an archeomagnetic analysis of burnt grain bin floors from ca 1200 to 1250 ad iron age south africa abstract recognition of the rapid decay of earth s magnetic field over the last 150 years chronicled in magnetic observatory and satellite data highlights the need for a higher resolution record of geomagnetic field behavior over the past millennium such a record would help us better understand the nature of the recent dramatic changes a limitation of the existing database is undersampling of the southern hemisphere here we investigate the potential of obtaining archeomagnetic data from iron age burnt grain bins from southern africa these structures preserve oriented material that can record both paleodirections and paleointensity information directional data collected from three sites ca 1200 1250 ad fall 9 22 to the east of predictions thellier coe and shaw paleointensity results differ from model values by 15 the consistency of results between the three sites suggests that further investigations of these materials with different ages could markedly improve the current spatial distribution of the archeomagnetic database

ice moraine and landslide dams in mountainous terrain we review recent work on ice moraine and landslide dams in mountainous terrain thus complementing several comprehensive summaries on glacier dams in intracontinental and arctic areas of low relief we discuss the roles of tectonic and climatic forcing on ice moraine and landslide dam formation and sudden drainage and focus on similarities and differences between their geomorphic impacts on confined valleys drained by steep bedrock and gravel bed rivers despite numerous reported failures of natural dams in mountain belts throughout the world their relevance to long term dynamics of mountain rivers remains poorly quantified all types of dams exert local base level controls thus trapping incoming sediment and inhibiting fluvial bedrock incision pervasive geomorphic and sedimentary evidence of outburst events is preserved even in areas of high erosion rates suggesting that sudden dam failures are characterized by processes of catastrophic valley floor aggradation active channel widening and downstream dispersion of sediment during which little bedrock erosion seems to be achieved we find that in the absence of direct evidence of former dams a number of similarities among the geomorphic and sedimentologic characteristics of catastrophic outburst flows may give rise to ambiguous inferences on the dam forming process this is especially the case for tectonically active mountain belts where there is ample and comparable potential for the formation and failure of ice moraine landslide and polygenetic dams concomitant with climatic oscillations or earthquake disturbance hence the palaeoclimatic implications of erroneously inferring the cause of dam formation may be significant we recommend that future research on natural dams in mountainous terrain addresses a climate and earthquake controlled systematics in the pattern of formation and failure b quantification of response of mountain rivers to catastrophic outburst events and their concomitant process sequences c elaboration of a comprehensive classification of natural dams in mountainous terrain with special attention to polygenetic dams d physical based modelling of dam formation failure and routing of water and sediment outbursts and e quantitative controls on the contribution of natural dams to sediment budgets in mountainous terrain

a 1000 year history of large floods in the upper ganga catchment central himalaya india abstract determining the frequency magnitude and causes of large floods over long periods in the flood prone himalaya is important for estimating the likelihood of future floods a thousand year record with some information from 2600 years ago of the frequency and some estimates of velocities and discharges of large floods has been reconstructed in the upper ganga catchment india using written reports litho stratigraphy and sedimentology and dated by optical and radiocarbon methods in the upper ganga catchment rainfall triggers large landslides that dam rivers and release large amounts of water when they burst thereby amplifying the effects of rainfall the large floods in the catchment may be the result of landslide dam bursts rather than glacial lake bursts and these are likely to continue and possibly worsen as the monsoon intensifies over the next century however preliminary information suggests that the recent devastating flood of june 2013 was the result of heavy rainfall not landslide dam bursts the frequency record is non random and shows a high frequency between ad 1000 and ad 1300 omitting uncertainties then a low frequency until a cluster of floods occurred about 200 years ago then increased frequency this temporal pattern is like but not identical with that in peninsular india and both appear to be the result of variations in the monsoon

a late quaternary catastrophic flood in the lahul himalayas impressive flood deposits are described resulting from a catastrophic lake outburst in the upper chandra valley in the lahul himalaya northern india reconstructions of the former glacial lake glacial lake batal and the discharges were undertaken using landforms and sediment data the glacial dam burst released 1 496 km3 of water in 0 72 days with peak discharges of between 21 000 and 27000 m3 s at batal dating by osl suggests the flood occurred ca 36 9 if 8 4 to 43 4 2 10 3 ka ago this cataclysmic flood was responsible for major resedimentation and landscape modification within the chandra valley journal of quaternary suence

geomagnetic field for 0 3 ka 2 a new series of time varying global models 1 steadily increasing numbers of archeomagnetic and paleomagnetic data for the holocene have allowed development of temporally continuous global spherical harmonic models of the geomagnetic field extending present and historical global descriptions of magnetic field evolution the current work uses various subsets of improved data compilations details of which are given in a companion paper by donadini et al 2009 and minor modifications of standard modeling strategies using temporally and spatially regularized inversion of the data and cubic spline parameterizations for temporal variations to produce five models with enhanced spatial and temporal resolution for 0 3 ka spurious end effects present in earlier models are eliminated by enforcing large scale agreement with the gufm1 historical model for 1650 1990 a d and by extending the model range to accommodate data older than 3 ka age errors are not considered as a contribution to data uncertainties but are included along with data uncertainties in an investigation of statistical uncertainty estimates for the models using parametric bootstrap resampling techniques we find common features but also significant differences among the various models indicating intrinsic uncertainties in global models based on the currently available holocene data model cals3k 3 based on all available archeomagnetic and sediment data without a priori quality selection currently constitutes the best global representation of the past field the new models have slightly higher dipole moments than our previous models virtual axial dipole moments vadms calculated directly from the data are in good agreement with all corresponding model predictions of vadms these are always higher than the spherical harmonic dipole moment indicating the limitations of using vadms as a measure of geomagnetic dipole moments

two thousand years of archeointensity from west africa this study presents 17 archeointensity estimates from senegal and mali two neighboring countries in west africa for the period 1000 bce to 1000 ce the archeological artifacts used in this study were collected during the course of two separate projects together spanning 22 years and across 8 separate excavations a primary objective of this study was to get accurate dates hence only samples with independent age constraints from pottery style detailed stratigraphy and 14c dates were used a total of 236 specimens from 63 samples were subjected to a double heating paleointensity experiment izzi method from which 95 specimens were selected using a set of very strict selection criteria the paleointensity results were corrected for differential cooling rate effects and remanence anisotropy additionally we demonstrate the equivalence of using tensors derived from anhysteretic and thermal remanences for correcting remanent anisotropy of the specimens and use the former for the anisotropy correction our data show good agreement with the most recent paleosecular variation model but are lower than the pre existing data which are mostly from egypt and morocco the presence of substantial non axial dipolar contributions in the region is evident when virtual axial dipole moments vadms from the published literature are calculated for 20 latitudinal bands and compared with our data the average vadm values show a distinct latitudinal gradient a prominent feature of this dataset is an intensity high observed prior to 700 ce in both senegal and mali comparing this peak with existing records from regions further to the north suggests a small but significant temporal offset and is interpreted to be additional evidence for a geomagnetic field with a significant and rapidly changing non axial dipolar contribution

