Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The effect of aquifer condition on methane recovery for CO2 injection in coalbed

To estimate methane recovery from an enhanced coal bed at the field scale, it is important to understand CO2 movement. Since coal beds are generally connected with aquifers, CO2 movement is affected by aquifer position and strength. Under conditions of no aquifer, CO2 initially has a tendency to move to the top layer of the coal seam due to the buoyancy effect. However, the permeability of the upper layer is decreased due to the swelling effect. The viscosity flow effectively improves CO2 movement due to high permeability in the bottom layer. Because of the offsetting effects of viscosity and gravitational flow, the vertical sweep efficiency of injected CO2 is very effective. Thus, methane recovery is highly calculated. Under conditions of an upper aquifer, CO2 flow in the bottom layer decreased as the injected CO2 leaked to the aquifer. As the hydraulic connection between the overlying aquifer and the coal seam is strong, the vertical sweep efficiency is weakened due to the high gas leakage rate. Therefore, methane recovery decreases. However, under conditions in which an aquifer is at the bottom, methane recovery should be high because the gas-leakage rate is almost negligible. Under conditions with an aquifer edge, injected CO2 in the coal bed has an asymmetric flow because pressure is only supported in the flow direction of the aquifer. As the pressure is greater at the aquifer, the asymmetric flow is gradually strengthened by changes in the equilibrium caused by viscosity and gravity. Consequently, enhanced coalbed methane recovery has irregular efficiency, in part due to the CO2 movement. However, by suitably adjusting the CO2 injection site and production well perforation, total methane recovery can be made more efficient, despite producing an asymmetric flow of injected CO2. These findings clearly indicate that production or injection plans for enhanced coalbed methane must be designed to consider CO2 movement.
Response of field-grown cotton (Gossypium hirsutum L.) to phosphorus fertilisation on alkaline soils in eastern Australia

Seventeen field experiments were conducted on alkaline soils in eastern Australia between 1997 and 2000 to evaluate irrigated cotton response to phosphorus (P) fertilisation. Only 3 experiments demonstrated significant (P < 0.05) increases in crop P uptake or lint yield with P application. Comparison of several soil P tests revealed that Colwell (bicarbonate) P provided the best correlation with P uptake at early flowering and lint yield. Soil P may limit cotton growth where Colwell-P concentrations are <6 mg/kg. Soil P concentrations at most of the sites were well above this critical limit, so P fertiliser application was not required. Average P uptake at physiological cut-out and P removal in seed cotton was 21 and 15 kg P/ha, respectively. Apparent P fertiliser recovery was variable (0-67%) and may have contributed to the lack of response that was observed in 14 out of the 17 experiments. It is recommended that at least 40 kg P/ha be applied to soils with Colwell-P concentrations <6 mg/kg to increase soil P reserves. Application rates of at least 20 kg P/ha are recommended where Colwell-P falls between 6 and 12 mg/kg to maintain soil P fertility.
Calibration of a Vadose Zone Model Using Water Injection Monitored by GPR and Electrical Resistance Tomography

The noninvasive characterization of the vadose zone has been the objective of intense research aiming at collecting data for the calibration of flow and transport models. This interest is motivated by the difficulty of accessing the vadose zone with direct methods without causing disturbance to the natural conditions. On the other hand, characterizing the vadose zone requires detailed knowledge of space and time variations of water distribution. Geophysical methods capable of imaging the moisture content, such as ground penetrating radar (GPR) and electrical resistance tomography (ERT), provide data with high resolution in space and time: natural infiltration and artificial injection (tracer) tests can be imaged, by repeating measurements over time (time‐lapse mode). We conducted a forced‐injection experiment at a test site in Gorgonzola, east of Milan (Italy). The site is characterized by Quaternary sand and gravel sediments that house an extensive unconfined aquifer. We used ERT and GPR in two‐dimensional cross‐hole configuration and time‐lapse mode during a period of several days preceding and following a tracer experiment with the injection of about 20 m3 of fresh water in a purposely excavated trench. The calibration of a three‐dimensional infiltration model on the basis of the geophysical data provides useful estimates of vertical saturated hydraulic conductivity; however, we observed a discrepancy in mass balance between calibrated simulations and measurements. This fact cannot be explained using a simple isotropic model for hydraulic properties; therefore, the method requires further investigation before being fully established.
Hydrological and biogeochemical controls on plant species distribution within calcareous fens

