The Taihua group on the southern margin of the North China craton: further insights from U–Pb ages and Hf isotope compositions of zircons

The "Taihua Group" is a collective term for a series of old terranes scattered along the southern margin of the North China Craton. The timing of formation and thermal overprinting of the Taihua Group have long been contentious, and its relationship with the Qinling orogenic belt has been unclear. In this study, new data from integrated in-situ U–Pb dating and Hf isotope analysis of zircons from an amphibolite (from the Xiong’ershan terrane) and a biotite gneiss (from the Lantian-Xiaoqinling terrane) indicate that the Upper Taihua Group formed during the Paleoproterozoic (2.3–2.5 Ga) and thus was originally part of the southern edge of North China Craton, detached during the Mesozoic Qinling orogeny and displaced about 100 km north from its original location. This suggests that the Taihua Group became part of the tectonic terrane associated with the Qinling orogeny and now forms part of the overthrust basement section of the Qinling belt. Before the Qinling orogeny, the Taihua Group was metamorphosed at 2.1 Ga. The initial Hf-isotope compositions of zircons, together with positive εNd(t) values for the whole-rocks, imply that the original magmas were derived from a juvenile source with some assimilation of an Archean crustal component.     

Secular variation in North America during historical times

Summary. The secular variation of the declination, inclination and total force of the geomagnetic field has been plotted for 74 locations in North America. A comparison of the occurrences of maxima and minima in the SV curves from different stations shows little evidence of drift in North America. Although a declination maximum exhibits westward drift up to 1915, all other extrema in declination, inclination and total intensity occur almost simultaneously over a wide area. The major feature of SV in North America appears to be a 4000 nT decrease in the total field since 1850, which may be due to a decrease in the dipole moment coupled with the decay of a large non-dipole anomaly situated under the continent. Short-period changes in the rate of decrease are possibly jerks of the magnetic field. Maximum entropy spectral analysis of all three components of the field indicates periods of 102 and 53 yr.     

Past environmental change and seawater intrusion into coastal Lake Lilaste,Latvia

Diatoms, organic matter and magnetic susceptibility in a 10-m-long sediment sequence from coastal Lake Lilaste, Latvia, were analysed to evaluate Holocene environmental changes related to past sea-water intrusions. Lake Lilaste is located ~1 km from the present sea coast in an area with a low uplift rate and a threshold altitude of 0.5 m a.s.l. It was thus considered to be an appropriate site to study the influence of past sea level fluctuations on the lake and its sediments. Variations in diatom community composition, along with sediment lithostratigraphy, show that a shallow, nutrient-rich freshwater lake existed there during the early Holocene. The first brackish-water diatoms appeared concurrent with a sea level rise ca. 8700 ± 50 cal a BP, but long-term, intermittent inputs of brackish water were observed between 6700 ± 40 and 4200 ± 80 cal a BP. During those time spans, diatoms indicate increased nutrient concentrations and high conductivity, a consequence of occasional mixing of brackish and freshwater that promoted biological productivity. Lilaste was isolated from the sea at 4200 ± 80 cal a BP, after which a stable freshwater environment, dominated by planktonic diatoms such as Aulacoseira ambigua, A. granulata, A. islandica and A. subarctica, was established. At 400 ± 50 cal a BP, planktonic diatoms were gradually replaced by Fragilaria spp., indicating the beginning of anthropogenic impact. The reconstructed relative water-level curve from the lake coincides with the eustatic sea level curve from 6800 ± 40 cal a BP onwards. There was a distinct increase in abundance of brackish-water diatoms when the sea level reached the threshold of Lilaste, which at that time was probably about 3 m lower than the present sea level. According to radiocarbon-dated shifts in the diatom community composition, the Litorina Sea transgression was a long-lasting event (ca. 2200 years) in the southern part of the Gulf of Riga, where the land uplift rate was near zero. It culminated more than 1000 years later than at other sites with higher uplift, in the northern part of the Baltic Sea.     