turbidite provenance in the lower palaeozoic manx group isle of man implications for the tectonic setting of eastern avalonia the provenance of turbidites from the predominantly arenig aged manx group has been constrained using petrographical and geochemical techniques petrographical analysis of sandstones reveals that mono and poly crystalline quartz grains of cratonic origin are dominant major trace and rare earth element concentrations in both sandstones and mudstones complement the petrographical data indicating that the source of the sediments consisted of quartzose basement and mature sedimentary rocks there is little evidence of a juvenile volcanic input but a minor palaeovolcanic component of active continental margin affinity is present there are indications of a more immature character in the oldest units but on the whole geochemical data from the manx group suggest an overall passive margin setting these results suggest that eastern avalonia was attached to gondwana during deposition of the manx group and that iapetus oceanic crust did not subduct beneath the region before the end of the arenig

sedimentology paleoflow dynamics and flood history of jokulhlaup deposits paleohydrology of holocene sediment sequences in southern iceland sandur deposits abstract this paper examines the sedimentology of a series of deposits associated with catastrophic floods caused by subglacial volcanic eruptions in southern iceland a simple model is proposed for the interpretation of the sediments in terms of changes in flow characteristics of the fluid sediment mix a range of sediment types characteristic of these flood flows is identified the predominant one being thick massive homogeneous poorly structured black pumice fine gravels with 65 p rcent silt clay type e and single lithology boulder deposits type f these flood deposits alternate with or are channeled into more normal sandur deposits comprising heterogeneous poorly sorted clast supported imbricated rounded cobble and pebble gravels type g the dominant sediment sequences are interpreted as representing hyperconcentrated fluid sediment mixtures with dispersive stresses acting to create massive poorly sorted nongraded or inversely graded sediments the latter characterized by large surface boulders the vertical changes in sediment type reflect significant changes in flow conditions during transport and subsequent deposition with an initial massive flood surge followed by flow deceleration sediment freezing and dewatering producing a more fluid series of flows the more fluid phases were associated with extensive erosion and channelization cutting deep scour channels marked by residual streamlined hummocks boulder lags and fields of megaripples leading downstream to a washed sandur plain the paper examines some of the problems associated with the application of paleoflow models for determining former flow dynamics the models adopted suggest that most of the flows occurred as relatively mobile low viscosity flows with little internal resistance to shear while sediment concentrations are estimated to have reached about 50 percent by weight with maximum yield strengths between 2 9 103 and 4 2 105 dn cm 2 maximum viscosities ranged between only about 2 and 8 102 poises a range of paleovelocity models applied to the flood sediment indicates flow rates of between abo t 4 and 13 ms 1 with peak discharges reaching a maximum of 3 3 105 m3 s 1 dating of the deposits by 14c dating and tephrochronology indicates that at least 8 major sediment producing jokulhlaups occurred over a 4 000 year period between c 4500 yr bp and 1357 ad hence although relatively rare the effects of these floods still dominate the proglacial landscape probably producing 85 percent of the total thickness of proglacial sandur sediments

first archaeomagnetic secular variation curve for the iberian peninsula comparison with other data from western europe and with global geomagnetic field models 1 a first secular variation sv curve for the iberian peninsula was computed by hierarchical bayesian method using a total of 134 archaeomagnetic directions with ages ranging from 775 to 1959 a d a general agreement is observed between the iberian curve and the french and german sv curves although some interesting differences were found such as the occurrence of lower inclinations between the 11th and 14th centuries in the iberian curve the analysis of these three reference curves indicates that sv in western europe is characterized by three major directional changes at 125 200 and 1350 a d it is suggested that these cusps are regional features of the geomagnetic field the iberian curve has been compared with the predictions of the jackson calsk7k 2 and hongre global models despite large differences recognized between these models even for the dipolar terms they predict reasonably well the iberian archaeomagnetic sv

reconstructing holocene geomagnetic field variation new methods models and implications reconstructions of the holocene geomagnetic field and how it varies on millennial timescales are important for understanding processes in the core but may also be used to study long term solar terrestrial relationships and as relative dating tools for geological and archaeological archives here we present a new family of spherical harmonic geomagnetic field models spanning the past 9000 yr based on magnetic field directions and intensity stored in archaeological artefacts igneous rocks and sediment records a new modelling strategy introduces alternative data treatments with a focus on extracting more information from sedimentary data to reduce the influence of a few individual records all sedimentary data are resampled in 50 yr bins which also means that more weight is given to archaeomagnetic data during the inversion the sedimentary declination data are treated as relative values and adjusted iteratively based on prior information finally an alternative way of treating the sediment data chronologies has enabled us to both assess the likely range of age uncertainties often up to and possibly exceeding 500 yr and adjust the timescale of each record based on comparisons with predictions from a preliminary model as a result of the data adjustments power has been shifted from quadrupole and octupole to higher degrees compared with previous holocene geomagnetic field models we find evidence for dominantly westward drift of northern high latitude high intensity flux patches at the core mantle boundary for the last 4000 yr the new models also show intermittent occurrence of reversed flux at the edge of or inside the inner core tangent cylinder possibly originating from the equator less

sequence stratigraphy of the palaeozoic welsh basin the timing and extent of unconformities in the welsh basin are investigated using rock preservation curves derived from outcrop stratigraphic logs four basin wide unconformities occur focussed in late precambrian late tremadoc pusgillian early ashgill and mid devonian times these bound three megasequences equating with newly defined lithostratigraphic units the dyfed gwynedd and powys supergroups less extensive unconformities bound 18 component sequences the majority of the sequence boundaries reflect a component of tectonic or volcanotectonic activity rather than a pure eustatic sea level change the megasequence boundaries are attributed to late precambrian to early cambrian onset of rifting to form a passive margin tremadoc onset of subduction with intra arc then back arc extension late caradoc end to subduction and late early devonian collisional deformation the megasequences and controlling events can be tentatively matched with other basins on the avalonian margin more generally this study shows that sequence analysis is feasible in onshore basins lacking well and seismic data and that the global eustatic interpretation of sequence stratigraphy is only partially applicable to active margin basins

secular variation of the earth s magnetic field in the balkan region during the last eight millennia based on archaeomagnetic data summary the first archaeomagnetic secular variation sv curves for the whole southern balkan peninsula are presented these are based on all data within a 700 km circle centred at thessaloniki 40 60on 23 00oe this data set consists of 325 directional and 625 intensity data mainly from greece bulgaria serbia and southern hungary some data from southern italy are also included the sliding moving window technique was used to calculate a continuous sv curve for intensity while the directional sv curves were calculated using the bivariate extension of the fisher statistics these curves are well constrained and clearly show the main features of the geomagnetic field variation in this region during the last eight millennia comparisons with the predictions of the scha dif 3k and scha dif 8k regional and the cals7k 2 and arch3k 1 global geomagnetic field models show a good agreement for the last 3000 years but differences for older times the balkan sv curves identify several rapid changes of the geomagnetic field in eastern europe and can be used as reference curves for archaeomagnetic dating in the balkan peninsula

