Investigation on the stochastic simulation of strong ground motions for Bucharest area

This short article evaluates the stochastic method of ground motion simulation for Bucharest area using both the single-corner frequency model and recently introduced double-corner frequency models. A dedicated Q model is derived using ground motions obtained during the largest Vrancea earthquakes from the past 30 years. The simulated ground motions are tested against the observed data from the Vrancea earthquakes of August 1986 and May 1990. Moreover, the observed data are also compared against simulations obtained using the Q model derived by Oth et al. (2008). Finally, the results of the simulations show that the derived Q model is better suited for larger magnitude events, while the Q model of Oth et al. (2008) provides better results for smaller earthquakes.     

Rapid imbibition of water in fractures within unsaturated sedimentary rock

The spontaneous imbibition of water and other liquids into gas-filled fractures in variably-saturated porous media is important in a variety of engineering and geological contexts. However, surprisingly few studies have investigated this phenomenon. We present a theoretical framework for predicting the 1-dimensional movement of water into air-filled fractures within a porous medium based on early-time capillary dynamics and spreading over the rough surfaces of fracture faces. The theory permits estimation of sorptivity values for the matrix and fracture zone, as well as a dispersion parameter which quantifies the extent of spreading of the wetting front. Quantitative data on spontaneous imbibition of water in unsaturated Berea sandstone cores were acquired to evaluate the proposed model. The cores with different permeability classes ranging from 50 to 500 mD and were fractured using the Brazilian method. Spontaneous imbibition in the fractured cores was measured by dynamic neutron radiography at the Neutron Imaging Prototype Facility (beam line CG-1D, HFIR), Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Water uptake into both the matrix and the fracture zone exhibited square-root-of-time behavior. The matrix sorptivities ranged from 2.9 to 4.6 mm s^−0.5, and increased linearly as the permeability class increased. The sorptivities of the fracture zones ranged from 17.9 to 27.1 mm s^−0.5, and increased linearly with increasing fracture aperture width. The dispersion coefficients ranged from 23.7 to 66.7 mm² s⁻¹ and increased linearly with increasing fracture aperture width and damage zone width. Both theory and observations indicate that fractures can significantly increase spontaneous imbibition in unsaturated sedimentary rock by capillary action and surface spreading on rough fracture faces. Fractures also increase the dispersion of the wetting front. Further research is needed to investigate this phenomenon in other natural and engineered porous media.     

南海东北部构造及块体运动指向的地震相响应(英文)

南海的构造与演化与资源环境等关系密切是本文研究重点。本文针对南海的东北部构造及其块体构造方向,利用所采集的区域地震剖面,通过解析地震相与构造及其演化的关系,提出以下观点:(1)构造分区特点明晰,可划分为五个不同构造单元,构造单元之间既有联系又相互独立;(2)南海沉积盆地无论表现为拉张-弱挤压-强挤压的何种构造格局,其区域构造应力场是统一的;(3)首次发现反射地震剖面上显示出两个浅俯冲点。每个块体构造层呈手风琴风箱式折曲并向东聚敛,体现沉积盆地从发育、成长、结束、消亡不同阶段在南海的表现,其块体俯冲方向以及块体包络区域性倾伏方向均与区域应力场方向一致。     

带外扩地下室结构的基础优化

在沿海高地下水位地区,地下水浮力对建筑物作用往往比较强,因而这类地区建筑基础抗浮设计成为工程建设中的关键问题。在地下工程中通常采用设置抗拔桩来抵消地下水浮力对建筑物的不利影响。然而,实践证明并非一定要采用抗拔桩才能抵消地下水浮力的作用,应针对具体建设条件,采用更加经济合理的基础形式。结合上海地区某工程实例,对基础设计安全性和经济合理性进行探讨分析,并提出优化基础方案,以期对同类其他工程的基础设计有一定的借鉴作用。     

Geology, Geochemistry and Chromite Mineralization Potential of the Amnay Ophiolitic Complex, Mindoro, Philippines