Geomagnetic control of polar mesosphere summer echoes

Using observations with the ALOMAR SOUSY radar near Andenes (69.3°N, 16.0°E) from 1994 until 1997 polar mesosphere summer echoes (PMSE) have been investigated in dependence on geomagnetic K indices derived at the Auroral Observatory Tromsø (69.66°N, 18.94°E). During night-time and morning hours a significant correlation between the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of the radar results and the geomagnetic K indices could be detected with a maximum correlation near midnight. The correlation becomes markedly smaller in the afternoon and early evening hours with a minimum near 17 UT. This diurnal variation is in reasonable agreement with riometer absorption at Ivalo (68.55°N, 27.28°E) and can be explained by the diurnal variation of ionization due to precipitating high energetic particles. Therefore, a part of the diurnal PMSE variation is caused by this particle precipitation. The variability of the solar EUV variation, however, has no significant influence on the PMSE during the observation period.     

Chronology building using objective identification of annual signals in trace element profiles of stalagmites

Determination of annual lamination provides important additional constraints to radiometric dates on speleothems, both for dating the duration of specific growth intervals and optimizing growth models. In the absence of visible laminae, however, speleothem age models are reliant upon curve fitting through discretely dated points and are therefore inherently more uncertain than annual chronologies from laminae. Given that the impact of seasonality on speleothems is expected to be strong enough to generate an annual pulse in trace element chemistry regardless of whether or not visible or fluorescent growth laminae are visible, we demonstrate the potential for deriving high-resolution stalagmite chronologies from non-laminated samples using annual chemical variations in stalagmites from two Alpine caves (Obir, Austria and Ernesto, NE Italy). Trace element data were obtained by ion microprobe analyses for H, P, Mg, Na, Sr and Ba and the annual signal was sought using spectral and wavelet analysis. An automated chemical peak-counting software tool was developed in MATLAB^©. It counts significant annual peaks using criteria of minimum amplitude in relation to the local standard deviation of signal variation and minimum separation between peaks determined by the thickness of the preceding layers. Verification of the tool using visibly laminated samples suggests the software is a reliable and accurate method of chronology building, with hit ratios greater than 0.93 and less than 0.75% false alarm occurrences. Used in conjunction with other dating methods such as radiocarbon, U–Th and sulphur peak dating, the automated chemical laminae chronology-building approach provides a more meaningful alternative to simple age-depth curve fitting for non-laminated samples.     

Geostatistics and Bayesian updating for transmissivity estimation in a multiaquifer system in Manitoba,Canada

In ground water flow and transport modeling, the heterogeneous nature of porous media has a considerable effect on the resulting flow and solute transport. Some method of generating the heterogeneous field from a limited dataset of uncertain measurements is required. Bayesian updating is one method that interpolates from an uncertain dataset using the statistics of the underlying probability distribution function. In this paper, Bayesian updating was used to determine the heterogeneous natural log transmissivity field for a carbonate and a sandstone aquifer in southern Manitoba. It was determined that the transmissivity in m²/sec followed a natural log normal distribution for both aquifers with a mean of -7.2 and - 8.0 for the carbonate and sandstone aquifers, respectively. The variograms were calculated using an estimator developed by Li and Lake (1994). Fractal nature was not evident in the variogram from either aquifer. The Bayesian updating heterogeneous field provided good results even in cases where little data was available. A large transmissivity zone in the sandstone aquifer was created by the Bayesian procedure, which is not a reflection of any deterministic consideration, but is a natural outcome of updating a prior probability distribution function with observations. The statistical model returns a result that is very reasonable; that is homogeneous in regions where little or no information is available to alter an initial state. No long range correlation trends or fractal behavior of the log-transmissivity field was observed in either aquifer over a distance of about 300 km.     