archeointensity in northeast brazil over the past five centuries abstract this study presents the first archeointensity results from northeast brazil obtained from 14 groups of architectural brick fragments sampled in the city of salvador bahia state 13 s 38 5 w and dated between the middle of the xvith century and the beginning of the xixth century the dating is ascertained by historical documents complemented by archeological constraints yielding in all cases age uncertainties of less than 50 years analyses were carried out using two experimental protocols 1 the zero field in field version of the classical thellier and thellier method as proposed by coe tt zi including partial thermoremanent magnetization ptrm and ptrm tail checks and 2 the triaxe procedure involving continuous high temperature magnetization measurements both trm anisotropy and cooling rate effects were taken into account for the intensity determinations the cooling rate effect was further explored for the tt zi protocol using three increasing slow cooling times 5 h 10 h and 25 h between 450 c and room temperature following archeological constraints the slowest cooling time was retained in our study yielding decreases of the raw intensity values by 4 to 14 for each fragment a mean intensity was computed and retained only when the data obtained from all specimens between 2 and 6 satisfied a coherence test at 5 a total of 57 fragments 183 specimens was considered for the computations of site mean intensity values with derived standard deviations of less than 8 of the corresponding means when separately computed using the two experimental techniques the site mean intensity values always agree to within 5 a good consistency is observed between intensity values of similar or close ages which strengthen their reliability our data principally show a significant and continuous decrease in geomagnetic field intensity in northeast brazil between the first half of the xviith century and the xxth century one result dated to the second half of the xvith century further suggests that the geomagnetic field intensity reached a maximum around 1600 ad this evolution is in good agreement with that expected in the city of salvador from the available global geomagnetic field models however the accuracy of these models appears less well constrained between 1550 ad and 1650 ad

the quaternary glacial history of the lahul himalaya northern india this paper presents the first glacial chronology for the lahul himalaya northern india the oldest glaciation the chandra glacial stage is represented by glacially eroded benches at altitudes greater than 4300 m above sea level this glaciation was probably of a broad valley type the second glaciation the batal glacial stage is represented by highly weathered and dissected lateral moraines which are present along the chandra valley and some of its tributaries this was an extensive valley glaciation the third major glaciation the kulti glacial stage is represented by well preserved moraines in the main tributary valleys of the chandra valley this represents a less extensive valley glaciation two minor glacial advances the sonapani i and ii are represented by small sharp crested moraines which are within a few hundred metres or few kilometres of the present day glaciers the change in style and extent of glaciation is attributed to an increase in aridity throughout the quaternary due either to global climatic change or uplift of the pir panjal mountains to the south of lahul which restricted the northward penetration of the south asian summer monsoon 1996 john wiley sons ltd

cosmogenic radionuclide dating of glacial landforms in the lahul himalaya northern india defining the timing of late quaternary glaciation the timing of glaciation in the lahul himalaya of northern india was ascertained using the concentrations of cosmogenic 10be and 26al from boulders on moraines and drumlins and from glacially polished bedrock surfaces five glacial stages were identified sonapani i and ii kulti batal and chandra of these cosmogenic exposure ages were obtained on samples representative of the batal and kulti glacial cycles stratigraphical relationships indicate that the sonapani i and ii are younger no age was obtained for the chandra glacial advance batal glacial stage deposits are found throughout the valley indicating the presence of an extensive valley glacial system during the kulti stage glaciers advanced ca 10 km beyond their current positions moraines produced during the batal stage ca 12 15 5 ka are coeval with the northern hemisphere late glacial interstadial bolling allerod deglaciation of the batal glacial stage was completed by ca 12 ka and was followed by the kulti glacial stage during the early holocene at ca 10 11 4 ka on millennial time scales glacier oscillations in the lahul himalaya apparently reflect periods of positive mass balance coincident with times of increased insolation during these periods the south asian summer monsoon strengthened and or extended its influence further north and west thereby enhancing high altitude summer snowfall copyright 2001 john wiley sons ltd

exhumation and incision history of the lahul himalaya northern india based on u th he thermochronometry and terrestrial cosmogenic nuclide methods abstract low temperature apatite u th he ahe thermochronology on vertical transects of leucogranite stocks and 10 be terrestrial cosmogenic nuclide tcn surface exposure dating on strath terraces in the lahul himalaya provide a first approximation of long term 10 4 10 6 years exhumation rates for the high himalayan crystalline series hhcs for northern india the ahe ages show that exhumation of the hhcs in lahul from shallow crustal levels to the surface was 1 2 mm a and occurred during the past 2 5 ma bedrock exhumation in lahul fits into a regional pattern in the hhcs of low temperature thermochronometers yielding plio pleistocene ages surface exposure ages of strath terraces along the chandra river range from 3 5 to 0 2 ka two sites along the chandra river show a correlation between tcn age and height above the river level yielding maximum incision rates of 12 and 5 5 mm a comparison of our ahe and surface exposure ages from lahul with thermochronometry data from the fastest uplifting region at the western end of the himalaya the nanga parbat syntaxis illustrates that there are contrasting regions in the high himalaya where longer term 10 5 10 7 years erosion and exhumation of bedrock substantially differ even though holocene rates of fluvial incision are comparable these data imply that the orogen s indenting corners are regions where focused denudation has been stable since the mid pliocene however away from these localized areas where there is a potent coupling of tectonic and surface processes that produce rapid uplift and denudation plio pleistocene erosion and exhumation can be characterized by disequilibrium where longer term rates are relatively slower and shorter term fluvial erosion is highly variable over time and distance the surface exposure age data reflect differential incision along the length of the chandra river over millennial time frames illustrate the variances that are possible in himalayan river incision and highlight the complexity of himalayan environments

elevated paleomagnetic dispersion at saint helena suggests long lived anomalous behavior in the south atlantic earth s magnetic field is presently characterized by a large and growing anomaly in the south atlantic ocean the question of whether this region of earth s surface is preferentially subject to enhanced geomagnetic variability on geological timescales has major implications for core dynamics core mantle interaction and the possibility of an imminent magnetic polarity reversal here we present paleomagnetic data from saint helena a volcanic island ideally suited for testing the hypothesis that geomagnetic field behavior is anomalous in the south atlantic on timescales of millions of years our results supported by positive baked contact and reversal tests produce a mean direction approximating that expected from a geocentric axial dipole for the interval 8 to 11 million years ago but with very large associated directional dispersion these findings indicate that on geological timescales geomagnetic secular variation is persistently enhanced in the vicinity of saint helena this in turn supports the south atlantic as a locus of unusual geomagnetic behavior arising from core mantle interaction while also appearing to reduce the likelihood that the present day regional anomaly is a precursor to a global polarity reversal

palaeosecular variations of the geomagnetic field in africa during the holocene a review the importance of the full understanding of the holocene geomagnetic field spans from human history and archaeology to palaeoclimatic changes and engineering to geomagnetic field modelling and unravelling of the geomagnetic field characteristics and anomalies unfortunately the dearth of data from large under covered areas such as oceans the african and south american continents and the southern hemisphere only 4 6 of the global datasets dramatically limits our knowledge of the temporal and spatial evolution of the geomagnetic field and its application here a review of all data from the african continent is presented in order to encourage and motivate a new generation of palaeomagnetic and archaeomagnetic studies new data will sharpen the palaeomagnetism as a dating tool improve our knowledge of local global geomagnetic features and will help to finally answer some of the fundamental questions in palaeomagnetism like the temporal and spatial distribution of the palaeointensity peaks described and the origin and evolution of the south atlantic anomaly 2020 the author s published by the geological society of london all rights reserved

