Supraglacial weathering crust dynamics inferred from cryoconite hole hydrology

Water levels in cryoconite holes were monitored at high resolution over a 3‐week period on Austre Brøggerbreen (Svalbard). These data were combined with melt and energy balance modelling, providing insights into the evolution of the glacier's near‐surface hydrology and confirming that the hydrology of the near‐surface, porous ice known as the ‘weathering crust’ is dynamic and analogous to a shallow‐perched aquifer. A positive correlation between radiative forcing of melt and drainage efficiency was found within the weathering crust. This likely resulted from diurnal contraction and dilation of interstitial pore spaces driven by variations in radiative and turbulent fluxes in the surface energy balance, occasionally causing ‘sudden drainage events’. A linear decrease in water levels in cryoconite holes was also observed and attributed to cumulative increases in near‐surface ice porosity over the measurement period. The transport of particulate matter and microbes between cryoconite holes through the porous weathering crust is shown to be dependent upon weathering crust hydraulics and particle size. Cryoconite holes therefore yield an indication of the hydrological dynamics of the weathering crust and provide long‐term storage loci for cryoconite at the glacier surface. This study highlights the importance of the weathering crust as a crucial component of the hydrology, ecology and biogeochemistry of the glacier ecosystem and glacierized regions and demonstrates the utility of cryoconite holes as natural piezometers on glacier surfaces. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Multi‐temporal scale changes of streamflow and sediment load in a loess hilly watershed of China

Global climate change and diverse human activities have resulted in distinct temporal–spatial variability of watershed hydrological regimes, especially in water‐limited areas. This study presented a comprehensive investigation of streamflow and sediment load changes on multi‐temporal scales (annual, flood season, monthly and daily scales) during 1952–2011 in the Yanhe watershed, Loess Plateau. The results indicated that the decreasing trend of precipitation and increasing trend of potential evapotranspiration and aridity index were not significant. Significant decreasing trends (p < 0.01) were detected for both the annual and flood season streamflow, sediment load, sediment concentration and sediment coefficient. The runoff coefficient exhibited a significantly negative trend (p < 0.01) on the flood season scale, whereas the decreasing trend on the annual scale was not significant. The streamflow and sediment load during July–August contributed 46.7% and 86.2% to the annual total, respectively. The maximum daily streamflow and sediment load had the median occurrence date of July 31, and they accounted for 9.7% and 29.2% of the annual total, respectively. All of these monthly and daily hydrological characteristics exhibited remarkable decreasing trends (p < 0.01). However, the contribution of the maximum daily streamflow to the annual total progressively decreased (?0.07% year^?1), while that of maximum daily sediment load increased over the last 60 years (0.08% year^?1). The transfer of sloping cropland for afforestation and construction of check‐dams represented the dominant causes of streamflow and sediment load reductions, which also made the sediment grain finer. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Frequency analysis of nonstationary annual maximum flood series using the time‐varying two‐component mixture distributions

The most popular practice for analysing nonstationarity of flood series is to use a fixed single‐type probability distribution incorporated with the time‐varying moments. However, the type of probability distribution could be both complex because of distinct flood populations and time‐varying under changing environments. To allow the investigation of this complex nature, the time‐varying two‐component mixture distributions (TTMD) method is proposed in this study by considering the time variations of not only the moments of its component distributions but also the weighting coefficients. Having identified the existence of mixed flood populations based on circular statistics, the proposed TTMD was applied to model the annual maximum flood series of two stations in the Weihe River basin, with the model parameters calibrated by the meta‐heuristic maximum likelihood method. The performance of TTMD was evaluated by different diagnostic plots and indexes and compared with stationary single‐type distributions, stationary mixture distributions and time‐varying single‐type distributions. The results highlighted the advantages of TTMD with physically‐based covariates for both stations. Besides, the optimal TTMD models were considered to be capable of settling the issue of nonstationarity and capturing the mixed flood populations satisfactorily. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Slope stability analysis using evolutionary optimization techniques

