Gradients in coral reef communities exposed to muddy river discharge in Pohnpei,Micronesia

This study analyzed how coral communities change along a gradient of increasing exposure to a mud-discharging river in the Enipein Catchment, Pohnpei, Micronesia. Using video transects, we quantified benthic communities at five sites along a gradient moving away from the river mouth towards the barrier reef. The most river-impacted site was characterized by a high accumulation of mud, low coral cover and low coral diversity. Although coral cover leveled off at ∼400 m from the river mouth to values found at the outer-most sites, coral diversity continued to increase with increasing distance, suggesting that the most distant site was still impacted by the river discharges. Fungiidae, Pavona, Acropora, Pachyseris and Porites rus all significantly increased in cover with distance from the river, while Turbinaria decreased. The combined presence and abundance of these six species groups, together with coral species richness, may help to indicate the effects of terrestrial runoff in similar runoff-exposed settings around Micronesia, whereas coral cover is not a sensitive indicator for river impact. Coral reefs are important resources for the people of Pohnpei. To prevent further degradation of this important resource, an integrated watershed approach is needed to control terrestrial activities.     

A protocol for classifying ecologically relevant marine zones,a statistical approach

Mapping ecologically relevant zones in the marine environment has become increasingly important. Biological data are however often scarce and alternatives are being sought in optimal classifications of abiotic variables. The concept of ‘marine landscapes’ is based on a hierarchical classification of geological, hydrographic and other physical data. This approach is however subject to many assumptions and subjective decisions.     

Constraining the propagation of bomb-radiocarbon through the dissolved organic carbon (DOC) pool in the northeast Pacific Ocean

This study extends the 1991-1995 records of marine dissolved organic carbon (DOC) concentrations and Δ¹⁴C values at hydrographic Station M (34°50′N, 123°00′W) with new measurements from a frozen (-20 °C) archive of samples collected between April 1998 and October 2004. The magnitudes and synchronicity of major Δ¹⁴C anomalies throughout the time-series imply transport of DOC from the surface ocean to depths of at least 450 m on the timescale of months. Keeling plots of all measurements at Station M predict a continuum of possible background DOC compositions containing at least 21 μM of -1000‰ (i.e., ≥57,000 ¹⁴C years) DOC, but are more consistent with mean deep DOC (38 μM, -549‰; i.e., 6,400 ¹⁴C years). These results and coral records of surface dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC) Δ¹⁴C were used to estimate pre-bomb DOC Δ¹⁴C depth profiles. The combined results indicate that bomb-¹⁴C has penetrated the DOC pool to depths of ≥450 m, though the signal at that depth is obscured by short-term variability.     

Introducing a transferable fishing day management regime for Pacific Island countries

On 1 December 2007, eight ‘Small Island Developing States’ in the Western and Central Pacific Ocean implemented a management regime restricting the total number of days fished by tuna purse seine vessels within their waters, commonly referred to as the Vessel Day Scheme (VDS). The VDS is seen as one component of management arrangements to reduce fishing mortality on bigeye and yellowfin tuna, constrain fishing effort, and increase the rate of return from access fees by Distant Water Fishing Nations.     

Variable hangingwall palaeotransport during Silurian and Devonian thrusting in the western Lachlan Fold Belt: Missing gold lodes,synchronous Melbourne Trough sedimentation and Grampians Group fold interference

