dimensional threshold for fracture linkage and hooking fracture connectivity in rocks depends on spatial properties of the pattern including length abundance and orientation when fractures form a single strike set they hardly cross cut each other and the connectivity is limited linkage probability increases with increasing fracture abundance and length as small fractures connect to each other to form longer ones a process for parallel fracture linkage is the hooking where two converging fracture tips mutually deviate and then converge to connect due to the interaction of their crack tip stresses quantifying the processes and conditions for fracture linkage in single strike fracture sets is crucial to better predicting fluid flow in naturally fractured reservoirs for 1734 fractures in permian shales of the lodeve basin se france we measured geometrical parameters in 2d characterizing three stages of the hooking process underlapping overlapping and linkage we deciphered the threshold values shape ratios and limiting conditions to switch from one stage to another one the hook set up depends on the spacing s and fracture length lh with the relation s 0 15 lh once the hooking is initiated with the fracture deviation length l l 0 4 lh the fractures reaches the linkage stage only when the spacing is reduced to s 0 02 lh and the convergence c is 0 1 l these conditions apply to multi scale fractures with a shape ratio l s 10 and for fracture curvature of 10 20

fracture characterization of chalk in uniaxial and triaxial tests by rock mechanics fractographic and electromagnetic radiation methods abstract this study relates to fracture characterization of chalk in uniaxial and triaxial tests by combined application of rock mechanic fractographic and electromagnetic radiation emr methods we found high strength results 1 3 that ranged from 37 7 to 52 6 mpa we identified several key surface morphologies that were distinct from each other and expanded on their characterization according to tensile and shear categories tensile features include plumes or striae and stairs shear features include a sugary texture ridges and grooves and steps fracture surfaces induced by tension and shear show distinct morphologies longitudinal splitting domains can occur continuously on an axial tensile plane or adjacent parallel planes on the other hand shear failure into meso fractures up to about 10 cm in length is a process that combines a series of distinct domains on separate surfaces that slightly differ in curvature and orientation and are inclined to the sample axis four fracture sequences that initiated either in tensile or in shear surfaces were distinguished in the failed samples results obtained by rock mechanics and by emr methods are well correlated for microcracks and for meso fractures and may vary over five orders of magnitude in size and this correlation is partially supported by fractography in particular a very good linear relationship was obtained between the ratio of the time interval to reach emr pulse envelope maximum and the pulse frequency t and the largest fractures formed extrapolating this result enabled us to calculate fracture sizes when the value of t was known

analogue modeling of overlapping spreading centers insights into their propagation and coalescence abstract the propagation and segmentation of mid ocean ridges is studied using centrifuged analogue models built with non linear materials the deformation of the brittle ductile model is controlled by diapiric uprise of buoyant analogous asthenospheric material induced by a centrifugal body force this linear upwelling laterally stretches the model mantle that in turn induces failure in the upper layer simulating the brittle crust arrays of fractures initiate within zones of high stress concentration above the diapir fractures propagate laterally in a direction perpendicular to the maximum tensile the minimum principal stress secondary tension cracks initiate in the vicinity of parent fracture tips through going fractures that crosscut the model surface develop by short fractures propagating toward each other and coalescing in different types of patterns the overlap overstep and inclination of fractures developed at the initial stage of extension control their subsequent growth and coalescence non overlapping sub parallel fractures propagate along nearly straight paths and coalesce to produce a single planar fracture if overlapping fractures are parallel they propagate towards each other along curved paths that enclose an intervening elliptical core of intact material fracture curvature in this case results from crack crack interaction and is similar to that of overlapping spreading centers oscs observed along mid ocean ridges overlapping non parallel fractures tend to coalesce by one of their tips propagating sub parallel to the spreading direction toward the other fracture such offsets can serve as models for the development of the orthogonal ridge transform fault patterns common along mid ocean ridges

emplacement and growth of alkaline dikes insights from the shonkinite dikes elchuru alkaline complex se india abstract the mesoproterozoic elchuru alkaline complex in the prakasam alkaline province pap eastern ghats belt se india is intruded by coeval shonkinite dikes magmas parental to both the host nepheline syenite and shonkinite dikes formed during ca 1350 ma continental rift related magmatism the shonkinite dikes show fine to medium grained equigranular to foliated textures with clinopyroxene biotite amphibole k feldspar perthite and nepheline as major mineral phases the dikes grew by inflation and coalescence of dike segments along intrusive steps anastomosis and subsequent coalescence and thermal mechanical erosion of the host rocks a few dikes resulted by filling the fractures created by shearing inflation of intrusive steps between magma segments by mode i opening is the major mechanism of shonkinite dike emplacement and growth however the shonkinite dikes also demonstrate the application of remote shear stress on the dike walls resulting in anastomosis entrapment and segmentation of tabular host rock xenoliths and in extreme cases brecciation of the host rocks under volatile rich and low viscous melt conditions fractal analysis of xenolith bearing dike further illustrates that thermal erosion was facilitated and accentuated by mechanical breakdown of host rock xenoliths due to interactions of tensile and shear forces cross cutting relationships between the shonkinite dikes suggest local deviation in the least compressive stress direction during dike emplacement the shonkinite dikes of elchuru demonstrate that spatially and temporally restricted high volatile low viscous alkaline magmas may have distinctly different styles of emplacement as controlled by interaction of near field magmatic tensile stress and far field tectonic shear stress in an evolving continental rift setting

