Robust dual‐sensor data sea‐surface ghost attenuation for quality control purposes

Three‐dimensional receiver ghost attenuation (deghosting) of dual‐sensor towed‐streamer data is straightforward, in principle. In its simplest form, it requires applying a three‐dimensional frequency–wavenumber filter to the vertical component of the particle motion data to correct for the amplitude reduction on the vertical component of non‐normal incidence plane waves before combining with the pressure data. More elaborate techniques use three‐dimensional filters to both components before summation, for example, for ghost wavelet dephasing and mitigation of noise of different strengths on the individual components in optimum deghosting. The problem with all these techniques is, of course, that it is usually impossible to transform the data into the crossline wavenumber domain because of aliasing. Hence, usually, a two‐dimensional version of deghosting is applied to the data in the frequency–inline wavenumber domain. We investigate going down the “dimensionality ladder” one more step to a one‐dimensional weighted summation of the records of the collocated sensors to create an approximate deghosting procedure. We specifically consider amplitude‐balancing weights computed via a standard automatic gain control before summation, reminiscent of a diversity stack of the dual‐sensor recordings. This technique is independent of the actual streamer depth and insensitive to variations in the sea‐surface reflection coefficient. The automatic gain control weights serve two purposes: (i) to approximately correct for the geometric amplitude loss of the Z data and (ii) to mitigate noise strength variations on the two components. Here, Z denotes the vertical component of the velocity of particle motion scaled by the seismic impedance of the near‐sensor water volume. The weights are time‐varying and can also be made frequency‐band dependent, adapting better to frequency variations of the noise. The investigated process is a very robust, almost fully hands‐off, approximate three‐dimensional deghosting step for dual‐sensor data, requiring no spatial filtering and no explicit estimates of noise power. We argue that this technique performs well in terms of ghost attenuation (albeit, not exact ghost removal) and balancing the signal‐to‐noise ratio in the output data. For instances where full three‐dimensional receiver deghosting is the final product, the proposed technique is appropriate for efficient quality control of the data acquired and in aiding the parameterisation of the subsequent deghosting processing.     

Potential wind erosion rate response to climate and land‐use changes in the watershed of the Ningxia–Inner Mongolia reach of the Yellow River,China, 1986–2013

Climate and land‐use changes could strongly affect wind erosion and in turn cause a series of environmental problems. Thus, the objective of this study was to assess potential wind erosion rate (PWER) response to climate and land‐use changes in the watershed of the Ningxia–Inner Mongolia Reach of the Yellow River (NIMRYR), China. The watershed of NIMRYR suffers from serious wind erosion hazards, and over recent decades, wind erosion intensity and distribution has changed, following climate and land‐use changes. To understand these processes in the NIMRYR watershed, the Integrated Wind Erosion Modelling System (IWEMS) and the Revised Wind Erosion Equation (RWEQ) were used to calculate the PWER under different climate conditions and land‐use scenarios, and to assess the influences of climate and land‐use changes on the PWER. The results show the PWER in the whole watershed had a significant declining trend from 1986 to 2013. The results of the relationship among PWER, climate change, and land‐use changes showed that climate change was the dominant control on the PWER change in this watershed. Compared to the period 1986–1995, the average PWER decreased 23.32% and 64.98% as a result of climate change in the periods 1996–2005 and 2006–2013, respectively. In contrast with climate change, the effects of land‐use changes on the average PWER were much lower, and represented a change in PWER of less than 3.3% across the whole watershed. The study method we used could provide some valuable reference for wind erosion modelling, and the research results should help climate and land‐use researchers to develop strategies to reduce wind erosion. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Variation in reach‐scale thalweg‐migration intensity in a braided reach of the lower Yellow River in 1986–2015

Thalweg migration of an alluvial river plays a key role in channel evolution, which may influence the effect of existing river training works and biodiversity on floodplains, and cause losses in riparian land and property. The braided reach of the Lower Yellow River underwent continuous channel aggradation during the period from 1986 to 1999, and then remarkable channel degradation in 1999–2015 owing to the state of operation of the Xiaolangdi Reservoir in 1999. Here we quantify associated thalweg migration changes and identify the key influencing factor in the braided reach. Thalweg‐migration distances and intensities at section‐ and reach‐scales were calculated during the past 30 years from 1986 to 2015, in order to investigate the characteristics of thalweg migration in the reach. There was a 47% reduction in the reach‐scale thalweg‐migration distance and a 35% reduction in the corresponding migration intensity after the reservoir operation. It is also revealed that fluvial erosion intensity is a dominant factor in controlling the thalweg migration, based on the investigation into various influencing factors in the study reach. The thalweg‐migration intensity of the braided reach can be expressed as a power function of the previous four‐year average fluvial erosion intensity. The calculated thalweg‐migration intensities in 1986–2015 using the proposed relation generally agree with the observed data. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Effects of changing climate on ice cover in three morphometrically different lakes

