Crustal outgassing and LILE enrichment in major lithosphere structures,Archean Abitibi greenstone belt: evidence on the source reservoir from strontium and carbon isotope tracers

Major structural discontinuities in the Abitibi greenstone belt acted as conduits for outgassing of the Archean crust, as reflected in fixation of a select group of lithophile elements including Si, C, K, Rb, Ba, Li, Cs, B and Pb, in metasomatized faults. For two of the largest structures, the Destor-Porcupine (DP) and Kirkland Lake — Cadillac (KC) fault zones 6×10¹⁵ g Si, 3×10¹⁵ g CO₂ and 10¹⁵ g K were introduced into the faults during expulsion of an estimated 6×10¹⁸ g aqueous fluids. Strontium isotope ratios of tourmaline, piemontite, actinolite and scheelite mineral separates, characterized by Rb/Sr0.02, are concordant with respect to ⁸⁷Sr/⁸⁶Sr initial ratios over local sectors of the faults. The Sr isotope data record geographic variations which, from east to west on the KC fault is 0.7031–0.7041 (Val d'Or), 0.7008–0.7022 (Bourlemaque), 0.7017–0.7019 (Bousquet), 0.7029–0.7031 (Noranda), and 0.7013 to 0.7015 (Kirkland Lake). At Timmins, on the PD fault, ⁸⁷Sr/⁸⁶Sr initial ratios cluster at 0.7010 to 0.7020. Metasomatised fault zones are systematically more radiogenic than contiguous host lithologies, and imply a source reservoir (0.7010 to 0.7041) generally more radiogenic than the upper mantle at 2690 Ma (0.700±0.001), or contemporaneous volcanic rocks of mafic to ultramafic composition (0.700 to 0.7012). Whereas certain minerals are concordant and retentive, Rb-Sr isochrons based on suites of rocks at progressive intensities of metasomatism, have been systematically reset over an elpased time of 200 Ma after termination of outgassing, due to disturbance accompanying incremental displacements on structures.Carbon isotope compositions of ferroan dolomites in faults are tightly clustered along local fault sectors, but also display a marked provinciality: from east to west ¹³C=–6.0 to –8.5 (Malartic), –8.0 to –9.0 (Cadillac), –2.0 to –4.5 (Kirkland Lake), and –0.5 to –3.5 (Timmins). The observed provinciality of both ¹³C values and ⁸⁷Sr/⁸⁶Sr initial ratios is interpreted to reflect compositional heterogeneities in a radiogenic sialic crust and the green-stone belt supracrustal sequence, both of which supplied volatiles, magmas and lithophile elements to the fault structures during late stage transpressive tectonics.     

Temperature and Salinity Effects on Alkenone Ratios Measured in Surface Sediments from the Indian Ocean

We compare alkenone unsaturation ratios measured on recent sediments from the Indian Ocean (20°N–45°S) with modern sea oceanographic parameters. For each of the core sites we estimated average seasonal cycles of sea surface temperature (SST) and salinity, which we then weighted with the seasonal productivity cycle derived from chlorophyll satellite imagery. The unsaturation index (U₃₇^K′) ranges from 0.2 to 1 and correlates with water temperature but not with salinity. TheU₃₇^K′versus SST relationship for Indian Ocean sediments (U₃₇^K′= 0.033 SST + 0.05) is similar to what has been observed for core tops from the Pacific and Atlantic oceans and the Black Sea. A global compilation for core tops givesU₃₇^K′= 0.031 T + 0.084 (R= 0.98), which is close to a previously reported calibration based on particulate organic matter from the water column. For temperatures between 24° and 29°C, however, the slope seems to decrease to about 0.02U₃₇^K′unit/°C. For Indian Ocean core tops, the ratios of total C₃₇alkenones/total C₃₈alkenones and the slope of theU₃₇^K′-SST relationship are similar to those previously observed for cultures ofEmiliania huxleyibut different from those previously published forGephyrocapsa oceanica.EitherE. huxleyiis a major producer of alkenones in the Indian Ocean or strains ofG. oceanicaliving in the northern Indian Ocean behave differently from the one cultured. In contrast with coccolithophorid assemblages, the ratios of C₃₇alkenones to total C₃₈alkenones lack clear geographic pattern in the Indian Ocean.     

