The tsunami-early warning system for the indian ocean: Ten years after

Technical concept of GITEWS.

The day after Christmas this year will mark the 10 anniversary of the tsunami disaster in the Indian Ocean. On 26 December 2004, a quarter of a million people lost their lives, five million required immediate aid and 1.8 million citizens were rendered homeless. The natural disaster, which caused extreme devastation over huge areas and the accompanying grief and anxiety, especially in Indonesia, Thailand and Sri Lanka exceeded the imaginable and reached such drastic dimensions, mainly due to the lack of a warning facility and a disaster management plan for the entire Indian Ocean region at this time.

Germany and the international community of states reacted with immediate support. Within the framework of the German Flood Victim Aid the Federal Government commissioned the Helmholtz Association of German Research Centres under the direction of the GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences with the development of an Early Warning System for the Indian Ocean. From 2005 to 2011, with the large-scale project GITEWS (German-Indonesian Tsunami Early Warning System), the core of an integrated, modern, and effective Tsunami Early Warning System in Indonesia was established. With the follow-up project PROTECTS (Project for Training, Education and Consulting for Tsunami Early Warning Systems, 2011-2014) the personnel of the participating Indonesian institutions were trained to proceed independently and to take over responsibility for the operation of the Early Warning System as well as for the diverse technical and organizational components. In this ways PROTECTS which started in June 2011 and comprised a total of 192 training courses, internships, and hands-on-practice courses, covering all aspects of operation and maintenance of the Tsunami-Early Warning System contributed significantly to the sustainability of InaTEWS.

Under the auspices of the IntergovernmentalOceanographicCommission of UNESCO and with the collaboration of international partner institutes from Germany, the USA, China and Japan, GITEWS was integrated into a Tsunami Early Warning System for Indonesia. GITEWS was positively reviewed by a commission of international experts in 2010 and handed over to Indonesia in March 2011. Since then it has been providing its services under the name InaTEWS -- Indonesian Tsunami Early Warning System and is operated by the Indonesian Service for Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics BMKG.

On 12 October 2011 the exercise drill "IOWAVE11" was carried out in the Indian Ocean. With this drill, InaTEWS successfully demonstrated that it could, furthermore, take over the role of a Regional Tsunami Service Provider (RTSP). Since then Indonesia, in addition to Australia und India, performs the double function as a National Tsunami Warning Center (NTWC) and also as a RTSP and takes over the responsibility for the timely warning of 28 states around the Indian Ocean in the event of a threatening Tsunami. With the on-going step-by-step development, a comprehensive all-encompassing InaTEWS could be successfully realized.

Indonesia now avails of one of the most modern Tsunami Early Warning Systems. On the basis of data from approx. 300 measuring stations a warning can be issued at a maximum of five minutes after an earthquake. These measuring stations include e.g. seismometers, GPS stations und coastal tide gauges. With the data gained from the sensors and using the most modern evaluation systems such as SeisComP3 which was developed by GFZ scientists for the analyses of earthquake data and a Tsunami simulation system in the Warning Centre it is possible to compile a comprehensive picture of the situation. With the aid of a decision support system respectively classified warnings for the affected coastal areas can then be issued. A total of 70 people are involved the operation of the Warning Centre in Jakarta, with 30 employees working solely in a full shift system. According to information provided by the BMKG a total of 1700 earthquakes with a magnitude of more than M= 5 and 11 quakes with a magnitude of 7 and higher have been evaluated and six Tsunami Warnings have been issued to the public by the Earthquake Monitoring and Tsunami Early Warning Centre since the hand over in March 2011.

Schooling, training and disaster precautions (capacity development) for the local community and Town and District councils have received special emphasis. This Capacity Development has been carried out since 2006 in three "typical" regions: Padang (Sumatra), Chilacap (South-Java) and Denpassar (Bali, tourist stronghold). Here particular emphasis was placed on understanding both the warnings issued and the planned evacuation measures.

Local disaster management structures are established with local decision-makers and Disaster Risk Reduction Strategies are developed. Specifically, the education of trainers who are, in turn, responsible for the further spreading of the developed concepts plays a significant role.

Another key element is the determination of hazard and risk maps as a basis for the local evacuation planning as well as for future town and land-use planning. In Bali communication with the hotel industry was an additional factor.

