Nutrients and zooplankton composition and dynamics in relation to the hydrological pattern in a confined Mediterranean salt marsh (NE Iberian Peninsula)

The role of the hydrological regime in the nutrients and zooplankton composition and dynamics has been analysed in five lagoons of La Pletera salt marshes (NE Iberian Peninsula) during a complete hydrological cycle (2002–2003). Two of the lagoons have their origin in the old river mouths while the other three were recently created in the framework of a Life Restoration project. This fact has also allowed us to study the effect of the lagoon age on nutrient and zooplankton composition and dynamics. The salt marsh hydrology is determined by a prolonged period of confinement without water inputs, irregularly interrupted by sudden water inputs due to flooding events (sea storms or intense rainfalls). While the dynamics of oxidized nitrogen compounds in the lagoons depends on the water inputs variability within each hydrological cycle, the internal load of phosphorus, total nitrogen and organic matter is related more to the cumulative mechanisms during the confinement periods. Accumulation processes may be easily related to lagoon age, since old lagoons have higher content of nutrients and organic matter, suggesting that these lagoons progressively accumulate nutrients during the successive confinement events. This is the usual case for most Mediterranean salt marshes without an artificially manipulated water regime. The zooplankton community in La Pletera integrates the effects of both the hydrological regime and the lagoon age since the former determines the temporal pattern of the main zooplankton species and the latter explains differences in composition and structure between old and new lagoons.     

Numerical Analysis of Space–Time Finite Element Formulations for Miscible Displacements

A finite element formulation is proposed to approximate a nonlinear system of partial differential equations, composed by an elliptic subsystem for the pressure–velocity and a transport equation (convection–diffusion) for the concentration, which models the incompressible miscible displacement of one fluid by another in a rigid porous media. The pressure is approximated by the classical Galerkin method and the velocity is calculated by a post-processing technique. Then, the concentration is obtained by a Galerkin/least-squares space–time (GLS/ST) finite element method. A numerical analysis is developed for the concentration approximation. Then, stability, convergence and numerical results are presented confirming the a priori error estimates.     

Spatiotemporal patterns of burned areas,fire drivers,and fire probability across the equatorial Andes

Field-based fire studies in the equatorial Andes indicate that fires are strongly associated with biophysical and anthropogenic variables. However, fire controls and fire regimes at the regional scale remain undocumented. Therefore, this paper describes spatial and temporal burned-area patterns, identifies biophysical and anthropogenic fire drivers, and quantifies fire probability across 6° of latitude and 3° of longitude in the equatorial Andes. The spatial and temporal burned-area analysis was carried out based on 18 years(2001-2018) of the MCD64 A1 MODIS burned-area product. Climate, topography, vegetation, and anthropogenic variables were integrated in a logistic regression model to identify the significance of explanatory variables and determine fire occurrence probability. A total of 5779 fire events were registered during the 18 years of this study, located primarily along the western cordillera of the Andes and spreading from North to South. Eighty-eight percent of these fires took place within two fire hotspots located in the northwestern and southwestern corners of the study area. Ninety-nine percent occurred during the second part of the year, between June and December. The largest density of fires was primarily located on herbaceous vegetation and shrublands. Results show that mean monthly temperature, precipitation and NDVI during the prefire season, the location of land cover classes such as forest and agriculture, distance to roads and urban areas, slope, and aspect were the most important determinants of spatial and temporal fire distribution. The logistic regression model achieved a good accuracy in predicting fire probability(80%). Probability was higher in the southwestern and northern corners of the study area, and lower towards the north in the western and eastern piedmonts of the Andes. This analysis contributes to the understanding of fires in mountains within the tropics. The results here presented have the potential to contribute to fire management and control in the region.     

Understanding the Past and Present and Predicting the Future: Farmers’ Use of Multiple Nutrient Best Management Practices in the Upper Midwest

Understanding what drives farmers’ voluntary adoption of nutrient and soil best management practices has important consequences for many environmental outcomes including water quality. We build on research revealing the need for simultaneous use of multiple nitrogen best management practices to achieve water quality improvement goals. Using social, economic and attitudinal variables we predict the use of multiple nitrogen best management practices at three time points: current use (2013), past use (before 2013), and likelihood of use on their largest field in the next three years. Our empirical analysis uses structural equation modeling with latent variables and 2014 farmer survey data from three Midwestern US states. Most farmers in our sample used at least one of the six best management practices. Our results reveal that farmers’ attitudes, use of information sources, and conservation program participation affect the number of nitrogen best management practices concurrently in use at multiple time points.     