This study determines spatial patterns of plant species richness and diversity in three calcareous fens and quantifies individual species response and range/tolerance to hydrological, peat physical, and porewater nutrient gradients using nonlinear quantile regression. Species richness and diversity were highly variable across the sites, with no single species occupying more than 25% of the area surveyed. Variable hydrological regime was related to distance from the principal source area of water to the fens. Surface peat organic matter and calcium carbonate content ranged from 11 to 91% and 2 to 83%, respectively. Dissolved inorganic nitrogen (DIN) and potassium concentrations from the shallow porewater ranged from 0 to 4 mg l−1, whereas available phosphorus was < 100 µg l−1. Species exhibited various response shapes to the environmental gradients, which produced segregated realized ranges. The duration of initial saturation of the peat from the start of the growing season and the peat organic matter content produced the greatest number of complete species responses and ranges. Aggregation of species across growth types based on environmental responses mirrored visually described communities, demonstrating the applicability of the method of analysis. The generation of species response curves for a suite of readily measured environmental variables can be a useful tool for assessing conceptual models of ecosystem functioning and wetland restoration/creation success. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Syn-kinematic palaeogeographic evolution of the West European Platform: correlation with Alpine plate collision and foreland deformation

Abstract Sequence stratigraphic correlations indicate that intermittent changes of the kinematic far-field stress-field regimes, and the associated geodynamic re-organisations at the plate-tectonic contacts of the African, Apulian, Iberian and European plates, affected the Tertiary palaeogeographic evolution of the West European Platform through a combination of intra-plate tectonics and fluctuations of relative sea level. A temporal sequence of first-order stages in structural, palaeotopographic and palaeohydrographic development of the platform can be distinguished from the Paleocene onwards. These formative stages are closely linked to major plate-boundary events involving the development of the Pyrenean and Alpine orogens, and can be traced throughout the West European Platform.
A constructive non-local means algorithm for low-dose computed tomography denoising with morphological residual processing

Low-dose computed tomography (LDCT) has attracted significant attention in the domain of medical imaging due to the inherent risks of normal-dose computed tomography (NDCT) based X-ray radiations to patients. However, reducing radiation dose in CT imaging produces noise and artifacts that degrade image quality and subsequently hinders medical disease diagnostic performance. In order to address these problems, this research article presents a competent low-dose computed tomography image denoising algorithm based on a constructive non-local means algorithm with morphological residual processing to achieve the task of removing noise from the LDCT images. We propose an innovative constructive non-local image filtering algorithm by means of applications in low-dose computed tomography technology. The nonlocal mean filter that was recently proposed was modified to construct our denoising algorithm. It constructs the discrete property of neighboring filtering to enable rapid vectorized and parallel implantation in contemporary shared memory computer platforms while simultaneously decreases computing complexity. Subsequently, the proposed method performs faster computation compared to a non-vectorized and serial implementation in terms of speed and scales linearly with image dimension. In addition, the morphological residual processing is employed for the purpose of edge-preserving image processing. It combines linear lowpass filtering with a nonlinear technique that enables the extraction of meaningful regions where edges could be preserved while removing residual artifacts from the images. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed algorithm preserves more textural and structural features while reducing noise, enhances edges and significantly improves image quality more effectively. The proposed research article obtains better results both qualitatively and quantitively when compared to other comparative algorithms on publicly accessible datasets.
Using high-resolution aeromagnetic surveys to map subsurface hydrogeology in sediment-filled basins: A case study over the Rio Grande rift, central New Mexico, USA

High-resolution aeromagnetic surveys were acquired for the Albuquerque basin in the central Rio Grande rift, a basin filled with poorly consolidated sediments. The surveys proved successful in efficiently and economically mapping previously unknown hydrogeologic features of the shallow subsurface. This success suggests that aeromagnetic methods may be useful in hydrogeologic studies of other sediment-filled basins. The aeromagnetic surveys were used primarily to delineate buried igneous rocks and to locate faults within the basin fill, both important for understanding the subsurface hydrogeology. Buried igneous rocks were recognized from their high-frequency, high-amplitude anomalies and anomaly patterns. The horizontal-gradient and local wavenumber methods were applied to these anomalies to obtain estimates of their source depths. The aeromagnetic surveys were also successfully used to locate faults within the basin fill. Anomalies associated with faults are produced by the juxtaposition of sediments having differing magnetic properties, contradicting the traditional belief that magnetization of poorly consolidated sediments is negligible. Expression of faults is abundant throughout the basin, revealing patterns that cannot be mapped at the surface due to widespread cover. A fault signature recognized in the high-resolution data that has multiple inflection points is best explained by a fault with a thin magnetic layer on the upthrown block and thick magnetic layer on the downthrown block, called the thin-thick layers model. Geologically, this signature indicates erosion of the upthrown block or a growth-faulting scenario: fault-controlled sedimentation for faults that offset sediments, and successive accumulation of basalt on the downthrown block for faults that offset volcanic rocks.
Effects of levees on soil microbial activity in a large river floodplain