Kimberlite metasomatism at Murowa and Sese pipes, Zimbabwe

Metasomatism accompanying kimberlite emplacement is a worldwide phenomenon, although infrequently described or recognised. At the Cambrian-aged Murowa and Sese kimberlite clusters located within the Archean Zimbabwe Craton just north of the boundary with the Limpopo Mobile Zone in southern central Zimbabwe, the metasomatism is intense and well exposed and the processes can be readily studied. Dykes, sills and the root zones of pipes are exposed at the current erosion level. Kimberlite lithologies present are hypabyssal macrocrystic kimberlite (“HMK”), HMK breccia, and tuffisitic kimberlite breccia (“TKB”) including minor lithic tuffisitic kimberlite breccia (“LTKB”). Country rocks are 2.6 Ga Chibi and Zimbabwe granite batholiths emplaced into 2.6–2.9 Ga or earlier Archean tonalitic gneiss and greenstones. During initial metasomatism, the granites become spotted with green chlorite, needles of alkaline amphiboles (winchite, riebeckite, arfvedsonite) and pyroxenes (aegirine–augite) with minor carbonate and felts of talc. Oligoclase feldspar becomes converted to albite, extensively altered, dusted and reddened with hematite, whereas K-feldspar remains unaffected. The granites become converted to syenite through removal of quartz. More intense metasomatism at Murowa and Sese results in veins of green metasomatite which cut and disrupt the granite. Progressive disruption entrains granite blocks, breaking down the granite still further, spalling off needle-like granite slivers, and so giving rise to LTKB. This process of disruption and entrainment appears to be the manner of initial development of the pipe structure. The chemistry of the metasomatite is intermediate between granite and kimberlite. Compared to granite country rock it has markedly higher Mg, Cr, Ni, CO₂ and H₂O+, higher Ca, Mn, Nb, Sr, P, Fe³⁺/Fe²⁺ ratio, U, Co, and Cu, approximately equal TiO₂, K₂O, Na₂O, La, Ta, Rb, Zr, Zn and resultant lower SiO₂, Al₂O₃, Ga and Y. The metasomatite Na₂O/K₂O ratio is slightly higher than that of the granite. The metasomatic process is broadly analogous to fenitisation of granitic wall rock accompanying carbonatite complex emplacement. The metasomatism at Murowa and Sese was caused by fluids from the rising but confined proto-kimberlite melt penetrating into cracks and matrix of granite country rock and reacting with it. These fluids were CO₂-rich, hydrous, oxidising, enhanced in ultramafic elements and carried low levels of Na.     

Mineralogical and Geochemical Constraints on the Sediment Sources of Late Stone Age Pottery from the Birimi Site,Northern Ghana

The mineralogy and bulk chemical compositions of 15 Kintampo (Late Stone Age) potsherds from the Birimi site on the Gambaga Escarpment and eight samples of local sediment were determined with the intent of characterizing these wares and identifying the material used in their manufacture. Sediment from clay pits still used by potters north of the escarpment contains iron‐rich laterite clasts (100 × XFeO_t = 100 × FeO_t/[FeO_t + Al₂O₃ + SiO₂] ≥10). Sedimentary clasts in stream sediments are relatively siliceous and iron‐poor (100 × XFeO_t < 10). Bulk geochemical data together with the compositions of lithic clasts (laterite, siltstone/sandstone) link the pottery to sediment sources, including escarpment sediments not presently used by Ghanaian potters. Fresh granite clasts found in some of the sherds were not found in the analyzed sediment samples, although some of their distinctive mineralogical constituents (e.g., variably barian alkali feldspar) are present. The analytical data suggest that pots found at Birimi were made locally by mixing escarpment sediment with clay and stream sediment brought in from below the escarpment. This contrasts with present‐day practice, whereby the pots themselves are imported. The place where Birimi pottery was made and the outcrop source of aluminous sediment (mudstone with an “escarpment” trace element signature) used in these wares, however, remain unidentified. © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.