Preprints
Filtering by Subject: Earth Sciences
Limited long-term cooling effects of flood basalt emplacements
Published: 2024-04-22
Subjects: Biogeochemistry, Earth Sciences, Geochemistry, Geology, Volcanology
The emplacement of large igneous provinces (LIPs) is known to have been a driver of climate change in Earth’s past, particularly during the breakup of Pangaea. However, the balance between climate warming through CO2 emission and climate cooling through increased weathering is poorly understood. To better understand the role of LIP emplacement on long-term climate change, we utilize a coupled [...]
Carbon isotope fractionation between CO2 and carbon in silicate melts at high temperature
Published: 2024-04-19
Subjects: Earth Sciences
The isotopic fractionation of carbon between CO2 gas and silicate melts is a crucial parameter to understand the carbon cycle at the planetary scale that requires accurate quantification. In this study, we conducted experiments to determine the carbon isotope fractionation between CO2 gas and carbon dissolved in silicate melt at 350 – 420 MPa and 1160 – 1225 °C, across a range of melt [...]
Systematic Review of the Geothermal Potential in Colombia: Implications as an Alternative Energy Source
Published: 2024-04-16
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Geochemistry, Geology, Geophysics and Seismology, Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Through literature review and information processing, the current state of geothermal energy in Colombia, its limitations, possible future uses, environmental impact and the current legal framework were described and analyzed. Approximations were made regarding the sustainability of geothermal energy in the country and its implications. Some of the projects, studies, and research that have been [...]
Evolution and architecture of an exhumed ocean-facing coarse-grained submarine canyon fill, Baja California, Mexico
Published: 2024-04-15
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Geology, Sedimentology, Stratigraphy, Tectonics and Structure
Present day submarine canyons are active conduits for large volumes of sediment, carbon, and pollutants from continents to oceans. However, the evolution of submarine canyons over geological timescales remains poorly understood due to their erosional nature and low preservation potential. The Late Cretaceous Punta Baja Formation represents a well-preserved submarine canyon-fill on a [...]
Linking the oxygen-17 compositions of water and carbonate reference materials using infrared absorption spectroscopy of carbon dioxide
Published: 2024-04-13
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Joint measurements of the 18O/16O and 17O/16O ratios of carbonate minerals and waters are increasingly used to investigate various geochemical, physical and biological processes. Diverse analytical methods, each of them technically challenging in one way or another, have been developed or refined in recent years to measure oxygen-17 anomalies (Δ17O) with instrumental precisions of 10 ppm or [...]
Late Holocene relative sea-level records from coral microatolls in Singapore
Published: 2024-04-11
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Late Holocene relative sea-level (RSL) data are important to understand the drivers of RSL change, but there is a lack of precise RSL records from the Sunda Shelf. Here, we produced a Late Holocene RSL reconstruction from coral microatolls in Singapore, demonstrating for the first time the utility of Diploastrea heliopora microatolls as sea-level indicators. We produced 12 sea-level index points [...]
Pleistocene shifts in Great Basin hydroclimate seasonality govern the formation of lithium-rich paleolake deposits
Published: 2024-04-10
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Hydrology, Oceanography and Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology, Paleobiology, Sedimentology
Southwestern North America is currently experiencing a multidecadal megadrought, with severe consequences for water resources. However, significant uncertainty remains about how precipitation will change in the 21st century in this semi-arid region. Paleoclimatic records are essential for both contextualizing current change, and for helping constrain the sensitivity of regional hydroclimate to [...]
Advancing forest aboveground biomass mapping by integrating GEDI with other Earth Observation data using a cloud computing platform: A case study of Alabama, United States
Published: 2024-04-06
Subjects: Applied Statistics, Climate, Earth Sciences, Environmental Monitoring, Environmental Sciences, Forest Management, Other Forestry and Forest Sciences
Forest aboveground biomass (AGB) is a crucial indicator for monitoring carbon and requires accurate quantification. This study aimed to advance AGB estimation using open access Earth observation (EO) data and cloud computing, focusing on Alabama, USA. The specific objectives were to: (1) develop a workflow for creating a 30 m forest AGBD map with GEDI, using GEE, (2) evaluate and compare [...]
Using mixed siliciclastic-bioclastic sediments as a natural analogue for plastic-rich systems
Published: 2024-04-05
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Environmental Sciences, Geology, Sedimentology
Mixed siliciclastic-bioclastic sediments and systems represent an analogue to understanding the behaviour and impact of plastic sediments in natural environments. The integration of knowledge derived from different mixed systems can enhance our comprehension of depositional processes, bedform morphology, and plastic distribution as well as assess the potentiality of siliciclastic-bioclastic [...]
Estimating microphysical properties of ice clouds for climate modeling and remote sensing applications
Published: 2024-04-04
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Oceanography and Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology, Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Ice clouds pose crucial challenges in climate model simulations and remote sensing retrievals due to complicated mechanisms of ice cloud formation that span from micro scale to planetary wave scale. Despite numerous attempts to parameterize these processes, many questions remain unanswered. This technical note provides a summary of the most common and recent studies on ice clouds and compiles [...]
Development of a Snow Growth Model for Rimed Snowfall
Published: 2024-04-04
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Physical Sciences and Mathematics
A snow growth model for rimed snowfall (SGMR) was developed based on the growth processes of vapor deposition, aggregation, and riming. The SGMR is initialized by radar reflectivity (Z) at the cloud top and thereafter simulates the vertical evolution of size spectra. The SGMR is based on the zeroth- and second-moment conservation equations with respect to mass, and thus conserves the number [...]
Progress in Understanding North American Monsoon Using a Climate Model
Published: 2024-04-01
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Oceanography and Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology, Physical Sciences and Mathematics
The North American Monsoon is a seasonal shift in the large-scale circulation that supplies 60-80% of annual rainfall in northwestern Mexico and 30-40% in the US southwest. Regional climate models have shown that summer precipitation prediction over North America is the poorest in the Monsoon region. Most climate models do not account for a crucial mechanism of Monsoon: the boundary layer [...]
A consistent terminology to communicate ground-related uncertainty
Published: 2024-03-26
Subjects: Civil and Environmental Engineering, Earth Sciences, Environmental Sciences, Risk Analysis, Social and Behavioral Sciences, Statistics and Probability
Engineering geology is highly affected by uncertainty related to geology, geotechnical parameters, models and methods. While the technical aspects of ground-related uncertainty are increasingly well investigated, the terminology to communicate uncertainty - e.g., “It is likely that X will happen.” - has not yet been unified and experts use it however they see fit. Due to varying experience, [...]
Grüneisen parameter formalism in the study of the Earth's core formation: a sensitivity study
Published: 2024-03-20
Subjects: Condensed Matter Physics, Earth Sciences, Geochemistry, Geology, Mineral Physics, Other Earth Sciences, Planetary Geophysics and Seismology, Planetary Mineral Physics, Planetary Sciences
The Grüneisen parameter is an important parameter for the thermal state and evolution of the core, but its uncertainties and their implications are sometimes overlooked . Several formalisms using different parameters values have been used in different studies, making comparison between studies difficult. In this paper, we use previously published datasets to test the sensitivity of modeling the [...]
Field geology under the sea with a remotely operated vehicle: Mona Rift, Puerto Rico
Published: 2024-03-18
Subjects: Earth Sciences
We implemented concepts of field geology at great ocean depths by constructing virtual outcrops from a string of overlapping video frames collected by remotely operated vehicles (ROV). This lower cost alternative to drilling boreholes allows stratigraphic extension into the offshore and for regional interpretation of marine seismic profiles. The imagery was collected along a dive transect on the [...]