Gravitational instability of suprathermal hydromagnetic plasma

The paper models the suprathermal plasma as the concatenation of two different gravitating fluids each having its own separate density and pressure. One of the fluids has isotropic pressure while the other has an anisotropic pressure. The system is subjected to a uniform magnetic field which is frozen with the fluids. The gravitational instability of the model for low frequency plane waves has been investigated in a linear framework for plasma parameters relevant to the spiral arms of the galaxy and the cosmic gas clouds. The analysis shows that the wavelength of the instability is strongly dependent upon the anisotropy of the non-thermal plasma.     

Characterisation of the Dabla Granitoids, North Khetri Copper Belt, Rajasthan, India: Evidence of Bimodal Anorogenic Felsic Magmatism

The Palaeoproterozoic Dabla granitoid pluton of the North Khetri Copper Belt is located to the east of a NNE-SSW trending lineament with numerous albite-rich intrusives, the intraplate ‘albitite line’. The Dabla pluton is essentially made up of calcic amphibole-bearing granitoids, displaying a concentric bimodal distribution of alkali-feldspar granites, comprising a microcline-albite granite and an albite-granite. The dominant rock type is pink-coloured granite, which is characterised by quartz, microcline, albite and hastingsitic hornblende, and occurs in the marginal parts of the pluton. The volumetrically subordinate albite-granite in the central part of the pluton is invariably white in colour, non-foliated and is mainly composed of quartz, albite and amphibole of actinolite to ferro-actinolite composition. The albite-granite is characterised by low K₂O (0.06-0.09%), Rb (<5 ppm) and Ba (<20 ppm), high Na₂O (7.19-7.36%) and high Na/K ratios (122.4-185.2) as compared to the granite. These rocks are not subjected to any metamorphic overprint, especially the albite-granite, which shows pristine abundances of major and trace elements. The rocks are highly evolved as reflected in their high SiO₂ (72 to 78%) contents and high DI (89.5-97) values. The Dabla granitoids are characterised by similar REE and spider patterns, displaying LREE enriched slopes, flat HREE profiles and strong negative Sr, P, Ti and Eu anomalies suggesting their comagmatic nature. Nevertheless, the granite is relatively more fractionated [(La/Yb)_N = 3.89-8.19] and show higher REE abundances (466-673 ppm) as compared to the albite-granite [(La/Yb)_N = 1.97-2.96; REE = 220-277 ppm]. Distinctive features of these rocks are their low Ca (0.21-1.53%), Mg (<0.02-0.19%), Al (11.84-12.96%) and Sr (12-46 ppm) abundances, high Zr (155-631 ppm), Y (67-156 ppm), Nb (14-91 ppm), and Ga (20-31 ppm) concentrations and high Fe*-number, high Ga/Al ratio and high agpaitic index (AI) values. These features, coupled with their ferroan, alkaline and metaluminous nature, are typical of within-plate aluminous A-type granites. The geochemical data further indicate that the Dabla magma was generated at fairly high temperature, apparently in an upper mantle region, under relatively low H₂O activities and reduced conditions and emplaced at a shallow depth in an extensional tectonic environment.     

Long-range precipitation forecasts using paleoclimate reconstructions in the western United States

Long-range precipitation forecasts are useful when managing water supplies.Oceanicatmospheric oscillations have been shown to influence precipitation.Due to a longer cycle of some of the oscillations,a short instrumental record is a limitation in using them for long-range precipitation forecasts.The influence of oscillations over precipitation is observable within paleoclimate reconstructions;however,there have been no attempts to utilize these reconstructions in precipitation forecasting.A data-driven model,KStar,is used for obtaining long-range precipitation forecasts by extending the period of record through the use of reconstructions of oscillations.KStar is a nearest neighbor algorithm with an entropy-based distance function.Oceanic-atmospheric oscillation reconstructions include the El Nino-Southern Oscillation(ENSO),the Pacific Decadal Oscillation(PDO),the North Atlantic Oscillation(NAO),and the Atlantic Multi-decadal Oscillation(AMO).Precipitation is forecasted for 20 climate divisions in the western United States.A 10-year moving average is applied to aid in the identification of oscillation phases.A lead time approach is used to simulate a one-year forecast,with a 10-fold cross-validation technique to test the models.Reconstructions are used from 1658-1899,while the observed record is used from 1900-2007.The model is evaluated using mean absolute error(MAE),root mean squared error(RMSE),RMSE-observations standard deviation ratio(RSR),Pearson’s correlation coefficient(R),NashSutcliffe coefficient of efficiency(NSE),and linear error in probability space(LEPS) skill score(SK).The role of individual and coupled oscillations is evaluated by dropping oscillations in the model.The results indicate ’good’ precipitation estimates using the KStar model.This modeling technique is expected to be useful for long-term water resources planning and management.     

