No Arabic abstract
Experimental microstylolites have been observed at stressed contacts between quartz grains loaded for several weeks in the presence of an aqueous silica solution, at 350 8C and 50 MPa of differential stress. Stereoscopic analysis of pairs of SEM images yielded a digital elevation model of the surface of the microstylolites. Fourier analyses of these microstylolites reveal a self-affine roughness (with a roughness exponent H of 1.2). Coupled with observations of close interactions between dissolution pits and stylolitic peaks, these data illustrate a possible mechanism for stylolite formation. The complex geometry of stylolite surfaces is imposed by the interplay between the development of dissolution peaks in preferential locations (fast dissolution pits) and the mechanical properties of the solid-fluid-solid interfaces. Simple mechanical modeling expresses the crucial competition that could rule the development of microstylolites: (i) a stress-related process, modeled in terms of the stiffness of springs that activate the heterogeneous dissolution rates of the solid interface, promotes the deflection. In parallel, (ii) the strength of the solid interface, modeled in terms of the stiffness of a membrane, is equivalent to a surface tension that limits the deflection and opposes its development. The modeling produces stylolitic surfaces with characteristic geometries varying from conical to columnar when both the effect of dissolution-rate heterogeneity and the strength properties of the rock are taken into account. A self-affine roughness exponent (Hz1.2) measured on modeled surfaces is comparable with natural stylolites at small length scale and experimental microstylolites.
The dissolution of porous materials in a flow field shapes the morphologies of many geologic landscapes. Identifying the dissolution front, the interface between the reactive and the unreactive regions in a dissolving medium, is a prerequisite for studying dissolution kinetics. Despite its fundamental importance, the dynamics of a dissolution front in an evolving natural microstructure has never been reported. Here we show an unexpected spontaneous migration of the dissolution front against the pressure gradient of a flow field. This retraction stems from the infiltration instability induced surface generation, which can lead to a reactive surface dramatically greater than the ex situ geometric surface. The results are supported by a very good agreement between observations made with real time X-ray imaging and simulations based on static images of a rock determined by nanoCT. They both show that the in situ specific surface area of natural porous media is dependent on the flow field and reflects a balancing between surface generation and destruction. The reported dynamics challenge many long-held understanding of water-rock interactions and shed light on reconciling the discrepancies between field and laboratory measurements of reaction kinetics.
Visualizing regional-scale landslides is the key to conveying the threat of natural hazards to stakeholders and policymakers. Traditional visualization techniques are restricted to post-processing a limited subset of simulation data and are not scalable to rendering exascale models with billions of particles. In-situ visualization is a technique of rendering simulation data in real-time, i.e., rendering visuals in tandem while the simulation is running. In this study, we develop a scalable N:M interface architecture to visualize regional-scale landslides. We demonstrate the scalability of the architecture by simulating the long runout of the 2014 Oso landslide using the Material Point Method coupled with the Galaxy ray tracing engine rendering 4.2 million material points as spheres. In-situ visualization has an amortized runtime increase of 2% compared to non-visualized simulations. The developed approach can achieve in-situ visualization of regional-scale landslides with billions of particles with minimal impact on the simulation process.
Stalagmites are an extraordinarily powerful resource for the reconstruction of climatological palaeoseasonality. Here, we provide a comprehensive review of different types of seasonality preserved by stalagmites and methods for extracting this information. A new drip classification scheme is introduced, which facilitates the identification of stalagmites fed by seasonally responsive drips and which highlights the wide variability in drip types feeding stalagmites. This hydrological variability, combined with seasonality in Earth atmospheric processes, meteoric precipitation, biological processes within the soil, and cave atmosphere composition means that every stalagmite retains a different and distinct (but correct) record of environmental conditions. Replication of a record is extremely useful but should not be expected unless comparing stalagmites affected by the same processes in the same proportion. A short overview of common microanalytical techniques is presented, and suggested best practice discussed. In addition to geochemical methods, a new modelling technique for extracting meteoric precipitation and temperature palaeoseasonality from stalagmite d18O data is discussed and tested with both synthetic and real-world datasets. Finally, world maps of temperature, meteoric precipitation amount, and meteoric precipitation oxygen isotope ratio seasonality are presented and discussed, with an aim of helping to identify regions most sensitive to shifts in seasonality.
SUMMARY We report a new method to infer continuous time series of the declination, inclination and intensity of the magnetic field from archeomagnetic data. Adopting a Bayesian perspective, we need to specify a priori knowledge about the time evolution of the magnetic field. It consists in a time correlation function that we choose to be compatible with present knowledge about the geomagnetic time spectra. The results are presented as distributions of possible values for the declination, inclination or intensity. We find that the methodology can be adapted to account for the age uncertainties of archeological artefacts and we use Markov Chain Monte Carlo to explore the possible dates of observations. We apply the method to intensity datasets from Mari, Syria and to intensity and directional datasets from Paris, France. Our reconstructions display more rapid variations than previous studies and we find that the possible values of geomagnetic field elements are not necessarily normally distributed. Another output of the model is better age estimates of archeological artefacts.
Electric signals have been recently recorded at the Earths surface with amplitudes appreciably larger than those hitherto reported. Their entropy in natural time is smaller than that, $S_u$, of a ``uniform distribution. The same holds for their entropy upon time-reversal. This behavior, as supported by numerical simulations in fBm time series and in an on-off intermittency model, stems from infinitely ranged long range temporal correlations and hence these signals are probably Seismic Electric Signals (critical dynamics). The entropy fluctuations are found to increase upon approaching bursting, which reminds the behavior identifying sudden cardiac death individuals when analysing their electrocardiograms.