Geomechanical Properties of Shear Zones in the Eastern Aar Massif,Switzerland and their Implication on Tunnelling

Summary ¶Rock zones containing a high fracture density and/or soft, low cohesion materials can be highly problematic when encountered during tunnel excavation. For example in the eastern Aar massif of central Switzerland, experiences during the construction of the Gotthard highway tunnel showed that heavily fractured areas within shear zones were responsible for overbreaks in the form of chimneys several metres in height. To understand and estimate the impact of the shear zones on rock mass behaviour, knowledge concerning the rock mass strength and deformation characteristics is fundamental. A series of laboratory triaxial tests, performed on samples from granite- and gneiss-hosted shear zones revealed that with increasing degree of tectonic overprint, sample strength decreases and rock behaviour shows a transition from brittle to ductile deformation. These trends may be explained by increasing fracture densities, increasing foliation intensity, increasing thickness of fine-grained, low cohesion fracture infill, and increasing mica content associated with the increasing degree of tectonic overprint. As fracture density increases and the influence of discrete, persistent discontinuities on rock mass strength decreases, behaviour of the test samples becomes more and more representative of rock mass behaviour, i.e. that of a densely fractured continuum. For the purpose of numerical modeling calculations, the shear zones may be subdivided with respect to an increasing fracture density, foliation intensity and mica content into a strongly foliated zone, a fractured zone and a cohesionless zone, which in turn exhibit brittle, brittle-ductile and ductile rock mass constitutive behaviour, respectively.Received December 17, 2001; accepted January 9, 2003 Published online April 29, 2003     

Wave-influenced deltas: geomorphological implications for facies reconstruction

ABSTRACT A process‐based facies model for asymmetric wave‐influenced deltas predicts significant river‐borne muds with potentially lower quality reservoir facies in prodelta and downdrift areas, and better quality sand in updrift areas. Many ancient barrier‐lagoon systems and ‘offshore bars’ may be better reinterpreted as components of large‐scale asymmetric wave‐influenced deltaic systems. The proposed model is based on a re‐evaluation of several modern examples. An asymmetry index A is defined as the ratio between the net longshore transport rate at the mouth (in m³ year^?1) and river discharge (in 10⁶ m³ month^?1). Symmetry is favoured in deltas with an index below ≈ 200 (e.g. Tiber, lobes of the Godavari delta, Rosetta lobe of the Nile, Ebro), whereas deltas with a higher index are asymmetric (e.g. Danube – Sf. Gheorghe lobe, Brazos, Damietta lobe of the Nile). Periodic deflection of the river mouth for significant distances in the downdrift direction occurs in extreme cases of littoral drift dominance (e.g. Mahanadi), resulting in a series of randomly distributed, quasi‐parallel series of sand spits and channel fills. Asymmetric deltas show variable proportions of river‐, wave‐ and tide‐dominated facies both among and within their lobes. Bayhead deltas, lagoons and barrier islands form naturally in prograding asymmetric deltas and are not necessarily associated with transgressive systems. This complexity underlines the necessity of interpreting ancient depositional systems in a larger palaeogeographic context.     

岩体工程质量分级应用研究

岩体质量评价采用的测试技术包括地质勘察、弹性波检测和室内岩石力学试验。结合水布垭水利枢纽大坝建基岩体工程质量评价实例,对岩体工程质量分级的应用进行了研究。     

冰云短波辐射特性参数化

该文对卷云和高层云分别构造了15种冰晶尺度分布，3种云高和云厚，总共30种冰水含量、90种冰水程长模式。对尺度小于与大于30 μm的冰晶粒子的单次散射特性分别用表面积等效冰球Mie理论和射线光学理论进行计算。采用delta-Eddington法计算了在4种不同地面反射率下冰云的多重散射辐射传输特性，提出了冰云辐射特性的参数化公式，指出参数化公式可以用于气候模式或大气环流模式。     

Amelioration of soil fertility by woody perennials in cropping fields: evaluation of three tree species in the semi-arid zone of Nigeria

Soil was sampled from cropping fields in radial patterns from beneathAcacia albida, Parkia bigloboza(Jacq.) Benth. andEucalyptus camaldulensisDehnh. near Zaria, Nigeria. Results of analysis show a significant coarsening of soil texture and a decrease in organic matter and cation exchange capacity with increasing distance from all three tree species at a depth of 0–15 cm. Concentrations of nitrogen and some exchangeable cations decreased significantly with increasing distance from beneath acacia and parkia, and soil pH decreased with increasing distance from eucalyptus. The implication of the results for land management are discussed in relation to increasing productivity and soil use sustainability.     