The Amnay Ophiolitic Complex in Mindoro, the Philippines, is considered an emplaced Cenozoic South China Sea oceanic lithosphere as a result of the collision between the Palawan microcontinental block and the Philippine mobile belt. Middle Oligocene sedimentary rocks intercalated with dominantly MORB-like pillow lavas and volcanic flows suggest the generation of this ophiolite complex in an intermediate spreading ridge within a back-arc basin setting. The volcanic rock suite geochemistry also manifests a slab component suggesting that it is a supra-subduction zone ophiolite. Petrography of the gabbros shows a plagioclase-clinopyroxene crystallization order consistent with a back-arc basin setting. Spinel and pyroxene geochemistry shows that the lherzolites and aluminous-spinel harzburgites are products of low degrees of partial melting. The chromitites hosted by the harzburgites could have not been associated with the MORB-like volcanic suites, gabbros, lherzolites and aluminous-spinel harzburgites. The chromitites are products of mantle sources that have undergone higher degrees of partial melting that would have involved the presence of water. The study of this ophiolitic complex gives us a glimpse of the characteristics of the South China Sea.     

A critical review of methods for pile design in seismically liquefiable soils

Collapse and/or severe damage to pile-supported structures are still observed in liquefiable soils after most major earthquakes. Poor performance of pile foundations remains a great concern to the earthquake engineering community. This review paper compares and contrasts the two plausible theories on pile failure in liquefiable soils. The well established theory of pile failure is based on a flexural mechanism; where the lateral loads on the pile (due to inertia and/or lateral spreading) induce bending failure. This theory is well researched in the recent past and assumes that piles are laterally loaded beams. A more recent theory based on buckling instability treats the piles as laterally unsupported slender columns in liquefiable soils and investigates the buckling instability (bifurcation). The objective of this paper is to investigate the implications to practical pile foundation design that flow from both these theories. Provisions for design made by major international codes of practice for pile design including the Japanese Highway Code (JRA) will be considered. The necessity for such codes to consider alternative forms of failure mechanisms such as the buckling instability of piles in liquefied ground will be discussed. S. Bhattacharya–Previously Departmental Lecturer in Engineering Science, University of Oxford, UK and Fellow of Somerville College, Oxford. S. P. G. Madabhushi–Fellow of Girton College, Cambridge.     

The influence of edifice slope and substrata on volcano spreading

Gravitational volcano spreading is caused by flow of weak substrata due to volcanic loading, and is now a process known to affect many edifices. The process produces extension in the upper edifice, evidenced by gräben and normal faults, and compression at the base, seen in strike–slip faults and thrusts. Where spreading is identified, host volcanoes have a range of fault densities, variable rift and gräben shapes, and different degrees of structural asymmetry. Previous studies have suggested a link between edifice shape and structure and the proportion of brittle to ductile material in the substrata or lower edifice. We study this link using refined sand cone analogue models standing on a brittle–ductile/sand–silicone substrata. Two scenarios have been investigated, the first mainly represents oceanic volcanoes with a ductile layer within the edifice (type I), where there is an outer ductile free surface. The second represents most continental volcanoes that have ductile substrata (type II). We apply the model results to natural examples and develop quantitative relationships between slope, brittle–ductile ratio fault density, spreading rate and structural style. Displacement fields calculated from stereophotogrammetry show significant differences between different slope models. We find that more faults are produced when the cone is initially steeper, or when the brittle substratum is thinner. However, the effect of the brittle layer dominates over that of slope. The strike–slip movements are found to be an essential feature in the spreading mechanism and the gräben are in fact transtensional features. Strike–slip and graben faults make a conjugate flower pattern. The structures produced are well-organised for type II edifices, but they are poorly organised for type I models. Type I models represent good analogues for oceanic volcanoes that are commonly affected by large slumps bounded by an extensional zone and lack of well-formed sector gräben. The well-observed connection between oceanic volcano rifts and large landslide-slumps is confirmed to be a consequence of spreading.     