No Early Warning System will ever be able to prevent a strong earthquake and a resulting tsunami and also, in the future, there will be loss of life and material damage. However, through the existence of an Early Warning System and the integration of organizational measures together with comprehensive capacity building the adverse effects of such a natural disaster can certainly be reduced.

Source: Helmholtz Centre Potsdam - GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences

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Atlantic warming turbocharges Pacific trade winds

Tropical beach (stock image). Rapid warming of the Atlantic Ocean, likely caused by global warming, has turbocharged Pacific Equatorial trade winds, according to new research. Credit: © michaelfitz / Fotolia

New research has found rapid warming of the Atlantic Ocean, likely caused by global warming, has turbocharged Pacific Equatorial trade winds. Currently the winds are at a level never before seen on observed records, which extend back to the 1860s.

The increase in these winds has caused eastern tropical Pacific cooling, amplified the Californian drought, accelerated sea level rise three times faster than the global average in the Western Pacific and has slowed the rise of global average surface temperatures since 2001.

It may even be responsible for making El Nino events less common over the past decade due to its cooling impact on ocean surface temperatures in the eastern Pacific.

"We were surprised to find the main cause of the Pacific climate trends of the past 20 years had its origin in the Atlantic Ocean," said co-lead author Dr Shayne McGregor from the ARC Centre of Excellence for Climate System Science (ARCCSS) at the University of New South Wales.

"It highlights how changes in the climate in one part of the world can have extensive impacts around the globe."

The record-breaking increase in Pacific Equatorial trade winds over the past 20 years had, until now, baffled researchers.

Originally, this trade wind intensification was considered to be a response to Pacific decadal variability. However, the strength of the winds was much more powerful than expected due to the changes in Pacific sea surface temperature.

Another riddle was that previous research indicated that under global warming scenarios Pacific Equatorial Trade winds would slow down over the coming century.

The solution was found in the rapid warming of the Atlantic Ocean basin, which has created unexpected pressure differences between the Atlantic and Pacific. This has produced wind anomalies that have given Pacific Equatorial trade winds an additional big push.

"The rapid warming of the Atlantic Ocean created high pressure zones in the upper atmosphere over that basin and low pressure zones close to the surface of the ocean," said Prof Axel Timmermann co-lead and corresponding author from the University of Hawaii.

"The rising air parcels, over the Atlantic eventually sink over the eastern tropical Pacific, thus creating higher surface pressure there. The enormous pressure see-saw with high pressure in the Pacific and low pressure in the Atlantic gave the Pacific trade winds an extra kick, amplifying their strength. It's like giving a playground roundabout an extra push as it spins past."

Many climate models appear to have underestimated the magnitude of the coupling between the two ocean basins, which may explain why they struggled to produce the recent increase in Pacific Equatorial trade wind trends.

While active, the stronger Equatorial trade winds have caused far greater overturning of ocean water in the West Pacific, pushing more atmospheric heat into the ocean, as shown by co-author and ARCCSS Chief Investigator Prof Matthew England earlier this year. This increased overturning appears to explain much of the recent slowdown in the rise of global average surface temperatures.

Importantly, the researchers don't expect the current pressure difference between the two ocean basins to last. When it does end, they expect to see some rapid changes, including a sudden acceleration of global average surface temperatures.

"It will be difficult to predict when the Pacific cooling trend and its contribution to the global hiatus in surface temperatures will come to an end," Prof England said.

"However, a large El Niño event is one candidate that has the potential to drive the system back to a more synchronized Atlantic/Pacific warming situation."

Source: University of New South Wales

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Protect the world's deltas, experts urge

A catastrophic landslide, one of the largest known on the surface of the Earth, took place within minutes in southwestern Utah more than 21 million years ago. Credit: Image courtesy of Kent State University

A catastrophic landslide, one of the largest known on the surface of the Earth, took place within minutes in southwestern Utah more than 21 million years ago, reports a Kent State University geologist in a paper published in the November issue of the journal Geology.

The Markagunt gravity slide, the size of three Ohio counties, is one of the two largest known continental landslides (larger slides exist on the ocean floors). David Hacker, Ph.D., associate professor of geology at Kent State University at Trumbull, and two colleagues discovered and mapped the scope of the Markagunt slide over the past two summers.

His colleagues and co-authors are Robert F. Biek of the Utah Geological Survey and Peter D. Rowley of Geologic Mapping Inc. of New Harmony, Utah.