Formation Mechanism of Mud Bank Along the Southwest Coast of India

Mud bank formation during the southwest monsoon along the southwest coast of India remains an enigma to the researchers and coastal community in spite of several earlier studies. The present study attempts to unravel the mystery through a high-frequency, season-long time-series observation at Alappuzha, located at the southern part of the west coast of India, a region of frequent occurrence of mud bank. Using 7-month-long weekly time-series observation, we identified strong winds and high waves associated with onset of the southwest monsoon and subsequent three episodic atmospheric low-pressure events (LPEs).With the help of in situ time-series data, we show that the strong winds and high waves associated with southwest monsoon pre-conditions the near shore bottom sediment to bring it into suspension. The high amplitude waves associated with the southwest monsoon, while propagating from the deep water to shallow water region, interact with the bottom initiating bottom-sediment movement and its suspension due to wave refraction and shoaling. The sporadic occurrence of the atmospheric LPEs enhances the process of suspension of bottom sediment in the near shore region leading to the formation of fluid mud. Simulations with a cohesive sediment transport model yielded realistic estimates of sediment transport, in the presence of an onshore current, a pre-requisite for transporting the fluid mud toward the coast. The prevailing onshore upwelling current during the southwest monsoon provides the favorable pre-requisite conditions for transporting the fluid mud through depression channel network towards the coast. Once sufficient quantity and thickness of fluid mud is accumulated in the near shore region, it acts as a wave damper for subsequent high monsoon waves, as indicated by the time-series wave data, leading to the formation of tranquil mud bank region. Depression channel networks extending from the shelf to the coast off Alappuzha, Kochi, Ponnani, Beypore, and Ullal were found in the bathymetric charts, thus explaining why mud banks occur only at few locations in spite of the prevalence of similar monsoon conditions.     

Hypotheses for earthquake occurrences

Very little work has been done in generating alternatives to the Poisson process model. The work reported here deals with alternatives to the Poisson process model for the earthquakes and checks them using empirical data and the statistical hypothesis testing apparatus. The strategy used here for generating hypotheses is to compound the Poisson process. The parameter of the Poisson process is replaced by a random variable having prescribed density function. The density functions used are gamma, chi and extended (gamma/chi). The original distribution is then averaged out with respect to these density functions. For the compound Poisson processes the waiting time distributions for the future events are derived. As the parameters for the various statistical models for earthquake occurrences are not known, the problem is basically of composite hypothesis testing. One way of designing a test is to estimate these parameters and use them as true values. Momentmatching is used here to estimate the parameters. The results of hypothesis testing using data from Hindukush and North East India are presented.     

Retrieval and Validation of Chlorophyll-a Concentrations in the Coastal Waters Off Yanam and Kakinada (Godavari) Basin Along East Coast of India

In this study chlorophyll measurements were made during March 2012 in the estuarine waters of Off Kakinada and Yanam coast, Bay of Bengal onboard a coastal vessel. In-situ water samples and optical data was collected at 21 stations (surface to 150 m depth) using Underwater radiometer (Hyperpro-II). In-vivo chlorophyll profiles were collected using wet labs fluorometer integrated with underwater Hyperspectral radiometer. Chlorophyll-a concentrations were estimated using HPLC by collecting the water samples at each sampling location. And also chlorophyll-a concentrations were retrieved from the OCM-2 data of OCEANSAT-2 satellite, processed using SeaDAS v.6.2 with the available global ocean colour algorithms namely, OC2 and OC4V4. A total of 33 samples used covering all the stations for chlorophyll-a estimation, and surface water samples of all the stations only being used for direct comparison among chlorophyll concentrations of HPLC, in-situ (fluorometrically integrated to Hyperpro-II) and retrieved from OCM-2. A good correlation found between the Fluorometer derived and HPLC measured chlorophyll-a concentration with an R² value of 0.78. The relation between Chlorophyll-a concentration measured from HPLC and retrieved from OCM-2 (OC2 and OC4V4 algorithms) using SeaDASv.6.2 for 10 samples has been compared for validation and obtained an R² value of 0.6. Also comparisons done with the in-situ measured (fluorometer) Chlorophyll-a concentration with OCM-2 chlorophyll data (OC4-V4 and OC2 algorithms) and validation with 10 concurrent in-situ surface measurements showed a significant overestimation by OCM-2 at low chlorophyll-a concentrations and underestimation at high chlorophyll-a concentrations.     

One-dimensional dispersion in unsteady flow in an adsorbing porous medium: An analytical solution

Analytical solutions describing the concentration distribution along one-dimensional unsteady seepage flow through adsorbing saturated finite porous medium have been obtained. An exponential function concentration is enforced at the source of the dispersion, while the change in the concentration is zero at the other boundary. A new time variable has been introduced to solve the unsteady flow problem and the solution is illustrated.     

Stability of a collisionless contact discontinuity

The stability of a contact discontinuity in a collisionless plasma is examined. It is shown that the discontinuity can become unstable when the pressure component normal to the magnetic field is not continuous across the discontinuity. Even when the system is unstable, the growth rates are very small and unimportant in the context of wave propagation, except when the propagation is almost normal to the field. The instability could, however, lead to the slow dissipation of contact discontinuities in the solar wind and in the day side of the cusp region of the solar wind-magnetosphere boundary.     

Free-convection flow past an exponentially accelerated vertical plate

The free-convection flow of an incompressible and viscous fluid past an exponentially accelerated infinite vertical plate is analysed. The Laplace transform method is used to obtain the expressions for velocity and skin-friction. The effect of various parameters, occuring into the problem, is discussed with the help of graphs and table.