climate records covering the last deglaciation the oxygen 18 oxygen 16 ratio of molecular oxygen trapped in ice cores provides a time stratigraphic marker for transferring the absolute chronology for the greenland ice sheet project gisp ii ice core to the vostok and byrd ice cores in antarctica comparison of the climate records from these cores suggests that near the beginning of the last deglaciation warming in antarctica began approximately 3000 years before the onset of the warm bolling period in greenland atmospheric carbon dioxide and methane concentrations began to rise 2000 to 3000 years before the warming began in greenland and must have contributed to deglaciation and warming of temperate and boreal regions in the northern hemisphere

breakage and shear behaviour of intermittent rock joints abstract the breakage and shear behaviour of intermittent rock joints have been investigated in a series of direct shear tests with a new shear device specifically designed for this purpose the tests have been performed on specimens of rock like material or hard rock respectively incorporating idealized non persistent joints made up of a number of short cracks in an en echelon arrangement along the central shear axis the shear behaviour of such a joint constellation has been found to be composed of different phases the first phase of shearing is that of the actual rupture initiated by the formation of wing cracks starting from the existing cracks and growing into the material bridges and concluded by the generation of additional new fractures connecting the initial cracks in the zone between the wing cracks the second phase of shearing is characterized by friction processes and volume increase in the then continuous shear zone finally the third phase of shearing reached after large shear displacements is determined by sliding processes inside the strongly fractured shear zone in a large number of shear tests the geometrical parameters of the discontinuous joints as well as the loading conditions have been found to influence the activated shear resistance in each phase of shearing to a noticeably different extent the orientation of the initial cracks and the normal stress however have been identified as the most influential parameters depending on the test conditions an initially discontinuous rock joint can activate the largest shear resistance not just before rupture but in one of the two subsequent phases of shearing as well the mechanisms which govern the different shear phases could be identified as 1 tensile rupturing 2 rolling and sliding friction of dilatant joint zones and 3 sliding within the joint filling composed of brecciated material

isotope calibrated greenland temperature record over marine isotope stage 3 and its relation to ch4 large temperature variations on millennial time scales in greenland characterised the last ice age abrupt warmings known as dansgaard oeschger do events can be traced in the 18oice record of greenland ice cores however it has been shown that 18oice is not a direct temperature proxy measurements of the isotopic composition of gases trapped in the ice can be used to calibrate the paleothermometer here we present a continuous temperature record based on high resolution 15n measurements and firn model studies it covers a sequence of 9 do events 9 17 during the time period from 38 to 64 kyr bp for which temperature changes of 8 to 15 c were estimated the difference between the modern and the glacial 18oice t relationship can be explained by a combination of source temperature changes and changes in the annual distribution of precipitation a detailed comparison of the temperature evolution with reconstructions of the atmospheric methane ch4 concentration shows that ch4 rises lag temperature increases at the onset of do events by 25 to 70 yr within data resolution the strong correlation between greenland temperature and ch4 on millennial and submillennial time scales suggests that variations on these time scales were probably of hemispheric extent

δ15n of n2 in air trapped in polar ice a tracer of gas transport in the firn and a possible constraint on ice age gas age differences with respect to gas transport the fim near the surface of an ice sheet can be divided into three zones the uppermost is a convective zone located just below the surface of the ice sheet in which the air is rapidly flushed by convective exchange with the overlying atmosphere below the convective zone there is a diffusive air column in which diffusion is rapid but there is no convection between the bottom of the diffusive air column and the bubble close off region there may be a nondiffusive zone in which diffusion is so slow that negligible gas transport occurs the diffusive air column is characterized by progressive enrichment with depth of 15n in n2 and heavy isotopes of gases in general as predicted using the barometric equation in this paper we present data on the 15n of n2 in recently trapped air samples from 12 ice cores along with numerous downcore samples from byrd vostok and dome c bubble close off depths for these cores calculated from a densification model ranged from 51 to 114 meters below the surface mbs we used these data and the barometric equation to calculate the thickness of the diffusive air column and found that it comprised 46 to 93 of the total firn thickness at our study sites paleo close off depths calculated from the densification model for glacial sections of byrd vostok and dome c are 15 25 m deeper than close off depths today diffusive column heights calculated from 15n varied in a more complex manner the diffusive column height at byrd appears to have decreased from 74 m during the last glacial period to 50 m during the holocene at vostok and dome c the diffusive column height calculated from 15n increase from about 65 m during the last glacial period to about 80 m in the holocene we use records of surface temperature and co2 at byrd and vostok along with their respective chronologies to constrain the ice age gas age difference age throughout the section of the vostok ice core corresponding to the last glacial termination in principle age values calculated from these data can be used to discriminate whether gas in the fim mixes to the bubble close off depth or to a depth equivalent to the diffusive column height in practice however uncertainties in the chronology of byrd and vostok are too great to allow us to distinguish between these two possibilities one can only say that at the time of the last termination age for vostok was between 3 and 10 5 kyr previous estimates fall within this range

quantitative evaluation of quaternary crustal deformation around the takayama basin central japan a paleomagnetic and numerical modeling approach abstract neotectonic crustal deformation in central japan is described quantitatively on the basis of paleomagnetic measurements and numerical modeling the welded part of the earliest quaternary nyukawa pyroclastic flow deposit npfd preserves stable remanent magnetization detailed paleo rock magnetic experiments reveal that remanence of the npfd near the takayama basin resides in unimodal titanomagnetite and comprises a component of thermoremanent magnetization trm and three components of thermoviscous remanent magnetization tvrm scatter in the untilted declinations of the syn depositional trm component represents differential rotation about vertical axes related to quaternary activity of three faults enako makigahora and harayama associated with the takayama basin the normal and reversed tvrm components probably acquired by warm water circulation near the active faults during the jaramillo subchron record a complicated rotational sequence since ca 1 ma dislocation modeling successfully simulates the spatial distribution of rotation and the uplift subsidence pattern around the takayama basin assuming strike slip motion on the enako and makigahora faults along the basin margin and vertical displacements on the harayama fault within the basin temporal changes in rotational motions recorded in the tvrms of near fault sites can be modeled by considering transition of active segments of the three faults which is geologically constrained