rapid last glacial maximum deglaciation in the indian himalaya coeval with midlatitude glaciers new insights from 10be dating of ice polished bedrock surfaces in the chandra valley nw himalaya despite a large number of dated glacial landforms in the himalaya the ice extent during the global last glacial maximum lgm from 19 to 23 ka is only known to first order new cosmogenic 10be exposure ages from well preserved glacially polished surfaces combined with published data and an improved production rate scaling model allow reconstruction of the lgm ice extent and subsequent deglaciation in the chandra valley of nw india we show that a 1000 m thick valley glacier retreated 150 km within a few thousand years after the onset of lgm deglaciation by comparing the recession of the chandra valley glacier and other himalayan glaciers with those of northern and southern hemisphere glaciers we demonstrate that post lgm deglaciation was similar and nearly finished prior to the bolling allerod interstadial our study supports the view that many himalayan glaciers advanced during the lgm likely in response to global variations in temperature

slump folds and gravity slide structures in a lower palaeozoic marginal basin sequence the skiddaw group nw england major folds with associated thrust faults and a major olistostrome are described from the skiddaw group a lower ordovician turbidite sequence in the lake district of nw england the style and geometry of the structures are shown to be compatible with their generation as submarine slumps or slide masses although they are much larger than any slump structures hitherto described from britain the predominant strain is shown to be simple shear spatial and temporal variations in strain permit a developmental model to be erected the opposing vergence of the structures across the mapped area indicates a relatively narrow probably fault controlled depositional basin

sedimentological evidence for a limited separation between armorica and gondwana during the early ordovician the vast extent of sedimentation deposits making up the gres armoricain and its equivalents over the north gondwanan domain is used in this study to test the hypothesis of continuity between the armorica and gondwana plates during the early ordovician the distribution of continental and marine environments the large volume of transported elastic material and the consistent current directions all indicate that the source of sediment supply on the north gondwanan margin was to the south of the sahara although there were local signs of incipient rifting between the two plates armorica was not yet detached from gondwana by arenigian time

lithofacies of lower palaeozoic deep marine sediments in the isle of man a new map and stratigraphic model of the manx group

ensembles of low degree archeomagnetic field models for the past three millennia abstract we introduce ensembles of time varying archeomagnetic field models consisting of a reference model a mean model and a thousand individual models we present a set of three such ensembles built from archeomagnetic volcanic and sedimentary data sets that cover the past three millennia these ensembles can be used to describe the field at any location from the core surface to the magnetosphere and assess the way uncertainties due to the limited distribution and quality of the data affect any of its component or parameter such as individual gauss coefficients they provide alternative and we argue more complete descriptions of the archeomagnetic field to those provided by previously published archeomagnetic field models being better suited to existing and emerging needs such as those of geomagnetic data assimilation we present the data sets we rely on essentially the same as those used by other recent archeomagnetic field models and describe how errors affecting the data and errors due to non modelled small spatial scales of the field are taken into account we next explain our modeling strategy and motivation for building low degree spherical harmonic degree ensembles of models we carry on a number of end to end simulations to both illustrate the usefulness of such ensembles and point at the type of errors one should expect practical illustrations of what can be done with these three ensembles of models with examples of geomagnetic inferences are also described northern high latitude flux patches for instance appear to be the most robust features of all these patches tend to fluctuate but clearly have some favored locations resulting in the same clear signature with three tongues over northern america europe and asia in the time averaged field at the core mantle boundary similar to what had been found in earlier models inferences about the field behavior in the southern hemisphere are more difficult to draw still some suggestions that the well known present south atlantic reversed patch could have arisen as early as in 1500 a d are found in some of the ensembles we otherwise confirm that most of the current archeomagnetic field model limitations are related to a number of sediment cores identified as producing frequent outliers in the modeling process we provide evidence that such cores are likely affected by timing errors and timing delays between magnetization lock in and sediment deposition that future more advanced treatment should be able to handle all source files for the three ensembles of models together with appropriate matlab applications can be downloaded from http geomag ipgp fr download archeo fm zip

subterranean clues to the future of our planetary magnetic shield the geomagnetic field generated in the liquid outer core provides a shield from cosmic radiation that can cause damage to man made satellites electrical power grids and the ozone layer 1 in the absence of this shield the solar wind might gradually erode the atmosphere eventually robbing the planet of its water 2 but the dipole magnetic field has decreased in strength over the last 160 y at an alarming rate 3 motivating continued spirited debate 4 6 over whether we are in the early stages of a geomagnetic pole reversal some even believe we are overdue but 160 y is just a blink of the eye in geological terms the record is too short to have great confidence about what these trends might mean about causal processes and the future in pnas trindade et al 7 provide insightful context for these modern changes in the form of a magnetic record from south america that extends 1 500 y into the past we know much about the recent waning geomagnetic field since the time of gauss in 1840 we have had a rich data source in the form of geomagnetic observatory records in the satellite era we have a deluge of data from magnetometers in orbit from analyses of these data we know that the field intensity decrease is concentrated in an area known as the south atlantic anomaly saa a vast swatch stretching from south africa to chile amazingly when one estimates the field structure beneath this region at the core mantle 1 1email john tarduno at rochester edu 1 xref corresp 1 1

tectonic controls of ordovician arc and marginal basin volcanism in wales ensialic destructive plate margin volcanism persisted in wales from late tremadoc to caradoc times late tremadoc uplift and erosion in nw wales is attributable to onset of subduction and development of a frontal ridge system fore arc south east of this in the vicinity of the harlech dome and in sw wales more localized uplift was associated with the development of arc volcanoes at a volcanic front in north wales the arc volcanism occurred in a regime of e w crustal extension and was centred on a deep crustal discontinuity during arenig times the arc terrane was transgressed subsequently marine conditions with local and temporary emergence persisted through arenig to caradoc episodes of marginal basin volcanism while there was widespread and persistent subsidence in wales during development of the marginal basin the volcanism occurred mainly along complex and relatively narrow grabens which were sites of repeated channelling of magmas and pronounced subsidence the grabens mark the sites of deep and steep crustal discontinuities fractures one of which controlled the earlier arc volcanism changing sites of volcanism in wales can now be seen as due to transfer of active extension from one fracture to another there is evidence that the fractures were present by tremadoc times and they almost certainly formed before development of the cambrian marine rift basin they are most likely to have been strike slip faults or shear zones and their pattern in wales indicates that they may represent part of a complicated deep crustal strike slip duplex system the volcanically active grabens of the marginal basin are considered to reflect upward propagation of splay faults flower structure which channelled magmas through the cover during extension across the fractures the fractures and associated grabens strongly influenced the location and orientation of zones of relatively high strain that developed during late caledonian compression and transpression in north wales the volcanically active grabens trended broadly n s oblique to the exposed ne sw basement tectonic grain and dominantly e w extension seems to have persisted throughout the ordovician volcanism while there is considerable uncertainty concerning ordovician plate tectonic configurations and displacements the extension is best explained by invoking a n s convergence vector between the oceanic and over riding microcontinental plates with resultant sinistral shear stress in the latter and sinistral transtensional displacements across the arc and marginal basin the model highlights the suspect nature of the relationship between the welsh ordovician terrane and others to the north

