A new record of Colpocoryphe (Trilobita) from the Skiddaw Group of the Cross Fell inlier,northern England

The trilobite Colpocoryphe sp. is described for the first time from the Kirkland Formation, Llanvirn, of the Skiddaw Group in the Cross Fell inlier. It is considered to be closely related to a form previously recorded from the upper Arenig of the Lake District. This new record supports the previously suggested Gondwanan aspects of the northern England Avalonian fauna during the early Ordovician. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Analysis of Stock Market Development and CO2 Emissions on OECD Countries via an Empirical Model

Accompanying economic growth, CO₂ emissions have polluted the natural environment worldwide. This study highlights the special problems with stock market development and CO₂ emissions in 25 Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) countries during 1971–2007 to trace the trend of CO₂ emissions while countries grow their economies. A panel‐data model is applied to analyze the relationships between stock market (SM) development, energy consumption, gross domestic product (GDP), and CO₂ emissions in 25 OECD countries. Low‐GDP countries show different results from high‐GDP countries in the trends of SM development and CO₂ emissions, and dynamic effects occur in SM development and CO₂ emissions under various GDP conditions. There is a negative relationship between SM development and CO₂ emissions if countries enjoy high economic growth, which means that these countries avoid CO₂ emissions through SM development. However, a positive relationship is found between SM development and CO₂ emissions if countries experience low economic growth, which means that SM development does not show the boycott‐effect relationship with CO₂ emissions when countries experience low levels of economic development. This study shows a correlation between SM development and CO₂ emissions among OECD countries.     

Research Note: Experimental measurements of Q‐contrast reflections

While seismic reflection amplitudes are generally determined by real acoustical impedance contrasts, there has been recent interest in reflections due to contrasts in seismic‐Q. Herein we compare theoretical and modelled seismic reflection amplitudes for two different cases of material contrasts. In case A, we examine reflections from material interfaces that have a large contrast in real‐valued impedance () with virtually no contrast in seismic‐Q. In case B, we examine reflections from material interfaces that have virtually no contrast in but that have very large seismic‐Q contrasts. The complex‐valued reflection coefficient formula predicts non‐zero seismic reflection amplitudes for both cases. We choose physical materials that typify the physics of both case A and case B. Physical modelling experiments show significantly large reflections for both cases – with the reflections in the two cases being phase shifted with respect to each other, as predicted theoretically. While these modelling experiments show the existence of reflections that are predicted by theory, there are still intriguing questions regarding the size of the Q‐contrast reflections, the existence of large Q‐contrast reflections in reservoir rocks and the possible application of Q‐reflection analysis to viscosity estimation in heavy oilfields.     

Roundhouse (RND) Mountain Top Research Site: Measurements and Uncertainties for Winter Alpine Weather Conditions

The objective of this work is to better understand and summarize the mountain meteorological observations collected during the Science of Nowcasting Winter Weather for the Vancouver 2010 Olympics and Paralympics (SNOW-V10) project that was supported by the Fog Remote Sensing and Modeling (FRAM) project. The Roundhouse (RND) meteorological station was located 1,856 m above sea level that is subject to the winter extreme weather conditions. Below this site, there were three additional observation sites at 1,640, 1,320, and 774 m. These four stations provided some or all the following measurements at 1 min resolution: precipitation rate (PR) and amount, cloud/fog microphysics, 3D wind speed (horizontal wind speed, U _h; vertical air velocity, w _a), visibility (Vis), infrared (IR) and shortwave (SW) radiative fluxes, temperature (T) and relative humidity with respect to water (RH_w), and aerosol observations. In this work, comparisons are made to assess the uncertainties and variability for the measurements of Vis, RH_w, T, PR, and wind for various winter weather conditions. The ground-based cloud imaging probe (GCIP) measurements of snow particles using a profiling microwave radiometer (PMWR) data have also been shown to assess the icing conditions. Overall, the conclusions suggest that uncertainties in the measurements of Vis, PR, T, and RH can be as large as 50, >60, 50, and >20 %, respectively, and these numbers may increase depending on U _h, T, Vis, and PR magnitude. Variability of observations along the Whistler Mountain slope (~500 m) suggested that to verify the models, model space resolution should be better than 100 m and time scales better than 1 min. It is also concluded that differences between observed and model based parameters are strongly related to a model’s capability of accurate prediction of liquid water content (LWC), PR, and RH_w over complex topography.     