Seismic study of the Ulleung Basin crust and its implications for the opening of the East Sea (Japan Sea)

The Ulleung Basin (Tsushima Basin) in the southwestern East Sea (Japan Sea) is floored by a crust whose affinity is not known whether oceanic or thinned continental. This ambiguity resulted in unconstrained mechanisms of basin evolution. The present work attempts to define the nature of the crust of the Ulleung Basin and its tectonic evolution using seismic wide-angle reflection and refraction data recorded on ocean bottom seismometers (OBSs). Although the thickness of (10 km) of the crust is greater than typical oceanic crust, tau-p analysis of OBS data and forward modeling by 2-D ray tracing suggest that it is oceanic in character: (1) the crust consists of laterally consistent upper and lower layers that are typical of oceanic layers 2 and 3 in seismic velocity and gradient distribution and (2) layer 2C, the transition between layer 2 and layer 3 in oceanic crust, is manifested by a continuous velocity increase from 5.7 to 6.3 km/s over the thickness interval of about 1 km between the upper and lower layers. Therefore it is not likely that the Ulleung Basin was formed by the crustal extension of the southwestern Japan Arc where crustal structure is typically continental. Instead, the thickness of the crust and its velocity structure suggest that the Ulleung Basin was formed by seafloor spreading in a region of hotter than normal mantle surrounding a distant mantle plume, not directly above the core of the plume. It seems that the mantle plume was located in northeast China. This suggestion is consistent with geochemical data that indicate the influence of a mantle plume on the production of volcanic rocks in and around the Ulleung Basin. Thus we propose that the opening models of the southwestern East Sea should incorporate seafloor spreading and the influence of a mantle plume rather than the extension of the crust of the Japan Arc.     

Carbonate Sequence Stratigraphy of a Back-Arc Basin： A Case Study of the Qom Formation in the Kashan Area, Central Iran

The Qom Formation comprises Oligo-Miocene deposits from a marine succession distributed in the Central Basin of Iran. It is composed of five members designated as A-F. Little previous work exists on the sequence stratigraphy. Based on an integrated study of sequence stratigraphy with outcrop data, wells and regional seismic profiles, the Qom Formation is interpreted as a carbonate succession deposited in a mid-Tertiary back-arc basin. There are two second-order sequences (designated as SS1 and SS2) and five third-order sequences (designated as S1-S5). Five distinct systems tracts including transgressive, highstand, forced regressive, slope margin and lowstand have been recognized. The relationship between the sequences and lithologic sub-units has been collated and defined (S1 to S5 individually corresponding to A-C1, C2-C4, D-E, the lower and upper portions of F); a relative sea level change curve and the sequence stratigraphic framework have been established and described in detail. The coincidence of relative sea level change between that of the determined back-arc basin and the world indicates that the sedimentary cycles of the Qom Formation are mainly controlled by eustatic cycles. The variable combination of the systems tracts and special tectonic-depositional setting causally underpin multiple sequence stratigraphic framework styles seen in the carbonates of the back-arc basin revealing: (1) a continental margin basin that developed some form of barrier, characterized by the development of multiple cycles of carbonate-evaporites; (2) a flat carbonate ramp, which occurred on the southern shelf formed by the lack of clastic supply from nearby magmatic islands plus mixed siliciclastics and carbonates that occurred on the northern shelf due to a sufficient clastics supply from the land; and (3) a forced regressive stratigraphic stacking pattern that occured on the southern shelf and in basin lows due to the uplifting of the southern shelf. Thick and widespread aggradational framework limestone usually occurs in the initial sequences (S1 and S3) of the supersequence, which led to preferential oil reservoir deposition but a lack of source and cap rocks, whereas the retrogradational and progradational framework limestone usually occurs in the later sequences (S2 and S4-S5) of the supersequence, which results in two perfect sets of source, reservoir and cap rock assemblies, so that the limestone in sub-member C2-C4 and the F-Member can be predicted as important objects for oil exploration.     

慢速-超慢速扩张西南印度洋中脊研究进展

西南印度洋中脊具有慢速—超慢速扩张速率和斜向扩张的特征,是全球洋中脊系统研究的热点之一,也是研究海底构造环境、热液活动、地幔深部过程及其动力学机制的重要区域。在前人工作的基础上较为详细地介绍了西南印度洋中脊的研究历史、地形划分、扩张速率及其构造特征,归纳了西南印度洋中脊热液活动及岩石地球化学特征,探讨了超慢速扩张洋脊和超镁铁质岩系热液系统的特殊性,并认为超慢速扩张洋脊广泛暴露的地幔岩及其蛇纹石化作用、超镁铁质岩系热液系统以及热液硫化物成矿作用是西南印度洋中脊今后研究的重要内容。