neotectonics and glacial deformation in the karakoram mountains and nanga parbat himalaya abstract the karakoram mountains and the nanga parbat himalaya are one of the most rapidly rising mountain areas in the world with uplift rates in the order of 2 mm yr large scale regional warping is the most likely form of uplift with the greatest rates around the nanga parbat haramosh massif only two active faults have been recognised in the pakistan karakoram the rakhiot and the misgar valley fault the rakhiot fault zone is a neotectonic expression of the rapid uplift centred around the nanga parbat syntaxis deformation structures in quaternary and recent sediments in the rakhiot area are not produced solely by neotectonic processes but also by processes in the glacial depostional environment and slope related processes structures present vary from neotectonic shear zones folds thrusts and high angled faults glacially produced folds thrusts shears and joints and debris slides bounded by discrete shear zones the distinction between these structures is vital in making valid neotectonic models for high active mountain belts

palaeomagnetism of palaeozoic peel sandstones and langness conglomerate formation isle of man implications for the age and regional diagenesis of manx red beds

geomagnetic field hemispheric asymmetry and archeomagnetic jerks abstract we investigate the origin of the so called archeomagnetic jerks detected in the french archeomagnetic record over the past three millennia although only very large scale global archeomagnetic field models are currently available we show that the occurrence of archeomagnetic jerks is intimately linked to what we define as most eccentric events i e periods of time when a simple description of the geomagnetic field in terms of an eccentric dipole reveals the center of this eccentric dipole to strongly move away from the earth s center from the behavior of the much better known historical field we interpret the evolution of the center of the eccentric dipole as reflecting the production and gathering of flux patches at the core mantle boundary within preferential hemispheres archeomagnetic jerks would thus correspond to episodes of maximum geomagnetic field hemispheric asymmetry such most eccentric events could also provide an explanation for some of the properties previously reported in the long term paleomagnetic field

relating the south atlantic anomaly and geomagnetic flux patches abstract the south atlantic anomaly saa is a region of weak geomagnetic field intensity at the earth s surface which is commonly attributed to reversed flux patches rfps on the core mantle boundary cmb while the saa is clearly affected by the reversed flux region below the south atlantic we show that the relation between the intensity minimum at earth s surface and rfps is not straightforward we map a field dependent intensity kernel constable 2007a to study the relation between the radial geomagnetic field at the cmb and the field intensity at earth s surface synthetic tests highlight the role of specific patches reversed and normal in determining the location of the surface intensity minimum and demonstrate that the saa can indeed be explained by a few intense patches we show that the level of axial dipolarity of the field determines the stability of the relation between the saa minimum and rfps the present position of the saa minimum is determined by the interplay among several robust geomagnetic flux patches at the cmb the longitude of the saa minimum appears near the longitude of the patagonia rfp due to the low latitude normal flux patches nfps near africa and mid atlantic which diminish the effect of the africa rfps the latitude of the saa minimum is lower than the patagonia rfp latitude due to the south pacific high latitude nfp and the axial dipole effect the motion of the saa minimum is explained by the motions and changes in intensity of these robust geomagnetic flux patches simple secular variation sv scenarios suggest that while the saa path can be explained by advection its intensity decrease requires magnetic diffusion in addition these sv scenarios provide some speculative predictions for the saa

directional changes of the geomagnetic field in west africa insights from the metallurgical site of korsimoro abstract this work shows the first archeomagnetic directions from western africa measured on 32 iron smelting kilns dated between 650 and 1800 ad the archeological excavation of the vast metallurgical site of korsimoro established the existence of four distinct iron smelting techniques the time frame of each technique could be clearly determined with radiocarbon dating many of the kilns investigated in this study could also be dated individually with residual charcoals found in their inside the results indicate that the inclination of the field changed gradually from shallow normal to shallow reversed during 800 to 1300 ad and then went back to shallow normal around 1600 1700 ad the declination was instead stable around 10 e between 800 and 1400 ad thereafter it started changing towards north this trend correlates well with available secular variation curves from the balkan and from spain and indicates that the field variation in west africa was similar to the one in europe

paleohydraulic reconstruction of flash flood peaks from boulder deposits in the colorado front range nine watersheds in the colorado front range with steep bedrock channels were used to test the accuracy of paleohydraulic reconstruction of large flash floods using boulder deposits the nine basins consist of eight small ungauged basins ranging in size from 1 6 to 29 km2 and the big thompson river at the mouth of the big thompson canyon draining 790 km2 between 1923 and 1976 all nine basins had had one catastrophic flash flood the magnitude of which has been estimated by the conventional slope area method in each basin coarse boulder deposits of the large flash floods were identified and three axes of the five largest boulders were measured along with at least two profiles of the valley cross section a simple arithmetic average of two theoretical and two empirical relationships was used to estimate average flood velocity using boulder size and shape average depth was estimated as the arithmetic average of four values computed from the manning equation a regression equation for boulder size and unit stream power a relative smoothness equation and a modified shields relationship the appropriate flood width for the estimated average depth was found by iteration using the valley cross sections the paleohydraulic discharges thus computed generally underestimate conventional slope area discharge estimates on small streams by as much as 75 although the average amount is only 28 too low and the reconstructed discharge in one stream was 31 too large the big thompson river flood of 1976 was overestimated by 76 reasons for discrepancy in reconstructed peaks could include 1 the possibility that floods may have been able to move boulders larger than those available to be moved 2 overestimation of the slope area discharge because high water marks were set prior to erosion of the channel 3 underestimation of original roughness coefficients and 4 macroturbulent effects during fast deep flows the paleohydraulic technique is applied to two other streams in colorado with sedimentological evidence of large flash floods but no conventional indirect discharge estimates a small tributary to the big thompson river draining 1 8 km2 has a paleohydraulic reconstructed flood peak of about 60 m3 s from a flood in 1976 using boulders excavated from a foundation site in holocene alluvium along boulder creek in boulder colorado a paleohydraulic reconstructed flood peak of between 860 and 1 512 m3 s is calculated this is 1 4 to 2 4 times the magnitude of the estimated 500 yr flood

a regional archeomagnetic model for europe for the last 3000 years scha dif 3k applications to archeomagnetic dating 1 the available european database of archeomagnetic field values and instrumental data has been used to produce a regional model for the geomagnetic field in europe for the last 3000 years from 1000 b c to 1900 a d connecting with the epoch covered by the igrf models this new model scha dif 3k constitutes an improvement with respect to the previous regional archeomagnetic model scha di 00 f which used relocated values and was only valid for the last 2000 years the new model has been obtained by least sums of absolute deviation inversion of paleomagnetic data using spherical cap harmonics for the spatial representation of the field and sliding windows in time an algorithm has been developed to jointly model the three archeomagnetic elements declination inclination and intensity the resulting model provides the direction and intensity of the earth s magnetic field over the european continent northern africa and western asia for the last 3000 years the fit to the european archeomagnetic database is more accurate than that provided by global archeomagnetic models in addition this model represents a step forward in archeomagnetic dating studies since the relocation error is avoided and can also be used to study the rapid changes of the geomagnetic field archeomagnetic jerks that have been recently proposed