A one‐dimensional hydrodynamic lake model (DYRESM‐WQ‐I) is employed to simulate ice cover and water temperatures over the period 1911–2014. The effects of climate changes (air temperature and wind speed) on ice cover (ice‐on, ice‐off, ice cover duration, and maximum ice thickness) are modeled and compared for the three different morphometry lakes: Fish Lake, Lake Wingra, and Lake Mendota, located in Madison, Wisconsin, USA. It is found that the ice cover period has decreased due to later ice‐on dates and earlier ice‐off dates, and the annual maximum ice cover thickness has decreased for the three lakes during the last century. Based upon simulated perturbations of daily mean air temperatures across the range of ?10°C to +10°C of historical values, Fish Lake has the most occurrences of no ice cover and Lake Wingra still remains ice covered under extreme conditions (+10°C). Overall, shallower lakes with larger surface areas appear more resilient to ice cover changes caused by climate changes.     

Enhanced identification of a hydrologic model using streamflow and satellite water storage data: A multicriteria sensitivity analysis and optimization approach

Hydrologic model development and calibration have continued in most cases to focus only on accurately reproducing streamflows. However, complex models, for example, the so‐called physically based models, possess large degrees of freedom that, if not constrained properly, may lead to poor model performance when used for prediction. We argue that constraining a model to represent streamflow, which is an integrated resultant of many factors across the watershed, is necessary but by no means sufficient to develop a high‐fidelity model. To address this problem, we develop a framework to utilize the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment's (GRACE) total water storage anomaly data as a supplement to streamflows for model calibration, in a multiobjective setting. The VARS method (Variogram Analysis of Response Surfaces) for global sensitivity analysis is used to understand the model behaviour with respect to streamflow and GRACE data, and the BORG multiobjective optimization method is applied for model calibration. Two subbasins of the Saskatchewan River Basin in Western Canada are used as a case study. Results show that the developed framework is superior to the conventional approach of calibration only to streamflows, even when multiple streamflow‐based error functions are simultaneously minimized. It is shown that a range of (possibly false) system trajectories in state variable space can lead to similar (acceptable) model responses. This observation has significant implications for land‐surface and hydrologic model development and, if not addressed properly, may undermine the credibility of the model in prediction. The framework effectively constrains the model behaviour (by constraining posterior parameter space) and results in more credible representation of hydrology across the watershed.     

Investigation of the thermal regime and subsurface properties of a tidally affected,variably saturated streambed

Temperature and moisture content in the variably saturated subsurface are two of the most important physical parameters that govern a wide variety of geochemical and ecological processes. An understanding of thermal and hydraulic processes and properties of transient vadose zones is therefore fundamental in the evaluation of such processes. Here, an investigation of the thermal regime and subsurface properties of a tidally affected, variably saturated streambed is presented. Field and laboratory measurements, as well as a forward numerical model, are jointly employed in the investigation. Temperature, soil moisture, surface level, and water level data were recorded in a transect perpendicular to a tidally driven stream. Frequency‐domain analysis of the subsurface temperature measurements revealed the rapid decay of the tidal temperature driver within the top ～30 cm of sediment. Several techniques were used to evaluate subsurface thermal and hydraulic properties, including thermal conductivity and the soil water retention curve. These properties were used to constrain a forward numerical model that included coupled treatment of relevant variable saturation thermal and hydraulic physics. Even though the investigated vadose zone is intermittent and relatively shallow ( 20 cm), the results illustrate how error can be introduced into heat‐transport calculations if unsaturated conditions are not taken into account.     

1D elastic full‐waveform inversion and uncertainty estimation by means of a hybrid genetic algorithm–Gibbs sampler approach

Stochastic optimization methods, such as genetic algorithms, search for the global minimum of the misfit function within a given parameter range and do not require any calculation of the gradients of the misfit surfaces. More importantly, these methods collect a series of models and associated likelihoods that can be used to estimate the posterior probability distribution. However, because genetic algorithms are not a Markov chain Monte Carlo method, the direct use of the genetic‐algorithm‐sampled models and their associated likelihoods produce a biased estimation of the posterior probability distribution. In contrast, Markov chain Monte Carlo methods, such as the Metropolis–Hastings and Gibbs sampler, provide accurate posterior probability distributions but at considerable computational cost. In this paper, we use a hybrid method that combines the speed of a genetic algorithm to find an optimal solution and the accuracy of a Gibbs sampler to obtain a reliable estimation of the posterior probability distributions. First, we test this method on an analytical function and show that the genetic algorithm method cannot recover the true probability distributions and that it tends to underestimate the true uncertainties. Conversely, combining the genetic algorithm optimization with a Gibbs sampler step enables us to recover the true posterior probability distributions. Then, we demonstrate the applicability of this hybrid method by performing one‐dimensional elastic full‐waveform inversions on synthetic and field data. We also discuss how an appropriate genetic algorithm implementation is essential to attenuate the “genetic drift” effect and to maximize the exploration of the model space. In fact, a wide and efficient exploration of the model space is important not only to avoid entrapment in local minima during the genetic algorithm optimization but also to ensure a reliable estimation of the posterior probability distributions in the subsequent Gibbs sampler step.     

