Impacts of Previous Winter Kuroshio SSTA on Summer Rainfall in China

1. IntroductionAs well known, Kuroshio is a famous and strongwest boundary current in the North Pacific. It trans-fers enormous energy from the low latitudes to themid-high latitudes and releases huge heat flux to theatmosphere above (Hsiung, 1985). The variation ofKuroshio exerts great influence on weather and cli-mate in East Asian.During 1950-60s, Lü (1950, 1964) found that thewestern North Pacific SSTA had a close relation withsummer rainfall in China. In the 1970s, evidencesshowed…     

Numerical Simulation of Wind and Temperature Fields over Beijing Area in Summer

1. IntroductionThe basic role of urban-rural boundary layer re-search is to study all kinds of physical process changesin the atmosphere boundary layer over urban and itssurrounding areas. Urban heat island (UHI) is a well-known feature of urban-rural climate. Attempts toincrease the understanding of the causes of the UHIand other urban-rural boundary layer phenomena haveused observational, theoretical and modelling methodssince long before. Seaman (1989) used a hydrostaticmodel, with real …     

Analytical exploration of γ-function explicit method for pseudodynamic testing of nonlinear systems

It has been well studied that the γ-function explicit method can be effective in providing favorable numerical dissipation for linear elastic systems. However, its performance for nonlinear systems is unclear due to a lack of analytical evaluation techniques. Thus, a novel technique is proposed herein to evaluate its efficiency for application to nonlinear systems by introducing two parameters to describe the stiffness change. As a result, the numerical properties and error propagation characteristics of the γ-function explicit method for the pseudodynamic testing of a nonlinear system are analytically assessed. It is found that the upper stability limit decreases as the step degree of nonlinearity increases; and it increases as the current degree of nonlinearity increases. It is also shown that this integration method provides favorable numerical dissipation not only for linear elastic systems but also for nonlinear systems. Furthermore, error propagation analysis reveals that the numerical dissipation can effectively suppress the severe error propagation of high frequency modes while the low frequency responses are almost unaffected for both linear elastic and nonlinear systems.     

Numerical simulation for 1975 Haicheng and 1999 Xiuyan earthquake processes by DDA+FEM

Introduction The Xiuyan earthquake(MS=5.4)on Nov.29,1999,occurred between Hushan town and Pi-anling town at the southeast end of the aftershocks of Haicheng earthquake(MS=7.3).These two earthquakes′sequences are highly similar in the way that the foreshocks are very frequent,focal mechanisms of the main shocks are about the same and fault strikes are approximately in the same direction.It is important to study these earthquakes for further research on seismogenesis to fore-cast earthquake…     

Studies on wind environment around high buildings in urban areas

High buildings or architectural complex in urban areas remarkably distort the urban surface wind fields. As the air flow approaches,local strong wind may appear around the buildings. The strong wind makes the pedestrians on sidewalks, entrances and terrace very uncomfortable and causes the pedestrian level wind environment problem. In this studies, hot-wire wind measurement, wind scouring in wind tunnel and numerical computation were carried out to evaluate the wind environment of tall buildings in the prevailing flow conditions in Beijing areas. The results obtained by three techniques were compared and mutually verified. The conclusions drawn from three approaches agree with each other. Also the advantages and limitations of each method were analyzed. It is suggested that the combination of different techniques may produce better assessment of wind environment around high buildings.     

Numerical Modeling of Basin-Range Tectonics Related to Continent-Continent Collision

Continent-continent collision is the most important driving mechanism for the occurrence of various geological processes in the continental lithosphere. How to recognize and determine continent-continent collision,especially its four-dimensional temporal-spatial evolution, is a subject that geological communities have long been concerned about and studied. Continent-continent collision is mainly manifested by strong underthrnsting (subduction) of the underlying block along an intracontinental subduction zone and continuous obduction (thrusting propagation) of the overlying block along the intracontinental subduction zone, the occurrence of a basin-range tectonic framework in a direction perpendicular to the subduction zone and the flexure and disruption of the Moho. On the basis of numerical modeling, the authors discuss in detail the couplings between various amounts and rates of displacement caused by basin subsidence, mountain uplift and Moho updoming and downflexure during obduction (thrusting propagation) and subduction and the migration pattern of basin centers. They are probably indications or criteria for judgment or determination of continent-continent collision.     

Stochastic Modelling of the Impact of Flood Protection Measures Along the River Waal in the Netherlands

River flooding is a problem of international interest. In the past few years many countries suffered from severe floods. A large part of the Netherlands is below sea level and river levels. The Dutch flood defences along the river Rhine are designed for water levels with a probability of exceedance of 1/1250 per year. These water levels are computed with a hydrodynamic model using a deterministic bed level and a deterministic design discharge. Traditionally, the safety against flooding in the Netherlands is obtained by building and reinforcing dikes. Recently, a new policy was proposed to cope with increasing design discharges in the Rhine and Meuse rivers. This policy is known as the Room for the River (RfR) policy, in which a reduction of flood levels is achieved by measures creating space for the river, such as dike replacement, side channels and floodplain lowering. As compared with dike reinforcement, these measures may have a stronger impact on flow and sediment transport fields, probably leading to stronger morphological effects. As a result of the latter the flood conveyance capacity may decrease over time. An a priori judgement of safety against flooding on the basis of an increased conveyance capacity of the river can be quite misleading. Therefore, the determination of design water levels using a fixed-bed hydrodynamic model may not be justified and the use of a mobile-bed approach may be more appropriate. This problem is addressed in this paper, using a case study of the river Waal (one of the Rhine branches in the Netherlands). The morphological response of the river Waal to a flood protection measure (floodplain lowering in combination with summer levee removal) is analysed. The effect of this measure is subject to various sources of uncertainty. Monte Carlo simulations are applied to calculate the impact of uncertainties in the river discharge on the bed levels. The impact of the “uncertain” morphological response on design flood level predictions is analysed for three phenomena, viz. the impact of the spatial morphological variation over years, the impact of the seasonal morphological variation and the impact of the morphological variability around bifurcation points. The impact of seasonal morphological variations turns out to be negligible, but the other two phenomena appear to have each an appreciable impact (order of magnitude 0.05–0.1 m) on the computed design water levels. We have to note however, that other sources of uncertainty (e.g. uncertainty in hydraulic roughness predictor), which may be of influence, are not taken into consideration. In fact, the present investigation is limited to the sensitivity of the design water levels to uncertainties in the predicted bed level.     

On Tension Failure of 2-D Rock Specimens and Associated Acoustic Emission

Summary To understand the failure mechanism of quasi-brittle materials like rock under tensile stress, observations on the failure process of granite and marble plate specimens under tension are summarized and presented. Micro- and macro-failure properties of rock plates under uniaxial tension have been characterized by using an acoustic emission technique. Acoustic emission signals associated with micro-fractures are captured to locate the sources. An algorithm based on arrival time difference is developed for this purpose. The results reveal clearly the failure processes of rock which include initiation, nucleation and propagation of micro-fractures when the axial stress is close to the peak strength of rock. It is believed that the difference in heterogeneity between granite and marble specimens leads to different fracture shapes and different behaviors of associated acoustic emissions. Numerical simulation of acoustic emissions for two-dimensional tensile test is also carried out. The simulated characteristics are in good agreement with the experimental results.