ALBERT

Description: True amplitude processing of the Urals Seismic Experiment and Integrated Studies (URSEIS) vibroseis deep reflection seismic data acquired by the URSEIS consortium shows the southern Uralide crust to be composed of four major blocks with distinctive reflection characteristics. These blocks are juxtaposed along crustal-scale boundaries. The foreland thrust and fold belt, developed from the East European craton crust, is imaged as subhorizontal to east dipping reflectivity that can be related to its Paleozoic and older tectonic history. The Moho beneath the foreland thrust and fold belt is not imaged in the vibroseis data set. The Main Uralian fault (the major arc-continent suture) is unreflective, but its subsurface location can be inferred by the truncation of the reflection pattern of the East European craton and its contrast with that of the Magnitogorsk arc. The Magnitogorsk arc reflectivity is characterized by patchy, noncoherent to coherent reflections in the upper ∼10 – 15 km that are interpreted to be related to the arc volcanic rocks. Below this, reflectivity is diffuse, or the arc crust is transparent, and the Moho is not imaged. The East Magnitogorsk fault zone, which juxtaposes the arc against the East Uralian zone, is not imaged by the data. The upper 5 to 6 km of the East Uralian zone, corresponding to the Dzhabyk granite, is transparent. Below the granite the crust is characterised by east dipping patches of moderately coherent, high-amplitude reflections that in the east become shallowly west-dipping. A ∼10 km thick, west dipping band of coherent, high amplitude reflections between 12 and 35 km depth, corresponding to the Kartaly Reflection Sequence, extends beneath almost the entire East Uralian zone. The crust beneath the easternmost East Uralian zone reaches 53 km in thickness. The upper and middle crust of the Trans-Uralian zone is characterized by a series of east and west dipping, concave upward, moderately coherent, high-amplitude reflections. The lowermost middle and lower crust displays thin bands of west dipping, coherent, low-amplitude reflectivity. The Moho is imaged as a sharp transition from reflective lower crust to transparent upper mantle at ∼49 km depth, and the lower crustal reflections appear to merge with it. The URSEIS vibroseis data are integrated with results from the explosion source reflection data, the wide-angle reflection data, and the surface geology to place constraints on the crustal architecture of the orogen and on the timing of its assemblage.

Description:  — Observations based on relatively limited data recorded by sparsely distributed stations have indicated that regional seismic phase propagation (Lg and Sn) is very complex in the Middle East. Accurate characterization of regional seismic wave propagation in this region necessitates the use of a large number of seismic stations. We have compiled a large data set of regional and local seismograms recorded in the Middle East. This data set comprises approximately four years of data from national short-period networks in Turkey and Syria, data from temporary broadband arrays in Saudi Arabia and the Caspian Sea region, and data from GSN, MEDNET, and GEOFON stations in the Middle East. We have used this data set to decipher the character and pattern of regional seismic wave propagation. We have mapped zones of blockage as well as inefficient and efficient propagation for Lg, Pg, and Sn throughout the Middle East. Two tomographic techniques have been developed in order to objectively determine regions of lithospheric attenuation in the Middle East.¶We observe evidence of major increase in Lg attenuation, relative to Pg, across the Bitlis suture and the Zagros fold and thrust belt, corresponding to the boundary between the Arabian and Eurasian plates. We also observe a zone of inefficient Sn propagation along the Dead Sea fault system which coincides with low Pn velocities along most of the Dead Sea fault system and with previous observations of poor Sn propagation in western Jordan. Our observations indicate that in the northern portion of the Arabian plate (south of the Bitlis suture) there is also a zone of inefficient Sn propagation that would not have been predicted from prior measurements of relatively low Pn velocities. Mapped high attenuation of Sn correlates well with regions of Cenozoic and Holocene basaltic volcanism. These regions of uppermost mantle shear-wave attenuation most probably have anomously hot and possibly thin lithosphere.

