Analytical investigation of the exact groundwater divide between rivers beyond the Dupuit–Forchheimer approximation

The groundwater divide is a key feature of river basins and significantly influenced by subsurface hydrological processes. For an unconfined aquifer between two parallel rivers or ditches, it has long been defined as the top of the water table based on the Dupuit–Forchheimer approximation. However, the exact groundwater divide is subject to the interface between two local flow systems transporting groundwater to rivers from the infiltration recharge. This study contributes a new analytical model for two-dimensional groundwater flow between rivers of different water levels. The flownet is delineated in the model to identify groundwater flow systems and the exact groundwater divide. Formulas with two dimensionless parameters are derived to determine the distributed hydraulic head, the top of the water table and the groundwater divide. The locations of the groundwater divide and the top of the water table are not the same. The distance between them in horizontal can reach up to 8.9% of the distance between rivers. Numerical verifications indicate that simplifications in the analytical model do not significantly cause misestimates in the location of the groundwater divide. In contrast, the Dupuit–Forchheimer approximation yields an incorrect water table shape. The new analytical model is applied to investigate groundwater divides in the Loess Plateau, China, with a Monte Carlo simulation process taking into account the uncertainties in the parameters.     

低轨道人造卫星(CHAMP、GRACE、GOCE)与高精度地球重力场——卫星重力大地测量的最新发展及其对地球科学的重大影响

评述了卫星重力大地测量的最新发展及其对地球科学的重大影响。为了更好地理解地球内部物理构造与海洋动力学，以及大陆，冰川和海洋的相互作用，改善现有地球重力场模型（包括精度和空间解析度）是非常重要的。IUGG等国际组织对此已经强调了很多年。最近，由德国的GFZ（GeoForschungsZentrum)，美国的NASA（National Aeronautics and Space Adminitration)以及欧洲宇航局ESA（European Space Agency)开发研制了最先进的地球监测技术－SST（Satellite-to-Sateilite Tracking)。其主要特点是利用现有的GPS连续追踪新发射低轨道卫星，并由低轨道卫星对地球重力场作精密观测。已经发射和即将发射的卫星有3颗：GHAMP（Challenging Mini-Satellite Payload for Geophysical Research an Application)已经于2000年发射；GRACE（Gravity Recovery and Climate Experimert)定于2002年发射；GOCE（Gravity Field and Steady-state Ocean Cirulation Explorer)计划2004年发射，它们可以统称为重力卫星。载有SST技术的人造卫星的主要目的是获得具有前所未有的高精度和高空间解析度的全球重力场和大地水准面模型，加强人们对地球内部构造的理解并为海洋和气象研究提供更好地参考。上述3个重力卫星工作在有明显区别的不同波谱内，它们有不同的科学应用，仅有一小部分重合。所以，就应用而言它们是完全互补的。它们在地球科学中的应用将是广泛的，特别对于固体地球物理学，海洋学以及大地测量学等领域，它们将会带来革命性的变化，其意义不亚于GPS。     

The formation and stability of the configuration of the planetary system HD 126611

Recent Doppler velocity measurements have revealed the existence of two planets orbiting the star HD 12661 on medium-eccentricity orbits. The inner planet has a period of 263.6 d and a mass of 2.3 Jupiter masses, and the outer planet has a period of 1444.5d and a mass of 1.57 Jupiter masses. The stability of this system requires the two planets to be in a state of mean-motion orbit resonances. By numerical method we have studied the orbit migration and stability of the system in its early ages under the action of the proto-stellar disk, and calculated the probabilities of the planets being captured into the mean -motion resonances during their migrations. It is found that at present the two planets are probably situated at the edge of the 11:2 mean-motion resonance and are in chaotic motions. This result may be helpful to clarify the arguments on the present configuration. Besides, it is indicated that very probably, after the formation of the system, the gaseous disk has almost disappeared before the planets migrated to the present configuration.     

Correcting systematic effects in a large set of photometric light curves

We suggest a new algorithm to remove systematic effects in a large set of light curves obtained by a photometric survey. The algorithm can remove systematic effects, such as those associated with atmospheric extinction, detector efficiency, or point spread function changes over the detector. The algorithm works without any prior knowledge of the effects, as long as they linearly appear in many stars of the sample. The approach, which was originally developed to remove atmospheric extinction effects, is based on a lower rank approximation of matrices, an approach which has already been suggested and used in chemometrics, for example. The proposed algorithm is especially useful in cases where the uncertainties of the measurements are unequal. For equal uncertainties, the algorithm reduces to the Principal Component Analysis (PCA) algorithm. We present a simulation to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm and we point out its potential, in the search for transit candidates in particular.     

Identification of physical processes inherent in artificial neural network rainfall runoff models

The emergence of artificial neural network (ANN) technology has provided many promising results in the field of hydrology and water resources simulation. However, one of the major criticisms of ANN hydrologic models is that they do not consider/explain the underlying physical processes in a watershed, resulting in them being labelled as black‐box models. This paper discusses a research study conducted in order to examine whether or not the physical processes in a watershed are inherent in a trained ANN rainfall‐runoff model. The investigation is based on analysing definite statistical measures of strength of relationship between the disintegrated hidden neuron responses of an ANN model and its input variables, as well as various deterministic components of a conceptual rainfall‐runoff model. The approach is illustrated by presenting a case study for the Kentucky River watershed. The results suggest that the distributed structure of the ANN is able to capture certain physical behaviour of the rainfall‐runoff process. The results demonstrate that the hidden neurons in the ANN rainfall‐runoff model approximate various components of the hydrologic system, such as infiltration, base flow, and delayed and quick surface flow, etc., and represent the rising limb and different portions of the falling limb of a flow hydrograph. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

HD 82943行星系统的2:1共振与稳定性

用直接数值积分方法通过模拟不同的行星构型探讨了HD82943行星系统(由两颗共振的巨行星组成)的长期动力演化,同时,还研究了在相空间的轨道运动.在对系统长达107年数值积分中,发现所有的稳定轨道均与2:1共振相关联.典型地,在相同的时标内,两个共振幅角θ1和θ2同时(或其中之一)存在秤动.由于共振幅角在一定范围内的秤动,因而使两颗行星轨道半长径被约束而表现为规则运动模式.另外,利用分析模型(包含了外行星偏心率e2的因素),还讨论了对于不同取值的e2和相对近星点经度θ时,内行星在相空间的运动,并发现2:1轨道共振对于相对较小的e2以及当θ=0°时易于保持.此外,适中的e2将导致系统的两颗行星进入深度共振状态.再者,分析模型和数值计算的结果吻合得很好,两者都揭示了行星系统的2:1共振结构.     

TEMPORAL TRENDS IN SOIL PRODUCTIVITY EVALUATIONS*

Studies of soil productivity must compensate for the effects of temporal trends in order to examine the pattern of crop yields along spatial gradients. An analysis of the published yield estimates for 30 soils in 233 counties, however, did not find consistent yield increases over the past three decades. On the contrary, the yield estimates for many soils were markedly uniform since 1972. The uniformity appears to have two causes: the acknowledged difficulty of making yield estimates in a time of increasing variability in soil and crop management, both within and between regions, and surveyors' awareness of data stored in a national soils data base. The effect is to cast doubt on soil productivity data reported in county soil surveys published between 1973 and 1988.