between 27°N and 30°N (Atlantis Transform Fault). Mosaics of the two side-scan sonar swaths provide a continuous image of the axial valley and the inner valley walls along more than six second-order segments of the MAR. Tectonic and volcanic analyses reveal a high-degree intra-segment and inter-segment variability. We distinguish three types of volcanic morphologies: hummocky volcanoes or volcanic ridges, smooth, flat-topped volcanoes, and lava flows. We observe that the variations in the tectonics from one segment to another are associated with variations in the distribution of the volcanic morphologies. Some segments have more smooth volcanoes near their ends and in the discontinuities than near their mid-point, and large, hummocky axial volcanic ridges. Their tectonic deformation is usually limited to the edges of the axial valley near the inner valley walls. Other segments have smooth volcanoes distributed along their length, small axial volcanic ridges, and their axial valley floor is affected by numerous faults and fissures. We propose a model of volcano-tectonic cycles in which smooth volcanoes and lava flows are built during phases of high magmatic flux. Hummocky volcanic ridges are constructed more progressively, by extraction of magma from pockets located preferentially beneath the centre of the segments, during phases of low magma input. These cycles might result from pulses in melt migration from the mantle. Melt arrival would lead to the rapid emplacement of smooth-textured volcanic terrains, and would leave magma pockets, mostly beneath the centre of the segments where most melt is produced. During the end of the volcanic cycle magma would be extracted from these reservoirs through dikes with a low magma pressure, building hummocky volcanic ridges at low effusion rates. In extreme cases, this volcanic phase would be followed by amagmatic extension until a new magma pulse arrives from the mantle.     

The source of De variability in periglacial sand wedges: Depositional processes versus measurement issues

Relict periglacial wedge structures are widespread in mid-latitude and polar regions. The wedges have a high preservation potential and are often infilled with quartz-rich aeolian sand, making them potentially suitable for luminescence dating. This paper presents initial work from an anti-syngenetic sand wedge in the Tuktoyaktuk Coastlands, Arctic Canada. When samples were measured at the single grain level they showed poor palaeodose (D_e) reproducibility and consequent high age uncertainties. The aim of the study was to determine whether this intra-sample D_e scatter reflected methodological issues arising from OSL measurement or processes of wedge development.Initial single grain dose recovery tests show that D_e scatter was not easily explained by poor recycling, sensitivity changes, variable OSL components, recuperation problems, or large D_e uncertainties from dim grains. Single grain preheating tests did show that some D_e scatter might be attributable to individual grains requiring different preheat temperatures, whilst dose recovery tests revealed that highly sensitive grains showed less scatter than dim grains. However, selection of these bright grains from natural samples still resulted in scattered D_e values. An alternative explanation for the D_e scatter relates to the formation of anti-syngenetic sand wedges by thermal contraction cracking over thousands of years in an eroding landscape, which may result in sediment of very different ages being deposited in adjacent cracks. Finite mixture modelling was used to identify D_e components within each sample. Ages calculated from these components suggest sand wedge formation at ca. 5, 8.5, 12.5 and 18 ka which correlate well with known cooling events over the last 18 ka and support a multiple phase activity model for anti-syngenetic sand wedges.