恐龙蛋化石物质组分研究

研究了ＸＬ０１恐龙蛋化石蛋腔内壁和腔内絮状物质的无机组分。采用常规的双目实体显微镜、偏光显微镜及扫描电子显微镜、电子探针和Ｘ光衍射仪，对蛋腔内主要三种矿物物相的物理性质、化学组成及矿物晶体结构进行了研究。并对腔内的矿物形态、结构特点及有利于有机大分子ＤＮＡ保存的条件做了讨论     

内蒙古科尔康油田沙海组储集层的岩石学特征

根据碎屑岩铸体薄片和扫描电镜观察分析资料，研究了科尔康油田沙海组储集层的岩石学特征。科尔康油田沙海组储集层的岩石类型主要为岩屑砂岩和岩屑砂砾岩。碎屑岩的岩性特征对沙海组储集层的成岩作用具有显著的影响作用。     

Geotechnical Hazards Associated with Desert Environment

The aridity of the Arabian Peninsula's deserts ranges between arid to hyperarid with hot dry climate, scarce precipitation and sparse vegetation. These harsh environmental conditions enhance some geomorphologic processes more than others, cause specific geotechnical problems, and increase desertification.From west to east, the general physiography of Saudi Arabia shows the Red Sea coastal plains and the escarpment foothills called Tihama followed by the Arabian Shield mountains, the Arabian Shelf plateau and finally the Arabian Gulf coastal plains. Sand moves by wind either as drifting sand or migrating dunes in four major sand seas, over the Arabian Shelf, and in the inter-mountain valleys, in the Arabian Shield causing problems of erosion and deposition. Human activities in the deserts may cause more instability to the sand bodies, enlarging the magnitude of the problem. Fine silty soil particles also move by wind, depositing loess mainly in selected areas downwind in the Tihama. These loess deposits subside and may form earth fissures by the process of hydrocompaction upon wetting. The addition of water can be either natural through storms or man-made through human agricultural or civil activities. Extensive sabkhas exist along the coastal plains of both the Red Sea and Arabian Gulf. The sabkha soil may also heave by salt re-crystallization or collapse by wetting. The shallow groundwater brines present in sabkhas also attack and corrode civil structures. Urbanization and excessive groundwater pumping may also deplete the fresh groundwater resources and may cause subsidence, ground fissuring and surface faulting as observed in some locations in the Arabian Shield. Although the average annual precipitation is very low, rain usually falls in the form of torrential storms, collected by dry valley basins and causing floods to unprotected downstream areas on the coastal plains of the Red Sea.The desert environment, being a fragile echo system, needs to be treated with care. Intercommunications between different national and international agencies and education of the layman should help to keep the system balanced and reduce the resulting environmental hazards. In addition, any suggested remedial measures should be planned with nature and engineered with natural materials.     

Flexible spectral methods for the generation of random fields with power-law semivariograms

Random field generators serve as a tool to model heterogeneous media for applications in hydrocarbon recovery and groundwater flow. Random fields with a power-law variogram structure, also termed fractional Brownian motion (fBm) fields, are of interest to study scale dependent heterogeneity effects on one-phase and two-phase flow. We show that such fields generated by the spectral method and the Inverse Fast Fourier Transform (IFFT) have an incorrect variogram structure and variance. To illustrate this we derive the prefactor of the fBm spectral density function, which is required to generate the fBm fields. We propose a new method to generate fBm fields that introduces weighting functions into the spectral method. It leads to a flexible and efficient algorithm. The flexibility permits an optimal choice of summation points (that is points in frequency space at which the weighting function is calculated) specific for the autocovariance structure of the field. As an illustration of the method, comparisons between estimated and expected statistics of fields with an exponential variogram and of fBm fields are presented. For power-law semivariograms, the proposed spectral method with a cylindrical distribution of the summation points gives optimal results.     

郑州国际会展中心展厅钢屋盖的动力特性分析

郑州国际会展中心展览厅钢屋盖采用了空间斜拉式索拱结构体系，为探讨该体系的动力特性，采用ANSYS有限元程序，分别建立钢屋盖与下部混凝土结构共同作用、钢屋盖单独作用以及无斜拉系统的钢屋盖单独作用时的3个空间计算模型，采用子空间迭代法计算其自振周期和振型，并加以比较。从而得出钢屋盖的动力特性，为进一步研究此类结构的受力特性奠定了基础。