Preprints
There are 8003 Preprints listed.
P- and S-Wave Travel-Time Characteristics and Station-Dependent Residuals from Local Earthquakes in Ghana
Published: 2026-10-09
Subjects: Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Understanding P- and S-wave travel-time behaviour is important for characterizing seismic-wave propagation and identifying station-dependent variability within regional seismic networks. This study investigates P- and S-wave travel-time characteristics and station-dependent residuals using local earthquakes recorded by the Ghana Digital Seismic Network (GHDSN). The analysis reexamines the [...]
Dehydration of Serpentinized Ultramafic Rocks as a Candidate Deep Crustal Source of Natural Hydrogen and Hydrocarbons: Experimental Evidence from the Lesser Caucasus
Published: 2026-10-29
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Geology, Geophysics and Seismology
Natural hydrogen generated by serpentinization — the hydration of ultramafic rocks, in which ferrous iron is oxidised and molecular hydrogen is liberated from water — has recently been shown to proceed at rates of only 0.1 to 0.5 tonnes H₂ yr⁻¹ km⁻³ of reactive rock, implying that economically significant accumulations would require 10³ to 10⁴ years to develop [1]. A complementary process [...]
Understanding Earthquake Physics with On-Fault Observatories
Published: 2026-10-02
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Geology, Geophysics and Seismology, Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Earthquakes often strike without warning. Current fault monitoring infrastructure is not sensitive enough to detect signals such as accelerating fault creep or dilation, which laboratory experiments and numerical models predict may precede large earthquakes. Here we argue that a paradigm shift is needed and technically achievable: from inferring faulting processes from a distance with surface [...]
Novel Mechanism of Abiotic Ammonium Oxidation Triggers Nitrous Oxide Bursts Upon Soil Rewetting
Published: 2026-10-02
Subjects: Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Drought-rewetting cycles (DWC) in soil are accompanied by a rapid burst of nitrous oxide (N2O) emission within minutes without reactivation of dormant microbes. Here we present a manifold of evidence for a previously unrecognized abiotic mechanism connecting soil ammonium (NH4+) to N2O with hydroxylamine (NH2OH) as a key intermediate. DWC experiments in the Negev Desert soil revealed comparable [...]
“Grand” petit-spot volcanism off the Japan Trench
Published: 2026-10-09
Subjects: Earth Sciences
Petit-spot volcanoes are a recently discovered type of small intraplate volcanoes that erupt on the outer rise of subducting plates. At petit-spot regions on the outer rise of the Japan Trench, an anomalously shallow acoustic basement reflector is widely distributed, leading to the hypothesis that it corresponds to sills or sheet-like lava flows and is associated with petit-spot magmatism. Here [...]
Subvolcanic magma pathways in transtensional regimes; AMS and structural evidence from SE Iceland
Published: 2026-09-24
Subjects: Physical Sciences and Mathematics
This study presents an integrated analysis of magmatic and tectonic strain data recorded within and around the Reyðarártindur intrusion, southeast Iceland, combining anisotropy of magnetic susceptibility (AMS) with UAV-based fracture mapping. Thermomagnetic experiments and petrography confirm AMS fabrics capture magmatic-state strain, defining a consistent NNE–SSW magnetic lineation with [...]
Year-Wise Refitted Spatiotemporal Landslide Susceptibility Forecasting Driven by IMD Rainfall and SMAP Soil Moisture, Wayanad, India
Published: 2026-10-21
Subjects: Engineering
Landslides in hilly regions threaten life, infrastructure, and ecosystems. Landslide susceptibility is inherently transient, yet conventional analysis produces time-invariant zoning and evaluates it by random partitioning of a temporally structured inventory, which permits later events to inform predictions for earlier ones. This study develops a year-wise refitted framework for the Wayanad [...]
The nonlinear effect of environmental regulations on urban green transformation in the Yellow River Basin
Published: 2026-09-24
Subjects: Geography
In order to better achieve regional sustainable development, it is extremely important to explore the relationship between environmental regulation (ENR) and urban green transformation. Nonetheless, there is a dearth of research that examines the nonlinear relationship between the ENR and urban green transformation. Taking the Yellow River Basin (YERB) as a case study, this paper uses a panel [...]
Fear without a dose-response: real-time crowdsourced psychometrics show a moderate earthquake’s psychological footprint is decoupled from shaking intensity in an anticipation-primed megacity
Published: 2026-10-21
Subjects: Engineering, Social and Behavioral Sciences
Fear shapes how populations respond to earthquakes, yet it is almost always measured retrospectively, once it cannot be separated from the damage. On 23 April 2025 a MW 6.2 earthquake shook Istanbul – a megacity that has anticipated a major rupture for 25 years – at ground motions below design level, causing one death and light damage. Using a validated earthquake-fear instrument delivered in [...]
Escalating Heatwave Activity and Return Periods Across the Climatic Zones of Ghana
Published: 2026-09-24
Subjects: Oceanography and Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology
Heatwaves are an increasing public health concern in West Africa, yet their characteristics and recurrence across Ghana’s climatic zones remain poorly quantified. Previous assessments in Ghana have largely focused on individual cities and percentile-based thresholds, which characterize extremes relative to the local climatology but do not explicitly account for recently experienced thermal [...]
GROW-Qual: A global observational groundwater quality dataset linked to water table dynamics and Earth system variables
Published: 2026-10-21
Subjects: Environmental Monitoring, Hydrology, Water Resource Management
Groundwater underpins freshwater supply, food production and ecosystem health across the globe. Yet, groundwater levels and quality are increasingly threatened by overextraction, contamination, and climate change. Understanding how water table dynamics and quality are interlinked and affected by these pressures requires integrated observational groundwater datasets combined with Earth system [...]
Stock to crop? Quantifying agricultural expansion in northern Australia and examining its drivers
Published: 2026-10-29
Subjects: Physical Sciences and Mathematics
In recent decades, local, state, and federal governments have actively promoted irrigation and rainfed cropping expansion as a pathway to regional economic development for inland northern Australia (INA). This has created tension and competing narratives about development in the region. This study seeks to ground discussion in observed patterns of change by synthesising the cropping, horticulture [...]
Orientations to navigate the complexity of freshwater resilience in social-ecological systems
Published: 2026-10-02
Subjects: Hydrology, Nature and Society Relations, Physical and Environmental Geography, Sustainability, Water Resource Management
Resilience is a widely applied and diversely interpreted concept in freshwater science with applications that span disciplines, analytical frameworks, scales of analysis, and system delineations. This diversity leads to an equally rich variety of resilience insights which are difficult to compare, aggregate, synthesize, and apply in decision-relevant contexts. Here, we seek to support greater [...]
Interior-fold and endpoint transitions in finite-depth capillary-gravity ship wakes
Published: 2026-10-23
Subjects: Fluid Dynamics, Oceanography
We study how finite water depth changes the principal stern caustics and wave patterns of linear capillary-gravity waves generated by a steadily moving pressure source on an inviscid fluid of uniform depth. Using the dispersion relation and ray directions relative to the source, we determine the conditions for caustic formation. Let H denote the water depth divided by the capillary length. No [...]
A multi-scale framework for selecting CO2 storage sites in oil and gas reservoirs Multi-scale framework for CO2 storage site selection in oil and gas reservoirs
Published: 2026-10-07
Subjects: Other Engineering
Quantified screening of sites for CO2 geological storage is fundamental to ensuring both the economic viability and safety of CO2 sequestration. However, existing site selection methodologies—domestically and internationally—predominantly rely on qualitative approaches. The operational indicators for storage site selection remain incomplete and lack comprehensive quantitative characterizations. [...]