Coralligenous habitat in the northern Adriatic Sea: an overview

The rocky outcrops irregularly scattered in the sandy‐muddy sea bed of the Northern Adriatic, formed by a base rock and a superimposed concretion of vegetal and animal organisms, are considered an infralittoral coralligenous habitat, according to the most recent definition. In the last four decades, research has mainly concentrated on their geology because of the question of the origin of the base rock – very similar to beachrock – which has only recently been attributed to sedimentary cementation induced by methane seeps. Studies on their macrobenthic assemblages have also been published recently, but true comparisons among them are difficult because they mostly refer only to a few selected phyla or to short‐term observations. Very few papers deal with the whole of the animal and plant communities, including all taxonomic groups and the most important environmental variables. On the basis of the literature data concerning several outcrops in the Gulf of Venice, we suggest that the Adriatic reefs differ slightly from the classic deeper coralligenous assemblages around the Mediterranean coast because they have smaller concretions of algae builders. We also suggest that the Northern Adriatic coralligenous reefs are younger than the other reefs occurring in the Mediterranean Sea.     

Nonracemic isovaline in the Murchison meteorite: chiral distribution and mineral association

The enantiomeric and carbon-isotopic composition of the amino acid isovaline have been analyzed in several samples of the Murchison meteorite and one sample of the Murray meteorite. l-Enantiomeric excesses of the amino acid were found to range from 0 to 15.2%, varying significantly both between meteorite stones and at short distances within a single stone. The upper limit of this range is the largest enantiomeric excess measured to date for a biologically rare meteoritic amino acid and raises doubts that circularly polarized light irradiation could have been the sole cause of amino acids chiral asymmetry in meteorites. Individual d- and l-isovaline δ¹³C values ware found to be about +18‰, with no significant differences between the two enantiomers to suggest terrestrial contamination. The amino acid relative abundance also varied between samples, with isovaline/alanine ratios of 0.5 to 6.5. X-ray diffraction analyses of contiguous meteorite fragments suggest a possible correlation between isovaline and hydrous silicates abundances.     

Deformation behavior of migmatites: insights from microstructural analysis of a garnet–sillimanite–mullite–quartz–feldspar-bearing anatectic migmatite at Rampura–Agucha,Aravalli–Delhi Fold Belt,NW India

International Journal of Earth Sciences - In the present study we investigate the microstructural development in mullite, quartz and garnet in an anatectic migmatite hosted within a Grenvillian-age...     

Iron(II) oxide determination in rocks and minerals

The determination of FeO of geologic materials by modern instrumental methods (such as atomic absorption spectroscopy (AAS), inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectroscopy (ICP-AES), X-ray fluorescence (XRF), etc.) cannot distinguish between different oxidation states of elements. In many cases, the oxidation state of Fe has to be known in order to perform several chemical calculations (norms, etc.) and discuss the reactions that occur during weathering, hydrothermal alteration and other processes. A modified Wilson method is proposed, giving reproducible results in a much shorter time than the classical method. Back-titration with potassium dichromate and an Fe(II) and ammonia sulphate solution is used, after dissolution of the sample powder in a heated HF/H₃PO₄ mixture and an ammonium vanadate solution. This modified method, tested with several international reference materials, gives reliable results, equivalent to the ones cited in the literature for the reference materials.     

A model for multiphase flow and transport in porous media including a phenomenological approach to account for deformation—a model concept and its validation within a code intercomparison study

Multiphase flow processes in unsaturated cohesive soils are often affected by deformation due to swelling and shrinking as a result of varying water contents. This paper presents a model concept which is denoted ‘phenomenological’ in terms of the processes responsible for soil deformation, since the effects of deformation on flow and transport are only considered by constitutive relations that allow an adaptation of the hydraulic properties. This new model is validated in a detailed intercomparison study with two state-of-the-art models that are capable of explicitly describing the processes relevant for the deformation. A ‘numerical experiment’ with a state-of-the-art reference model is used to produce ‘measurement data’ for an inverse-modelling-based estimation of the model input parameters for the phenomenological concept.