Geologists had known about smaller portions of the Markagunt slide before the recent mapping showed its enormous extent. Hiking through the wilderness areas of the Dixie National Forest and Bureau of Land Management land, Hacker identified features showing that the Markagunt landslide was much bigger than previously known.

The landslide took place in an area between what is now Bryce Canyon National Park and the town of Beaver, Utah. It covered about 1,300 square miles, an area as big as Ohio's Cuyahoga, Portage and Summit counties combined.

Its rival in size, the "Heart Mountain slide," which took place around 50 million years ago in northwest Wyoming, was discovered in the 1940s and is a classic feature in geology textbooks.

The Markagunt could prove to be much larger than the Heart Mountain slide, once it is mapped in greater detail.

"Large-scale catastrophic collapses of volcanic fields such as these are rare but represent the largest known landslides on the surface of the Earth," the authors wrote. The length of the landslide -- over 55 miles -- also shows that it was as fast moving as it was massive, Hacker said.

Evidence showing that the slide was catastrophic -- occurring within minutes -- included the presence of pseudotachylytes, rocks that were melted into glass by the immense friction. Any animals living in its path would have been quickly overrun. Evidence of the slide is not readily apparent to visitors today. "Looking at it, you wouldn't even recognize it as a landslide," Hacker said.

But internal features of the slide, exposed in outcrops, yielded evidence such as jigsaw puzzle rock fractures and shear zones, along with the pseudotachylytes.

Hacker, who studies catastrophic geological events, said the slide originated when a volcanic field consisting of many strato-volcanoes, a type similar to Mount St. Helens in the Cascade Mountains, which erupted in 1980, collapsed and produced the massive landslide.

The collapse may have been caused by the vertical inflation of deeper magma chambers that fed the volcanoes. Hacker has spent many summers in Utah mapping geologic features of the Pine Valley Mountains south of the Markagunt where he has found evidence of similar, but smaller slides from magma intrusions called laccoliths.

What is learned about the mega-landslide could help geologists better understand these extreme types of events. The Markagunt and the Heart Mountain slides document for the first time how large portions of ancient volcanic fields have collapsed, Hacker said, representing "a new class of hazards in volcanic fields."

While the Markagunt landslide was a rare event, it shows the magnitude of what could happen in modern volcanic fields like the Cascades.

"We study events from the geologic past to better understand what could happen in the future," he said. The next steps in the research, conducted with his co-authors on the Geology paper, will be to continue mapping the slide, collect samples from the base for structural analysis and date the pseudotachylytes.

Hacker, who earned his Ph.D. in geology at Kent State, joined the faculty in 2000 after working for an environmental consulting company. He is co-author of the book Earth's Natural Hazards: Understanding Natural Disasters and Catastrophes, published in 2010.

Source:  Kent State University

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Exploring a large, restless volcanic field in Chile

Laguna del Maule, Chile, is at the center of a volcanic field that has erupted 36 times during the last 25,000 years, and is now experiencing significant uplift due to magma intrusion.
Credit: David Tenenbaum

If Brad Singer knew for sure what was happening three miles under an odd-shaped lake in the Andes, he might be less eager to spend a good part of his career investigating a volcanic field that has erupted 36 times during the last 25,000 years. As he leads a large scientific team exploring a region in the Andes called Laguna del Maule, Singer hopes the area remains quiet.

But the primary reason to expend so much effort on this area boils down to one fact: The rate of uplift is among the highest ever observed by satellite measurement for a volcano that is not actively erupting.

That uplift is almost definitely due to a large intrusion of magma -- molten rock -- beneath the volcanic complex. For seven years, an area larger than the city of Madison has been rising by 10 inches per year.

That rapid rise provides a major scientific opportunity: to explore a mega-volcano before it erupts. That effort, and the hazard posed by the restless magma reservoir beneath Laguna del Maule, are described in a major research article in the December issue of the Geological Society of America's GSA Today.

"We've always been looking at these mega-eruptions in the rear-view mirror," says Singer. 

"We look at the lava, dust and ash, and try to understand what happened before the eruption. Since these huge eruptions are rare, that's usually our only option. But we look at the steady uplift at Laguna del Maule, which has a history of regular eruptions, combined with changes in gravity, electrical conductivity and swarms of earthquakes, and we suspect that conditions necessary to trigger another eruption are gathering force."

Laguna del Maule looks nothing like a classic, cone-shaped volcano, since the high-intensity erosion caused by heavy rain and snow has carried most of the evidence to the nearby Pacific Ocean. But the overpowering reason for the absence of "typical volcano cones" is the nature of the molten rock underground. It's called rhyolite, and it's the most explosive type of magma on the planet.

