Geometrical focusing as a mechanism for significant amplification of ground motion in sedimentary basins: analytical and numerical study

We study the geometrical and material conditions which lead to focusing of seismic waves traveling across a concave velocity interface representing the boundary of a sedimentary basin within a denser rock. We approximate, using geometrical analysis for plane-waves, the combination of interface eccentricities and velocity ratios for which the seismic rays converge to a near surface region of the basin. 2-D finite difference modeling is used to compute Peak Ground Velocity (PGV) and spectral amplification across the basin. We show that effective geometrical focusing occurs for a narrow set of eccentricities and velocity ratios, where seismic energy is converged to a region of $\pm $ 0.5 km from surface. This mechanism leads to significant amplification of PGV at the center of the basin, up to a factor of 3; frequencies of the modeled spectrum are amplified up to the corner frequency of the source. Finally, we suggest a practical method for evaluating the potential for effective geometrical focusing in sedimentary basins.     

Follow the road: historical GIS for evaluating the development of routes in the Negev region during the twentieth century

ABSTRACT

At the beginning of the twentieth century, a British mapping team led by Captain S. F. Newcombe surveyed and mapped the Negev region, Sinai, and western Jordan. The map was mainly produced for military use. Consequently, it included a network of branched routes, water supplies and facilities, and topographic contours. This study used this map to examine the development of routes in the Negev region between the beginning of and until the end of the twentieth century. First, the individual sheets comprising the study area were pieced together and the accuracy of the map was evaluated. The accuracy found on the Newcombe map was 0.76 mm on the map scale, equivalent to 100.3 m. Route development during the twentieth century was then evaluated by comparing the routes digitized from the Newcombe map to digitized routes on a late twentieth-century map. The results do not reveal tremendous changes in path, shape, or number of routes. Instead, they merely indicate the natural development in their quality. This Historical GIS-based approach provided a useful technique for analyzing and comparing the line segments extracted from historical and modern maps. The implemented approach may also serve other geographical or historical studies aiming to examine the development of branched networks throughout history.     

Factors controlling the formation of coppice dunes (nebkhas) in the Negev Desert

Due to their role in increasing fertility, coppice dunes (nebkhas) are regarded by many researchers as important contributors to aridland ecosystems. Yet, despite their frequent occurrence, little information exists regarding the rate and factors that control their formation. The goal of the current study is to examine the formation rate and factors that determine the establishment of coppice dunes in the Hallamish dune field in the western Negev Desert. The rate in which sand and fines, hereafter aeolian input (AI) was trapped and its particle size distribution (PSD) were examined by means of the solidification of 2 m × 2 m plots using surface stabilizers, and by the installation of three pairs of artificial shrubs (SH), three pairs of artificial trees (TR), and a pair of control (CT) plots. Measurements were annually conducted during June 2004 and June 2008, with monthly collection during June 2004 and May 2006. The PSD was compared to coppice dunes located on the fine‐grained playa surface. AI was trapped at SH, while it was not trapped at TR and CT. The annual rate of AI accretion under the canopy was highly variable ranging between 1405 and 13 260 g m^?2, with a four‐year average of 5676 g m^?2, i.e. 3.8 mm a^?1. It depended upon the wind power, with drift potential having a threshold velocity of U_t > 10 m s^?1 yielding the higher correlations with the monthly AI (r² = 0.59–0.84). No significant relations were obtained between the monthly AI and shrub height. Sand saltation, suspension and creep are seen responsible for mound formation, which based on the current rates of sand accretion are relatively fast with a 60 cm‐high coppice dune forming within ~150–160 years. The current data highlight the problematic design of some previous research using conventional traps and confining the measurements only to certain seasons. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Hydrological and salinity impacts of a bio‐drainage strategy application in the Yizre'el Valley,Israel

