GEO LOGIC

Let me begin by outlining the role of this column. It is aimed at European geoscientists who use personal computers. Rather than duplicating what is already discussed in the hundreds of computer magazines that can be found at any newsagent, I will concentrate on those products and services that have a particular application in the Earth Sciences. This is not to say that only those products with a specific Earth Science application will be discussed. Instead, anything that a practising geoscientist might find useful will be a candidate for review; a software package for compiling reference lists in the many styles demanded by different journals would be an example. The column will devote itself to products for IBM-PC and Mac users. I apologise in advance for the UK perspective offered in the first few articles; this reflects my ignorance of the European scene and the difficulties I have faced in overcoming it. I look forward to feedback from continental geoscientists who, I hope, will bring me up to date regarding the truly European picture.     

Velocity oscillations in solar plage regions

The properties of wave propagation in a perfectly electrically conducting, plane-stratified, inviscid, compressible atmosphere premeated by a horizontal magnetic field which varies with height are investigated. It is shown that a diagnostic diagram can be constructed through a generalization of the propagation equation to account for the presence of a magnetic field.The effect of the magnetic field on the oscillations in solar plages around the temperature minimum is studied and compared with the non-magnetic case based on the Bilderberg Continuum Atmosphere. Due to the joint action of ionization and the magnetic field, a potential well for internal gravity waves is formed. The properties of the trapped waves are in qualitative agreement with the observations.The Brunt-Väisälä frequencies in the presence (N) and absence (N ₀) of the magnetic field around the temperature minimum are shown to obey the relation N/N ₀ (1 + ²)^–1/2, where is the ratio between the Alfvén and the sonic speeds. The modified Brunt-Väisälä frequency (N) is decreased as the strength of the magnetic field increases. The magnetic effect makes the potential well shallower, thus shrinking the domain for the trapped gravity modes.     

On the long-term motion of Pluto

A modified periodic orbit of the third kind is introduced that is closely related to periodic orbits of the third kind as defined by Poincaré. It is shown that Pluto librates about the periodic orbit with apparent stability. This further explains the librational motion of the resonant argument of Pluto and the avoidance of a Pluto-Neptune close approach as found by Cohen and Hubbard and the long-term motion of Pluto and the librational motion of the perihelion as found by Williams and Benson. With libration about a periodic orbit, the numerical solution of Williams and Benson can be extrapolated to longer times in the past and future.     

Fragmentation of a nonisothermal protostellar cloud

The collapse of a very low thermal energy, rotating cloud results in fragmentation to a binary protostellar system even in the nonisothermal regime. The solar system therefore probably did not form from a fragmentation hierarchy involving ejection of the presolar nebula from a multiple system.     

Matrix formulation of the Picard method for parallel computation

Celestial Mechanics and Dynamical Astronomy - The increasing availability of computing machines capable of parallel computation has accelerated interest in numerical methods that exhibit natural...     

The relationship between abundances of meiofauna and their suspected microbial food (diatoms and bacteria)

Samples were taken bi-weekly for one year at a sand site and a mud site in the North Inlet Estuary, Georgetown, South Carolina, for meiofauna, their suspected microbial food (bacteria and diatoms), and associated physical factors. Linear regression techniques were used to correlate food abundance and physical factors with the density of meiofaunal taxa. At both sites diatoms positively correlated with meiofauna taxa, but bacteria did not. Physical factors were not correlated with meiofaunal or microbial abundances at the sand site. Whereas, at the mud site meiofauna and diatom abundances were positively correlated with the depth of the redox layer and inversely correlated with temperature. Peaks of meiofaunal abundance did not follow peaks of food abundance. Analysis of copepods at the species level indicated that taxa response was due to the response of the dominant species. Even though some correlations existed, this study suggests that copepod species and meiofauna at the gross taxonomic level do not respond to changes in potential food abundance. Physical factors apparently influence both meiofauna and diatoms in the same fashion. However, bacterial abundance was not positively correlated with any of the factors studied.     

Distinction between Permian and post-Permian igneous rocks in the southern Sydney Basin, New South Wales, on the basis of major-element geochemistry

Permian and post-Permian igneous rocks of the southern Sydney Basin of New South Wales can be distinguished on the basis of major-element geochemistry. A data base of 102 analyses of these igneous rocks has been used to evaluate the effectiveness of various discriminants based on univariate and multivariate analysis. Inspection of histograms of compositional frequency for each major-element oxide is an efficient method of univariate analysis and assigns up to 92.2% of the rocks to the correct age group. Discriminant function analysis using up to 10 variables does not produce a more efficient discriminant than the simple binary plot of SiO ₂ versus TiO ₂,which assigns 95.1% of the rocks to the correct age group. No other binary or ternary diagram commonly used in petrology produces such an efficient discriminator.