Description: An active-source seismic experiment at the KTB deep drill hole in southeast Germany reveals seismic P wave anisotropy to exist within a tectono-metamorphic sub-terrane of the crystalline Bohemian massif. The experiment used multi-azimuth vertical seismic profiling whereby downhole sensors recorded surface seismic Vibroseis sources located along six 7.5-km radial profiles emanating from the borehole location. Representative bulk anisotropic P wave velocities of the upper crust were derived from this seismic data and compared with predictions of velocity and anisotropy based on petrophysical laboratory measurements and geological information. We show that azimuth and inclination behavior of the observed anisotropy is consistent with characterization of the geology surrounding the borehole as a coherent regional block containing pervasive highly tilted foliation. This seismic anisotropy can be explained by “intrinsic” material properties associated with the well-developed foliation fabrics.

Description: We review the historical, geological, tide-gauge, GPS and gravimetric evidence advanced in favour of or against continuing land uplift around Hudson Bay, Canada. After this, we reanalyse the tide-gauge and GPS data for Churchill using longer time series than those available to previous investigators. The dependence of the mean rate of relative sea-level change obtained on the length and mid-epoch of the observation interval considered is investigated by means of the newly developed linear-trend analysis diagram. For studying the shorter-period variability of the tide-gauge record, the continuous-wavelet transform is used. The mean rate of land uplift obtained from GPS is based on a new analysis using IGS solutions of GFZ. Furthermore, sea-level indicators from the Churchill region representing the relative sea-level history during the past 8000 a are included. Finally, the four types of observable are jointly inverted in terms of mantle viscosity. The optimum values are 3×10^20 Pa s and 1.6 × 10^22 Pa s for the upper- and lower-mantle viscosities, respectively.

Description: Quantum mechanics in dissipative systems with a magnetic field is discussed. For strong magnetic fields the system exhibits an oscillatory behavior around the classical trajectory of the electron which should generate emissions in the millimeter range of the electromagnetic spectrum.

Description: The report describes the main results of investigations performed in 2001 year in framework of a research contract between GeoForschungsZentrum Potsdam (GFZ) and the Institute of Radio Engineering and Electronics of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow (IRE).

Description: SKS and SKKS shear waves recorded on the INDEPTH III seismic array deployed in central Tibet during 1998 - 1999 have been analysed for the direction and extent of seismic polarization anisotropy. The 400-km-long NNW trending array extended south to north, from the central Lhasa terrane, across the Karakoram-Jiali fault system and Banggong-Nujiang suture to the central Qiangtang terrane. Substantial splitting with delay times from 1 to 2 s, and fast directions varying from E-W to NE-SW, was observed for stations in the Qiangtang trerrane and northernmost Lhasa terrane. No detectable splitting was observed for stations located farther south in the central Lahsa terrane. The change in shear wave splitting characteristics occurs at 32°N, approximately coincident with the transcurrent Karakoram-Jiali fault system but ~40 km south of the surface trace of the Banggong-Nujiang suture. This location is also near the southernmost edge of a region of high Sn attenuation and low upper mantle velocities found in previous studies. The transition between no measured splitting and strong anisotropy (2.2 s delay time) is exceptionally sharp (=15 km), suggesting a large crustal contribution to the measured splitting. The E-W to NE-SW fast directions are broadly similar to the fast directions observed farther east along the Yadong-Golmud highway, suggesting that no large-scale change in anisotropic properties occurs in the east-west direction. However, in detail, fast directions and delay times vary over lateral distances of ~100 km in both the N-S and E-W direction by as much as 40° and 0.5-1 s, respectively. The onset of measurable splitting at 32° N most likely marks the northern limit of the underthrusting Indian lithosphere, which is characterized by negligible polarization anisotropy. Taken in conjunction with decades of geophysical and geological observations in Tibet, the new anisotropy measurements are consistent with a model where hot and weak upper mantle beneath northern Tibet is being squeezed and sheared between the advancing Indian lithosphere to the south and the Tsaidam and Tarim Lithospheres to the north and west, resulting in eastward flow and possibly thickening and subsequent detachment due to gravitational instability. In northern Tibet, crustal deformation clearly follows this large-scale deformation pattern.