Geology of the summit limestone of Mount Qomolangma (Everest) and cooling history of the Yellow Band under the Qomolangma detachment

Abstract   Newly discovered peloidal limestone from the summit of Mount Qomolangma (Mount Everest) contains skeletal fragments of trilobites, ostracods and crinoids. They are small pebble-sized debris interbedded in micritic bedded limestone of the Qomolangma Formation, and are interpreted to have been derived from a bank margin and redeposited in peri-platform environments. An exposure of the Qomolangma detachment at the base of the first step (8520 m), on the northern slope of Mount Qomolangma was also found. Non-metamorphosed, strongly fractured Ordovician limestone is separated from underlying metamorphosed Yellow Band by a sharp fault with a breccia zone. The ⁴⁰Ar–³⁹Ar ages of muscovite from the Yellow Band show two-phase metamorphic events of approximately 33.3 and 24.5 Ma. The older age represents the peak of a Barrovian-type Eo-Himalayan metamorphic event and the younger age records a decompressional high-temperature Neo-Himalayan metamorphic event. A muscovite whole-rock ⁸⁷Rb–⁸⁶Sr isochron of the Yellow Band yielded 40.06 ± 0.81 Ma, which suggests a Pre-Himalayan metamorphism, probably caused by tectonic stacking of the Tibetan Tethys sediments in the leading margin of the Indian subcontinent. Zircon and apatite grains, separated from the Yellow Band, gave pooled fission-track ages of 14.4 ± 0.9 and 14.4 ± 1.4 Ma, respectively. These new chronologic data indicate rapid cooling of the hanging wall of the Qomolangma detachment from approximately 350°C to 130°C during a short period (15.5–14.4 Ma).     

The 1998 Hida Mountain, Central Honshu, Japan, earthquake swarm: Double-difference event relocation, frequency–magnitude distribution and Coulomb stress changes

By using the double-difference relocation technique, we have determined the fine structure of seismicity during the 1998 Hida Mountain earthquake swarm. The distribution of seismic activity defines two main directions (N–S and E–W) that probably correspond to the regional stress pattern. The detailed structure of seismicity reveals intense spatio-temporal clustering and earthquake lineations. Each cluster of events contains a mainshock and subsequent aftershock activity that decays according to the Omori law. The seismicity and the b-value temporal and spatial patterns reflect the evolution of the static stress changes during the earthquake swarm. About 80% of the swarm's best-relocated events occur in regions of increased ΔCFF. The smaller value of b found in the northern part of the swarm region and a larger b-value observed to the south, for the same period of time, could be well explained by the static stress changes caused by the larger events of the sequence. We argue that the state of stress in the crust is the main factor that controls the variation of b-value.     

Interhemispheric anti-phasing of rainfall during the last glacial period

We have obtained a high-resolution oxygen isotopic record of cave calcite from Caverna Botuverá (27°13′S, 49°09′W), southern Brazil, which covers most of the last 36 thousand years (ka), with an average resolution of a few to several decades. The chronology was determined with 46 U/Th ages from two stalagmites. Tests for equilibrium conditions show that oxygen isotopic variations are primarily caused by climate change. We interpret our record in terms of meteoric precipitation changes, hence the variability of South American Monsoon (SAM) intensity. The oxygen isotopic profile broadly follows local insolation changes and shows clear millennial-scale variations during the last glacial period with amplitudes as large as 3‰ but with smaller centennial-scale shifts (<1‰) during the Holocene. The overall record is strikingly similar to, but strongly anti-correlated with, a number of records from the Northern Hemisphere.We compared our record to other precisely dated contemporaneous records from Hulu Cave eastern China. Minima in δ¹⁸O (wet periods, intense SAM) at our site are synchronous with maxima in δ¹⁸O (dry periods, weak East Asian Monsoon, EAM) in eastern China (within precise dating errors) and vice versa. This anti-phased precipitation relationship between two low-latitude locations may be interhemispheric in extent, based on comparison with records from other sites. Precipitation anti-phasing may be related to north–south shifts in the mean position of the intertropical convergence zone (ITCZ) and asymmetry in Hadley circulation in two hemispheres, associated not with seasonal changes as observed today, but with millennial-scale climate shifts. The millennial-scale atmospheric see-saw patterns that we observe could have important controls and feedbacks on climate within hemispheres because of water vapor's greenhouse properties.     