Slope stability optimization, in the presence of a band of a weak layer between two strong layers, is accounted for in complicated geotechnical problems. Classical optimization algorithms are not suitable for solving such problems as they need a proper preliminary solution to converge to a valid result. Therefore, it is necessary to find a proper algorithm which is capable of finding the best global solution. Recently a lot of metaheuristic algorithms have been proposed which are able to evade local minima effectively. In this study four evolutionary algorithms, including well‐known and recent ones, such as genetic algorithm, differential evolution, evolutionary strategy and biogeography‐based optimization (BBO), are applied in slope stability analysis and their efficiencies are explored by three benchmark case studies. Result show BBO is the most efficient among these evolutionary algorithms and other proposed algorithms applied to this problem. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The Fluxes and Behaviour of Plumes Inferred from Measurements of Coherent Structures within Images of the Bulk Flow

This paper describes how measurements of the movement of identifiable features at the edge of a turbulent plume can be interpreted to determine the properties of the mean flow and consequently, using plume theory, can be used to make estimates of the fluxes of volume (mass), momentum, and buoyancy in a plume. This means that video recordings of smoke rising from a chimney or buoyant material from a source on the sea bed can be used to make accurate estimates of the source conditions for the plume. At best we can estimate the volume flux and buoyancy flux to within about 5% and 15% of the actual values, respectively. Although this is restricted to the case of a plume rising in a stationary and unstratified environment, we show that the results may be of practical use in other more complex situations. In addition, we demonstrate that large-scale (turbulent) coherent structures at the plume edge form on a scale approximately 40% of the local (mean) plume half-width and travel at almost 60% of the average local (mean) velocity in the plume.     

基于ArcGIS平台与质检软件的地理国情普查快速质量控制方法

"信息化质检平台IGCES"及"地理国情普查成果质检软件"是某省地理国情普查采用的主要人机交互质量控制软件。该类软件使用复杂,某些检查项耗时长,难以满足快速化质检的要求,本文结合地理国情普查具体实施要求,提出"人工详查、基于ArcGIS 10.1平台与质检软件概查"的快速质检方法,为国家战略规划制定、空间规划管理、区域政策制定、灾害预警、科学研究等领域的地理国情监测提供有力的数据保障。     

关于制作像控电子点之记方法与流程的探讨

主要介绍电子点之记的制作流程及方法,以及所涉及的一些计算机软件和工序中可以自动化处理的程序,对于实现难点也进行了分析及说明,使像片控制测量点之记制作的流程更为简便,成果更为可靠。     

农村集体土地确权测量中的塔尖交会技术研究

简要介绍了农村集体土地确权测量中的塔尖交会技术,生成平差文件的方法,以及平差计算的理论模型,最后给出了平差实例,极大地提高了作业效率,达到了满意的效果。     

GPS精密卫星钟差估计研究

随着精密单点定位技术的发展,对于精确的卫星坐标以及卫星钟差改正精度的要求越来越高,精密卫星星历以及精密卫星钟差的求解成为制约精密单点定位技术发展的瓶颈。本文基于修复周跳的载波相位观测值与相位平滑伪距观测值,采用无电离层延迟星间单差精密卫星钟差估计模型,在先估计出整周模糊度后,进行了精密卫星钟差的估计,并采用与IGS事后精密钟差作二次差的方法进行精度分析,这对于提高精密单点定位精度具有一定的意义。     

高分二号卫星影像融合方法探析

图像融合技术是卫星影像处理过程中的一个重要步骤,它可以将全色影像的高空间分辨率特点与多光谱影像的高光谱分辨率特点有机地结合起来,使得融合后的影像更利于后续解译。由于融合处理方法的原理以及获取影像的传感器特性不同,不同的卫星影像适合于不同的融合方法。针对高分二号卫星影像的特点,本文采用Gram-Schmidt融合法、FIHS变换方法、HPF方法、Pansharp方法进行试验。实验结果表明:HPF方法所得融合结果在光谱特性保持方法性能最优,而Pansharp方法融合结果在信息量的保持以及清晰度方面效果更优,因此,在实际应用中,应根据具体需求进行方法选择。