The bio‐drainage–commercial forestry strategy was applied in five plots in the Yizre'el Valley, northern Israel, to evaluate the hydrological and salinity impacts of eucalypt plantations. Each plot contained a mix of 11 selected eucalyptus species/ecotypes. Two plots (Nahalal and Genigar), representing the two extreme waterlogging/salinity conditions in the valley, were selected for in‐depth monitoring over a 10‐year period to assess the likely environmental improvement through bio‐drainage. Despite impressive growth rates of genetically improved Eucalyptus camaldulensis in the year‐round waterlogged, slightly saline Nahalal site (650 mm annual rainfall), the water uptake by the trees was insufficient to control the rising water table caused by excessive water inputs, both natural and human. In the more saline, alkaline and drier Genigar plot (450 mm annual rainfall), where rainfall is the only water input, the ground water dropped to below 3 m from soil surface in the fourth year after planting, i.e. deeper than the adjacent ground water levels. Both sites showed appreciable rise in wells that penetrated the 3‐ to 4‐m confining layer. The 10‐year salinity (EC) trend of the top layer in Nahalal varied because the drainage was limited by the positive water balance and the above‐average spells of dry winters. In and below the 4 m deep layer the EC remained below 1·5 dS m^?1 throughout the entire 10‐year study. The last EC measurement, taken in 2003, showed values not higher than 4 dS m^?1 throughout the 6 m soil profile. In Genigar, there was significant leaching of salts from the top layer (1 m) during the 9‐year monitoring period, but recently a salts ‘bulge’ was gradually developed in the 1–5 m strata indicating that the expected downward movement of leached salts was impeded by the 3–4 m deep low‐permeability clayey layer that lies over a coarser, far more conductive and notably confined layer, which leads to a perched water body. The last EC measurement at the end of 2003 showed a maximum value of 5·5 dS m^?1 at 3 m depth. No signs of tree stress were observed in either site, at any soil depth during the 10 years of monitoring. Theoretical considerations do not support the hypothesis that there would be a fatal long‐term accumulation of salts in the root zone. The Israeli experience has shown that the bio‐drainage technique can effectively lower a shallow water table and reverse salinity trends, provided that the overall water balance is negative, i.e. that the water inputs match the water use by the tree plantation and local drainage characteristics. However, the rate of improvement of the hydraulic, salinity, sodicity and soil physical properties is site specific. Excess fresh water inputs into the plantation, although they create waterlogging conditions, supply unlimited water to the trees, which, in turn, show exceptional growth rates, with usable commercial value. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A city hit by an earthquake: an HGIS approach to reconstructing the damage in Tiberias (Israel) in 1837

On 1 January 1837 a devastating earthquake struck northern Ottoman Palestine, Lebanon and southern Syria, causing considerable damage in many localities. Tiberias, located on the western shores of the Sea of Galilee, suffered badly and many of its inhabitants were injured or perished. Yet, although the earthquake and the resulting damage were described in many contemporary sources, evaluation of the damage and its spatial distribution was never made before. In this study textual and visual sources were collected and compiled to evaluate the damage that resulted. An HGIS (historical GIS) approach was implemented to examine these sources, geo-code the damage and digitally reconstruct Tiberias at the time. The results were a contemporaneous map of Tiberias at the beginning of the nineteenth century and three-dimensional models of the city prior to and after the earthquake. The models enabled a 360º examination of the damage distribution in high resolution and evaluation of the overall impact of the earthquake. This study demonstrates the use of HGIS in the reconstruction of past urban cityscapes and the investigation of earthquake damage. It also suggests extending this methodology to other historical–geographical studies of past landscapes and to the examination of any kind of gradual or dramatic change.     

Relation of Carlin-type gold mineralization to lithology,structure and alteration: Screamer zone,Betze-Post deposit,Nevada

