Preprints
Filtering by Subject: Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Machine-Learning Approaches for Assessing Aerosol Optical Depth (AOD) in Ghana, West Africa
Published: 2024-01-08
Subjects: Education, Medicine and Health Sciences, Physical Sciences and Mathematics
In the field of environmental health, assessing air pollution exposure has historically posed challenges, primarily due to sparse ground observation networks. To overcome this limitation, satellite remote sensing of aerosols provides a valuable tool for monitoring air quality and estimating particulate matter concentration (PM) at the surface. In this study, we employ two predictive models to [...]
Designing and describing climate change impact attribution studies: a guide to common approaches
Published: 2024-01-06
Subjects: Climate, Earth Sciences, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Environmental Public Health, Environmental Studies, Human Geography, Physical and Environmental Geography, Physical Sciences and Mathematics, Probability, Public Health, Spatial Science, Statistical Methodology, Statistical Models, Statistics and Probability
Impact attribution is an emerging transdisciplinary sub-discipline of detection and attribution, focused on the social, economic, and ecological impacts of climate change. Here, we provide an overview of common end-to-end frameworks in impact attribution, focusing on examples relating to the human health impacts of climate change. We propose a typology of study designs based on whether [...]
Hydrogen wettability and capillary pressure in Clashach sandstone for underground hydrogen storage
Published: 2024-01-05
Subjects: Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Hydrogen (H2) can support the transition to net-zero carbon (C) emissions by facilitating increased renewable energy use by acting as an energy store to balance supply and demand. Underground H2 storage in porous media is investigated due to its high capacity and economical price. An important unknown in underground porous media H2 storage is the volume of recoverable H2 which is partly [...]
Megathrust locking encoded in subduction landscapes
Published: 2024-01-04
Subjects: Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Locked areas of subduction megathrusts are increasingly found to coincide with landscape features sculpted over hundreds of kyrs, yet the mechanisms that underlie such correlations remain elusive. We show that interseismic locking gradients induce increments of irreversible strain across the overriding plate manifested predominantly as distributed seismicity. Summing these increments over [...]
Aggregation - Disaggregation Cycles in ERA 5 Reanalysis
Published: 2024-01-04
Subjects: Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Understanding convective aggregation is very important for understanding tropical climate and climate sensitivity. However, we still lack a full understanding of how aggregation evolves in the real world or what phenomena and scales are analogous to the self-aggregation observed in idealized models. In this study, we apply the moist static energy (MSE) variance budget framework to ERA5 reanalysis [...]
A shake and a surge: Assessing the possibility of an earthquake-triggered eruption at Steamboat Geyser
Published: 2024-01-03
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Physical Sciences and Mathematics, Volcanology
When and why earthquakes trigger the eruption of magma, mud, and water remain unclear. On 18 September 2022, Steamboat Geyser in Yellowstone, USA erupted 8.25 hours after a local M3.9 earthquake. The distribution of Steamboat eruption intervals suggests a low probability of erupting so soon after the earthquake by chance. A seismometer 340 m from Steamboat recorded seismic waves with a peak [...]
Microbial indicators and detection of Cu-sulfide ore mineralization
Published: 2024-01-02
Subjects: Biogeochemistry, Earth Sciences, Geochemistry, Geology, Other Earth Sciences, Physical Sciences and Mathematics, Soil Science
Rapid electrification of society is placing unprecedented demand on critical mineral and metal resources. New strategies and technologies are thus needed to promote mineral discovery in regions where deposits are likely buried deep under soil and glacial till. We show that microbial communities from different soil types change in composition in response to amendment with copper. We also show [...]
New U-Pb zircon data and patterns of collision magmatism in the Northern Highlands of Scotland
Published: 2023-12-29
Subjects: Physical Sciences and Mathematics
The Northern Highlands Terrane of the Scottish Caledonides contain a record of Palaeozoic collision magmatism which overlaps with Baltica – Laurentia convergence and the Scandian Orogeny. Here, there remain gaps in our understanding of the relationship between collision dynamics and the spatial-temporal distribution of Caledonian intrusions. In this study, the Strontian and Helmsdale plutons and [...]
A Systematic Review of Machine Learning Algorithms in Groundwater Level Simulations and Forecasting
Published: 2023-12-29
Subjects: Education, Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Over two billion individuals worldwide rely on subterranean water as their primary reservoir of clean water. Ensuring the sustainable management of this heavily burdened resource necessitates a comprehensive quantitative evaluation of groundwater reserves. This becomes even more critical as water resources face escalating demands resulting from socioeconomic growth, population expansion, and the [...]
Deep-Water Fan Hierarchy: Assumptions, Evidence, and Numerical Modelling Analysis
Published: 2023-12-26
Subjects: Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Submarine fan strata are commonly described and interpreted assuming a nested, hierarchical organisation of elements, from beds, to lobe elements, lobes and lobe complexes. However, describing outcrop and subsurface strata following a particular conceptual method or model is never evidence in itself that the model or method accurately reflects the true nature of the strata. To develop better [...]
Geochronology and geodynamics of collision magmatism in the Southern Uplands-Down-Longford Terrane in Scotland and Ireland
Published: 2023-12-24
Subjects: Physical Sciences and Mathematics
The relationship between igneous activity and the geodynamics of subduction and collision is uncertain in northern Britain and Ireland, which lay on the Laurentian margin during accretion of Baltica and peri-Gondwanan terranes during the Palaeozoic Caledonian - Acadian orogenies. There is uncertainty over the relevance and timing of Iapetus slab breakoff beneath the Laurentian margin, and modest [...]
On sea ice emission modeling for MOSAiC's L-band radiometric measurements
Published: 2023-12-21
Subjects: Engineering, Physical Sciences and Mathematics
The sea ice thickness retrieval using L-band passive remote sensing requires robust sea ice emission models. In this work, measurements from surface-based radiometers during MOSAiC are assessed with the Burke, Wilheit and SMRT models. These models encompass three distinct methodologies: incoherent without scattering, incoherent with scattering, and coherent approaches. Before running them, the [...]
MoonIndex, an Open-Source Tool to Generate Spectral Indexes for the Moon from M3 Data
Published: 2023-12-21
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Physical Sciences and Mathematics, Planetary Sciences
Spectral indexes are tools widely used to analyze the composition of the lunar surface. Many indexes have been formulated over the years, but there is no unified database for them. In this work we describe an Open-Source Python package called MoonIndex, that recreates thirty-nine indexes compiled from the literature and derived from several instruments, using data from the Moon Mineralogy Mapper [...]
Shortening and extrusion in the East Anatolian Plateau: how was Neogene Arabia-Europe convergence tectonically accommodated?
Published: 2023-12-21
Subjects: Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Deformation in orogenic belts is typically widely distributed but may be localized to form discrete, fast-moving fault zones enclosing semi-rigid microplates. An example is the Anatolian microplate, which is extruding westwards from the East Anatolian Plateau in the Arabia-Eurasia collision zone along the North and East Anatolian Faults that cause devastating earthquakes, including the February [...]
Field testing autogenic storage thresholds for environmental signals in the strata of the Mississippi River Delta, U.S.A.
Published: 2023-12-19
Subjects: Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Sediments transported from source terrains to depositional sinks carry environmental signals, which may or may not be preserved in stratigraphy. Recently developed theory suggests storage thresholds for environmental signals are set by the internal dynamics of sediment transport systems. For the first time, we explore this theory by testing whether changes in relative sea level (RSL) of various [...]