Improvements on particle swarm optimization algorithm for velocity calibration in microseismic monitoring

In this paper,we apply particle swarm optimization(PSO),an artificial intelligence technique,to velocity calibration in microseismic monitoring.We ran simulations with four 1-D layered velocity models and three different initial model ranges.The results using the basic PSO algorithm were reliable and accurate for simple models,but unsuccessful for complex models.We propose the staged shrinkage strategy(SSS) for the PSO algorithm.The SSS-PSO algorithm produced robust inversion results and had a fast convergence rate.We investigated the effects of PSO's velocity clamping factor in terms of the algorithm reliability and computational efficiency.The velocity clamping factor had little impact on the reliability and efficiency of basic PSO,whereas it had a large effect on the efficiency of SSS-PSO.Reassuringly,SSS-PSO exhibits marginal reliability fluctuations,which suggests that it can be confidently implemented.     

城市热岛效应热点问题研究进展

概述了国内外城市热岛效应研究热点及不足,探讨了时空替代性、评价指标合理性、模拟空间尺度适宜性及理论与应用研究相结合等问题,指出未来城市热岛效应研究应注重新方法与新思路的集成、城市群热岛效应监测、城市热岛与全球异常环境要素间的生态关联性、缓解城市热岛效应的生态途径与技术方法。     

“Global warming” versus “climate change”: A replication on the association between political self-identification,question wording,and environmental beliefs

Climate change is one of the greatest threats to humanity and requires immediate action. Schuldt, Konrath, and Schwarz (2011) suggested that beliefs in environmental phenomena can be influenced by the terminology used to describe it: changing question wording from global warming to climate change resulted in a 6.3 percentage point increase in belief in environmental phenomena. This association was moderated by political self-identification, with Republicans being 16.2 percentage points more likely to believe in climate change than in global warming, with Democrats showing no difference. The potential for connotative meanings to shift over time and the sociopolitical changes since the original study, potential policy and environmental campaign implications, and an expansion of these findings to other countries, motivated an attempt to replicate this important finding. This pre-registered study repeated the original procedures in the United States of America and two other countries (United Kingdom and Australia; total N = 5,717). Although question wording no longer had a significant effect on beliefs in climate change/global warming, the association of political self-identification with beliefs in environmental phenomena replicated in all three countries, with Conservatives consistently believing less in climate change/global warming than Liberals. The potential impacts of temporal and methodological differences on the discrepancies between this study's and the original's findings are discussed.     

A Kaapvaal craton debate: Nucleus of an early small supercontinent or affected by an enhanced accretion event?

Incorporation of the Kaapvaal craton within a speculative Neoarchaean–Palaeoproterozoic supercontinent has long been debated, and this idea provides a potential solution to solving the apparently enigmatic provenance of the huge quantities of gold within the famous Witwatersrand auriferous deposits of Kaapvaal. Within a framework of a postulated Neoarchaean “Kenorland” (“northern”; present-day reference) supercontinent, we examine possible “southern” cratons that may have been contiguous with Kaapvaal: Pilbara, Zimbabwe, Dharwar, São Francisco, Amazon, Congo. Brief reviews of their basic geology and inferred evolution in syn-Witwatersrand basin times (c. 3.1–2.8 Ga) show no obvious support for any such supercontinental amalgamations. An alternative idea to explain a measure of gross similarity amongst several Neoarchaean cratons is through global events, such as a c. 3125–3000 Ma cratonic-scale erosive event interpreted for both Pilbara and Kaapvaal, and a much more widespread magmatic event at c. 2760–2680 Ma. We postulate that a global superplume event at c. 3.0 Ga included a plume beneath the Kaapvaal cratonic nucleus, thus halting any subduction around that terrane due to the thermal anomaly. Such a speculative global magmatic event is assumed to have enhanced production of juvenile oceanic crust at mid-ocean ridges, including those “offshore” of the thermally elevated Kaapvaal nucleus. Intra-oceanic obduction complexes may have built up fairly rapidly under such conditions, globally, and once the plume event had abated, “normal” plate tectonics would have resulted in composite (greenstone-tonalite, possibly also including granite) terranes accreting with nuclei such as Kaapvaal. This enhanced plume-related cratonic growth can be seen as a rapid accretion event. Formation of the envisaged ophiolite complexes possibly encompassed deformation-related first-order concentration of gold, and once accretion occurred around Kaapvaal's nucleus, from north and west (present-day frame of reference), a second-order (deformation-related) gold concentration may have resulted. The third order of gold concentration would logically have occurred once placer systems reworked detritus derived from the orogens along the N and W margins of Kaapvaal. Such conditions and placer gold deposits are known from many Neoarchaean cratons. The initial source of gold was presumably from the much hotter Mesoarchaean mantle and may have been related to major changes in Earth's tectonic regime at c. 3.0 Ga. The unique nature of Kaapvaal is probably its early stabilization, enabling formation of a complex flexural foreland basin system, in which vast quantities of placer sediments and heavy minerals could be deposited, and preserved from younger denudation through a unique post-Witwatersrand history.     