The western margin of the Lachlan Fold Belt contains early ductile and brittle structures that formed during northeast‐southwest and east‐west compression, followed by reactivation related to sinistral wrenching. At Stawell all of these structural features (and the associated gold lodes) are dismembered by a complex array of later northwest‐, north‐ and northeast‐dipping faults. Detailed underground structural analysis has identified northwest‐trending mid‐Devonian thrusts (Tabberabberan) that post‐date Early Devonian plutonism and have a top‐to‐the‐southwest transport. Deformation associated with the initial stages of dismemberment occurred along an earlier array of faults that trend southwest‐northeast (or east‐west) and dip to the northwest (or north). The initial transport of the units in the hangingwall of these fault structures was top‐to‐the‐southeast. ‘Missing’ gold lodes were discovered beneath the Magdala orebody by reconstructing a displacement history that involved a combination of transport vectors (top‐to‐the‐southeast and top‐to‐the‐southwest). Fold interference structures in the adjacent Silurian Grampians Group provide further evidence for at least two almost orthogonal shortening regimes, post the mid‐Silurian. Overprinting relationships, and correlation with synchronous sedimentation in the Melbourne Trough, indicates that the early fault structures are mid‐ to late‐Silurian in age (Ludlow: ca 420–414 Ma). These atypical southeast‐vergent structures have regional extent and separate significant northeast‐southwest shortening that occurred in the mid‐Devonian (‘Tabberabberan orogeny’) and Late Ordovician (‘Benambran orogeny’).     

Structural and metamorphic evolution of the Moornambool Metamorphic Complex,western Lachlan Fold Belt,southeastern Australia

The wedge‐shaped Moornambool Metamorphic Complex is bounded by the Coongee Fault to the east and the Moyston Fault to the west. This complex was juxtaposed between stable Delamerian crust to the west and the eastward migrating deformation that occurred in the western Lachlan Fold Belt during the Ordovician and Silurian. The complex comprises Cambrian turbidites and mafic volcanics and is subdivided into a lower greenschist eastern zone and a higher grade amphibolite facies western zone, with sub‐greenschist rocks occurring on either side of the complex. The boundary between the two zones is defined by steeply dipping L‐S tectonites of the Mt Ararat ductile high‐strain zone. Deformation reflects marked structural thickening that produced garnet‐bearing amphibolites followed by exhumation via ductile shearing and brittle faulting. Pressure‐temperature estimates on garnet‐bearing amphibolites in the western zone suggest metamorphic pressures of ～0.7–0.8 GPa and temperatures of ～540–590°C. Metamorphic grade variations suggest that between 15 and 20 km of vertical offset occurs across the east‐dipping Moyston Fault. Bounding fault structures show evidence for early ductile deformation followed by later brittle deformation/reactivation. Ductile deformation within the complex is initially marked by early bedding‐parallel cleavages. Later deformation produced tight to isoclinal D₂ folds and steeply dipping ductile high‐strain zones. The S₂ foliation is the dominant fabric in the complex and is shallowly west‐dipping to flat‐lying in the western zone and steeply west‐dipping in the eastern zone. Peak metamorphism is pre‐ to syn‐D₂. Later ductile deformation reoriented the S₂ foliation, produced S₃ crenulation cleavages across both zones and localised S₄ fabrics. The transition to brittle deformation is defined by the development of east‐ and west‐dipping reverse faults that produce a neutral vergence and not the predominant east‐vergent transport observed throughout the rest of the western Lachlan Fold Belt. Later north‐dipping thrusts overprint these fault structures. The majority of fault transport along ductile and brittle structures occurred prior to the intrusion of the Early Devonian Ararat Granodiorite. Late west‐ and east‐dipping faults represent the final stages of major brittle deformation: these are post plutonism.     

An occurrence of grandidierite,kornerupine, and tourmaline in southeastern Ontario,Canada

Grandidierite, kornerupine, and tourmaline occur in high-grade pelitic gneisses from southeastern Ontario, Canada. The kornerupine occurs in quartz-bearing layers associated with biotite, cordierite, garnet, ilmenite, K-feldspar, magnetite, quartz, and, less commonly, sillimanite. Grandidierite is found in quartz-poor, cordierite+sillimanite segregations in contact with biotite, cordierite, ilmenite, K-feldspar, magnetite, sillimanite, and, more rarely, garnet. Tourmaline is sporadically distributed in all compositional layers, but is not in contact with the other borosilicates. There is no textural evidence for a reactive relationship among the three borosilicates. Neither chemical or textural equilibrium has been achieved on the scale of a thin section.It is proposed that the granite, K-feldspar-rich leucosomes, and different borosilicate assemblages in adjacent compositional layers evolved along a path of decreasing pressure and increasing temperature. The P-T path intersected a series of dehydration and melting reactions. This P-T path indicates that uplift had occurred before cooling had started and before the maximum temperature was reached. Corona and symplectite textures developed at various times during uplift both before and after cooling had started.     