Mechanical shredding of water hyacinth (<Emphasis Type="Italic">Eichhornia crassipes</Emphasis>): Effects on water quality in the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta,California

Management actions to control invasive aquatic species can have significant ecosystem-scale effects. We evaluated the water chemistry and nutrient effects of mechanical shredding to control water hyacinth (Eichhornia crassipes) in an agricultural slough and a tidal wetland on the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta, California. Shredding was conducted with two types of shredder boats in fall of 2003 and another boat in spring of 2004. Shredding measurably affected water quality, but specific effects varied as a function of shredding site and season. Significant increases were observed for total Kjeldahl nitrogen and total phosphorus for all experiments. Dissolved oxygen effects varied by site, decreasing after shredding at the agricultural slough but increasing at the tidal wetland. The increase in dissolved oxygen likely resulted from tidal incursions from the adjacent river. A year-long time series of dissolved oxygen data indicated a negative relationship between hyacinth abundance and dissolved oxygen concentrations. Hyacinth contained similar tissue concentrations of mercury to underlying sediments, suggesting that plant harvesting could aid mercury remediation efforts. Simple mass calculations indicated that Delta-wide shredding operations could cause between 0.1% and 9.6% increases in the overall abundance of carbon, nitrogen, and phosphorus in the Delta water column. Results suggest that local effects of management actions to control invasive aquatic plants will vary widely as a function of site-specific hydrology, but that estuary-wide effects would be limited.     

A Validation of CloudSat and CALIPSO's Temperature,Humidity, Cloud Detection,and Cloud Base Height over the Arctic Marine Cryosphere

Abstract

This study presents a semi‐analytic non‐iterative solution for the Monin‐Obukhov similarity equations under unstable surface conditions. The solution is represented in terms of the non‐dimensional Monin‐Obukhov stability parameter z/L. This parameter is given as a function of the bulk Richardson number and other surface parameters including the heat and momentum roughness lengths which are generally assumed to be different in this formulation. The proposed formulations give results that are both quantitatively and qualitatively consistent with the fully iterated numerical solution for a wide range of surface parameters.     

Linking vulnerability, adaptation, and resilience science to practice: Pathways, players, and partnerships

Vulnerability, adaptation and resilience are concepts that are finding increasing currency in several fields of research as well as in various policy and practitioner communities engaged in global environmental change science, climate change, sustainability science, disaster risk-reduction and famine interventions. As scientists and practitioners increasingly work together in this arena a number of questions are emerging: What is credible, salient and legitimate knowledge, how is this knowledge generated and how is it used in decision making? Drawing on important science in this field, and including a case study from southern Africa, we suggest an alternative mode of interaction to the usual one-way interaction between science and practice often used. In this alternative approach, different experts, risk-bearers, and local communities are involved and knowledge and practice is contested, co-produced and reflected upon. Despite some successes in the use and negotiation of such knowledge for ‘real’ world issues, a number of problems persist that require further investigation including the difficulties of developing consensus on the methodologies used by a range of stakeholders usually across a wide region (as the case study of southern Africa shows, particularly in determining and identifying vulnerable groups, sectors, and systems); slow delivery of products that could enhance resilience to change that reflects not only a lack of data, and need for scientific credibility, but also the time-consuming process of coming to a negotiated understanding in science–practice interactions and, finally, the need to clarify the role of ‘external’ agencies, stakeholders, and scientists at the outset of the dialogue process and subsequent interactions. Such factors, we argue, all hinder the use of vulnerability and resilience ‘knowledge’ that is being generated and will require much more detailed investigation by both producers and users of such knowledge.     