In recent years, large river floodplains have received attention because of their importance in water quality amelioration and biodiversity support. However, few studies have addressed the effects of the extensive anthropogenic modification of floodplains caused by levee construction. To assess the effects of levees on soil properties, we measured microbial activities (electron transport system and extracellular enzyme activities), soil properties (organic matter, pH, ions, soil texture, etc.), coarse woody debris and litter accumulations in a section of the Wisconsin River floodplain in 1999 and 2000, where levees were constructed more than 100 years ago. No significant differences in the amount of organic matter or coarse woody debris were observed outside the levee compared to areas inside the levee. However, significantly higher microbial activities (dehydrogenase, β‐glucosidase, phosphatase) per gram organic matter were found for soils inside the levee. These changes were attributed to (1) modified hydrology, which caused differences in water availability and soil chemistry, and (2) tree species composition (e.g. higher number of oaks outside the levee), which caused differences in substrate quality. These results suggest that modification of the hydrologic regime by levees may alter not only the structure of plant communities but also the organic matter dynamics of floodplain. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Fast Solution of Time-Harmonic Wave Equation for Full-Waveform Inversion

For many full-waveform inversion techniques, the most computationally intensive step is the computation of a numerical solution for the wave equation on every iteration. In the frequency domain approach, this requires the solution of very large, complex, sparse, ill-conditioned linear systems. In this extended abstract we bring out attention specifically to CGMN method for solving PDEs, known for being flexible (i.e. it is able to treat equally acoustic data as well as visco-elastic or more complex scenarios) efficient with respect both to memory and computation time, and controllable accuracy of the final approximation. We propose an improvement for the known CGMN method by imposing a minimal residual condition, which incurs in one extra model vector storage. The resulting algorithm called CRMN enjoys several interesting properties as monotonically nonincreasing behaviour of the norm of the residual and minimal residual, guaranteeing optimal convergence for the relative residual criterion. We discuss numerical experiments both in an isolated PDE solve and also within the inversion procedure, showing that in a realistic scenario we can expect a speedup around 25% when using CRMN rather than CGMN.
Sonic to ultrasonic Q of sandstones and limestones: Laboratory measurements at in situ pressures

Laboratory measurements of the attenuation and velocity dispersion of compressional and shear waves at appropriate frequencies, pressures, and temperatures can aid interpretation of seismic and well-log surveys as well as indicate absorption mechanisms in rocks. Construction and calibration of resonant-bar equipment was used to measure velocities and attenuations of standing shear and extensional waves in copper-jacketed right cylinders of rocks (Formula in length, Formula in diameter) in the sonic frequency range and at differential pressures up to Formula. We also measured ultrasonic velocities and attenuations of compressional and shear waves in Formula-diameter samples of the rocks at identical pressures. Extensional-mode velocities determined from the resonant bar are systematically too low, yielding unreliable Poisson's ratios. Poisson's ratios determined from the ultrasonic data are frequency corrected and used to calculate thesonic-frequency compressional-wave velocities and attenuations from the shear- and extensional-mode data. We calculate the bulk-modulus loss. The accuracies of attenuation data (expressed as Formula, where Q is the quality factor) are Formula for compressional and shear waves at ultrasonic frequency, Formula for shear waves, and Formula for compressional waves at sonic frequency. Example sonic-frequency data show that the energy absorption in a limestone is small (Formula greater than 200 and stress independent) and is primarily due to poroelasticity, whereas that in the two sandstones is variable in magnitude (Formula ranges from less than 50 to greater than 300, at reservoir pressures) and arises from a combination of poroelasticity and viscoelasticity. A graph of compressional-wave attenuation versus compressional-wave velocity at reservoir pressures differentiates high-permeability (Formula, Formula) brine-saturated sandstones from low-permeability (Formula, Formula) sandstones and shales.
A medium-depth ice core drill

Taking as a model the Alfred Wegener Institute medium depth ice core drill, we have developed a drill capable of retrieving ice cores to depths of around 150-200m. At a total system weight of 340kg, including drill, winch, cable, tower and generator, the system is easily transported by Twin Otter aircraft. Two identical copies of the drill system were produced, and used to drill successfully at eleven locations in both the Arctic and the Antarctic. Ice conditions experienced during drilling ranged from cold Antarctic plateau sites to Arctic sites close to melting, and also blue, bubble-free ice.
A Generic Toolkit for the Visualization of Archaeological Features on Airborne LiDAR Elevation Data