climate correlations between greenland and antarctica during the past 100 000 years the ice cores recovered from central greenland by the grip1 2 and gisp23 projects record 22 interstadial warm events during the part of the last glaciation spanning 20 105 kyr before present the ice core from vostok east antarctica records nine interstadials during this period4 5 here we explore links between greenland and antarctic climate during the last glaciation using a high resolution chronology derived by correlating oxygen isotope data for trapped o2 in the gisp2 and vostok cores we find that interstadials occurred in east antarctica whenever those in greenland lasted longer than 2 000 years our results suggest that partial deglaciation and changes in ocean circulation are partly responsible for the climate teleconnection between greenland and antarctica ice older than 115 kyr in the gisp2 core shows rapid variations in the 18o of o2 that have no counterpart in the vostok record the age depth relationship and thus the climate record in this part of the gisp2 core appears to be significantly disturbed

research on the geometry of shear fracture zones the geometry of brittle shear fracture zones has been studied by the examination of some strike slip faults and shear joints in china pinnate and en echelon deformational patterns are two fundamental arrangements of fractures within brittle shear fracture zones the pinnate angle is usually less than 25 and the en echelon is more than 25 the deformation in the rock bridge the area between two secondary fractures depends on the arrangements of secondary fractures and the sense of shear some tensile ruptures are formed at the terminations of both primary shear fracture zones and secondary fractures the direction of a tensile rupture is commonly parallel to the orientation of the principal compression along the direction of propagation of the shear fracture the horizontal displacement is large and the attenuation of displacements is slow the maximum horizontal displacement of the shear zone may be located in the region of the initial fracture under certain conditions the shear fracture zones may possess pivotal movement this type of movement may be expressed by the behavior of the fault or by the geomorphology of the fault zone

eight glacial cycles from an antarctic ice core the antarctic vostok ice core provided compelling evidence of the nature of climate and of climate feedbacks over the past 420 000 years marine records suggest that the amplitude of climate variability was smaller before that time but such records are often poorly resolved moreover it is not possible to infer the abundance of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere from marine records here we report the recovery of a deep ice core from dome c antarctica that provides a climate record for the past 740 000 years for the four most recent glacial cycles the data agree well with the record from vostok the earlier period between 740 000 and 430 000 years ago was characterized by less pronounced warmth in interglacial periods in antarctica but a higher proportion of each cycle was spent in the warm mode the transition from glacial to interglacial conditions about 430 000 years ago termination v resembles the transition into the present interglacial period in terms of the magnitude of change in temperatures and greenhouse gases but there are significant differences in the patterns of change the interglacial stage following termination v was exceptionally long 28 000 years compared to for example the 12 000 years recorded so far in the present interglacial period given the similarities between this earlier warm period and today our results may imply that without human intervention a climate similar to the present one would extend well into the future

cenozoic basin forming processes along the northeastern margin of eurasia constraints determined from geophysical studies offshore of hokkaido japan abstract the cenozoic evolution of a sedimentary basin on a long lasting deformation zone along the northeastern eurasian margin is investigated using geophysical studies analysis of seismic reflection data with detailed age assignments reveals that an offshore paleogene and early miocene basin around northwestern hokkaido developed as a typical pull apart depression at the right stepping part of n s trending dextral faults numerical modeling estimates the total slip on the paleogene strike slip faults is ca 12 km which matches the actual shape and volume of the basin the total displacement resulted from quite active 1 4 mm year dextral motions along the fault zone during the paleogene and early miocene deformation fields around the fault step also indicate a complicated pattern of vertical axis rotation the emergence of contraction tectonics in the middle miocene is suggested from the foreland type basin configuration observed the temporal variations of sedimentation rate through the cenozoic are estimated utilizing the depth converted seismic record and they confirm an accelerated subsidence implying a forearc foreland transition upon the eurasian margin

measurements of isotope and elemental ratios of air from polar ice with a new on line extraction method 1 a recently developed continuous on line extraction and analyzing technique for air trapped in ice cores has been improved and tested the technique allows fast high resolution measurements of the isotopic and elemental ratios of the main air components nitrogen oxygen and argon continuous measurements of up to 1 m long ice sections can be performed with a resolution of 3 cm running average for nitrogen and oxygen isotope ratios the accuracy and reproducibility are comparable to conventional melt extraction techniques it depends on the desired resolution and the composition of the ice for either pure bubble or complete bubble free ice the reproducibility and accuracy for a resolution of 3 cm are 0 02 for 15n 0 05 for 18o and 0 06 for 17o furthermore ar o2 1 o2 n2 ar n2 both 5 8 and 36ar 0 2 0 3 can be determined as well the precision of elemental ratios is good enough to resolve variations that are detected in ice at depths where air bubbles form clathrate hydrates surprisingly at these depths the elemental ratios show roughly annual variations probably due to strong fractionations between air in clathrate hydrates and air in bubbles on the basis of our measuring precision we cannot exclude similar effects for isotope ratios