High-resolution historical records from Pettaquamscutt River basin sediments: 1. Pb and varve chronologies validate record of Cs released by the Chernobyl accident

Cesium-137 derived from the explosion of the Chernobyl reactor in 1986 was preserved in anoxic sediments from a coastal environment in southern Rhode Island. Although the radioactive plume was detected in surface air samples at several locations in the United States, this is the first known record of a Chernobyl ¹³⁷Cs peak in sediments from North America. The inventory of Chernobyl ¹³⁷Cs that was preserved in the Pettaquamscutt River is small compared to European counterparts and should only be detectable for the next 15-20 yr. However, the presence of two ¹³⁷Cs peaks (1963 and 1987) identifies a well-dated segment of the sediment column that could be exploited in understanding the decomposition and preservation of terrestrial and aquatic organic matter. Different methods for calculating the ²¹⁰Pb chronology were also evaluated in this study and checked against independent varve counting. The end result is a detailed chronology of a site well suited for reconstruction of historical records of environmental change.     

A paleolimnological constraint to the extent of the Last Glaciation on northern Devon Island, Canadian High Arctic

Pre-Holocenelacustrine sediments from a small coastal lake on the TrueloveLowland, northeastern Devon Island,Nunavut Territory, Canada, indicatethat a viable terrestrial ecosystem existed prior to postglacialmarine inundation and subsequent isostatic emergence of thebasin. An AMS ¹⁴C age of 38 kaBP on the basal lacustrine unit provides a preliminarygeochronological framework. This find has directimplications for regional glacial history, becauseit argues against both the Late Wisconsinan glaciation ofcertain coastal lowlands on northern Devon Island,as well as the occupation of Jones Sound by an outlet of theInnuitian Ice Sheet between Devon and Ellesmere islands.     

The legacy of crystal-plastic deformation in olivine: high-diffusivity pathways during serpentinization

Crystal-plastic olivine deformation to produce subgrain boundaries composed of edge dislocations is an inevitable consequence of asthenospheric mantle flow. Although crystal-plastic deformation and serpentinization are spatio-temporally decoupled, we identified compositional readjustments expressed on the micrometric level as a striped Fe-enriched ( [`(X)]<sub>\textFe</sub> \bar{X}_{\text{Fe}}  = 0.24 ± 0.02 (zones); 0.12 ± 0.02 (bulk)) or Fe-depleted ( [`(X)]_\textFe \bar{X}_{\text{Fe}}  = 0.10 ± 0.01 (zones); 0.13 ± 0.01 (bulk)) zoning in partly serpentinized olivine grains from two upper mantle sections in Norway. Focused ion beam sample preparation combined with transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and aberration-corrected scanning TEM, enabling atomic-level resolved electron energy-loss spectroscopic line profiling, reveals that every zone is immediately associated with a subgrain boundary. We infer that the zonings are a result of the environmental Fe²⁺Mg₋₁ exchange potential during antigorite serpentinization of olivine and the drive toward element exchange equilibrium. This is facilitated by enhanced solid-state diffusion along subgrain boundaries in a system, which otherwise re-equilibrates via dissolution-reprecipitation. Fe enrichment or depletion is controlled by the silica activity imposed on the system by the local olivine/orthopyroxene mass ratio, temperature and the effect of magnetite stability. The Fe-Mg exchange coefficients K_\textD^{\textAtg/\textOl} K_{\text{D}}^{{{\text{Atg}}/{\text{Ol}}}} between both types of zoning and antigorite display coalescence toward exchange equilibrium. With both types of zoning, Mn is enriched and Ni depleted compared with the unaffected bulk composition. Nanometer-sized, heterogeneously distributed antigorite precipitates along olivine subgrain boundaries suggest that water was able to ingress along them. Crystallographic orientation relationships gained via electron backscatter diffraction between olivine grain domains and different serpentine vein generations support the hypothesis that serpentinization was initiated along olivine subgrain boundaries.