Tectonic relation between northeastern China and the Korean peninsula revealed by interpretation of GRACE satellite gravity data

The major continental blocks in northeastern Asia are the North China block and the South China block, which have collided starting from the Korean peninsula. Geologic and geophysical interpretations reveal a well defined suture zone in northeastern China from Qinling through Dabie to Jiaodong. The discovery of high-pressure metamorphic rocks in the Hongseong area of the Korean peninsula, prominent evidence for the collision zone, indicates extension of the collision zone in northeastern China into the Korean peninsula. Interpretation of the GRACE satellite gravity dataset shows two prominent structural boundaries in the Yellow Sea. One extends from the Jiaodong Belt in eastern China to the Imjingang Belt in the Korean peninsula. The other extends from near Nanjing, eastern China, to Hongseong. Tectonic movement in or near the suture zone may be responsible for seismic activity in the western Korean peninsula and the development of the Yellow Sea sedimentary basin.     

Neoproterozoic alkaline magmatism at Sivamalai, southern India

The Sivamalai alkaline complex lies at the southern margin of the Cauvery Shear System that separates the Archaean and Proterozoic domains of the Southern Granulite Terrain in India. U–Pb TIMS dating of zircon from a pegmatitic syenite sample in the complex yields a concordant age of 590.2 ± 1.3 (2σ) Ma which is interpreted to date the intrusion of the alkaline rocks. A lower concordia intercept at 168 ± 210 Ma defined by two grains with high common lead may indicate post-magmatic disturbances due to recrystallisation which is also evident in the CL images of the zircons. EPMA dating of monazite from a post-kinematic pegmatite which intrudes the crystalline basement hosting the alkaline rocks yields an age of 478 ± 29 (2σ) Ma and provides a lower bracket for the main phase of tectonism in this part of the Southern Granulite Terrain. The Pan-African high-grade metamorphism and ductile deformation has thus most likely affected the alkaline rocks. This is supported by the presence of a metamorphic foliation and extensive recrystallisation textures seen in the rocks. The major and trace element concentrations measured on selected samples reveals the presence of both enriched and depleted rock types. The enriched group includes ferrosyenite and nepheline syenite while the depleted group has only nepheline syenites. The trace element depletion of some nepheline syenites is interpreted to be a result of fractional crystallization involving the removal of accessory phases like zircon, titanite, apatite and allanite.     

PCBs and OCPs in sediments from Hongfeng Reservoir in Guizhou Province, China

In this research, chlorinated hydrocarbons （polychlorinated biphenyls and organochlorine pesticides） were measured by GC-ECD in sediments from the Hongfeng Reservoir area. The concentrations of total PCBs range from 3.2 to 31.6 ng/g, among which PCB28, PCB52 are the major congeners with the concentrations from 0.5 to 4.6 ng/g, and from 0.4 to 28.1 ng/g, respectively. The concentrations of these pollutants decrease from surface to bottom, while the concentrations at 1-4 cm are lower than at 5-8 cm, suggesting the decline of PCBs input. TOC concentrations of sediment are found in a significant positive correlation with those of PCBs, suggesting that PCBs are mainly adsorbed on organic matter and particles. HCHs and DDTs are the predominant organochlorine pesticides with the concentrations ranging from 1.6 to 8.9 ng/g （average 3.2 ng/g） and 0.9 to 25.7 ng/g （average 7.8 ng/g）, respectively. β-HCH and γ-HCH （lindane） are the predominant HCH isomers from sediments, and p, p＇-DDE and p, p＇-DDT are the predominant DDT isomers. DDT/DDE＋DDD and α-HCH/γ-HCH ratios range from 0.6 to 0.9 and 0.1 to 3.0, respectively, which indicates more use of lindane than technical mixtures of HCHs before, and also suggests changes in HCHs and DDTs in the environment. The high values of β-HCH and p, p＇-DDE also show that atmospheric input is one of the important sources of the Hongfeng Reservoir, because β-HCH and p, p＇-DDE are stable and have low Sw and Pv so that they can be easily transferred over a long range in atmosphere.     

