Potential of mosques to serve as evacuation shelters for foreign Muslims during disasters: a case study in Gunma,Japan

Natural Hazards - Foreigners tend to be vulnerable to disasters due to religious and cultural differences. In Japan, Muslim foreign residents, who are minorities, likely face difficulties in terms...     

Genetic algorithm for fitting a mixed Bingham distribution to 3D orientations: a tool for the statistical and paleostress analyses of fracture orientations

The clustering of fracture orientations is important for tectonic studies and for geotechnical engineering. In this study, a real‐coded genetic algorithm was adopted to fitting a mixed Bingham distribution to orientation data by maximizing the log‐likelihood function of the distribution. The maximization is a difficult problem, because the function has multimodality and singularity. It was found that the algorithm was effective for this problem. Given the orientations of dilational fractures, the present method determines not only the stress axes and stress ratio of each of the fracture groups but also the maximum non‐dimensionalized fluid pressure at the time of their formation. In addition, the software calculates the 95 % error ellipses of the concentration axes. The present method found that the orientations of ore veins of the Akenobe Mine, SW Japan, should be partitioned into three clusters. It is shown that two of the groups had distinctive Zn and Sn contents, and that the ore fluids had overpressures only slightly greater than the minimum principal stress at the time of the deposition of Zn‐ and Sn‐rich veins.     

Identification of landslide susceptible settlements using geographical information system of Yelwandi river basin,Maharashtra (India)

Natural Hazards - Landslides are one of the critical geological processes, which cause enormous damage to civil engineering structures and also lead to loss of life. The present study is an attempt...     

Soil erosion estimation of Bhandara region of Maharashtra,India, by integrated use of RUSLE,remote sensing,and GIS

Natural Hazards - The agricultural land of the whole world is deteriorating due to the loss of top fertile soil reducing agricultural productivity and groundwater availability. Mainly, natural...     

Dasycladalean algae and their depositional environments in the Sylhet Limestone Formation (lower-middle Eocene), Bengal Basin

A very rich and diversified dasycladalean algal assemblage has been discovered from the Sylhet Limestone Formation (lower-middle Eocene) of the Bengal Basin of India for the first time. The depositional environments of the Sylhet Limestone Formation have been discussed based on the presence of the 11 species of the dasycladalean algae belonging to the three families Dasycladaceae (Cymopolia inflataramosa Segonzac, C. mayaenese Johnson and Kaska, C. paronai Raineri, Cymopolia sp.), Triploporaceae (Dissocladella lunata Segonzac, Dissocladella sp., Jodotella sloveniaensis Deloffre and Radoicic) and Acetabulariaceae (Clypeina socanensis Deloffre and Radoicic, Clypeina sp., Terquemella sp., Neomeris sp.). The lower Eocene Sylhet Limestone Formation revealed predominance of dasycladalean algal assemblage with the halimedacean and udoteacean algae and rare occurrence of coralline algae. This suggests their luxuriant growth in the open lagoonal to shelf environment at the depth of 5–6 m in the warm waters. There is a gradual decrease in the dasycladalean species and genera in the middle Eocene Sylhet Limestone Formation. The predominance of coralline algae associated with the Sporolithon indicates that the limestone of middle Eocene Sylhet Limestone Formation have been deposited at the littoral to shallow, high energy open shelf marine environments at a depth of about 40–60 m in warm tropical waters.     

Unstable forearc stress in the eastern Nankai subduction zone for the last 2 million years

Transpressional tectonics characterizes the SW Japan arc. However, we will show in this article that offshore seismic profiles and onshore mesoscale faults indicate that the eastern part of the forearc was subject to transtensional tectonics since ca. 2.0 Ma. Offshore normal faults imaged on the profiles run parallel to the Nankai Trough, and started activity at 1.0 Ma, but transtensional tectonics commenced the onshore area earlier. In order to understand the stress history in the forearc region, we collected fault-slip data from onshore mesoscale faults in Plio-Pleistocene sedimentary rocks in the Kakegawa area at the northeastern extension of the offshore normal faults. Most of the mesoscale faults are oblique-normal, indicating that the area was subject to transtensional tectonics. The faults suggest that the compressional tectonic regime was followed by the transtensional one at 2.0 Ma, in agreement with regional tectonostratigraphic data, which indicate that folding ceased at that time. Present compressional stress followed the transtensional tectonic regime sometime in the late Pleistocene. Transtensional or extensional tectonic zone shifted from the Kakegawa area to the offshore region.These observations indicate that the state of stress just behind the accretionary prism of the eastern Nankai subduction zone has been unstable in the last 2 million years, suggesting that the forearc wedge has been at critical state in that gravitational force and basal shear traction on the wedge have been balanced, but the forearc tectonics has been susceptible to small perturbations. Possible factors compatible with the observed stress history include the change of subduction direction of the plate at 1.0 Ma, and the rapid uplift of Central Japan thereafter.     