230Th/234U and 14C dating of a lowstand coral reef beneath the insular shelf off Irabu Island, Ryukyus, southwestern Japan

Abstract   High-resolution seismic reflection profiles delineated the distribution of mound-shaped reflections, which were interpreted as reefs, beneath the insular shelf western off Irabu Island, Ryukyus, southwestern Japan. A sediment core through one of the mounded structures was recovered from the sea floor at a depth of −118.2 m by offshore drilling and was dated by radiometric methods. The lithology and coral fauna of the core indicate that the mounded structure was composed of coral–algal boundstone suggesting a small-scaled coral reef. High-precision α-spectrometric ²³⁰Th/²³⁴U dating coupled with calibrated accelerator mass spectrometric ¹⁴C ages of corals obtained reliable ages of this reef ranging from 22.18 ± 0.63 to 30.47 ± 0.98 ka. This proves that such a submerged reef was formed during the lowstand stage of marine oxygen isotope stages 3–2. The existence of low-Mg calcite in the aragonitic coral skeleton of 22.18 ± 0.63 ka provides evidence that the reef had once been exposed by lowering of the relative sealevel to at least −126 m during the last glacial maximum in the study area. There is no room for doubt that a coral reef grew during the last glacial period on the shelf off Irabu Island of Ryukyus in the subtropical region of western Pacific.     

Three-Dimensional Interpolation and Lithofacies Analysis of Granular Composition Data for Earthquake-Engineering Characterization of Shallow Soil

In Japan, many major cities are located on tectonic basins which are surrounded by faults and underlain by soft alluvial materials. Because these areas are subject to earthquake damages, it is important to determine their seismic engineering characteristics. Geotechnical databases which contain many borehole logs are useful information sources for this type of analysis. Each datum stored in the database has a value or an attribute, and its location is irregular in both horizontal and vertical directions. A new interpolation method based on the optimization principle is proposed here to deal with such three-dimensionally distributed data. Susceptibility of unconsolidated ground to liquefaction is known to be related to the content of loose and saturated sand. The mixture ratio of several soil types in a deposit, i.e., granular composition, is strongly influenced by the sedimentary environment. There are two numerical methods: the optimization principle method (OPM) used to determine three-dimensional distribution of granular composition and the model used to evaluate liquefaction. The application of the proposed methods to two locations in Japan indicated that the zones with high susceptibility to liquefaction were indeed those that had suffered from liquefaction during past earthquakes.     

Restoring forces on vertical circular cylinders forced by earthquakes

An eigenfunction solution is presented for the dynamic response of vertical circular cylinders to earthquake excitation in a compressible fluid of finite depth. This single eigenseries expansion eliminates the need for a double summation over both the eigenfunctions and the trial functions as required by Rayleigh-Ritz methods. Revised definitions for the added mass and hydrodynamic radiation damping coefficients per unit length are derived from the hydrodynamic fluid pressures. Based on comparisons between these newly defined coefficients, the compressibility of the fluid is found to be relatively more important at dimensionless frequencies greater than unity (ω > 1.0) when analysing both rigid and flexible cylinders having relatively large diameter to water depth ratios,r₀/h > 0.25 (squatty type). This conclusion regarding the relative importance of the fluid compressibility is derived from a comparison between the relative magnitudes and the vertical distributions over depth of both the added mass and radiation damping coefficients per unit length for both rigid and flexible squatty cylinders. From additional comparisons with Rayleigh-Ritz solutions that require trial functions, the results for totally immersed flexible slender cylinders (r₀/h< 0.10) are shown to be equivalent; but the results for totally immersed flexible squatty cylinders (r₀/h > 0.25) are not. The reason for this difference appears to be in the truncation of the trial function series in the Rayleigh-Ritz methods, which excludes the higher mode shapes, and in the definitions of the added mass coefficients. Comparisons with laboratory data for both rigid and flexible cylinders confirm the accuracy of the solutions obtained by the eigenseries in the limited frequency interval above the highest frequency for surface gravity waves (f > 1.0 Hz) and below the first dimensionless cut-off frequency for acoustic waves (ω< 1.0).     