Early diagenesis of nurtrients （C, N, P and Si） stored in sediments of two reservoirs in southwestern China

Damming is a common anthropogenic intervention along the course of rivers, which is defined as ＂artificial-lake effect＂, both in China and across the world. Today as many as 48000 dams and/or reservoirs are in operation in the Changjiang River （Yangtze River） drainage area, and more are being constructed. While damming is well known to affect riverbome nutrient loads, and thus the riverine ecosystems owing to removal of carbon fixation, and removal of particles in reservoir sediments, there is limited information on the detailed early diagenesis of sediments in reservoirs including the regeneration processes of nutrients deposited in sediments and exchange flux across the sediment-water interface, which is important for mass balance of riverbome nutrients. In the present study, two large-size reservoirs, Wujiangdu Reservoir （WJDR） and Dongfeng Reservoir （DFR）, located on the main steam of the Wujiang River and with uniformity hydrography and discrepancy biogeochemical activity （e. g. primary production）, were selected for a comparative study on the detailed processes of nutrient regeneration. Water, pore water and sediment were sampled from these two reservoirs and dissolved organic carbon （DOC）, NH4^＋, NO3^-, PO4^3-, dissolved silica （DSi） in the overlying water and pore water, and total organic matter in sediments were determined. The results of correlation analysis suggested that in these two reservoirs, processes of nutrient regeneration near the sediment-water interface were significantly different. As a result of rapid decomposition of algae-derived ＂labile＂ organic matter in upper sediments, nutrient regeneration processes and upward fluxes in WJDR are dramatically stronger than those of DFR. NH4^＋ upward flux from sediment in WJDR was about 17 times higher than that in DFR. PO4^3- flux in WJDR is about 13 times above that in DFR. DOC flux in WJDR is larger that in DFR by 5 times, and DSi by 1 time.     

Reservoir description using dynamic parameterisation selection with a combined stochastic and gradient search

There is a correspondence between flow in a reservoir and large scale permeability trends. This correspondence can be derived by constraining reservoir models using observed production data. One of the challenges in deriving the permeability distribution of a field using production data involves determination of the scale of resolution of the permeability. The Adaptive Multiscale Estimation (AME) seeks to overcome the problems related to choosing the resolution of the permeability field by a dynamic parameterisation selection. The standard AME uses a gradient algorithm in solving several optimisation problems with increasing permeability resolution. This paper presents a hybrid algorithm which combines a gradient search and a stochastic algorithm to improve the robustness of the dynamic parameterisation selection. At low dimension, we use the stochastic algorithm to generate several optimised models. We use information from all these produced models to find new optimal refinements, and start out new optimisations with several unequally suggested parameterisations. At higher dimensions we change to a gradient-type optimiser, where the initial solution is chosen from the ensemble of models suggested by the stochastic algorithm. The selection is based on a predefined criterion. We demonstrate the robustness of the hybrid algorithm on sample synthetic cases, which most of them were considered insolvable using the standard AME algorithm.     

Effects of magnetic interactions in anisotropy of magnetic susceptibility: Models, experiments and implications for igneous rock fabrics quantification

Besides granites of the ilmenite series, in which the anisotropy of magnetic susceptibility (AMS) is mainly controlled by paramagnetic minerals, the AMS of igneous rocks is commonly interpreted as the result of the shape-preferred orientation of unequant ferromagnetic grains. In a few instances, the anisotropy due to the distribution of ferromagnetic grains, irrespective of their shape, has also been proposed as an important AMS source. Former analytical models that consider infinite geometry of identical and uniformly magnetized and coaxial particles confirm that shape fabric may be overcome by dipolar contributions if neighboring grains are close enough to each other to magnetically interact. On these bases we present and experimentally validate a two-grain macroscopic numerical model in which each grain carries its own magnetic anisotropy, volume, orientation and location in space. Compared with analytical predictions and available experiments, our results allow to list and quantify the factors that affect the effects of magnetic interactions. In particular, we discuss the effects of (i) the infinite geometry used in the analytical models, (ii) the intrinsic shape anisotropy of the grains, (iii) the relative orientation in space of the grains, and (iv) the spatial distribution of grains with a particular focus on the inter-grain distance distribution. Using documented case studies, these findings are summarized and discussed in the framework of the generalized total AMS tensor recently introduced by Cañon-Tapia (Cañon-Tapia, E., 2001. Factors affecting the relative importance of shape and distribution anisotropy in rocks: theory and experiments. Tectonophysics, 340, 117–131.). The most important result of our work is that analytical models far overestimate the role of magnetic interaction in rock fabric quantification. Considering natural rocks as an assemblage of interacting and non-interacting grains, and that the effects of interaction are reduced by (i) the finite geometry of the interacting clusters, (ii) the relative orientation between interacting grains, (iii) their heterogeneity in orientation, shape and bulk susceptibility, and (iv) their inter-distance distribution, we reconcile analytical models and experiments with real case studies that minimize the role of magnetic interaction onto the measured AMS. Limitations of our results are discussed and guidelines are provided for the use of AMS in geological interpretation of igneous rock fabrics where magnetic interactions are likely to occur.     