himalayan glacial sedimentary environments a framework for reconstructing and dating the former extent of glaciers in high mountains abstract reconstructing paleoenvironmental change from glacial geologic evidence in the himalayas has been difficult because of the lack of organic material for radiocarbon dating and the problems of correctly identifying the origin of highly dissected landforms studies of the contemporary glacial depositional environments and ancient landforms and sediments in the hunza valley karakoram mountains the lahul and garhwal himalaya and the khumbu himalaya illustrate the variability in processes landforms and sediment types these studies can be used to interpret ancient landforms and sediments for paleoenvironmental reconstructions and aid in forming strategies for sampling sediments and rocks for the developing techniques of cosmogenic radionuclide crn surface exposure and optically stimulated luminescence osl dating many himalayan glaciers have thick covers of supraglacial debris derived from valley sides and such debris mantled glaciers exhibit important differences from clean glaciers both in terms of debris transport processes and the depositional landforms that they produce analysis of sediment landform associations can be used to reconstruct processes of sediment transport and deposition and the relationship between moraines and other landforms and climatic forcing cycles such analysis is of fundamental importance in guiding sampling and interpretation in crn and osl dating work

terrane assemblage of the leinster massif se ireland during the lower palaeozoic compilation of irish geological survey mapping is used to construct a synthesis of the tectonic evolution of the leinster massif during the lower palaeozoic the massif is interpreted as a series of ne sw trending tectonostratigraphic terranes of diverse origin and provenance brought together along major sinistral transcurrent faults with minor discrepancies the age of these terranes decreases from se to nw the precambrian basement rosslare terrane is succeeded by the early cambrian continental margin cullenstown cahore terrane in the waterford wicklow terrane late cambrian early ordovician accreted ocean floor materials are overlain by a late ordovician volcanic arc the early to mid ordovician accreted ocean floor dublin terrane to the nw is overthrust by the early cambrian continental margin bray terrane and is followed to the nw by the mainly silurian midlands terrane these terranes were juxtaposed after substantial sinistral movement along transcurrent faults during the silurian consolidation of the massif also took place from se to nw stages in the consolidation are marked by the intrusion of the saltees 437 ma carrigmore 415 ma and leinster 404 ma stitching plutons fault movement ceased before the deposition of late devonian and carboniferous sediments on a linking unconformity across the massif

small scale structure of the geodynamo inferred from oersted and magsat satellite data the geodynamo in the earth s liquid outer core produces a magnetic field that dominates the large and medium length scales of the magnetic field observed at the earth s surface1 2 here we use data from the currently operating danish oersted3 satellite and from the us magsat2 satellite that operated in 1979 80 to identify and interpret variations in the magnetic field over the past 20 years down to length scales previously inaccessible projected down to the surface of the earth s core we found these variations to be small below the pacific ocean and large at polar latitudes and in a region centred below southern africa the flow pattern at the surface of the core that we calculate to account for these changes is characterized by a westward flow concentrated in retrograde polar vortices and an asymmetric ring where prograde vortices are correlated with highs and retrograde vortices with lows in the historical 400 year average magnetic field4 5 this pattern is analogous to those seen in a large class of numerical dynamo simulations6 except for its longitudinal asymmetry if this asymmetric state was reached often in the past it might account for several persistent patterns observed in the palaeomagnetic field7 8 9 10 we postulate that it might also be a state in which the geodynamo operates before reversing

improving geomagnetic field reconstructions for 0 3 ka global geomagnetic field reconstructions on millennial time scales can be based on comprehensive paleomagnetic data compilations but especially for older data these still suffer from limitations in data quality and age controls as well as poor temporal and spatial coverage here we present updated global models for the time interval 0 3 ka where additions to the data basis mainly impact the south east asian alaskan and siberian regions we summarize recent progress in millennial scale modelling documenting the cumulative results from incremental modifications to the standard algorithms used to produce regularized time varying spherical harmonic models spanning 1000 bc to 1990 ad from 1590 to 1990 ad gauss coefficients from the historical gufm1 model supplement the paleomagnetic information in addition to absolute paleointensities calibrated relative paleointensity data from sediments are now routinely included iterative data rejection and recalibration of relative intensity records from sediments ensure stable results bootstrap experiments to generate uncertainty estimates for the model take account of uncertainties in both age and magnetic elements and additionally assess the impact of sampling in both time and space based on averaged results from bootstrap experiments taking account of data and age uncertainties we distinguish more conservative model estimates cals3k nb representing robust field structure at the core mantle boundary from relatively high resolution models cals3k n for model versions n 3 and 4 we assess the impact of newly available data and modifications to the modelling method by comparing the previous cals3k 3 the new cals3k 4 and the conservative new model cals3k 4b we conclude that with presently available data it is not feasible to produce a model that is equally suitable for relatively high resolution field predictions at earth s surface and robust reconstruction of field evolution avoiding spurious structure at the core mantle boundary cmb we presently consider cals3k 4 the best high resolution model and recommend the more conservative lower resolution version for studies of field evolution at the cmb

on the possible occurrence of archaeomagnetic jerks in the geomagnetic field over the past three millennia abstract archaeomagnetism can provide a high resolution full vector description of the earth s magnetic field for the past several thousand years we analyse the bulk of archaeomagnetic data both direction and intensity obtained recently in western europe and the eastern mediterranean covering the past three millennia we demonstrate a remarkable coincidence between sharp cusps in geomagnetic field direction and intensity maxima two clear ones at ad 200 and 1400 two presently less well constrained at 800 bc and ad 800 these sharp changes may constitute a new feature of geomagnetic secular variation archaeomagnetic jerks with time characteristics intermediate between geomagnetic jerks and magnetic excursions

the stratigraphy correlation provenance and palaeogeography of the skiddaw group ordovician in the english lake district a new lithostratigraphy is presented for the skiddaw group lower ordovician of the english lake district two stratigraphical belts are described five formations are defined in the northern fells belt ranging in age from tremadoc to early llanvirn they are all mudstone or sandstone dominated of turbidite origin in ascending order they are named the bitter beck watch hill hope beck loweswater and kirk stile formations two formations are defined in the central fells belt ranging in age from late arenig to llanvirn these are the buttermere formation a major olistostrome deposit overlain by the tarn moor formation consisting of turbidite mudstones with volcaniclastic turbidite sandstone beds a revised graptolite and new acritarch biostratigraphy for the skiddaw group is presented with eight graptolite biozones and thirteen acritarch assemblages and sub assemblages the provenance of the group is assessed from detailed petrographical and geochemical work this suggests derivation in the early ordovician largely from an old inactive continental arc terrane lying to the south east with the appearance of juvenile volcanic material in the llanvirn comparisons and correlations of the skiddaw group are made with the isle of man and eastern ireland

regional modeling of the geomagnetic field in europe from 6000 to 1000 b c we have developed a first low degree regional geomagnetic model for the european continent valid for the period 6000 1000 b c from a selected compilation of sedimentary and archeomagnetic data the scha dif 8k model this model provides information about both direction declination and inclination and intensity of the earth s magnetic field by connecting it with our previous model scha dif 3k valid from 1000 b c to 1900 a d and the igrf we furnish continuous geomagnetic field information for the last 8000 years in europe it has been developed using the revised spherical cap harmonic analysis in 2 dimensions technique r scha2d and using the norm of the earth s magnetic field to constrain the inversion problem the size of the cap is 22 and the maximum degree of the expansion is 2 the linearization problem was solved by using the truncated taylor s series applied to the expressions representing the relationship between the declination inclination and intensity data and the cartesian components of the geomagnetic field we used the geocentric axial dipole gad field as our initial or reference field for time we used the classical sliding overlapping window method the size of the window was set to 100 years shifted by 50 years we compared the model s prediction with the input data with the global cals7k 2 model and with new independent data the regional model shows a better fit to the input and to the independent data than the global model especially in terms of intensity and agrees with the virtual axial dipole moment given by other studies for the last 8000 years the european geomagnetic field has recorded rapid changes or archeomagnetic jerks the average field for the last 8000 years in europe is indistinguishable from the gad field