Spatial behaviour of Rayleigh waves in layered half‐spaces under active surface sources

In the free state, Rayleigh waves are assumed to travel in the form of planar wavefronts. Under such an assumption, the propagation behaviour of the modes of Rayleigh waves in layered half‐spaces is only frequency dependent. The frequency behaviour, which is often termed as dispersion, is determined by the shear wave velocity profile of layered soils within the depth related to wavelength (or frequency). According to this characteristic, the shear wave velocity profile can be back‐analysed from the dispersion. The technique is widely used in the surface wave testing. However, the wavefronts of Rayleigh waves activated by the surface sources are non‐planar. The geometric discrepancy could result in Rayleigh waves manifesting distance‐dependent behaviour, which is referred to as spatial behaviour in this paper. Conventional analysis ignoring this spatial behaviour could introduce unexpected errors. In order to take the effects of sources on the propagation behaviour into account, a new mathematical model is established for Rayleigh waves in layered elastic media under vertical disc‐like surface sources using the thin‐layer method. The spatial behaviour of the activated modes and the apparent phase velocity, which is the propagation velocity of Rayleigh waves superposed by the multiple modes, are then analysed. Aspects of the spatial behaviour investigated in this paper include the equilibrium path, the particle orbit, and the geometric attenuation of the activated Rayleigh waves. The results presented in this paper can provide some guidelines for developing new inverse mathematical models and algorithms.     

Influence of earthquake ground‐motion duration on damage estimation: application to steel moment resisting frames

This paper presents an analytical study evaluating the influence of ground motion duration on structural damage of 3‐story, 9‐story, and 20‐story SAC steel moment resisting frame buildings designed for downtown Seattle, WA, USA, using pre‐Northridge codes. Two‐dimensional nonlinear finite element models of the buildings are used to estimate the damage induced by the ground motions. A set of 44 ground motions is used to study the combined effect of spectral acceleration and ground motion significant duration on drift and damage measures. In addition, 10 spectrally equivalent short‐duration shallow crustal ground motions and long‐duration subduction zone records are selected to isolate duration effect and assess its effect on the response. For each ground motion pair, incremental dynamic analyses are performed at at least 20 intensity levels and response measures such as peak interstory drift ratio and energy dissipated are tracked. These response measures are combined into two damage metrics that account for the ductility and energy dissipation. Results indicate that the duration of the ground motion influences, above all, the combined damage measures, although some effect on drift‐based response measures is also observed for larger levels of drift. These results indicate that because the current assessment methodologies do not capture the effects of ground motion duration, both performance‐based and code‐based assessment methodologies should be revised to consider damage measures that are sensitive to duration. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd     

Experimental study of deformable connection consisting of buckling‐restrained brace and rubber bearings to connect floor system to lateral force resisting system

This paper presents experimental and numerical studies of a full‐scale deformable connection used to connect the floor system of the flexible gravity load resisting system to the stiff lateral force resisting system (LFRS) of an earthquake‐resistant building. The purpose of the deformable connection is to limit the earthquake‐induced horizontal inertia force transferred from the floor system to the LFRS and, thereby, to reduce the horizontal floor accelerations and the forces in the LFRS. The deformable connection that was studied consists of a buckling‐restrained brace (BRB) and steel‐reinforced laminated low‐damping rubber bearings (RB). The test results show that the force–deformation responses of the connection are stable, and the dynamic force responses are larger than the quasi‐static force responses. The BRB+RB force–deformation response depends mainly on the BRB response. A detailed discussion of the BRB experimental force–deformation response is presented. The experimental results show that the maximum plastic deformation range controls the isotropic hardening of the BRB. The hardened BRB force–deformation responses are used to calculate the overstrength adjustment factors. Details and limitations of a validated, accurate model for the connection force–deformation response are presented. Numerical simulation results for a 12‐story reinforced concrete wall building with deformable connections show the effects of including the RB in the deformable connection and the effect of modeling the BRB isotropic hardening on the building seismic response. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.