Sinkhole characterization in the Dead Sea area using airborne laser scanning

Since the early 1980s, the Dead Sea coast has undergone a near catastrophic land deterioration as a result of a rapid lake-level drop. One conspicuous expression of this deterioration is the formation of sinkholes fields that puncture the coastal plains. The evolution of sinkholes along nearly 70-km strip has brought to a halt the regional development in this well-known and toured area and destroyed existing infrastructures. Great efforts are being invested in understanding the phenomena and in development of monitoring techniques. We report in this paper the application of airborne laser scanning for characterization of sinkholes. We demonstrate first the appropriateness of laser scanning for this task and its ability to provide detailed 3D information on this phenomenon. We describe then an autonomous means for their extraction over large regions and with high level of accuracy. Extraction is followed by their detailed geometric characterization. Using this high-resolution data, we show how sinkholes of 0.5 m radius and 25 cm depth can be detected from airborne platforms as well as the geomorphic features surrounding them. These sinkhole measures account for their embryonic stage, allowing tracking them at an early phase of their creation.     

The genesis of wadi Magrish migmatites (N-E Sinai)

The migmatite complex of the Magrish area is part of a large crystalline massif south of Elat. The mineralogical composition of the migmatites is very uniform. The components of the melanosome are biotite, quartz and plagioclase, with small amounts of garnet and very rarely sillimanite and those of the leucosome — quartz and plagioclase. On the basis of chemical composition of the migmatites and possible premigmatitic parent rocks, absence of orthoclase in the leucosome, similar composition of plagioclase in the leucosome and in neighbouring melanosome, and Qz:Plag values which do not plot around a cotectic line, it is concluded that migmatisation occurred in a nearly closed system, without the presence of a melt phase. Thus, injection of granitic material, metasomatism or partial anatexis as possible main formation mechanisms are rejected and metamorphic differentiation is favoured.     

Deterministic seismic microzonation of Kolkata city

This paper presents the deterministic seismic microzonation of densely populated Kolkata city situated on the world’s largest delta island with very soft and thick soil deposit in the surficial layers. A fourth-order accurate staggered-grid finite-difference algorithm for SH-wave propagation simulation in visco-elastic medium is used for the linear computation of ground motion amplifications in sedimentary deposit. Different maps such as for fundamental frequency (F ₀), peak ground acceleration (PGA), peak ground velocity, and peak ground displacement are developed for variety of end-users communities, including structural and geotechnical engineers for performance-based designs, building officials, emergency managers, land-use planners, private businesses, and the general public. The scenario of simulated amplification factors in the different frequency bands revealed that the Kolkata city is very much prone to severe damage even during a moderate earthquake and very selective damage may occur at some of the localities during local and distant earthquakes. The deterministically predicted PGA at bedrock level is 0.0844 g and the maximum PGA predicted at the free surface is 0.6 g in Kolkata city due to maximum credible earthquake (M _w = 5.4) associated with Eocene Hinge Zone at a depth of 36 km. The seismic microzonation of Kolkata city reveals that the Nager Bazar and Nimtala areas are the safest regions with earthquake point of view.     

Influence of spatial variability of permeability property on steady state seepage flow and slope stability analysis

In recent years, spatial variability modeling of soil parameters using random field theory has gained distinct importance in geotechnical analysis. In the present study, commercially available finite difference numerical code FLAC 5.0 is used for modeling the permeability parameter as spatially correlated log-normally distributed random variable and its influence on the steady state seepage flow and on the slope stability analysis are studied. Considering the case of a 5.0 m high cohesive–frictional soil slope of 30°, a range of coefficients of variation (CoV%) from 60 to 90% in the permeability values, and taking different values of correlation distance in the range of 0.5–15 m, parametric studies, using Monte Carlo simulations, are performed to study the following three aspects, i.e., (i) effect of stochastic soil permeability on the statistics of seepage flow in comparison to the analytic (Dupuit′s) solution available for the uniformly constant permeability property; (ii) strain and deformation pattern, and (iii) stability of the given slope assessed in terms of factor of safety (FS). The results obtained in this study are useful to understand the role of permeability variations in slope stability analysis under different slope conditions and material properties.     

Analysis of buried pipelines subjected to reverse fault motion

Presently available simplified analytical methods and semi-empirical methods for the analysis of buried pipelines subjected to fault motion are suitable only for the strike-slip and the normal-slip type fault motions, and cannot be used for the reverse fault crossing case. A simple finite element model, which uses beam elements for the pipeline and discrete nonlinear springs for the soil, has been proposed to analyse buried pipeline subjected to reverse fault motion. The material nonlinearities associated with pipe-material and soil, and geometric nonlinearity associated with large deformations were incorporated in the analysis. Complex reverse fault motion was simulated using suitable constraints between pipe-nodes and ground ends of the soil spring. Results of the parametric study suggest that the pipeline's capacity to accommodate reverse fault offset can be increased significantly by choosing a near-parallel orientation in plan with respect to the fault line. Further improvement in the response of the pipeline is possible by adopting loose backfill, smooth and hard surface coating, and shallow burial depth in the fault crossing region. For normal or near normal orientations, pipeline is expected to fail due to beam buckling at very small fault offsets.     

Non-Gaussian distribution and clustering of hot and cold pixels in the five-year WMAP sky

We present measurements of the clustering of hot and cold patches in the microwave background sky as measured from the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe 5-year data. These measurements are compared with theoretical predictions which assume that the cosmological signal obeys Gaussian statistics. We find significant differences from the simplest Gaussian-based prediction. However, the measurements are sensitive to the fact that the noise is spatially inhomogeneous (e.g. because different parts of the sky were observed for different lengths of time). We show how to account for this spatial inhomogeneity when making predictions. Differences from the Gaussian-based expectation remain even after this more careful accounting of the noise. In particular, we note that hot and cold pixels cluster differently within the same temperature thresholds at few-degree scales. While these findings may indicate primordial non-Gaussianity, we discuss other plausible explanations for these discrepancies. In addition, we find some deviations from Gaussianity at sub-degree scales, especially in the W band, whose origin may be associated with extragalactic dust emission.     

Cosmic-ray positrons: are there primary sources?

Galactic cosmic rays consist of primary and secondary particles. Primary cosmic rays are thought to be energized by first order Fermi acceleration processes at supernova shock fronts within our Galaxy. The cosmic rays that eventually reach the Earth from this source are mainly protons and atomic nuclei, but also include electrons. Secondary cosmic rays are created in collisions of primary particles with the diffuse interstellar gas. They are relatively rare but carry important information on the Galactic propagation of the primary particles. The secondary component includes a small fraction of antimatter particles, positrons and antiprotons. In addition, positrons and antiprotons may also come from unusual sources and possibly provide insight into new physics. For instance, the annihilation of heavy supersymmetric dark matter particles within the Galactic halo could lead to positrons or antiprotons with distinctive energy signatures. With the High-Energy Antimatter Telescope (HEAT) balloon-borne instrument, we have measured the abundances of positrons and electrons at energies between 1 and 50 GeV. The data suggest that indeed a small additional antimatter component may be present that cannot be explained by a purely secondary production mechanism. Here we describe the signature of the effect and discuss its possible origin.