Oxygen isotope and deuterium composition of snow cover on the profile of Western Siberia from Tomsk to the Gulf of Ob

The purpose of this work is to study the variability of the isotope composition (δ¹⁸О, δD, d _exc) of the snow cover on a long transect of Western Siberia from the southern taiga to the tundra. The study of the snow cover is of paleogeographic, paleogeocryological, and paleohydrological value. The snow cover of western Siberia was sampled on a broadly NS transzonal profile from the environs of Tomsk (southern taiga zone) to the eastern coast of the Gulf of Ob (tundra zone) from February 19 to March 4, 2014. Snow samples were collected at 31 sites. Most of the samples represented by fresh snow, i.e., snow that had fallen a day before the moment of sampling were collected in two areas. In the area of Yamburg, the snow specimens collected from the surface are most probably settled snow of different ages. The values of δ¹⁸О in the snow from Tomsk to Yamburg varied from–21.89 to–32.82‰, and the values of δD, from–163.3 to–261.2‰. The value of deuterium excess was in the range of 4.06–19.53‰.     

Island arcs,deep-sea trenches,and seismofocal zones of Indonesia and the Pacific Ocean: Similarity and distinctions

The available geological, gravimetric, and seismological data suggest that island arcs, deep-sea trenches, and seismofocal zones of Indonesia (as a part of the Alpine-Indonesian mobile belt) differ significantly from structures of the same names of the Pacific ring proper. Thus, seismofocal zones of the ring are characterized by the stress-strain conditions of subhorizontal across-strike compression at depths of 0–400 km. In seismofocal zones of the mobile belt, such conditions exist only in the depth interval ～(0–40) km. At depths of about 40 to 400 km, lengthening (the T axis) is oriented along the dip-updip direction of a zone, whereas shortening (the P axis) is oriented along the strike of a seismofocal zone or, if individual P axes are not well ordered in this depth interval, they are scattered near the plane normal to the lengthening axis. We relate these distinctions to the fact that the mobile belt inherits a geosynclinal, rather than oceanic, basin that cannot be regarded as a huge bay of the paleo-Pacific. The aforementioned data imply that SW Melanesia (the New Guinea Islands, Bismarck Archipelago, and Solomon Islands) includes the recent Bismarck geosynclinal zone located on the strike of the Indonesian segment of the Alpine-Indonesian mobile belt.     

Estimation of surface temperature anomalies of the Sea of Okhotsk and adjacent areas based on satellite data

Based on the long-term data obtained with a TeraScan receiver from NOAA satellites, the monthly average anomalies of the water surface in the Sea of Okhotsk have been calculated with a resolution of 0.25° and their statistical characteristics have been analyzed. During the studies, water areas with significant deviations from the average long-term values were estimated and the zones where anomalies substantially exceeded the standard deviation were distinguished. The spatial-time variations in these anomalies have been studied using the methods of decomposition in terms of empirical orthogonal functions and spectral analysis.     

The structure of mercury’s regolith from photometric data

The integral photometric properties of Mercury and the Moon were studied, and the similarities in the reflectance characteristics of small surface areas determined by centimeter-sized irregularities were found. The relations obtained were used to pattern the surface of the Hermean soil on a specified scale. In a first approximation, the resulting image shows the character of the photometric relief of Mercury and the fine-grained structure of the surface in a range of phase angles, where the shadow function of centimeter-sized irregularities most affects the brightness of the mantle material. Probable variations of the photometric-relief types were revealed in processing the images selected from a series obtained from the Mariner 10 flyby. According to the data analysis, three main types of photometric relief were distinguished, which correspond to different morphological types of the Hermean surface formations. The relationship between the morphological types and the properties of the surface structure of the Hermean mantle material was revealed via morphological studies.Translated from Astronomicheskii Vestnik, Vol. 38, No. 6, 2004, pp. 504–512.Original Russian Text Copyright © 2004 by Molodensky     

A Spectropolarimetric Maturity Index of Lunar Soil

The lunar soil maturity is the most important parameter of the Moon's surface material. The degree of regolith processing should be taken into account in remote determinations of the chemical and mineralogical surface compositions. However, the possibilities for directly determining the lunar regolith maturity are limited to laboratory studies of the fine fraction and microparticles of samples returned to Earth. In these conditions, the urgency of developing methods for remotely determining the lunar soil maturity increases sharply. The suggested method of using spectropolarimetric data to quantitatively estimate the maturity of the surface material has an advantage that the derived maturity index is determined only by structural parameters of the reflecting layer and is completely free from the effects of chemical and mineralogical surface rock compositions. The reference catalog of spectropolarimetric indices contains values for 92 objects on the Moon's visible hemisphere and includes a wide range of structures with various degrees of maturity of the surface material. We obtained correlations with other maturity indices determined by laboratory and remote sensing techniques and the time scale that represents the correspondence between the spectropolarimetric maturity index and the soil exposure age.     