abrupt increase in greenland snow accumulation at the end of the younger dryas event the warming at the end of the last glaciation was characterized by a series of abrupt returns to glacial climate the best known of which is the younger dryas event1 despite much study of the causes of this event and the mechanisms by which it ended many questions remain unresolved1 oxygen isotope data from greenland ice cores2 4 suggest that the younger dryas ended abruptly over a period of about 50 years dust concentrations2 4 in these cores show an even more rapid transition 20 years this extremely short timescale places severe constraints on the mechanisms underlying the transition but dust concentrations can reflect subtle changes in atmospheric circulation which need not be associated with a large change in climate here we present results from a new greenland ice core gisp2 showing that snow accumulation doubled rapidly from the younger dryas event to the subsequent preboreal interval possibly in one to three years we also find that the accumulation rate change from the oldest dryas to the bo11ing allerod warm period was large and abrupt the extreme rapidity of these changes in a variable that directly represents regional climate implies that the events at the end of the last glaciation may have been responses to some kind of threshold or trigger in the north atlantic climate system

precursors to the shear failure of rock discontinuities active geophysical monitoring of potential failure along mechanical discontinuities in rock requires identification of precursory signatures to failure in geophysical signals active ultrasonic monitoring of shear failure along frictional discontinuities was performed to determine the signatures of potential failure an instrumented direct shear apparatus was used to apply a constant shearing rate to a discontinuity that was held under a constant normal stress transmitted and reflected compressional and shear waves were recorded during the shearing process ultrasonic precursors were identified as distinct maxima in the amplitude of transmitted shear waves as well as minima in the amplitude of reflected shear waves that occurred well before the peak shear strength of a frictional discontinuity the precursors are linked to changes in the local shear specific stiffness along the discontinuity while the discontinuity s macroscopic shear strength continues to increase prior to failure

orbital tuning chronology for the vostok climate record supported by trapped gas composition abstract we present data on the o2 n2 ratios of trapped gas samples for the entire length of the vostok climate record as in other cores o2 n2 ratios in these samples are less than the atmospheric ratio by a small and variable amount because o2 is selectively excluded during the gas trapping process and because o2 is also preferentially lost in poorly preserved core samples samples younger than 150 ka have large and variable o2 depletions samples older than 200 ka have o2 n2 ratios that replicate well and vary smoothly with depth we plot o2 n2 ratios of well replicated samples older than 160 ka using a chronology derived by matching the 18o of paleoatmospheric o2 18oatm to northern hemisphere june insolation on this timescale o2 n2 varies coherently with local 78 s summertime insolation based on time series analysis of the o2 n2 record and the dynamics of snow metamorphism at the surface we conclude that summertime insolation influences physical properties of ice grains that control the degree of o2 exclusion during bubble closeoff o2 n2 in vostok is thus arguably a property that records local summertime insolation and can be used to test independent chronologies for the core we show that the 18oatm chronology supported by the coincidence of o2 n2 ratios with insolation is also compatible with recent radiometric dating of corals from high sea stands we further successfully test the 18oatm tuning chronology by showing that it predicts a chronology for the gisp2 core which is essentially indistinguishable from the standard gisp2 chronology and therefore in excellent agreement with the radiometric chronology of hulu cave china an accurate chronology for the vostok ice core is now in place

significance of palaeomagnetic data from the oceanic poya terrane new caledonia for sw pacific tectonic models results from a palaeomagnetic study of pillow basalts and associated pelagic sediments of the late cretaceous palaeocene poya terrane of new caledonia are presented the poya terrane forms a nappe that was thrust sw over the island i e the pacific side in the middle eocene data from four outcrops nine sites spread over 250 km yield a normal polarity tilt corrected mean inclination of 57 2 where 95 11 2 and k 67 4 which suggests formation at 37 8 12 1 s the between outcrop declinations are unfortunately too scattered to be used in regional tectonic discussions they indicate rotations that are localised and sometimes very large following reference to sw pacific late cretaceous palaeogene plate tectonic reconstructions the inclination data suggest that the poya terrane formed close to the new caledonian portion of the indo australia plate this interpretation is consistent with tectonic models where the poya terrane is generated in a marginal basin immediately to the northeast of new caledonia during the break up of east gondwana the terrane was thrust over new caledonia in the middle eocene possibly in response to a change in relative motion of the australian and pacific plates at about this time a short time later it was overthrust by a supra subduction zone ultramafic nappe and together they have since drifted northwards as passengers on the australia plate

oxygen isotope and palaeotemperature records from six greenland ice core stations camp century dye 3 grip gisp2 renland and northgrip oxygen isotope variations spanning the last glacial cycle and the holocene derived from ice core records for six sites in greenland camp century dye 3 grip gisp2 renland and northgrip show strong similarities this suggests that the dominant influence on oxygen isotope variations reflected in the ice sheet records was regional climatic change differences in detail between the records probably reflect the effects of basal deformation in the ice as well as geographical gradients in atmospheric isotope ratios palaeotemperature estimates have been obtained from the records using three approaches i inferences based on the measured relationship between mean annual 18o of snow and of mean annual surface temperature over greenland ii modelled inversion of the borehole temperature profile constrained either by the dated isotopic profile or iii by using monte carlo simulation techniques the third of these approaches was adopted to reconstruct holocene temperature variations for the dye 3 and grip temperature profiles which yields remarkably compatible results a new record of holocene isotope variations obtained from the northgrip ice core matches the grip short term isotope record and also shows similar long term trends to the dye 3 and grip inverted temperature data the northgrip isotope record reflects i a generally stronger isotopic signal than is found in the grip record ii several short lived temperature fluctuations during the first 1500 yr of the holocene iii a marked cold event at ca 8 2 ka the 8 2 ka event iv optimum temperatures for the holocene between ca 8 6 and 4 3 ka a signal that is 0 6 stronger than for the grip profile v a clear signal for the little ice age and vi a clear signal of climate warming during the last century these data suggest that the northgrip stable isotope record responded in a sensitive manner to temperature fluctuations during the holocene copyright 2001 john wiley sons ltd