3D seismic imaging of a Tertiary Dyke Swarm in the Southern North Sea,UK

We use three‐dimensional (3D) seismic reflection and magnetic data to interpret and describe the 3D geometry of igneous dykes in the southern North Sea. The dykes were emplaced into Paleozoic and Mesozoic sediments and have a common upper termination in Early Tertiary sediments. We interpret the dykes to be part of the British Tertiary volcanic province and estimate the age of the dykes to be 58 Ma. The dykes are characterized by a narrow 0.5–2 km wide vertical disturbance of seismic reflections that have linear plan view geometry. Negative magnetic anomalies directly align with the vertical seismic disturbance zones and indicate the presence of igneous material. Linear coalesced collapse craters are found above the dykes. The collapse craters have been defined and visualized in 3D. Collapse craters have formed above the dyke due to the release of volatiles at the dyke tip and resulting volume loss. Larger craters have potentially formed due to explosive phreatomagmatic interaction between magma and pore water. The collapse craters are a new Earth analogue to Martian pit chain craters.     

Numerical study of upper ocean response to a typhoon moving zonally across the Luzon Strait

The Luzon Strait (LS) is a wide channel between Taiwan and the Luzon islands. Eastward of the LS, the Kuroshio Current (KC) flows northward along the eastern coasts of Luzon and Taiwan. A typhoon is a strong and localized low-pressure weather system that occurs frequently in the vicinity of the Taiwan area. One typical typhoon track, passing through the seas surrounding Taiwan, is a zonal path across the LS. The satellite measured SST, corresponding to typhoons Pabuk (5 Aug. 2007–12 Aug. 2007) and Dujuan (29 Aug. 2003–5 Sep. 2003), which both moved along this path, demonstrated that a classic right bias cooling occurs to the north of the storm track, during the typhoon forced period. However, some cold anomaly water also present toward left (south) of the storm track east of the LS in the relaxation period. This paper adopted a three-dimensional hydrostatic primitive equation model to study the possible causes of this southward transport of cold waters. Both model results and the observed SST anomaly revealed that the strength of the upper ocean cooling depends on whether a resonant regime between the typhoon winds and the near-inertial currents can be excited. To the east of the LS, the convergence between the warm Kuroshio water and the cold wakes in the poststorm period will enhance the southward spreading of cold anomaly water. The enhanced vertical mixing, induced by the southward propagation of nearly inertial waves associated with the cold wakes, can also produce some cold anomaly to the south of a storm track in the poststorm period. Both mechanisms can contribute to the occurrence of some cold anomaly water to the south of the storm track east of the KC. To the west of the LS, the convergence between the warm Kuroshio water and the cold upwelling water from the northern South China Sea can further strengthen the Kuroshio front in the LS.     

Modelling tidal current turbine wakes using a coupled RANS-BEMT approach as a tool for analysing power capture of arrays of turbines

An improved method is developed to couple an inner domain solution of the blade element momentum theory with an outer domain solution of the Reynolds averaged Navier Stokes equations for evaluating performance of tidal current turbines. A mesh sensitivity study shows that a mesh of at least 6 M cells with at least 40% of these within the turbine wake is required to ensure satisfactory convergence of the velocity deficit. In addition to the usually applied axial momentum source terms, angular momentum and turbulence intensity source terms are shown to be required to model the near wake evolution. Three different lateral turbine spacing of 2, 4 and 6 turbine diameters are used to demonstrate the influence of the effective channel blockage on the velocity distribution in the turbine bypass region, the rate of spread of the wake and the recovery of velocity distribution. A final study shows that for a fixed number of turbines minimising the lateral spacing within each row, with a small number of staggered rows spaced as longitudinally as far apart as practical, is the most effective strategy for energy capture.