A temporal model for landslide risk based on historical precipitation

Of the recognized nonsteady-state factors that influence slope stability, probably most critical in many field situations is the character of precipitation and infiltration activity. A groundwater response model used in conjunction with precipitation records can provide a historical catalog of estimated maximum groundwater levels in a particular study area. An extreme-value statistical analysis of this catalog is linked with geotechnical slope stability analyses to provide a landslide hazard model for estimating the probability of slope failure within a given time. This modeling approach can provide meaningful input to risk assessments for landslide mitigation programs and to decision analyses and cost-benefit studies important for land-use planning and resource management.This paper was presented at Emerging Concepts, MGUS 87 Conference, Redwood City, California, 13–15 April 1987.     

Early Cretaceous uplift and erosion of the northern Appalachian Basin, New York, based on apatite fission track analysis

The thermal history of outcropping Devonian sediments of the northern Appalachian Basin, New York, has been investigated using fission track analysis of detrital apatites from 57 sandstone samples. Based on lengths and apparent age measurements using fission tracks in apatite it is concluded that Lower Devonian sediments presently at the surface in the Catskill region were cooled rapidly from temperatures higher than about 110°C during Early Cretaceous times (120–140 Ma ago). In the western part of New York (Wellsville-Buffalo) data from late Devonian sediments are consistent with cooling at the same time as that identified for the Catskill region but from lower temperatures, in the range of approximately 80–110°C, the maximum temperature these sediments experienced since deposition. For a pre-uplift paleogeothermal gradient of 25–35°C/km, the confined track length data indicates uplift and erosion of 2–3 km for western New York and greater than 3–4 km for the Catskill region, a differential uplift pattern which is consistent with the historical stratigraphic data from the region. This conclusion is at variance with earlier interpretations put forth by others.Rapid broad scale uplift and erosion of the scale identified imply that large volumes of sediment could have been supplied from the northern Appalachian Basin during the Early Cretaceous. This timing for the dominant post-Devonian cooling phase in the basin is not accounted for by recent models of the tectonic evolution of the Appalachian Orogen but is compatible with the change from carbonate to siliciclastic deposition in the Atlantic coastal plain. It is suggested that this style of broad regional uplift without significant deformation is characteristic of a tectonic regime associated with, and subsequent to, continental rifting.Apatite fission track analysis is shown to be a basic tool in providing fundamental limits for thermal history assessment in regional tectonic problems.     

Subsurface transport in water and gas

Current designs for nuclear-waste repositories rely primarily upon subsurface geologic barriers for long-term containment. Because water and air are generally considered to be the mechanisms most likely to transport radioactivity to the surface environment, flow and transport models are important tools in repository assessment. Most models assume that the geologic medium can be treated as a continuum. A substantial body of recent work has focused on applying these models to difficult-to-solve problems, such as the simulation of variably dense or variably saturated flow and transport, large and complex flow systems, sharp solute concentration fronts, and fractured rock systems. The complex chemical interactions between the transport fluid and solid particles within the system have been analyzed using geochemical flow models, most of which assume that the system is at chemical equilibrium. The role of colloids in contaminant transport is a relatively new area of research. The large-scale effects of small-scale variability within the geologic system have been the subject of intense investigation. Inherent limitations of the continuum approach have prompted the design of models in which the flow occurs in discrete fractures. The difficulty and complexity of simulating transport has led to the development of network transport models, which represent the flow field as a series of 1-D path segments. The widespread use of models for prediction and analysis has prompted investigations of their reliability and relative merits.