The eruption of a rhyolite volcano is too quick and violent to build up a cone. Instead, this viscous, water-rich magma often explodes into vast quantities of ash that can form deposits hundreds of yards deep, followed by a slower flow of glassy magma that can be tens of yards tall and measure more than a mile in length.

The next eruption could be in the size range of Mount St. Helens -- or it could be vastly bigger, Singer says. "We know that over the past million years or so, several eruptions at Laguna del Maule or nearby volcanoes have been more than 100 times larger than Mount St. Helens," he says. "Those are rare, but they are possible." Such a mega-eruption could change the weather, disrupt the ecosystem and damage the economy.

Trying to anticipate what Laguna del Maule holds in store, Singer is heading a new $3 million, five-year effort sponsored by the National Science Foundation to document its behavior before an eruption. With colleagues from Chile, Argentina, Canada, Singapore, and Cornell and Georgia Tech universities, he is masterminding an effort to build a scientific model of the underground forces that could lead to eruption. "This model should capture how this system has evolved in the crust at all scales, from the microscopic to basinwide, over the last 100,000 years," Singer says. "It's like a movie from the past to the present and into the future."

Over the next five years, Singer says he and 30 colleagues will "throw everything, including the kitchen sink, at the problem -- geology, geochemistry, geochronology and geophysics -- to help measure, and then model, what's going on."

One key source of information on volcanoes is seismic waves. Ground shaking triggered by the movement of magma can signal an impending eruption. Team member Clifford Thurber, a seismologist and professor of geoscience at UW-Madison, wants to use distant earthquakes to locate the underground magma body.

As many as 50 seismometers will eventually be emplaced above and around the magma at Laguna del Maule, in the effort to create a 3-D image of Earth's crust in the area.

By tracking multiple earthquakes over several years, Thurber and his colleagues want to pinpoint the size and location of the magma body -- roughly estimated as an oval measuring five kilometers (3.1 miles) by 10 kilometers (6.2 miles).

Each seismometer will record the travel time of earthquake waves originating within a few thousand kilometers, Thurber explains. Since soft rock transmits sound less efficiently than hard rock, "we expect that waves that pass through the presumed magma body will be delayed," Thurber says. "It's very simple. It's like a CT scan, except instead of density we are looking at seismic wave velocity."

As Singer, who has been visiting Laguna del Maule since 1998, notes, "The rate of uplift -- among the highest ever observed -- has been sustained for seven years, and we have discovered a large, fluid-rich zone in the crust under the lake using electrical resistivity methods. Thus, there are not many possible explanations other than a big, active body of magma at a shallow depth."

The expanding body of magma could freeze in place -- or blow its top, he says. "One thing we know for sure is that the surface cannot continue rising indefinitely."

Source:  University of Wisconsin-Madison

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Re-thinking Southern California earthquake scenarios in Coachella Valley, San Andreas Fault

New 3D numerical modeling that captures more geometric complexity of an active fault segment in southern California than any other suggests that the overall earthquake hazard for towns on the west side of the Coachella Valley such as Palm Springs may be slightly lower than previously believed. Credit: Courtesy Google Earth and UMass Amherst

New three-dimensional (3D) numerical modeling that captures far more geometric complexity of an active fault segment in southern California than any other, suggests that the overall earthquake hazard for towns on the west side of the Coachella Valley such as Palm Springs and Palm Desert may be slightly lower than previously believed.

New simulations of deformation on three alternative fault configurations for the Coachella Valley segment of the San Andreas Fault conducted by geoscientists Michele Cooke and Laura Fattaruso of the University of Massachusetts Amherst, with Rebecca Dorsey of the University of Oregon, appear in the December issue of Geosphere.

The Coachella Valley segment is the southernmost section of the San Andreas Fault in California. It has a high likelihood for a large rupture in the near future, since it has a recurrence interval of about 180 years but has not ruptured in over 300 years, the authors point out.

The researchers acknowledge that their new modeling offers "a pretty controversial interpretation" of the data. Many geoscientists do not accept a dipping active fault geometry to the San Andreas Fault in the Coachella Valley, they say. Some argue that the data do not confirm the dipping structure. "Our contribution to this debate is that we add an uplift pattern to the data that support a dipping active fault and it rejects the other models," say Cooke and colleagues.