南海北部陆缘磁静区及与全球大洋磁静区对比的研究评述

磁静区与磁异常条带不同,具有宽缓的低幅值磁异常特征,但可能同样包含了从陆壳张裂到海底扩张早期的构造活动和演化信息.为了加深认识南海北部陆缘磁静区,归纳了全球深海和边缘两大类型磁静区的物理、化学及构造三大成因,主要包括大西洋和西太平洋侏罗纪磁静区,以及北太平洋、印度洋和南大洋白垩纪磁静区,强调磁静区与不同程度地幔柱活动、斜交扩张初始产生的小型错断磁源体及隐含弱磁条带关系的重要性.总结了南海北部陆缘磁静区的研究现状,并从区域综合地球物理和地幔热活动作用两方面探讨了南海北部陆缘磁静区的可能成因机制,最后阐述了需要关注的研究重点及其研究意义.     

青藏高原北部地区弱震空间图像特征与中短期地震预测方法

通过对青藏高原北部地区31次地震的研究,确定了震前地震活动图像的中短期预测指标以及中期向短期过渡的异常判据及预测方法。研究结果表明,中强地震前普遍存在地震空区、弱震条带、前兆地震或震群、地震活动增强和平静等异常图像,所表现出的异常时间存在很大的差异。具有中短期特征的弱震空区(段)和条带一般出现在震前1～3a,平均持续时间1a,在空区解体后1～6个月发生地震。大多数前兆地震或震群活动属于短临异常,一般出现在震前几天至6个月,震级差为1．0～2．3,距离震中5～60km,空间上主要集中在祁连山地震带。地震活动增强以应力集中为主,属于短期异常特征。异常图像在时间上表现为中期阶段以孕震空区、弱震条带、地震活动增强和平静等异常,异常比较显著且不同步;短临阶段出现前兆地震和地震空区停止活动而形成的临震前的相对平静。异常图像在空间上具有较明显的分区性,与区域活动构造有一定的关系。     

Relative source time functions of seismic events at the Rudna copper mine, Poland: estimation of inversion uncertainties

The relative source time function (RSTF) inversion uncertainty assessment was performed for two small, mining-induced seismic events (M _W =2.9 and 3.0) that occurred at Rudna copper mine in Poland. The seismograms of selected events were recorded by the seismic net work composed of over 60, short-period, vertical seismometers, recording ground velocity, located in the distance ranging from 400 m up to 8 km from their hypocenters. The RSTFs were calculated for each seismic station independently, using the empirical Green’s function technique. The pseudospectral approximation of the sought RSTF by a finite sum of Gaussian kernel functions was used and the inverse problem was solved with the adaptive simulated annealing algorithm. Both methods improved the stability of the deconvolution procedure and physical correctness of the final solution in comparison to the classical deconvolution methods. To estimate the inversion uncertainties, classical Markov-chain Monte-Carlo techniques were used. The uncertainty analysis allows for improved selection of a priori data to the following inversion for kinematic rupture process.     

Steric Sea-Level Change and its Impact on the Gravity Field caused by Global Climate Change

It is sometimes assumed that steric sea-level variations do not produce a gravity signal as no net mass change, thus no change of ocean bottom pressure is associated with it. Analyzing the output of two CO₂ emission scenarios over a period of 2000 years in terms of steric sea-level changes, we try to quantify the gravitational effect of steric sea-level variations. The first scenario, computed with version 2.6 of the Earth System Climate Model developed at the University of Victoria, Canada (UVic ESCM), is implemented with a linear CO₂ increase of 1% of the initial concentration of 365 ppm and shows a globally averaged steric effect of 5.2 m after 2000 years. In the second scenario, computed with UVic ESCM version 2.7, the CO₂ concentration increases quasi-exponentially to a level of 3011 ppm and is hold fixed afterwards. The corresponding globally averaged steric effect in the first 2000 years is 2.3 m. We show, due to the (vertical) redistribution of ocean water masses (expansion or contraction), the steric effect results also in a small change in the Earth’s gravity field compared to usually larger changes associated with net mass changes. Maximum effects for computation points located on the initial ocean surface can be found in scenario 1, with the effect on gravitational attraction and potential ranging from 0.0 to −0.7·10⁻⁵ m s⁻² and −3·10⁻³ to 6·10⁻³ m² s⁻², respectively. As expected, the effect is not zero but negligible for practical applications.     

水库诱发地震中的断层响应分析

通过对过去近半个世纪水库诱发地震资料的分析,认为水库诱发地震的诱发因素尽管复杂,但一些国内外水库诱发震例表明,水库诱发地震的断层响应现象是明显的,这种现象由水库诱发地震的非均匀分布性、集中呈带性、地震带与水库位置关系的非确定性、地震带沿库区某些断层展布等方面所反映.     

Fault scarp statistics at the Galapagos spreading centre from Deep Tow data

Much of the relief of the abyssal hills covering the ocean basins is believed to originate from faulting of oceanic crust at mid-ocean ridges. The timescale over which faults grow is controversial, however, with some authors arguing that faults continue to grow in places for 0.5 m.y. or more based on increasing relief of fault scarps with distance from ridge axes. We examine Deep Tow profiler records of the Galapagos Spreading Centre, in which basement reflections allow scarp relief to be measured beneath the sediment cover, and find that relief does not increase but decreases systematically to 40 km off-axis (1.5 Ma seafloor). Since reversal of fault offsets is unlikely in this tectonic setting, we interpret this result as indicating that variations in fault statistics could reflect temporal variations in the tectonic or volcanic state of the ridge crest, not necessarily progressive fault growth with age as previously assumed. Resolving the issue of fault longevity will therefore require independent data on the timing of fault growth and distribution of present growth activity. We suggest some possible alternative indicators of fault longevity and discuss more generally the implications of volcanic flows to studies of faulting at ridges.