Incipient weathering rind development on introduced machine‐polished granite discs in an Arctic alpine environment,northern Scandinavia

Weathering rinds, zones of alteration on the exterior surfaces of rock outcrops and coarse unconsolidated surficial debris are widely used by geomorphologists and Quaternary geologists as indicators of the relative age of landforms and landscapes. Additionally they provide unique insights into the earliest stages of rock and mineral weathering, yet the origin of these alteration zones is relatively poorly understood. This lack of understanding applies especially to the initial stages of rind formation. The study reported in this paper has two principal objectives. The first is to use lightly polished granite discs inserted in soil profiles under several different plant communities in an Arctic alpine environment for a period of four or five years to investigate the nature of incipient weathering rind development. The second is to investigate the factors responsible for spatial variability in the nature and rates of rind formation. Incipient weathering rind development on the outer edges of the granite discs is observable and measurable over a period of time as short as four years in the mild Arctic alpine environment of Swedish Lapland. The earliest stages of rind development involve the development of a porous structure consisting of a combination of pits and fractures which have been solutionally enlarged and modified. Solution appears to be preferentially concentrated on the surfaces of feldspars and, to a lesser extent, quartz. In addition, iron oxides are present along grain boundaries and in grain interiors and are interpreted to have been derived from the oxidation of ferromagnesian minerals. Spatial variability in weathering rind development appears to be particularly driven by differences in moisture but is not related to soil pH. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The interaction between armouring and particle weathering for eroding landscapes

The interaction between particle weathering and surface armouring and its effect on erosion has been investigated. The effect of soil armouring is to decrease sediment transport with time by preferentially stripping away fine particles. On the other hand the effect of weathering, which breaks down the particles in the armour, is generally believed to increase erosion. By extending an existing armouring model, ARMOUR, and using a variety of published weathering mechanisms this interaction has been explored. The model predicts that while this is generally true, in some cases erosion can be decreased by weathering. When the particles generated by weathering were approximately of equal diameter, erosion increased while armouring decreased. When weathering produced very fine particles by spalling, erosion increased and armouring also increased. When weathering produced a range of particles from fine to coarse, the armour layer broke down and erosion decreased relative to the no‐weathering case. This latter decrease in erosion was due to the high entrainment of coarser transportable materials from the bed decreasing the sediment transport capacity of the flow. In these studies clear regimes could be identified where erosion was limited by either the energy of the flow alone (i.e. ‘transport‐limited’), or the rate of weathering (‘weathering‐limited’); however, for some mechanisms there was an interaction between the two, which we called ‘weathering/transport limited’. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

南京红层桩基持力层承载力初探

南京红层岩性复杂，桩基持力层承载力难确定。依据南京某工程勘察资料，建立南京红层泥岩、泥质粉砂岩不同互层情况的地质模型，运用FLAC3D软件分析，并与载荷板试验结果进行对比表明：桩基持力层应选择在厚度大于两倍桩径的泥质粉砂岩地层上，避免放置于泥岩地层；载荷板试验结果偏于保守，设计时可以把这部分作为安全储备。     

软岩填料的长期沉降变形特性及分析

通过现场试验路堤和室内模型试验研究了几种较有代表性的软岩填石料的长期沉降变形特性,证明了软岩填石料的长期变形性能除了与填石料的岩石特性和压实密度有关外,风化程度、干湿循环是影响填石料的长期变形性能的主要因素。     

贵州西部中、上二叠统界线附近风化壳类型及成矿作用

贵州西部中、上二叠统界线附近普遍存在不整合面,在不整合面上往往发育厚度不等的风化壳。风化壳主要可归纳为三种类型:茅口组顶部的喀斯特漏斗、洼地中堆积的红粘土风化壳,锰质(铁质)风化壳,峨眉山玄武岩喷发间断面上或玄武岩顶部与龙潭组(宣威组)之间的的高铝高岭石风化壳。喀斯特侵蚀面上的红土风化壳是红土型金矿的赋存层位,峨眉山玄武岩喷发间断面上的高铝高岭石风化壳是铜矿、铝土矿赋存层位,喀斯特侵蚀面上的锰质(铁质)风化壳是锰矿、铁矿赋存层位,而玄武岩顶部与龙潭组(宣威组)之间的高岭石粘土风化壳是稀土、硫铁矿、铝土矿赋存层位。中、上二叠统界线附近风化壳对金、铜、铝土、硫铁、锰和稀土有明显的控制作用。     

Statistical empirical index of chemical weathering in igneous rocks: A new tool for evaluating the degree of weathering

Chemical weathering indices are useful tools in characterizing weathering profiles and determining the extent of weathering. However, the predictive performance of the conventional indices is critically dependent on the composition of the unweathered parent rock. To overcome this limitation, the present paper introduces an alternative statistical empirical index of chemical weathering that is extracted by the principal component analysis (PCA) of a large dataset derived from unweathered igneous rocks and their weathering profiles. The PCA analysis yields two principal components (PC1 and PC2), which capture 39.23% and 35.17% of total variability, respectively. The extent of weathering is reflected by variation along PC1, primarily due to the loss of Na₂O and CaO during weathering. In contrast, PC2 is the direction along which the projections of unweathered felsic, intermediate and mafic igneous rocks appear to be best discriminated; therefore, PC1 and PC2 represent independent latent variables that correspond to the extent of weathering and the chemistry of the unweathered parent rock. Subsequently, PC1 and PC2 were then mapped onto a ternary diagram (MFW diagram). The M and F vertices characterize mafic and felsic rock source, respectively, while the W vertex identifies the degree of weathering of these sources, independent of the chemistry of the unweathered parent rock.