sediment drifts and contourites on the continental margin off northwest britain abstract seismic reflection profiles and short cores from the continental margin off northwest britain have revealed a variety of sediment drift styles and contourite deposits preserved in the northeast rockall trough and faeroe shetland channel the sediment drifts include 1 distinctly mounded elongate drifts both single and multi crested 2 broad sheeted drift forms varying from gently domed to flat lying and 3 isolated patch drifts including moat related drifts fields of sediment waves are locally developed in association with the elongate and gently domed broad sheeted drifts the contrasting styles of the sediment drifts most probably reflect the interaction between a variable bottom current regime and the complex bathymetry of the continental margin the bulk of the mounded gently domed drifts occur in the northeast rockall trough whereas the flat lying sheet form deposits occur in the faeroe shetland channel a much narrower basin which appears to have been an area more of sediment export than drift accumulation patch drifts are present in both basins in the northeast rockall trough the along strike variation from single to multi crested elongate drifts may be a response to bottom current changes influenced by developing drift topography muddy silty muddy and sandy contourites have been recovered in sediment cores from the uppermost parts of the drift sequences on the basis of their glaciomarine origin these mid to high latitude contourites can be referred to collectively as glacigenic contourites both partial and complete contourite sequences are preserved the former consist largely of sandy mid only and top only contourites sandy contourites by their coarse grained nature and their formation under strongest bottom current flows are the most likely to be preserved in the rock record however the very large scale of sediment drifts should be borne in mind with regard to the recognition of fossil contourites in ancient successions

paleohydrology of late pleistocene superflooding altay mountains siberia cataclysmic flooding is a geomorphological process of planetary significance landforms of flood origin resulted from late pleistocene ice dammed lake failures in the altay mountains of south central siberia peak paleoflows which exceeded 18 x 10 6 cubic meters per second are comparable to the largest known terrestrial discharges of freshwater and show a hydrological scaling relation to floods generated by catastrophic dam failures these seem to have been earth9s greatest floods based on a variety of reconstructed paleohydraulic parameters

three millennia of directional variation of the earth s magnetic field in western europe as revealed by archeological artefacts directional secular variation of the geomagnetic field over the last 2000 years has been defined in western europe from numerous archeomagnetic studies however the number of archeomagnetic results for older periods is much more limited for this reason we present new data obtained from fired archeological structures found in two french sites loupiac and aspiran dated within the first millennium b c latest bronze earliest iron age transition 850 700 b c and iron age 525 475 b c respectively from a compilation of archeomagnetic results from western europe great britain italy and france and northern africa tunisia we propose a directional secular variation curve for western europe that covers the entire first millennium b c this curve exhibits a large clockwise motion with rapid changes during the first half of the millennium while the last four centuries b c are characterized by weak variations

the holocene floods and their affinity to climatic variability in the western himalaya india abstract the present study in the middle satluj valley explores the sedimentary records of past floods with an objective to understand the climatic processes responsible for their genesis based on lithostratigraphy sedimentology and grain size variability 25 flood events are identified the geochemical data indicate that the flood sediments were mostly generated and transported from the higher himalayan crystalline and the trans himalaya our study suggests that the floods were generated by landslide lake outburst floods llofs during extreme precipitation events however the existing database does not allow us to negate the contribution from glacial lake outburst floods glofs field stratigraphy supported by optical chronology indicates four major flood phases that are dated to 13 4 10 4 8 3 3 6 2 2 1 4 and

a geomagnetic field model for the holocene based on archaeomagnetic and lava flow data abstract we propose a new geomagnetic field model for the holocene period based on archaeomagnetic and lava flow data avoiding the use of lake sediment data the source of data comes from the geomagia50v2 database which has been updated with the new archaeomagnetic and volcanic studies published during the last 3 yr the model called sha dif 14k allows us to analyse the behaviour of the geomagnetic field for the last 14 000 yr from 12 000 bc to 1900 ad for the model construction we use the spherical harmonic analysis in space and the penalized cubic b splines in time both spatial and temporal regularization norms are used to constrain the inversion problem and applied at the core mantle boundary cmb to assure the convergence of the model for the last 3 ka the model predictions agree with those given by the global model arch3k 1 and the european model scha dif 3k for older epochs the new model presents a clear improvement in field resolution with respect to other current models of the geomagnetic field for the holocene for the last 9 ka the time evolution of the dipolar moment obtained from the dipole field shows a clear minimum between 5500 bc and 3000 bc and the well known continuous decreasing trend of the geomagnetic field strength for the last millennium and a half a general view of the time average evolution of the geomagnetic field flux lobes at the cmb for the northern hemisphere suggests a marked lobe of positive magnetic flux when the dipole moment was maximum this lobe vanishes when the dipolar field is decreasing the north polar wander paths of both north magnetic dip and geomagnetic poles were obtained showing an average rate of motion of 5 1 km yr and 3 7 km yr respectively the model shows that the geomagnetic field can be averaged as axial dipolar in 2000 yr within an error of 5 the typical uncertainty of the palaeomagnetic studies finally and following the recent definition of archaeomagnetic jerks we found 8 critical events in the time evolution of the geomagnetic field for the last 8 ka characterized by a maximum in the hemispheric asymmetry of the proposed model the model is available in the earth ref digital archive at http earthref org erda 1897

eastward and westward drift of the earth s magnetic field for the last three millennia abstract we analyse the secular variation captured by the archaeomagnetic field model cals7k 2 in an effort to determine episodes of eastward and westward motions of earth s magnetic field at the core mantle boundary cmb over the past 3000 yr the direction amplitude and geographical distribution of these motions are described we find that the clearest azimuthal motions are observed at mid to high latitudes in the northern hemisphere where both eastward and westward motions occur these azimuthal motions correspond to displacements and distortions of the two main quasi stationary high latitude magnetic flux patches similar motions are not observed in the southern hemisphere although this may be a consequence of the poorer data coverage there the globally averaged drift for the past 1000 yr has been westward since 1400 ad but eastward between 1000 ad and 1400 ad in the broad region of the cmb under europe the times of transition in the direction of the mean azimuthal motion coincide with the times at which archaeomagnetic jerks have been reported our results suggest that these are caused by a relatively rapid