Optimization of nonconventional wells under uncertainty using statistical proxies

The determination of the optimal type and placement of a nonconventional well in a heterogeneous reservoir represents a challenging optimization problem. This determination is significantly more complicated if uncertainty in the reservoir geology is included in the optimization. In this study, a genetic algorithm is applied to optimize the deployment of nonconventional wells. Geological uncertainty is accounted for by optimizing over multiple reservoir models (realizations) subject to a prescribed risk attitude. To reduce the excessive computational requirements of the base method, a new statistical proxy (which provides fast estimates of the objective function) based on cluster analysis is introduced into the optimization process. This proxy provides an estimate of the cumulative distribution function (CDF) of the scenario performance, which enables the quantification of proxy uncertainty. Knowledge of the proxy-based performance estimate in conjunction with the proxy CDF enables the systematic selection of the most appropriate scenarios for full simulation. Application of the overall method for the optimization of monobore and dual-lateral well placement demonstrates the performance of the hybrid optimization procedure. Specifically, it is shown that by simulating only 10% or 20% of the scenarios (as determined by application of the proxy), optimization results very close to those achieved by simulating all cases are obtained.     

Cretaceous isochron ages from K–Ar and Ar / Ar dating of eclogitic rocks in the Tso Morari Complex, western Himalaya, India

The Tso Morari Complex, which is thought to be originally the margin of the Indian continent, is composed of pelitic gneisses and schists including mafic rock lenses (eclogites and basic schists). Eclogites studied here have the mineral assemblage Grt + Omp + Ca-Amp + Zo + Phn + Pg + Qtz + Rt. They also have coesite pseudomorph in garnet and quartz rods in omphacite, suggesting a record of ultrahigh-pressure metamorphism. They occur only in the cores of meter-scale mafic rock lenses intercalated with the pelitic schists. Small mafic lenses and the rim parts of large lenses have been strongly deformed to form the foliation parallel to that of the pelitic schists and show the mineral assemblages of upper greenschist to amphibolite facies metamorphism. The garnet–omphacite thermometry and the univariant reaction relations for jadeite formation give 13–21 kbar at 600 °C and 16–18 kbar at 750 °C for the eclogite formation using the jadeite content of clinopyroxene (X_Jd = 0.48).

Phengites in pelitic schists show variable Si / Al and Na / K ratios among grains as well as within single grains, and give K–Ar ages of 50–87 Ma. The pelitic schist with paragonite and phengite yielded K–Ar ages of 83.5 Ma (K = 4.9 wt.%) for paragonite–phengite mixture and 85.3 Ma (K = 7.8 wt.%) for phengite and an isochron age of 91 ± 13 Ma from the two dataset. The eclogite gives a plateau age of 132 Ma in Ar/Ar step-heating analyses using single phengite grain and an inverse isochron age of 130 ± 39 Ma with an initial ⁴⁰Ar / ³⁶Ar ratio of 434 ± 90 in Ar/Ar spot analyses of phengites and paragonites. The Cretaceous isochron ages are interpreted to represent the timing of early stage of exhumation of the eclogitic rocks assuming revised high closure temperature (500 °C) for phengite K–Ar system. The phengites in pelitic schists have experienced retrograde reaction which modified their chemistry during intense deformation associated with the exhumation of these rocks with the release of significant radiogenic ⁴⁰Ar from the crystals. The argon release took place in the schists that experienced the retrogression to upper greenschist facies metamorphisms from the eclogite facies conditions.