A range of techniques have become established for the visualization and analysis of airborne LiDAR elevation data within the field of archaeology. In this paper we discuss the visualization of test data representing archaeological features in a variety of terrains using a suite of techniques, all available through generic geographical information system or image processing software. These comprise elevation shading using constrained colour ramps, slope analysis, hill‐shading, principal component analysis of multi‐azimuth hill‐shading, local relief models and solar insolation modelling. The strengths and weaknesses of each technique are discussed and a generic toolkit, suited to the visualization of airborne LiDAR data for archaeological purposes, is presented. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
SOIL-NAILED WALL UNDER PILED BRIDGE ABUTMENT: SIMULATION AND GUIDELINES

A three-dimensional (3D) nonlinear finite-element analysis is used to study the behavior of soil-nailed walls constructed under a bridge abutment built on piles. The numerical model simulates the piles and the nails with beam elements, the abutment and the pile cap with solid 3D brick elastic elements. The soil model used is a modified hyperbolic model with unloading hysteresis. The complete sequence of construction is simulated including the excavation of the embankment slope under the bridge in front of the abutment and the placement of the nails. The numerical model is calibrated against an instrumented case history. Then a parametric study is conducted. The results give information on the effect of the excavation and nail placement on the following: axial load and bending moment in the piles and load in the nails and wall deflections. The results are used to suggest design guidelines.
On the movement of tropical cyclones

The approach of a tropical cyclone is usually accompanied by intensification of circulation aloft in the broad currents on its poleward side. Anticyclogenesis usually occurs downstream from the cyclone, the so-called steering wedge tending to grow and extend westward, which tends to perpetuate the normal westward movement of the storm. The results of this study indicate that the steering level is determined by the height to which the storm s vortical circulation extends, being located approximately at the elevation where closed isobars over the storm disappear. This level ranges from below 10,000 ft to above 50,000 ft and may vary more than 10,000 ft in 24 hours. For this reason no single level can be used to determine the steering of the storm from day to day. It has been found, however, that changes occurring in the flow patterns of the 20,000-foot, or 500-mb, chart are excellent indices to critical changes in movement. A new tool for forecasting direction of movement for tropical cyclones has recently been developed which is apparently more valuable and effective than steering-level analyses. By using charts of the difference in height between the 700 mb and 500 mb levels (mean virtual temperature charts), or of the weight in millibars of the layer from 10,000 to 20,000 ft, it has been found that a tongue of warmer, lighter air is associated with the moving storm. This tongue is oriented with its major axis parallel to the movement of the cyclone. An excellent lag correlation exists, such that the orientation of the tongue at any instant usually indicates the direction of cyclone movement for the ensuing 24-hour period.
Estimation of crossbreeding and genetic parameters for reproductive traits of Boer x Central Highland goats in Ethiopia

Additive genetic and non-additive parameters for reproductive traits of Boer x Central Highland goats were estimated. Pedigree and performance records comprised of Central Highland and their crosses with Boer goats were collected from 2009 to 2018 in the Sirinka Agricultural Research Center sheep and goat breeding station. Least-squares means for genotypes were obtained using a general linear model procedure in SAS. To estimate crossbreeding parameters, breed additive, heterotic, and recombination effects were fitted as fixed covariates instead of genotypes. Variance, heritability, and repeatability estimates were estimated through the AI-REML algorithm using WOMBAT software. Genotype did not significantly (P>0.05) influence most of the reproductive traits studied except for gestation length. The additive effect for litter size at birth (LSB), total litter birth weight (LBW), total litter weaning weight (LWW), litter size at weaning (LSW), and gestation length (GL) was estimated to be -0.004 kid, 0.08 kg, -3.18 kg, -0.54 kid, and 3.69 days, respectively. The contribution of heterosis to LSB, LWW, and GL of crossbred goats was negative, while the estimates for LBW and LSW were positive. However, Boer goats’ heterosis effect and direct additive contribution to reproductive traits were insignificant (P>0.05) except for LSW. The recombination effect was negligible and not significant (P>0.05) for all traits examined. The direct heritability estimate for LSB, LWB, LWW, LSW, and GL were 0.050, 0.098, 0.086, 0.018, and 0.00, respectively. The repeatability estimates for LSB, LWB, LWW, LSW, and GL were 0.149, 0.116, 0.099, 0.086, and 0.061, respectively. The result indicates that improvement in reproductive traits would not be expected by crossing Boer with Central Highland goats. In addition, heritability estimates indicate that the improvement of reproductive traits through selection will be small, and the repeatability estimates indicate that multiple records have to be used to make a decision of culling or selection.