style and timing of glacial and paraglacial sedimentation in a monsoon influenced high himalayan environment the upper bhagirathi valley garhwal himalaya abstract the gangotri glacier at the source of the ganges river has fluctuated greatly throughout the late quaternary in response to climatic oscillations this has resulted in impressive moraines paraglacial debris flow fans and terraces along the upper stretches of the bhagirathi valley cosmogenic radionuclide crn dating of glacial and paraglacial landforms shows that fans terraces and associated moraines formed approximately synchronously as the landscape readjusted to changing environmental conditions this synchronicity suggests that fan and terrace formation is intimately related to glaciation and that fluctuations in glacial and associated environments during times of climatic instability cause rapid sediment transfer and resedimentation of glacial landforms the crn dates show that all existing glacial and paraglacial landforms in the upper bhagirathi valley formed during the late pleistocene and holocene this demonstrates that in this high mountain environment paraglacial and glacial landforms are eroded and resedimented within about 20 000 years furthermore this testifies to the dynamic nature of glacial environments in monsoon influenced high mountain regions

speleothem record of geomagnetic south atlantic anomaly recurrence the diminishing strength of the earth s magnetic dipole over recent millennia is accompanied by the increasing prominence of the geomagnetic south atlantic anomaly saa which spreads over the south atlantic ocean and south america the longevity of this feature at millennial timescales is elusive because of the scarcity of continuous geomagnetic data for the region here we report a unique geomagnetic record for the last 1500 y that combines the data of two well dated stalagmites from pau d alho cave located close to the present day minimum of the anomaly in central south america magnetic directions and relative paleointensity data for both stalagmites are generally consistent and agree with historical data from the last 500 y before 1500 ce the data adhere to the geomagnetic model arch3k 1 which is derived solely from archeomagnetic data our observations indicate rapid directional variations 0 1 y from approximately 860 to 960 ce and approximately 1450 to 1750 ce a similar pattern of rapid directional variation observed from south africa precedes the south american record by 224 50 y these results confirm that fast geomagnetic field variations linked to the saa are a recurrent feature in the region we develop synthetic models of reversed magnetic flux patches at the core mantle boundary and calculate their expression at the earth s surface the models that qualitatively resemble the observational data involve westward and southward migration of midlatitude patches combined with their expansion and intensification

magnitude and frequency in proglacial rivers a geomorphological and sedimentological perspective abstract proglacial fluvial sedimentary systems receive water from a variety of sources and have variable discharges with a range of magnitudes and frequencies little attention has been paid to how these various magnitude and frequency regimes interact to produce a distinctive sedimentary record in modern and ancient proglacial environments this paper reviews the concept of magnitude and frequency in relation to proglacial fluvial systems from a geomorphic and sedimentary perspective rather than a hydrological or statistical perspective the nature of the meltwater inputs can be characterised as low magnitude high frequency primarily controlled by ablation inputs from the source glacier or high magnitude low frequency primarily controlled by exceptional inputs the most important high magnitude low frequency inputs are catastrophic outburst floods often referred to by the term jokulhlaup icelandic for glacier burst glacier surges are an additional form of cyclical variation impacting the proglacial environment which briefly alter the volumes and patterns of meltwater input the sedimentary consequences of low magnitude high frequency discharges are related to frequent variations in stage the greater directional variability that sediment will record and the increased significance of channel confluence sedimentation in contrast the most significant characteristics of high magnitude low frequency flooding include the presence of large flood bars and mid channel jokulhlaup bars hyperconcentrated flows large gravel dunes and the formation of ice block kettle hole structures and rip up clasts glacier surges result in a redistribution of low magnitude high frequency processes and products across the glacier margin and small floods may occur at the surge termination criteria for distinguishing magnitude and frequency regimes in the proglacial environment are identified based on these major characteristics studies of quaternary proglacial fluvial sediments are used to determine how the interaction of the various magnitude and frequency regimes might produce a distinctive sedimentary record consideration of sandur architecture and stratigraphy shows that the main controls on the sedimentary record of proglacial regions are the discharge magnitude and frequency regime sediment supply the pattern of glacier advance or retreat and proglacial topography a model of sandur development is suggested which shows how discharge magnitude and frequency in combination with sandur incision and aggradation controlled by glacier advance and retreat can control sandur stratigraphy

low grade metamorphism of the manx group isle of man a comparative study of white mica crystallinity techniques studies have been made in two laboratories on metapelites from the manx group isle of man showing the distribution of white mica crystallinity using the kubler index 2 and the weber index hb rel two isocryst maps which show broadly similar distributions of metamorphic grade are illustrated and a correlation between the laboratories is presented the mineralogy of the fraction in relation to crystallinity has been determined the distribution of metamorphic grade over central and eastern parts of the isle of man as depicted by the kubler index isocryst map is related to subjacent granite plutons but these contact metamorphic effects overprint an earlier largely anchizonal regional metamorphism localized late retrograde effects are related to low temperature hydrothermal mineralization and to cold re working in a large fault zone differences between the maps are largely in the degrees of resolution which stem directly from the different sampling intervals employed comparisons between the maps suggest a sampling interval of 1 2 km is adequate in regions of simpler geology but that an interval of the changes in the mineralogy of the

catastrophic partial drainage of pangong tso northern india and tibet abstract catastrophic partial drainage of pangong tso one of the largest lakes in tibet is supported by the geomorphology of the tangtse valley ladakh northern india and cosmogenic 10be nuclide ages of roche moutonnees strath terraces and a flood deposit downstream from the former spillway the former spillway for pangong tso is 20 m high and likely allowed 18 km3 of water to drain catastrophically down the tangtse valley over a period of about 2 days sometime during the latest pleistocene to early holocene the largest flood deposit composed of imbricated granitic boulders up to 4 5 m in length is present 33 km downvalley of the spillway these boulders have a cosmogenic 10be exposure age of 11 1 1 0 ka the age of the outburst flood the minimum calculated discharge was 110 000 m3 s 1 one set of strath terraces upvalley of the flood deposit along the flood s drainage path shows that the rate of fluvial incision 0 3 0 1 mm y 1 during 122 10 5 ka increased to 1 5 0 5 mm y 1 during 10 5 ka to the present the temporal overlap of this increase in the rate of fluvial incision with the main flood deposit suggests that the flood was important in defining the incision along the tangste valley a second set of strath terraces shows little change in incision from 0 6 0 9 to 0 9 1 4 mm y 1 sometime between 18 and 27 ka roche moutonnees upvalley from strath terraces yield a cosmogenic 10be age of 35 8 3 0 ka defining the time when glaciers last occupied the tangtse valley however the lack of glacial sediment along the tangste valley suggests that the flood eroded glacial depositional landforms and sediments resulting in high sediment loads in the floodwater which in turn increased fluvial incision to form strath terraces much of the eroded glacial sediment was subsequently redeposited as the main flood deposit the catastrophic drainage of pangong tso may be the result of breaching of the pangong tangste spillway during very high lake levels in a period of intensified monsoon 10 7 9 6 ka and or possibly the consequence of seismic activity along the karakoram fault that is associated with the initial formation of pangong tso

fall in earth s magnetic field is erratic earth s magnetic field has decayed by about 5 per century since measurements began in 1840 directional measurements predate those of intensity by more than 250 years and we combined the global model of directions with paleomagnetic intensity measurements to estimate the fall in strength for this earlier period 1590 to 1840 a d we found that magnetic field strength was nearly constant throughout this time in contrast to the later period extrapolating to the core surface showed that the fall in strength originated in patches of reverse magnetic flux in the southern hemisphere these patches were detectable by directional data alone the pre 1840 model showed little or no evidence of them supporting the conclusion of a steady dipole up to 1840