An evaluation of the relation between geologic features and gold grade has been undertaken in the Screamer zone of the Betze-Post deposit, the largest Carlin-type gold deposit in the world. Screamer, which forms the western end of Betze-Post, is a stratiform ore zone that is hosted almost entirely by the wispy member of the Popovich Formation. The wispy member is overlain by the planar member of the same formation and underlain by the Roberts Mountains Formation, both of which contain much smaller amounts of gold mineralization in the Screamer zone. Geologic features recognized at Screamer reflect the long history of events that have affected the area since mid-Paleozoic time. The two earliest events at Screamer were probably sulfidation and formation of flat fractures, and the two latest events were pyritization and formation of kaolinite-filled fractures, which took place at least partly during gold mineralization. Gold mineralization at Screamer shows ambiguous relations to most lithologic, alteration and structural features. For instance, gold grades in the wispy member of the Popovich Formation are slightly higher in rock units that contain the largest proportion of debris flow material, but this relation does not account for most ore. The correlation of gold grades with fracture density is also generally poor, but gold grades are slightly higher in samples containing vertical and/or kaolinite-bearing fractures, particularly those with a northeasterly trend. Most early veins at Screamer are horizontal and most later veins are vertical, suggesting that the long-term trend of fluid pressures in the area has been from lithostatic to hydrostatic. Finally, gold grades correlate poorly with silicification and decarbonatization, and although some gold appears to be associated with rock containing kaolinite, much is not. The only rock feature that shows a direct relation to gold grade is pyrite. Some pyrite formed by sulfidation of the original rock, but much of it formed by addition of pyrite to the rock. Stability limits for ore and alteration assemblages at Screamer indicate that pressures of mineralization were probably not less than about 300 bar, which require depths of about 3 km for the hydrostatic conditions that probably prevailed in the Betze-Post hydrothermal system.     

Reappraised list of historical earthquakes that affected Israel and its close surroundings

Numerous historical reports of damaging earthquakes in the Levant have accumulated over the last 3000 years. Here, we screen that information and focus on the damaging earthquakes that affected Israel from the second millennia BCE to the 1927 CE Jericho earthquake and list the earthquakes by date, of major damage, type of sequence, and degree of size. The compilation results in three different lists: (i) 71 reliable earthquakes that in our opinion were most probably associated with the Dead Sea Transform (DST) and affected Israel and its close surroundings; (ii) 41 questionable earthquakes that should be re-evaluated or ignored; and (iii) 46 earthquakes that probably occurred but were erroneously associated with damage in Israel. What emerges from the list of the reliable earthquakes is that (i) Israel and its close surroundings suffered damage about 32 times during the last two millennia, that is, once in about 60 years, although not regularly; (ii) 21 of the earthquakes occurred during the last millennia, i.e., an event every ～45 years; and (iii) three intervals of increased reporting are noticed: between the fourth and the mid-eighth century, from the beginning of the eleventh to the end of the thirteenth century, and from the end of the eighteenth century up to the last entry in 1927, though this period may be extended until today. In-depth evaluation of the changing regimes over time within the study area, the historical reports of earthquake damage outside of Israel, and comparison with physical paleo- and archaeo-seismology evidence, such as the “137–206” and “165–236” paleoseismic earthquakes for which there is no historical match, indicates that the historical list is far from being complete. Thus, we argue that the apparent cycles of historical reporting do not necessarily reflect the actual rate of seismic activity and further investigation is needed to establish a compiled, multi-sourced list to decipher the true nature of cycles of strong earthquakes in this region during historical times.     

Long-term environmental impact of coral mining at the Wakatobi marine park, Indonesia

Coral mining for use as construction material is a major cause of reef degradation in several coastal nations. We studied the long-term impact of coral mining at the Wakatobi marine park, Indonesia, where a substantial mining event was undertaken two decades ago in order to supply building material for a jetty. The mined area shows significant differences in reef viability compared to a control reef 1000 m away: the percentage of dead coral in the substrate, the percentage of live coral coverage, the species richness and abundance of hard corals are all greatly reduced. For the most part, soft corals and other (non-coral) invertebrates do not show significant differences in richness, abundance or diversity, but their species composition differs greatly: the control site abounds giant clams, whereas these are absent at the mined site; instead, the dominant species there is Strombus, an algae-grazing gastropod associated with stressed reefs. We conclude that the mined reef flat failed to recover from the severe mining event, despite being un-mined for over 20 years. Our results demonstrate that without effective management and enforcement, coral mining may cause a long-term, destructive impact on the coral reef ecosystem. We propose the following management steps: first, law enforcement measures must become more stringent; second, alternative income sources such as aquaculture, ecotourism, or even land-based alternatives need to be actively promoted and financed; third, alternative building materials such as landrock and concrete should become more accessible and affordable; and fourth, education and awareness regarding both the MPA regulations and the environmental impact of coral mining have to be strengthened.