a 135 000 year vostok specmap common temporal framework the object of the present study is to introduce a means of comparing the vostok and marine chronologies our strategy has been to use the 18o of atmospheric o2 denoted 18oatm from the vostok ice core as a proxy for the 18o of seawater denoted 18osw our underlying premise in using 18oatm as a proxy for 18osw is that past variations in 18osw an indicator of continental ice volume have been transmitted to the atmospheric o2 reservoir by photosynthesizing organisms in the surface waters of the world s oceans we compare our record of 18oatm to the 18osw record which has been developed from studies of the isotopic composition of biogenic calcite 18oforam in deep sea cores we have tied our 18oatm record from vostok to the specmap timescale throughout the last 135 kyr by correlating 18oatm with a 18osw record from v19 30 results of the correlation indicate that 77 of the variance is shared between these two records we observed differences between the 18oatm and the 18osw records during the coldest periods which indicate that there have been subtle changes in the factors which regulate 18oatm other than 18osw our use of 18oatm as a proxy for 18osw must therefore be considered tentative especially during these periods by correlating 18oatm with 18osw we provide a common temporal framework for comparing phase relationships between atmospheric records from ice cores and oceanographic records constructed from deep sea cores our correlated age depth relation for the vostok core should not be considered an absolute vostok timescale we consider it to be the preferred timescale for comparing vostok climate records with marine climate records which have been placed on the specmap timescale we have examined the fidelity of this common temporal framework by comparing sea surface temperature sst records from sediment cores with an antarctic temperature record from the vostok ice core we have demonstrated that when the southern ocean sst and antarctic temperature records are compared on this common temporal framework they show a high degree of similarity we interpret this result as supporting our use of the common temporal framework for comparing other climate records from the vostok ice core with any climate record that has been correlated into the specmap chronology

visual stratigraphic dating of the gisp2 ice core basis reproducibility and application annual layers are visible in the greenland ice sheet project 2 ice core from central greenland allowing rapid dating of the core changes in bubble and grain structure caused by near surface primarily summertime formation of hoar complexes provide the main visible annual marker in the holocene and changes in cloudiness of the ice correlated with dustiness mark wisconsinan annual cycles both markers are evident and have been intercalibrated in early holocene ice layer counts are reproducible between different workers and for one worker at different times with 1 error over century length times in the holocene reproducibility is typically 5 in wisconsinan ice age ice and decreases with increasing age and depth cumulative ages from visible stratigraphy are not significantly different from independent ages of prominent events for ice older than the historical record and younger than approximately 50 000 years visible observations are not greatly degraded by brittle ice or many other core quality problems allowing construction of long consistently sampled time series high accuracy requires careful study of the core by dedicated observers

variation in n2 o2 ratio of occluded air in dome fuji antarctic ice ancient atmospheric gases are trapped in polar ice sheets the gas molecules are stored in air bubbles at shallow depth and are incorporated into clathrate hydrates below a depth at which the hydrostatic pressure becomes greater than the formation pressure of the air clathrate hydrate significant gas fractionation has been found from measurements of the depth profile of the n2 o2 composition ratios in clathrate hydrates and air bubbles of vostok antarctic ice to investigate the effect of the ice condition on the fractionation process we measured the n2 o2 ratios in clathrate hydrates and air bubbles from dome fuji antarctic ice using raman spectroscopy the results showed that the n2 o2 ratios in the clathrate hydrates of the dome fuji ice are slightly lower than those of the vostok ice although the tendency of the variation of the n2 o2 ratio with depth is similar the difference in the n2 o2 ratio between the dome fuji ice and the vostok ice for the transition zone is attributed to the difference of the ice temperature and the snow accumulation rate on the other hand it is concluded that the difference in the bubble free ice zone was caused by gas loss from the ice core after coring the n2 o2 ratio of clathrate hydrate increases after coring because of higher diffusion rate and lower dissociation pressure of o2 than of n2 our data suggest that the effect of gas loss in the dome fuji ice is relatively small and so the gas composition in the dome fuji ice can be a precise paleoenvironmental indicator

delta15n measurements as a calibration tool for the paleothermometer and gas ice age differences a case study for the 8200 b p event on grip ice isotopic composition measurement on atmospheric nitrogen 15n trapped in ice cores is established as a gravitational enrichment indicator recently it was discovered that thermal diffusion has a significant influence on this parameter during periods of large temperature fluctuations severinghaus et al 1998 here we present results for the 8200 b p event the largest temperature excursion during the holocene which underpin this view and extend it to medium range temperature changes the thermal diffusion component is about one third of the gravitational enrichment for this event the shortness of this cooling event does not significantly affect the gravitational enrichment as documented by rather constant close off depths therefore the 15n residuals can be directly used to estimate temperature changes hence calibrating the paleothermometer since our 15n record can resolve temperature variations as short as a few decades it complements the calibration technique of borehole temperature measurements for which the resolution decreases rapidly with increasing age we obtained a relation 18oice temperature of 0 30 0 11 k which agrees nicely with the temporal dependence for cold periods about 0 30 k and is significantly lower than today s greenland spatial relation 0 67 k this corresponds to a range of the surface temperature shift for the 8200 b p event in central greenland between 5 4 and 11 7 k with a best estimate of 7 4 k by matching the 15n variations with 18oice variations we estimate the mean gas ice age difference to be 209 15 years which is in good agreement with model estimates