Styles of mesoscale brittle deformations associated with the Miocene folding of the Taishu Group,Tsushima, between the Japan Sea and East China Sea backarc basins

The Taishu Group is a folded, Eocene–Lower Miocene, thick sedimentary package exposed widely on Tsushima Island between the Japan Sea and East China Sea. This location makes the strata important to understand tectonics and paleo-environments in the Far East, but the timing of the folding is controversial. We studied the styles of brittle deformations of the strata. It was found that flextural-slip folds were dominant. Mesoscale faults were classified into two groups: NE–SW trending reverse faults and NW–SE trending strike-slip faults. Members of both the groups showed movements largely perpendicular to the fold axes. The latter group consisted of sinistral and dextral faults. Accordingly, we interpreted that they were transfer faults activated during the folding. Consequently, mesoscale faults and flexural-slip faults evidence the map-scale plane strain of the Taishu Group in the plane perpendicular to the NE-trending fold axes. There were few transpressional deformations in the group. This is inconsistent with the transpression hypothesis for explaining the simultaneous folding and Japan Sea opening. Another hypothesis in which the folds in Tsushima are regarded as an onshore part of the Taiwan-Shinji fold belt is inconsistent with the timing of folding suggested by mining geologists to be consistent with and contemporaneous with this deformation. On the other hand, we found that dolerite dikes and sills were involved in the folding. Therefore, we conclude that the folding began during the late Early Miocene time and climaxed during the ore mineralization at around 15 Ma. We suggest that the folding in Tsushima was the easternmost manifestation of the compressional regime around the Yellow Sea and East China Sea in the Early to early Middle Miocene, and that the compression was brought about by the arrival of the Philippine Sea plate to initiate buoyant subduction under Kyushu.     

Age and associated stress field of middle Miocene back-arc basalt magmatism in Northeast Japan

A large volume of middle Miocene basaltic rocks is widely distributed across the back-arc region of Northeast Japan, including around the Dewa Mountains. Petrological research has shown that basaltic rocks of the Aosawa Formation around the Dewa Mountains were generated as a result of the opening of the Sea of Japan. To determine the precise ages of the middle Miocene basaltic magmatism, we conducted U–Pb and fission-track (FT) dating of a rhyolite lava that constitutes the uppermost part of the Aosawa Formation. In addition, we estimated the paleostress field of the volcanism using data from a basaltic dike swarm in the same formation. The rhyolite lava yields a U–Pb age of 10.73 ±0.22 Ma (2σ) and a FT age of 10.6 ±1.6 Ma (2σ), and the paleostress analysis suggests a normal-faulting stress regime with a NW–SE-trending σ₃-axis, a relatively high stress ratio, and a relatively high magma pressure. Our results show that the late Aosawa magmatism occurred under NW–SE extensional stress and ended at ~ 11 Ma.     

Eocene extensional tectonics in the Amakusa region,northern Ryukyu arc

Paleogene surface tectonics in Japan is not well understood because of the paucity of onshore Paleogene stratigraphic records except for those from accretionary complexes. Paralic Paleogene formations remaining in SW Japan are usually so thin that it is difficult to decipher the tectonics from them. However, the Eocene paralic sedimentary package with a thickness of kilometers indicates syn-depositional tectonic subsidence by a few kilometers in the Amakusa archipelago, west of Kyushu Island. Thus, we made a detailed geological map of the Eocene formations in an area of ~50 square kilometers in the northwestern part of the archipelago. We identified NE-SW and NW-SE trending normal faults, most of which were recognized by previous researchers, and also discovered low-angle faults. NW-SE trending ones are known to be of the Miocene. NE-SW trending and low-angle normal faults are the oldest map-scale structures in the Eocene ones. It is not obvious within the above-mentioned area whether those normal faults are accompanied by growth strata. However, the significant southeastward thickening of the Eocene formations across the Amakusa archipelago suggests that they filled a large half graben with the basin margin fault along the eastern side of the archipelago. This basin model is consistent with the N-S to NW-SE transport directions of the low-angle and NE-SW trending normal faults. Since many NE-SW to EW trending Eocene grabens were formed in the offshore regions west of Kyushu Island and in the East China Sea, the Amakusa region was probably a northeastern branch of the rift system. The geologic structures and depositional ages of the Eocene formations indicate that the Eocene extensional tectonics removed the overlying strata to some extent for the high-P/T Takahama Metamorphic Rocks which crops out to the south of our study area.     

Arc-parallel extension in preparation of the rotation of southwest Japan: Tectonostratigraphy and structures of the Lower Miocene Ichishi Group

Opening of the Japan Sea back arc basin was accompanied by extensional tectonics in the drifting southwest Japan arc. Various trends of Early Miocene grabens in the arc suggest multi-directional rifting, which necessarily involved strike-slip components of some of basin-margin faults. However, such components are not well understood. In this work we conducted a field survey in the Early Miocene Ichishi basin on the northern side of the Median Tectonic Line, central southwest Japan. We found that the basin was a compound of grabens that were formed along normal and sinistral strike-slip faults, the latter of which had northeast–southwest trends. The block faulting in this phase produced basement highs between sub-basins, which were filled with the lower part of the Ichishi Group. We found a low-angle angular unconformity at a middle horizon in the group, with which we define the upper and lower part of the group. The upper part onlapped both the basement highs and the lower part. It means that the transtensional basin formation ceased sometime between 18 and 17.5 Ma in the Ichishi area. The Ichishi basin turned subsequently into a sag basin subsided due to normal faulting probably along the Nunobiki-sanchi-toen fault zone. The transtension and the basin sag were driven by ENE–WSW extensional stress. This arc-parallel extension produced grabens various areas including Ichishi in the Early Miocene. The extensional deformation was eventually localized to the deep rift along the Fossa Magna to make the lithosphere under southwest Japan decoupled from that under northeast Japan. The decoupling allowed the rapid rotation of southwest Japan from ~17.5 Ma. The cluster of those grabens around the Ise bay probably determined the southeastern margin of the Kinki triangle.