Age and impacts of the caldera-forming Aniakchak II eruption in western Alaska

The mid-Holocene eruption of Aniakchak volcano (Aniakchak II) in southwest Alaska was among the largest eruptions globally in the last 10,000 years (VEI-6). Despite evidence for possible impacts on global climate, the precise age of the eruption is not well-constrained and little is known about regional environmental impacts. A closely spaced sequence of radiocarbon dates at a peatland site over 1000 km from the volcano show that peat accumulation was greatly reduced with a hiatus of approximately 90–120 yr following tephra deposition. During this inferred hiatus no paleoenvironmental data are available but once vegetation returned the flora changed from a Cyperaceae-dominated assemblage to a Poaceae-dominated vegetation cover, suggesting a drier and/or more nutrient-rich ecosystem. Oribatid mites are extremely abundant in the peat at the depth of the ash, and show a longer-term, increasingly wet peat surface across the tephra layer. The radiocarbon sample immediately below the tephra gave a date of 1636–1446 cal yr BC suggesting that the eruption might be younger than previously thought. Our findings suggest that the eruption may have led to a widespread reduction in peatland carbon sequestration and that the impacts on ecosystem functioning were profound and long-lasting.     

中国历史时期气候变化影响及其应对的启示简

The social impact of global climate change is one of the hotspots in the current research. To deal with the challenges from climate change, it could be learned from the adapting experiences and lessons to climate change in the history. The main achievements of cognition on the historical impacts of climatic change in China and on coping with the climate changes in the future based the published papers in recent years is summarized. The followings are the main conclusions. ①The general characteristics of the impacts of climatic change in the history was negative in the cold periods and positive in the warm periods, but there were regional differences in the impact and responses. ②The cooling trend on centurial scale and the social economic decline run concurrently. The rapid development supported by better resources and environment in the warm period could lead to the increase of the social vulnerability when the climate turned to the cold period. ③Strategies and policies to cope with the climate change in the history were adopted according to the temporal and spatial circumstances and the subjects. Initiative adaptation promoted by governments was an effective way.     

未来气候情景下气候变化响应过程研究综述

气候变化将会对生态系统、自然资源、极端气候和人类社会产生一定的影响,科学评估未来气候变化响应是应对气候变化的前提。通过对当前研究成果的回顾,建立未来气候情景下气候变化响应研究的系统思路,并总结了研究所涉及的方法。系统论述了应用第5阶段耦合模式比较计划(CMIP5)气候模式前进行适用性评价的必要性;分析了当前降尺度方法尤其是统计降尺度的主要方法及进展;归纳了偏差校正过程中普遍使用的方法,最后,综合分析了整个研究过程中的不确定性。研究将为气候变化响应分析提供方法和思路指导。     

Economics of climate change: risk and responsibility by world region

The impacts of predicted climate change will not be distributed evenly around the world. As post-Kyoto negotiations unfold, relating the geographical distribution of projected impacts to responsibility for emissions among world regions is essential for achieving an equitable path forward. This article surveys the current knowledge of regional climate consequences, and delves into the regional predictions of economic assessment models to date, examining how the uncertainties, assumptions and ethical dimensions influence the portrayal of risk at this scale. The few studies that quantitatively compared regional risk and responsibility are reviewed, and the analytical framework from one such study is applied to the 2006 Stern Review's projections to give the first regional comparison to take purchasing power and welfare considerations into account. Synthesizing burden and blame in this way is informative for policy makers; the world's most vulnerable communities—in Africa, the Indian subcontinent, Latin America, and small island states—accounted for less than 33% of global greenhouse gas emissions over the period 1961–2000, but may experience more than 75% of the ensuing climate damages this century. This analysis reinforces the call for industrialized nations to lead mitigation efforts, and to do so decisively and swiftly.     

3. Solar System Formation and Early Evolution: the First 100 Million Years

The solar system, as we know it today, is about 4.5 billion years old. It is widely believed that it was essentially completed 100 million years after the formation of the Sun, which itself took less than 1 million years, although the exact chronology remains highly uncertain. For instance: which, of the giant planets or the terrestrial planets, formed first, and how? How did they acquire their mass? What was the early evolution of the “primitive solar nebula” (solar nebula for short)? What is its relation with the circumstellar disks that are ubiquitous around young low-mass stars today? Is it possible to define a “time zero” (t ₀), the epoch of the formation of the solar system? Is the solar system exceptional or common? This astronomical chapter focuses on the early stages, which determine in large part the subsequent evolution of the proto-solar system. This evolution is logarithmic, being very fast initially, then gradually slowing down. The chapter is thus divided in three parts: (1) The first million years: the stellar era. The dominant phase is the formation of the Sun in a stellar cluster, via accretion of material from a circumstellar disk, itself fed by a progressively vanishing circumstellar envelope. (2) The first 10 million years: the disk era. The dominant phase is the evolution and progressive disappearance of circumstellar disks around evolved young stars; planets will start to form at this stage. Important constraints on the solar nebula and on planet formation are drawn from the most primitive objects in the solar system, i.e., meteorites. (3) The first 100 million years: the “telluric” era. This phase is dominated by terrestrial (rocky) planet formation and differentiation, and the appearance of oceans and atmospheres.     