the dole effect and its variations during the last 130 000 years as measured in the vostok ice core we review the current understanding of the dole effect the observed difference between the delta sup 18 o of atmospheric o sub 2 and that of seawater and its causes extended the record of variations in the dole effect back to 130 kyr before present using data on the delta sup 18 o of o sub 2 obtained from studying the vostok ice core and discuss the significance of temporal variations the dole effect reflects oxygen isotope fractionation during photosynthesis respiration and hydrologic processes evaporation precipitation and evapotranspiration our best prediction of the present day dole effect 20 8 per thousand is considerably lower than the observed value 23 5 per thousand and we discuss possible causes of this discrepancy during the past 130 kyr the dole effect has been 0 05 per thousand lower than the present value on average the standard deviation of the dole effect from the mean has been only per thousand and the dole effect is nearly unchanged between glacial maxima and interglacial periods the small variability in the dole effect suggests that relative rates of primary production in the land and marine realms have been relatively constant most periodic variability in the dole effect is in the precession band suggesting that changes in this global biogeochemical termmore reflects variations in low latitude land hydrology and productivity or possibly variability in low latitude oceanic productivity 65 refs 4 figs 3 tabs less

high resolution record of northern hemisphere climate extending into the last interglacial period high resolution record of northern hemisphere climate extending into the last interglacial period

fracture coalescence as a mechanism for earthquakes observations based on mining induced microseismicity abstract microseismic events with magnitudes less than zero recorded within a volume at depth in an underground mine are used to evaluate failure conditions associated with a magnitude 2 9 event rockburst the approach incorporated several independent methods of analysis including the principal component analysis pca of seismicity focal mechanisms stress inversion underground in situ stress measurements and structural mapping and three dimensional numerical modelling derived stresses a good correlation was found between stress inversion and pca derived microseismic failure planes and structural mapping and between the in situ principal stress orientations and those obtained through stress inversion and numerical modelling a few days prior to the large event and during the aftershock sequence a change in microseismic failure plane orientation to a shallower dip angle than mapped underground was found to coincide with the numerical modelling derived plane of maximum slip potential this orientation along with measured fracture characteristics persistence and spacing and an increase in event clustering into the plane suggests that the formation of the large event plane of rupture was likely related to the coalescence of mapped fractures an observed reduction in stress release accompanying the increased tendency towards planarity prior to the large event indicates that the development of a large rupture surface occurred under an increased effective shear stress build up as part of the earthquake generation process and the process of coalescence can be considered as the breakage of barriers new fracture growth accompanied by an increase in the effective shear stress on the remaining asperities pre existing fractures

coalescence of fractures under shear stresses in experiments a series of uniaxial compression tests were performed on gypsum specimens with preexisting fractures to study the failure mechanism of fractures and rock bridges in fractured rock masses the coalescence mechanism of two parallel and offset fractures was investigated by monitoring the process of fracture initiation and propagation with a video camera the tests showed that two inclined parallel fractures can coalesce by shear failure and or tensile failure under a uniaxial load the coalescence path and mechanism mainly depend on the relative position of the two fractures for instance when the two fractures are coplanar or slightly offset coalescence is generated by shear failure when they are overlapping in the loading direction coalescence is generated by mixed shear and tensile failure two types of preexisting fractures one without initial surface contact and hence frictionless and another with surface contact and friction were used to study the influence of fracture contact conditions on the coalescence path and load it was found that coalescence of fractures with surface contact and friction requires loads as much as 35 higher than that for coalescence of fractures without contact and friction a stress analysis was conducted in this study to explain the different coalescence mechanisms the analytical work indicated that different fracture geometries produce significantly different stress fields in the rock bridge area and hence result in different failure modes

age scale of the air in the summit ice implication for glacial interglacial temperature change the air occluded in ice sheets and glaciers has in general a younger age defined as the time after its isolation from the atmosphere than the surrounding ice matrix because snow is first transformed into open porous firn in which the air can exchange with the atmosphere only at a certain depth firn ice transition the pores are pinched off and the air is definitely isolated from the atmosphere the firn ice transition depth is at around 70 m under present climatic conditions at summit central greenland the air at this depth is roughly 10 years old due to diffusive mixing whereas the ice is about 220 years old this results in an age difference between the air and the ice of 210 years this difference depends on temperature and accumulation rate and did thus not remain constant during the past we used a dynamic firn densification model to calculate the firn ice transition depth and the age of the ice at this depth and an air diffusion model to determine the age of the air at the transition past temperatures and accumulation rates have been deduced from the 18o record using time independent functions we present the results of model calculations of two paleotemperature scenarios yielding a record of the age difference between the air and the ice for the greenland ice core project grip and the greenland ice sheet project two gisp2 ice cores for the last 100 000 years during the holocene the age difference stayed rather stable around 200 years while it reached values up to 1400 years during the last glaciation for the colder scenario the model results are compared with age differences obtained independently by matching corresponding climate events in the methane and 18o records assuming a very small phase lag between variations in the greenland surface temperature and the atmospheric methane the past firn ice transition depths are compared with diffusive column heights obtained from 15n of n2 measurements the results of this study corroborate the large temperature change of 20 to 25 k from the coldest glacial to holocene climate found by evaluating borehole temperature profiles

the greenland ice sheet project 2 depth age scale methods and results the greenland ice sheet project 2 gisp2 depth age scale is presented based on a multiparameter continuous count approach to a depth of 2800 m using a systematic combination of parameters that have never been used to this extent before the ice at 2800 m is dated at 110 000 years b p with an estimated error ranging from 1 to 10 in the top 2500 m of the core and averaging 20 between 2500 and 2800 m parameters used to date the core include visual stratigraphy oxygen isotopic ratios of the ice electrical conductivity measurements laser light scattering from dust volcanic signals and major ion chemistry gisp2 ages for major climatic events agree with independent ages based on varve chronologies calibrated radiocarbon dates and other techniques within the combined uncertainties good agreement also is obtained with greenland ice core project ice core dates and with the specmap marine timescale after correlation through the 18 o of o 2 although the core is deformed below 2800 m and the continuity of the record is unclear we attempted to date this section of the core on the basis of the laser light scattering of dust in the ice