Crustal structure of the Mizuho Plateau, East Antarctica from geophysical data

Various kinds of geophysical surveys have been carried out in the Mizuho Plateau, East Antarctica by the Japanese Antarctic Research Expeditions (JARE). The correlation between the high-level gravity anomaly and the bedrock elevation is examined along a route where both data are sufficient to permit deriving a crustal model from gravity, radio-echo sounding and explosion seismic data. The bedrock elevation usually correlates well with the high-level gravity anomaly. However, along the traverse route S-H-Z from the Syowa to Mizuho stations, the bedrock elevation has a weak negative correlation with the high-level gravity anomaly. Such a weak negative correlation is attributed to the deeper part of the crust.The crustal structure between the Syowa and Mizuho stations is modeled from the gravimetric data and the radio-echo sounding of bedrock elevations, so as to fit the P-wave velocity structure derived from the data of explosion seismic experiments. Then the structure is extended from Syowa Station seaward across Lützow-Holm Bay and from Mizuho Station southeastwards inland, where only gravimetric data are available. Thus, a crustal section about 600 km long is obtained on a margin of East Antarctica. The depth of the Moho increases by about 7 km from Syowa Station to the point Y200 (71° 46′S, 48° 56′E), about 500 km from the coast. A graben-like structure is obtained along the line across Lützow-Holm Bay. This suggests that both sides of the bay are bounded by faults.     

The characterization and distribution of aerosol and gaseous species in the winter monsoon over the western pacific ocean

In order to obtain a better understanding of the behavior of aerosols and SO₂ in the longrange transport through a marine boundary layer, a simple box-model is applied to the evaluation of the residence times of the species from the concentrations of gases and aerosols measured simulataneously on two islands in the West Pacific Ocean in the north-west monsoon. For Aitken and large particles, the residence time is varied from 3.7 to 7.4 days depending on the particle size, and their flux to the sea is equal to or slightly smaller than that of the free atmosphere. The residence time of giant particles is about one day and their flux to the sea is three times larger than that of the free atmosphere. The residence time of SO₂ is 15 hr, and the relative SO₂ mass flows of the deposition to the sea, of the diffusion to the free atmosphere and of the transformation to SO₄ ^2- are approximately 4, 1 and 1, respectively.     

Tectonic evolution along the northernmost border of the Philippine Sea plate since about 1 Ma

Recent structural, tephrochronologic and magnetostratigraphic studies conducted along the northernmost border of the Philippine Sea (PHS) plate enable us to reconstruct the precise tectonic evolution along the convergent boundary between the PHS plate and the Northeast Japan (NEJ) plate or the North American (NAM) plate since about 1 Ma. The authors of the present study split the tectonic evolution into five stages and present the characteristics of each stage. A plate tectonic interpretation is proposed, based upon the tectonic evolution, with special reference to the mode of convergent motion. In brief, our interpretations are as follows: the relative motion between the PHS and the NEJ plates was not recognized geologically within the area studied from about 1.0 to 0.9 Ma (Stage 1), suggesting either none or small influence from the coupling between the two plates during that period of time. Convergence between the PHS and the NEJ plates was possibly in N-S direction from 0.9 to 0.5 Ma (Stage II), and probably north-northwestward since 0.5 Ma (Stages III to V). The mode of the convergent motion was that of buoyant subduction in Stages II and III. The mode changed gradually from buoyant subduction during Stage IV to collision in Stage V (0.07 Ma to the present).