The W index has a number of significant properties that are not found in conventional weathering indices. First, the W index is sensitive to chemical changes that occur during weathering because it is based on eight major oxides, whereas most conventional indices are defined by between two and four oxides. Second, the W index provides robust results even for highly weathered sesquioxide-rich samples. Third, the W index is applicable to a wide range of felsic, intermediate and mafic igneous rock types. Finally, the MFW diagram is expected to facilitate provenance analysis of sedimentary rocks by identifying their weathering trends and thereby enabling a backward estimate of the composition of the unweathered source rock.     

江西黄连坑锰矿成矿特征及成因探讨

江西省武宁县境内分布了众多的小型铁、锰矿床(点),前人称之为“武宁式”铁矿。通过对黄连坑锰矿区地层的含矿性、控矿构造及容矿构造、矿体特征、矿石类型等地质特征的论述,认为震旦系地层是“初始矿源层”,滑脱构造对成矿物质起迁移、富集及容矿作用。并与萍—乐断陷盆地内的沉积加热液叠改型乐华锰矿床进行了对比分析,二者在矿体规模、矿石类型、锰品位等方面存在显著差别,应属不同成因类型的矿床。初步认为黄连坑锰矿床属构造控矿、风化淋滤成因。     

Post-Palaeozoic evolution of weathered landsurfaces in Uganda by tectonically controlled deep weathering and stripping

A model for the evolution of weathered landsurfaces in Uganda is developed using available geotectonic, climatic, sedimentological and chronological data. The model demonstrates the pivotal role of tectonic uplift in inducing cycles of stripping, and tectonic quiescence for cycles of deep weathering. It is able to account for the development of key landforms, such as inselbergs and duricrust-capped plateaux, which previous hypotheses of landscape evolution that are based on climatic or eustatic controls are unable to explain. Development of the Ugandan landscape is traced back to the Permian. Following late Palaeozoic glaciation, a trend towards warmer and more humid climates through the Mesozoic enabled deep weathering of the Jurassic/mid-Cretaceous surface in Uganda during a period of prolonged tectonic quiescence. Uplift associated with the opening South Atlantic Ocean terminated this cycle and instigated a cycle of stripping between the mid-Cretaceous and early Miocene. Deep weathering on the succeeding Miocene to recent (African) surface has occurred from Miocene to present but has been interrupted in the areas adjacent to the western rift where development of a new drainage base level has prompted cycles of stripping in the Miocene and Pleistocene.     

Silicate and carbonate weathering in the drainage basins of the Ganga-Ghaghara-Indus head waters: Contributions to major ion and Sr isotope geochemistry

The role of silicate and carbonate weathering in contributing to the major cation and Sr isotope geochemistry of the headwaters of the Ganga-Ghaghara-Indus system is investigated from the available data. The contributions from silicate weathering are determined from the composition of granites/ gneisses, soil profiles developed from them and from the chemistry of rivers flowing predominantly through silicate terrains. The chemistry of Precambrian carbonate outcrops of the Lesser Himalaya provided the data base to assess the supply from carbonate weathering. Mass balance calculations indicate that on an average ∼ 77% (Na + K) and ∼ 17% (Ca + Mg) in these rivers is of silicate origin. The silicate Sr component in these waters average ∼40% and in most cases it exceeds the carbonate Sr. The observations that (i) the⁸⁷Sr/⁸⁶Sr and Sr/Ca in the granites/gneisses bracket the values measured in the head waters; (ii) there is a strong positive correlation between⁸⁷Sr/⁸⁶Sr of the rivers and the silicate derived cations in them, suggest that silicate weathering is a major source for the highly radiogenic Sr isotope composition of these source waters. The generally low⁸⁷Sr/⁸⁶Sr (< 0.720) and Sr/Ca (∼ 0.2 nM/ μM) in the Precambrian carbonate outcrops rules them out as a major source of Sr and⁸⁷Sr/⁸⁶Sr in the headwaters on a basin-wide scale, however, the high⁸⁷Sr/⁸⁶Sr (∼ 0.85) in a few of these carbonates suggests that they can be important for particular streams. The analysis of⁸⁷Sr/⁸⁶Sr and Ca/Sr data of the source waters show that they diverge from a low⁸⁷Sr/⁸⁶Sr and low Ca/Sr end member. The high Ca/Sr of the Precambrian carbonates precludes them from being this end member, other possible candidates being Tethyan carbonates and Sr rich evaporite phases such as gypsum and celestite. The results of this study should find application in estimating the present-day silicate and carbonate weathering rates in the Himalaya and associated CO₂ consumption rates and their global significance.