ALBERT

Description / Table of Contents: The Earth's climate varies through geological time as a result of external, orbital processes, as well as the positions of continents, growth of mountains and the opening and closure of oceanic gateways. Climate modelling suggests that the intensity of the Asian monsoon should correlate, at least in part, with the uplift history of the Tibetan Plateau and the Himalaya, as well as the evolution of gateways and the retreat of shallow seas in Central Asia. Long-term reconstructions of both mountain building and monsoon activity are key to testing the proposed links. This collection of papers presents a series of new studies documenting the variations of the Asian monsoon on orbital and tectonic timescales, together with the impact this has had on environmental conditions. The issue of which proxies are best suited to measuring monsoons is addressed, as is the effect that the monsoon has had on erosion and the formation of the stratigraphic record both on and offshore.

Description / Table of Contents: This volume honours the career of Brian F. Windley, who has been hugely influential in helping to achieve our current understanding of the evolution of the continental crust, and who has inspired many students and scientists to pursue studies on the evolution of the continents. Brian has studied processes of continental formation and evolution on most continents and of all ages, and has educated and inspired two generations of geologists to undertake careers in studies of continental evolution. The volume is organized into six sections, including: oceanic and island arc systems and continental growth; tectonics of accretionary orogens and continental growth; growth and stabilization of continental crust; collisions and intraplate processes; Precambrian tectonics and the birth of continents; and active tectonics and geomorphology of continental collision and growth zones.

Description / Table of Contents: The invasion of the land by plants (‘terrestrialization’) was one of the most significant evolutionary events in the history of life on Earth, and correlates in time with periods of major palaeoenvironmental perturbations. The development of a vegetation cover on the previously barren land surfaces impacted on the global biogeochemical cycles and the geological processes of erosion and sediment transport. The terrestrialization of plants preceded the rise of major new groups of animals, such as insects and tetrapods, the latter numbering some 24 000 living species, including ourselves. Early land-plant evolution also correlates with the most spectacular decline of atmospheric CO2 concentration of Phanerozoic times and with the onset of a protracted period of glacial conditions on Earth. This book includes a selection of papers covering different aspects of the terrestrialization, from palaeobotany to vertebrate palaeontology and geochemistry, promoting a multidisciplinary approach to the understanding of the co-evolution of life and its environments during Early to Mid-Palaeozoic times.

Description / Table of Contents: Several different databases and models have been developed over many years of petrological study carried out by several European and non-European groups on mantle xenoliths, peridotite massifs, ophiolites and mafic magmas spanning in age from Archaean to Recent times. This volume aims to bring together these different approaches and to integrate the geochemical perceptions of the European upper mantle. The papers include regional petrological studies of the European lithospheric mantle, from Spain to the Pannonian Basin, from Corsica and Serbia as far north as Svalbard. Six contributions are based on studies of mantle xenoliths, while the remaining three deal with ophiolitic and peridotitic complexes. A further article provides an update on the textural classification of mantle rocks using a computer-aided approach and there is an introductory overview.

Description / Table of Contents: Our understanding of calcium carbonate precipitation within freshwater carbonate systems is being revolutionized by new quantitative approaches at both field and laboratory scale. These systems cover a diverse range of topical research areas including tufas, speleothems, stromatolites and microbial processes. Progress by various international research groups has been impressive, with major contributions to such areas as climate change, absolute dating, carbon sequestration, and biofilm construction and precipitation. A diverse sample of interrelated research is presented that provides a tantalizing glimpse of the interplay between microbial, geochemical and physical processes that control the development of tufas and speleothems. This volume will provide a cross-disciplinary platform that will stimulate further exchanges about new concepts, methodologies and interpretations associated with freshwater carbonates. In particular, it will help reinforce the importance of cross-discipline research: the driving force behind the new field of Geobiology.

Description / Table of Contents: The world's mountain ranges are the clearest manifestations of long-term deformation of the continental crust. As such they have attracted geological investigations for centuries. Throughout this long history of research a few keynote publications stand out. One of the most important is the Geological Survey's 1907 Memoir on The Geological Structure of the North-West Highlands of Scotland. The Memoir summarized some of the Geological Survey's finest work, and outlined many of the principles of field-based structural and tectonic analysis that have subsequently guided generations of geologists working in other mountain belts, both ancient and modern. The thematic set of 32 papers in this Special Publication celebrate the 100th anniversary of the 1907 Memoir by placing the original findings in both historical and modern contexts, and juxtaposing them against present-day studies of deformation processes operating not only in the NW Highlands, but also in other mountain belts.

Description / Table of Contents: Limestone is a highly successful and widely used building material, found in many important historic buildings and new monuments around the world. Whilst its success reflects its durability under a wide range of environmental conditions, there are still important questions surrounding the selection, use and conservation of building limestones. In order to make best use of new limestone today, and to conserve old limestone most effectively, we need to bring modern research methods to bear on understanding the characteristics of different limestones, what mortars to use, and how key limestones have responded to polluted atmospheres. This volume brings together recent inter-disciplinary research on these issues, illustrating the diversity of innovative techniques that are now being applied to furthering our understanding of building limestones.

