Volcanic Risk Assessment and Mapping in the Vesuvian Area Using GIS

This paper assesses the risk to people and property from lava flow hazard in the Vesuvian area of Italy using a Geographical Information System (GIS). The intense urbanisation and dense population near Mt. Vesuvius make the area very hazardous. Due to the large amount of available data, GIS is an essential tool to facilitate risk evaluation and constant monitoring of the zone. This analysis is based mainly on a lava flow hazard map of Mt. Vesuvius, determined from volcanic activity between 1631 and 1944. A land-use zonation map of the area was created in order to show areal distribution of the resources, built-up centres and population. For each of the 17 municipalities in the area, demographic and urban data were entered into the GIS database and linked to each appropriate geographic unit in order to create a set of reference maps at the 1:50 000 scale. The lava flow hazard map was overlain on the land use map, and spatial and numerical information of risk were extracted from the resulting maps.     

Mineral resources inventory in the northern part of haiti: A basic rationale for selecting areas of potential mining interest

Agriculture has always been the major source of income of the Republic of Haiti. Only in the late sixties did the Haitian Government decide to move toward industrialization and explotation of natural resources, but no reliable inventory of mineral potential was available. In June 1970 the Resources and Transport Division of the U.N. (now CNRET) undertook a structural analysis of the Caribbean with reference to defining favorable loci for ore disposition. One of the conclusions of this survey was that from the metallogenetic point of view, the Northern part of Haiti was a favorable area for prospecting for habe metal deposits, especially for copper. Those conclusions were acknowleadged with great enthusiams by the Haitian authorities, and they welcomed in July 1971 a UN technical adviser who outlined a first phase of exploration. Following this mission, a “Mineral exploration Project” was created by the Haitian Government with the cooperation of UNDP, and an area of 9000 km² was selected, based on structural, lithological, and metallogenetic reasons, as an exploration target. The most important aspects of this project were:Mineral Exploration—First Phase (1973–1974). The following operations were carried out by a small team: (a) photo interpretation at 1:50,000 and 1:200,000 scale, (b) geological reconnaissance at 1:50,000 scale, (c) geochemical reconnaissance (stream sediment) at 1:50,000 scale. The photo interpretation helped outline zones of particular structural interest and was followed up by ground control studies. Stream sediment geochemical reconnaissance was carried out over half of the project area, following the indications given by the photo geological interpretation. finally, combining all the data, five areas were selected for detailed follow up survey: (1) Terrier Rouge—Perche, (2) Vallieres, (3) Mont-Organise, (4) Limonade, (5) Gros Morne—Le Borgne.Mineral Exploration—Second Phase (1975–1976). The main zones of interest were reduced to a few hundred km² and porphyry copper type deposits appeared to be the most promising target. Detailed geological mapping (1:25,000 to 1:2,000) and soil geochemistry were carried out on the above mentioned five areas, the most promising appearing quickly to be Terrier Rouge-Perges, with porphyry-type copper mineralization. A geophysical survey (IP and Mag) confirmed the geochemical results. At the end of the second phase of exploration (December 1976) two of the five prospects of the Terrier Rouge area have been diamond drilled and appeared to be of potential economic interest. Because of the number and importance of the prospects discovered a third phase of exploration was deemed necessary with the purpose of continuing the detailed prospection work and drilling the other prospects. This third phase started in January 1977 and was expected to last until December 1979. This paper was presented at the International Geological Correlation Program (IGCP) Project 98: “Standards for Computer Applications in Resource Studies” held at Taita Hills, Kenya, November 8–15, 1977.     

Remarques comparatives sur quelques éléments sédimentologiques et paléogéographiques liés aux gisements de fer oolithiques du Djebel Ank (Tunisie) et de Lorraine (France)

Résumé Bien que de moindre intérêt économique, le gisement de fer oolithique du Djebel Ank se rapporte au type «Lorraine».Il s'agit d'une minéralisation localisée vers le littoral d'un sillon intracratonique, en marge du domaine géosynclinal et située, comme en Lorraine, dans une séquence lithologique négative, mais à lithofaciès détritiques en Lorraine, chimiques en Tunisie. On note aussi la localisation des grands gisements de phosphates dans les mêmes faisceaux stratigraphiques et dans les mêmes types de séquences que le gisement de fer du Djebel Ank, fer et phosphate présentant une radioactivité du même ordre et étant situés sur le même linéament.

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Although the Djebel Ank deposit is of less economic value, it may be correlated to «Lorraine» type. Mineralisation of Djebel Ank is found near the ancient shore line of a intracratonic trench on the border of geosynclinal area. The mineralisations both at Djebel Ank and Lorraine occur in a lithologic negative sequence, although the lithofacies are detridal in Lorraine and chemical in Tunisia. It is important to point out that phosphates and iron in Tunisia occur in the same stratigraphic series and in an identical type of lithologic sequence. Also iron ore is rich in phosphates. It is significant that the iron and phosphate contain same amount of radioactivities. Likewise, phosphate and iron in Tunisia are localized along a common «lineament».

     

Using new remote sensing satellites for assessing water quality in a reservoir

Water quality monitoring could benefit from information derived from the newest generation of medium-resolution Earth observation satellites. The main objective of our study was to assess the suitability of both Landsat 8 and Sentinel-2A satellites for estimating and mapping of Secchi disk transparency (SDT), a common measurement of water clarity, in Cassaffousth Reservoir (Córdoba, Argentina). Ground observations and a dataset of four Landsat 8 and four Sentinel-2A images were used to create and validate models to estimate SDT in the reservoir. The selected algorithms were used to obtain graphic representations of water clarity. Slight differences were found between Landsat 8 and Sentinel-2 estimations. Thus, we demonstrated the suitability of both satellites for estimating and mapping water quality. This study highlights the importance of free and readily available satellite datasets in monitoring water quality, especially in countries where conventional monitoring programmes are either lacking or unsatisfactory.     

TIRCAM: A mid-IR camera for astronomical imaging

We present the main characteristics of a new mid-IR camera, TIRCAM, operating at the 1.5 m Italian Infrared Telescope.     

3D multivalued travel time and amplitude maps

An algorithm for computing multivalued maps for travel time, amplitude and any other ray related variable in 3D smooth velocity models is presented. It is based on the construction of successive isochrons by tracing a uniformly dense discrete set of rays by fixed travel-time steps. Ray tracing is based on Hamiltonian formulation and includes computation of paraxial matrices. A ray density criterion ensures uniform ray density along isochrons over the entire ray field including caustics. Applications to complex models are shown.     

The Morphological Evolution of Galaxy Satellites

We study the evolution of galaxy satellites with high resolutionN-body simulations. Satellites are modelled as replicas of typical low and high surface brightness galaxies (LSBs and HSBs). Encounters on high eccentricity orbits (as typical in hierarchical models of galaxy formation) strip LSBs of most of their stars and tend to decrease their surface brightness. In contrast, bar instability in HSBs leads to substantial loss of angular momentum of the stellar component and to an increase in central surface brightness. In both cases the remnant resembles a spheroidal galaxy with an exponential surface brightness profile. A simple modelling of colour evolution and interaction-driven star formation gives M/L ratios for the remnants that are roughly consistent with observations. These results suggest an evolutionary scenario for the dwarf galaxies in our Local Group, faint dSphs being the descendants of LSBs and brighter dSphs/dEs being the final state of HSB satellites. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.