Spacecraft exploration of asteroids

The past, current, and planned space missions for asteroid exploration are reviewed. The main results based on observations performed with satellites in near-Earth orbits (OAO-2, IUE, FIRSSE, IRAS, HST, Hipparcos, ISO, MSX) and space probes sent to particular objects (Galileo, NEAR, DS1, Stardust) are reported. Future space missions (MUSES-C, Rosetta, DOWN, etc.) and their main goals in asteroid study are considered. The feasibility of using spacecraft for minor-body exploration is discussed.Translated from Astronomicheskii Vestnik, Vol. 39, No. 1, 2005, pp. 81–90. Original Russian Text Copyright © 2005 by Shevchenko, Mohamed.     

Photometric relief of the previously uninvestigated surface of mercury

The results of investigations of the surface relief of Mercury with a classical photometric method are reported. A subject of the photometric method is the intensity of light reflected by the surface of the planet. The main data for the photometric study are the high-resolution images of Mercury received from the MESSENGER space station during its first flyby over Mercury. The images of the surface of Mercury were downloaded from the NASA web-site (http://messenger.jhuapl.edu) and converted to a digital form for photometric measurements. The reflectance characteristics of the surface were calculated according to the model of a three-dimensional scattering phase function (Shevchenko, 1979; 2004a; 2006). From the photometric processing of the space-borne images, the reflectance of four morphologic types of the surface structure of Mercury was determined. With the Hapke model of the bidirectional reflectance (Hapke, 2001), the structural inhomogeneity of the regions of the morphologic forms with centimeter-sized rough-ness was estimated.     

Photometry and models of eight near-Earth asteroids

We present new observations and models of the shapes and rotational states of the eight near-Earth Asteroids (1580) Betulia, (1627) Ivar, (1980) Tezcatlipoca, (2100) Ra-Shalom, (3199) Nefertiti, (3908) Nyx, (4957) Brucemurray, and (5587) 1990 SB. We also outline some of their solar phase curves, corrected to common reference geometry with the models. Some of the targets may feature sizable global nonconvexities, but the observable solar phase angles were not sufficiently high for confirming these. None is likely to have a very densely cratered surface. We discuss the role of the intermediate topographic scale range in photometry, and surmise that this scale range is less important than large or small scale lengths.     

Seasonal variability of oceanological conditions in the northern part of the Tatar Strait

An average long-term distribution of temperature and salinity is analyzed for different months (May–November) computed on the basis of materials accumulated at standard oceanological sections of the northern part of the Tatar Strait. The main attention is paid to the section Korsakov Cape-Cape Syurkum crossing the water area under study practically in the middle. In early spring, the cold waters with salinity of more than 33‰ are registered at the section Korsakov Cape-Cape Syurkum. The waters with smaller salinity are revealed only in late spring, in June. In the same period, the intensification of cold intermediate layer occurs, first of all, in the western part of the section. The waters in the surface layer near the Sakhalin coast are warmed more than at the continental shelf. During the summer, this difference gradually decreases and the surface layer temperature becomes even in September. On the contrary, the spatial salinity gradients increase. In the fall, under the influence of northern and northwestern winds being typical of this period, the upwelling is formed near the Sakhalin coast and the cold dense waters emerge in the narrow coastal strip. The direction of alongshore flow changes from northern to the southern one. At the section Korsakov Cape-Cape Syurkum in November, the influence of small-salinity waters associated with the Amur River runoff is significantly revealed.     

Massive identification of asteroids in three-body resonances

An essential role in the asteroidal dynamics is played by the mean motion resonances. Two-body planet–asteroid resonances are widely known, due to the Kirkwood gaps. Besides, so-called three-body mean motion resonances exist, in which an asteroid and two planets participate. Identification of asteroids in three-body (namely, Jupiter–Saturn–asteroid) resonances was initially accomplished by Nesvorný and Morbidelli (Nesvorný D., Morbidelli, A. [1998]. Astron. J. 116, 3029–3037), who, by means of visual analysis of the time behaviour of resonant arguments, found 255 asteroids to reside in such resonances. We develop specialized algorithms and software for massive automatic identification of asteroids in the three-body, as well as two-body, resonances of arbitrary order, by means of automatic analysis of the time behaviour of resonant arguments. In the computation of orbits, all essential perturbations are taken into account. We integrate the asteroidal orbits on the time interval of 100,000 yr and identify main-belt asteroids in the three-body Jupiter–Saturn–asteroid resonances up to the 6th order inclusive, and in the two-body Jupiter–asteroid resonances up to the 9th order inclusive, in the set of ～250,000 objects from the “Asteroids – Dynamic Site” (AstDyS) database. The percentages of resonant objects, including extrapolations for higher-order resonances, are determined. In particular, the observed fraction of pure-resonant asteroids (those exhibiting resonant libration on the whole interval of integration) in the three-body resonances up to the 6th order inclusive is ≈0.9% of the whole set; and, using a higher-order extrapolation, the actual total fraction of pure-resonant asteroids in the three-body resonances of all orders is estimated as ≈1.1% of the whole set.