Description / Table of Contents: The Zagros fold-thrust belt (ZFTB) extends from Turkey to the Hormuz Strait, resulting from the collision of the Arabian and Eurasian plates during Cenozoic times, and separates the Arabian platform from the large plateaux of central Iran. To the east a pronounced syntaxis marks the transition between the Zagros collision belt and the Makran accretionary wedge. In the ZFTB, the Proterozoic to Recent stratigraphic succession pile is involved in huge folds, and offers the opportunity to study the stratigraphic and tectonic evolution of the Palaeo-Tethyan margin. Few recent data were widely available on the southern Tethys margin preserved in the Zagros Mountains. The Middle East Basins Evolution (MEBE) program was an excellent opportunity to go back to the field and to collect new data to better constrain the evolution of this margin. In this volume the structure of the Zagros Mountains is explored through different scales and using different methodologies.

Description / Table of Contents: This volume contains a collection of stratigraphic and diagenetic case studies of Mesozoic and Cenozoic carbonate sequences from the Tethyan realm. High levels of industry and academic interest in the region have generated numerous multi-disciplinary studies of these sequences, a selection of which are presented in this volume. The studies presented are based on both comprehensive subsurface datasets from important hydrocarbon-bearing strata of the Middle East and the excellent surface exposures in the region of interest. The studies presented in this volume may serve as suitable starting points in the development of age and architecture specific carbonate reference models. Such models can form the basis of internally consistent models for carbonate deposition, sequence development and reservoir performance. Ideally such models, suitably scaled, will be equally applicable to academic studies, the exploration and development phases of the field life cycle and in the prediction of future reservoir performance.

Description / Table of Contents: Disequilibrium textures versus equilibrium modelling: geochronology at the crossroads / Igor M. Villa / Geological Society, London, Special Publications, 332, 1-15, 1 January 2010, https://doi.org/10.1144/SP332.1 --- Argon enters the retentive zone: reassessment of diffusion parameters for K-feldspar in the South Cyclades Shear Zone, Ios, Greece / M. A. Forster and G. S. Lister / Geological Society, London, Special Publications, 332, 17-34, 1 January 2010, https://doi.org/10.1144/SP332.2 --- Serrated quartz grain boundaries, temperature and strain rate: testing fractal techniques in a syntectonic granite / Manish A. Mamtani and R. O. Greiling / Geological Society, London, Special Publications, 332, 35-48, 1 January 2010, https://doi.org/10.1144/SP332.3 --- Microstructure and elastic anisotropy of naturally deformed leucogneiss from a shear zone in Montalto (southern Calabria, Italy) / Rosolino Cirrincione, Eugenio Fazio, Renée Heilbronner, Hartmut Kern, Kurt Mengel, Gaetano Ortolano, Antonino Pezzino and Rosalda Punturo / Geological Society, London, Special Publications, 332, 49-68, 1 January 2010, https://doi.org/10.1144/SP332.4 --- Geometry of intercrystalline brine in plastically deforming halite rocks: inference from electrical resistivity / Tohru Watanabe / Geological Society, London, Special Publications, 332, 69-78, 1 January 2010, https://doi.org/10.1144/SP332.5 --- Brittle plus plastic deformation of gypsum aggregates experimentally deformed in torsion to high strains: quantitative microstructural and texture analysis from optical and diffraction data / M. Zucali, V. Barberini, D. Chateigner, B. Ouladdiaf and L. Lutterotti / Geological Society, London, Special Publications, 332, 79-98, 1 January 2010, https://doi.org/10.1144/SP332.6 --- Numerical modelling of spontaneous slab breakoff dynamics during continental collision / Cyrill Baumann, Taras V. Gerya and James A. D. Connolly / Geological Society, London, Special Publications, 332, 99-114, 1 January 2010, https://doi.org/10.1144/SP332.7 --- Present-day vertical isostatic readjustment of the Western Alps revealed by numerical modelling and geodetic and seismotectonic data / Annalisa Gardi, Stéphane Baize and Oona Scotti / Geological Society, London, Special Publications, 332, 115-128, 1 January 2010, https://doi.org/10.1144/SP332.8 --- Block model versus thermomechanical model: new insights on the present-day regional deformation in the surroundings of the Calabrian Arc / Raffaele Splendore, Anna Maria Marotta, Riccardo Barzaghi, Alessandra Borghi and Letizia Cannizzaro / Geological Society, London, Special Publications, 332, 129-147, 1 January 2010, https://doi.org/10.1144/SP332.9 --- The role of mantle hydration in continental crust recycling in the wedge region / Marco Meda, Anna Maria Marotta and Maria Iole Spalla / Geological Society, London, Special Publications, 332, 149-172, 1 January 2010, https://doi.org/10.1144/SP332.10 --- Three-dimensional evaluation of fabric evolution and metamorphic reaction progress in polycyclic and polymetamorphic terrains: a case from the Central Italian Alps / Francesca Salvi, Maria Iole Spalla, Michele Zucali and Guido Gosso / Geological Society, London, Special Publications, 332, 173-187, 1 January 2010, https://doi.org/10.1144/SP332.11 --- The interaction of deformation and metamorphic reactions / Bruce E. Hobbs, Alison Ord, Maria Iole Spalla, Guido Gosso and Michele Zucali / Geological Society, London, Special Publications, 332, 189-223, 1 January 2010, https://doi.org/10.1144/SP332.12