the δ18o of atmospheric o2 from air inclusions in the vostok ice core timing of co2 and ice volume changes during the penultimate deglaciation one important question about the co2 climate connection is how increasing atmospheric pco2 levels affect climate and thereby the mass balance of continental ice sheets a record of atmospheric co2 variations over the last 160 000 years has recently been constructed by analyzing the trapped gas in the vostok ice core barnola et al 1987 the relationship between changes in atmospheric co2 and the size of the continental ice sheets has been difficult to ascertain because the co2 record is obtained from ice cores while the ice volume record has been constructed from the stable isotopic composition of biogenic caco3 in deep sea sediment cores in order to compare these two records in a more precise manner we present a record of the isotopic composition 18o of atmospheric o2 trapped in the vostok ice core and propose that it may be considered a proxy for the 18o of seawater and hence ice volume having a record of atmospheric co2 along with a continental ice volume proxy in trapped air in the same ice core allows us to compare the timing of changes in these two parameters with little uncertainty in the relative ages of important events our results suggest that during the penultimate glacial termination atmospheric co2 began to increase at least 3 kyr before the initial introduction of meltwater to the oceans possible errors in the relative age depth curve of the vostok ice core and uncertainties in the influence of biological and hydrologic processes on the 18o of atmospheric o2 introduce some uncertainty into our conclusions however our results are in general agreement with the observed phase relationship between atmospheric co2 and ice volume imbrie et al 1984 imbrie et al 1989 inferred from changes in the 13c difference between contemporaneous planktonic and benthic forams deposited in deep sea cores and the specmap ice volume record

a method for precise measurement of argon 40 36 and krypton argon ratios in trapped air in polar ice with applications to past firn thickness and abrupt climate change in greenland and at siple dome antarctica we describe a method for measuring the 40ar 36ar ratio and the 84kr 36ar ratio in air from bubbles trapped in ice cores these ratios can provide constraints on the past thickness of the firn layer at the ice core site and on the magnitude of past rapid temperature variations when combined with measured 15n 14n both variables contribute to paleoclimatic studies and ultimately to the understanding of the controls on earth s climate the overall precision of the 40ar 36ar method 1 standard error of the mean is 0 012 for a sample analyzed in duplicate corresponding to 0 6 m in reconstructed firn thickness we use conventional dynamic isotope ratio mass spectrometry with minor modifications and special gas handling techniques designed to avoid fractionation about 100 g of ice is used for a duplicate pair of analyses an example of the technique applied to the gisp2 ice core yields an estimate of 11 3k of abrupt warming at the end of the last glacial period 15 000 years ago the krypton argon ratio can provide a diagnostic of argon leakage out of the bubbles which may happen naturally during bubble close off or artifactually if samples are warmed near the freezing point during core retrieval or storage argon leakage may fractionate the remaining 40ar 36ar ratio by 0 007 per change in 84kr 36ar introducing a possible bias in reconstructed firn thickness of about 2 m if thermal diffusion is not accounted for or 6 m if thermal diffusion effects are quantified with measured 15n 14n reproducibility of 84kr 36ar measured in air is about 0 2 1 standard error of the mean but is about 1 for ice core samples ice core samples are systematically enriched in 84kr 36ar relative to atmosphere by 5 probably reflecting preferential size dependent exclusion of the smaller argon atom during bubble entrapment recent results from the siple dome ice core reveal two climate events during the last deglaciation including an 18 m reduction in firn thickness associated with an abrupt warming at sometime between 18 and 22 kyr bp and a partial or total removal of the firn during an ablation event at 15 3 kyr bp

greenland temperature response to climate forcing during the last deglaciation greenland ice core water isotopic composition 18 o provides detailed evidence for abrupt climate changes but is by itself insufficient for quantitative reconstruction of past temperatures and their spatial patterns we investigate greenland temperature evolution during the last deglaciation using independent reconstructions from three ice cores and simulations with a coupled ocean atmosphere climate model contrary to the traditional 18 o interpretation the younger dryas period was 4 5 2 c warmer than the oldest dryas due to increased carbon dioxide forcing and summer insolation the magnitude of abrupt temperature changes is larger in central greenland 9 to 14 c than in the northwest 5 to 9 c fingerprinting a north atlantic origin simulated changes in temperature seasonality closely track changes in the atlantic overturning strength and support the hypothesis that abrupt climate change is mostly a winter phenomenon