CCD Photometry of Asteroid （147） Protogeneia

We measured the light-curve of the asteroid (147) Protogeneia in November 2004, with a CCD detector attached to the 1-meter telescope at the Yunnan Observatory, China. The synodic period and maximum amplitude of (147) at this apparition are 7.852 hours and 0.25 mag, respectively. The value of a/b for (147), from a preliminary estimation, is not less than 1.26:1.     

A survey of orbits of co-orbitals of Mars

Many asteroids with a semimajor axis close to that of Mars have been discovered in the last several years. Potentially some of these could be in 1:1 resonance with Mars, much as are the classic Trojan asteroids with Jupiter, and its lesser-known horseshoe companions with Earth. In the 1990s, two Trojan companions of Mars, 5261 Eureka and 1998 VF₃₁, were discovered, librating about the L₅ Lagrange point, 60° behind Mars in its orbit. Although several other potential Mars Trojans have been identified, our orbital calculations show only one other known asteroid, 1999 UJ₇, to be a Trojan, associated with the L₄ Lagrange point, 60° ahead of Mars in its orbit. We further find that asteroid 36017 (1999 ND₄₃) is a horseshoe librator, alternating with periods of Trojan motion. This asteroid makes repeated close approaches to Earth and has a chaotic orbit whose behavior can be confidently predicted for less than 3000 years. We identify two objects, 2001 HW₁₅ and 2000 TG₂, within the resonant region capable of undergoing what we designate “circulation transition”, in which objects can pass between circulation outside the orbit of Mars and circulation inside it, or vice versa. The eccentricity of the orbit of Mars appears to play an important role in circulation transition and in horseshoe motion. Based on the orbits and on spectroscopic data, the Trojan asteroids of Mars may be primordial bodies, while some co-orbital bodies may be in a temporary state of motion.     

The impact of fragment “L” of comet SL-9 on Jupiter

Filtergrams of high spatial and temporal resolution were obtained in the methane band centred at 892 nm during the impact of fragment L of comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 on Jupiter. The light curve shows two maxima of an emission ball observed above the limb shortly after the impact. The second maximum was the brightest and had a short life time of about 90 seconds. During it's life, the apparent height of the emission ball declined towards the surface of Jupiter; the amount of displacement is larger than the expected effect caused by Jupiter's rotation. About half an hour after the impact, a domelike feature became visible when the location of the impact rotated into the illuminated hemisphere of Jupiter.     

Interannual and seasonal variation of the Huanghe (Yellow River) water discharge over the past 50 years: Connections to impacts from ENSO events and dams

The Huanghe, the second largest river in China, is now under great pressure as a water resource. Using datasets of river water discharge, water consumption and regional precipitation for the past 50 years, we elucidate some connections between decreasing water discharges, global El Niño/Southern Oscillation (ENSO) events and anthropogenic impacts in the drainage basin. Global ENSO events, which directly affected the regional precipitation in the river basin, resulted in approximately 51% decrease in river water discharge to the sea. The degree of anthropogenic impacts on river water discharge is now as great as that of natural influences, accelerating the water losses in the hydrological cycle. The large dams and reservoirs regulated the water discharge and reduced the peak flows by storing the water in the flood season and releasing it in the dry season as needed for agricultural irrigation. Thus, as a result, large dams and reservoirs have shifted the seasonal distribution patterns of water discharge and water consumption and finally resulted in rapidly increasing water consumption. Meanwhile, the annual distribution pattern of water consumption also changed under the regulation of dams and reservoirs, indicating that the people living in the river basin consume the water more and more to suit actual agricultural schedule rather than depending upon natural pattern of annual precipitation. The combination of the increasing water consumption facilitated by the dams and reservoirs and the decreasing precipitation closely associated with the global ENSO events over the past half century has resulted in water scarcity in this world-famous river, as well as in a number of subsequent serious results for the river, delta and coastal ocean.