16 c rapid temperature variation in central greenland 70 000 years ago variations in the29n2 28n2 ratio of air bubbles trapped in polar ice cores and their relation to variations of the 18o 16o of the ice allow past surface temperature variations and ice age gas age differences to be determined high resolution measurements of29n2 28n2 in dansgaard oeschger event 19 around 70 000 years before the present in ice from central greenland show that at the beginning of the event the ice age gas age difference was 1090 100 years with the use of a combined firn densification temperature and gas diffusion model the 18oice temperature coefficient was determined to be 0 42 0 05 per mil per kelvin this coefficient implies a mean surface temperature change of 16 0 kelvin between 14 3 and 18 1 kelvin which differs substantially from values derived from borehole temperatures and modern spatial 18oice surface temperature correlations

co2 and o2 n2 variations in and just below the bubble clathrate transformation zone of antarctic ice cores co2 measurements on the epica european project for ice coring in antarctica dml ice core in depth levels just below the bubble ice clathrate ice transformation zone 1230 2240 m depth were performed in the youngest part 1230 1600 m they reveal variations of up to 25 ppmv around the mean atmospheric concentration within centimetres corresponding to a snow deposition interval of a few years similar results are found at corresponding depth regions of the dome c and the talos dome ice cores since we can exclude all hitherto known processes altering the concentration of co2 in ice cores we present a hypothesis about spatial fractionation of air components related to episodically increasing clathrate formation followed by diffusion processes from bubbles to clathrates this hypothesis is supported by optical line scan observations and by o2 n2 measurements at the same depth where strong co2 variations are detected below the clathrate formation zone this small scale fractionation process is slowly smoothed out most likely by diffusion regaining the initial mean atmospheric concentration although this process compromises the representativeness of a single co2 measurement on small ice samples in the clathrate formation zone of an ice core it does not affect the mean atmospheric co2 concentration if co2 values are averaged over a sufficiently long depth scale 10 cm in case of the epica dml ice core

quantification of rapid temperature change during do event 12 and phasing with methane inferred from air isotopic measurements the description of rapid climatic changes during the last glacial period at high northern latitudes has been largely documented through greenland ice cores that are unique climatic and environmental records however greenland ice isotopic records are biased temperature proxies and it is still a matter of debate whether changes in the high latitudes lead or lag rapid changes elsewhere we focus here on the study of the mid glacial dansgaard oeschger event 12 45 ky bp associated to a large d 18 oice change in the grip greenland ice core project ice core we use combined measurements of ch4 d 15 n and d 40 ar in entrapped air associated with a recently developed firn densification and heat diffusion model to infer i the phasing between methane and temperature increases and ii the amplitude of the temperature change our method enables us to overcome the difficulty linked with rapid accumulation change in quantifying the temperature change we obtain a 12f2 5 8c temperature increase at the beginning of do event 12 thus confirming that the conventional use of water isotopes in the greenland ice cores largely underestimates the actual amplitude of rapid temperature change in central greenland in agreement with previous studies methane and temperature increase are in phase at the sampling resolution of that part of our profile 90 years d 2004 elsevier b v all rights reserved

evidence for substantial accumulation rate variability in antarctica during the holocene through synchronization of co 2 in the taylor dome dome c and dml ice cores high resolution records of atmospheric co2 concentration during the holocene are obtained from the dome concordia and dronning maud land antarctica ice cores these records confirm that the co2 concentration varied between 260 and 280 ppmv in the holocene as measured in the taylor dome ice core however there are differences in the co2 records most likely caused by mismatches in timescales matching the taylor dome timescale to the dome c timescale by synchronization of co2 indicates that the accumulation rate at taylor dome increased through the holocene by a factor two and bears little resemblance to the stable isotope record used as a proxy for temperature this result shows that different locations experienced substantially different accumulation changes and casts doubt on the often used assumption that accumulation rate scales with the saturation vapor pressure as a function of temperature at least for coastal locations d 2004 elsevier b v all rights reserved

formation of air clathrate hydrates in polar ice sheets heterogeneous nucleation induced by micro inclusions to investigate factors influencing nucleation of air clathrate hydrates in polar ice sheets we have performed high resolution mapping of the distributions of soluble impurities air bubbles and air hydrate crystals versus depth in the dome fuji antarctic ice significant correlation observed between the concentrations of air inclusions and impurities in ice along with frequent occurrence of impurities inside hydrate crystals suggest that micro inclusions promote hydrate nucleation in the ice matrix our observations also show that the diffusive macroscopic scale redistribution of air constituents in ice in the bubble hydrate transition zone is controlled by the original sedimentary layering of soluble impurities acting as nucleation helpers the results of this study are important for the correct interpretation of high resolution gas analyses of ice cores and for better understanding the global bubble to hydrate transformation process in polar ice sheets

multi stage structural and kinematic analysis of a retrogressive rock slope instability complex preonzo switzerland abstract large catastrophic rock slope failures are difficult to predict because the underlying mechanisms causing slope accelerations are difficult to study under in situ conditions for slope failures with compound basal rupture planes not only fracture propagation and slip in the basal rupture surface but also within the landslide body control the displacement evolution and time to failure the preonzo instability complex in southern switzerland failed several times since 2002 and offers a unique opportunity to study these mechanisms under in situ conditions the largest failure at preonzo occurred in may 2012 and was conditioned by large slope parallel nne ssw fracture zones which are intersected by ne and sw and e w striking faults creating diverging lateral boundaries whereas in the head scarp region oblique and flexural toppling along pre existing fracture sets is the prevailing mechanism sliding of either planar or wedge type is the preferred kinematic mode facilitated by the new discontinuities developed within the basal rupture surfaces these dominating mechanisms leading to a classical rock slope collapse could only be revealed in retrospect we compare fracture patterns in stable ground tectonic and unloading fractures with new fractures related to rock slope failure observed on basal rupture surfaces and in the head scarp simplified mechanical and kinematic analyses show that old pre existing tectonic fractures cannot accommodate substantial deformations under the in situ stress conditions and propagate connect through curved wing cracks forming at high angles this situation favors the development of new nearly slope parallel fractures which are interpreted as synthetic p shears along localized shear zones fractographic markings on these fractures indicate a continuous and relatively fast formation which presumably has taken place during a period of about 60 years prior to catastrophic failure this detailed description of the multi stage evolution of slope failure at preonzo represents a unique data set for future numerical studies of progressive failure in crystalline rocks