Their new model yields an estimated 10 percent increase in shaking overall for the Coachella segment. But for the towns to the west of the fault where most people live, it yields decreased shaking due to the dipping geometry. It yields a doubling of shaking in mostly unpopulated areas east of the fault. "This isn't a direct outcome of our work but an implication," they add.

Cooke says, "Others have used a dipping San Andreas in their models but they didn't include the degree of complexity that we did. By including the secondary faults within the Mecca Hills we more accurately capture the uplift pattern of the region."

Fattaruso adds, "Others were comparing to different data sets, such as geodesy, and since we were comparing to uplift it is important that we have this complexity." In this case, geodesy is the science of measuring and representing the Earth and its crustal motion, taking into account the competition of geological processes in 3D over time.

Most other models of deformation, stress, rupture and ground shaking have assumed that the southern San Andreas Fault is vertical, say Cooke and colleagues. However, seismic, imaging, aerial magnetometric surveys and GPS-based strain observations suggest that the fault dips 60 to 70 degrees toward the northeast, a hypothesis they set out to investigate.

Specifically, they explored three alternative geometric models of the fault's Coachella Valley segment with added complexity such as including smaller faults in the nearby Indio and Mecca Hills. "We use localized uplift patterns in the Mecca Hills to assess the most plausible geometry for the San Andreas Fault in the Coachella Valley and better understand the interplay of fault geometry and deformation," they write.

Cooke and colleagues say the fault structures in their favored model agree with distributions of local seismicity, and are consistent with geodetic observations of recent strain. "Crustal deformation models that neglect the northeast dip of the San Andreas Fault in the Coachella Valley will not replicate the ground shaking in the region and therefore inaccurately estimate seismic hazard," they note.

This work was supported by the National Science Foundation.

Source:  University of Massachusetts at Amherst

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The Science behind Hindu’s Four Ages (Chatur Yugas): Magnetogeddon may destroy the World!

Science behind Hindu’s Four Ages (Chatur Yugas): Magnetogeddon may destroy the world!

Research paper written by London Swaminathan

Research article No.1458; Dated  4th   December 2014.

The study of the earth’s magnetic field and the prediction about Magnetogeddon by the scientists justify the Hindus’ classification of Chatur Yugas. An interesting article reveals the science behind the Chatur Yugas

YugasWhat is Chatur Yuga/Four Ages?
Hindus have divided the ages of the world into four: Krita (4), Treta (3), Dwapara(2) and Kali (1).

Krita lasts for 1 ,728,000 years, Treta for 1296 000 years, Dwapara for 864,000 years and the last kali for 4,32,000 years. Four Yugas is Chatur Yuga in Sanskrit.8640,000,000 years make one Kalpa which is one day for Brahma, the Creator God, in Hinduism. He will live for 100 years like this. This cycle is never ending and the next Brhama takes over. 200 years ago it would not have made much sense. Now after the study of cosmology and the latest news about the Black Holes and other things show that the Hindus are the only one ancient race that understood the functioning of the Universe.

Hindus wrote in their scriptures that in between the Yugas there is an interval called Sandhya period and another as Sandhyansa period. Hindus also told that the time period for Devas, Gods and Humans are different.



What is Magnetogeddon?

Like Devas and Asuras churned the Milky Ocean, the earth’s stomach is also churned. When the molten iron bowel of the earth is churned, it inflates a magnetic bubble around our world. That protects us from the full radiation coming out of the sun.

 Now scientists are worried that this magnetic field is weakening and could soon flip out entirely. That means the magnetic North and South poles may trade places. European Space Agency’s Swarm satellites have been mapping the magnetic fields for the past several months. In the past 150 years the magnetic field has weakened 10 percent. This is an indication that the flip over is going to happen. That means North Pole will become South Pole and vice verse.

solar wind

Yuga= Change of Polarity

Geological evidence of preserved magnetic fields shows this happens every 400,000 years or so closer to the figure of Hindu’s 4,32,000 years of Kali Yuga. Hindus believe that the world will be destroyed at the end of Kali Yuga and then a new era will begin.

In the past, life has NOT been eradicated at the end of 400,000 years or so. But theoretically speaking extinction (MAGNETOGEDDON) is possible according to the scientists. Probably this is what Hindus meant the “destruction” at the end of each Chatur Yuga. When Krishna and Vyasa lived it was Dwapara Yuga. A great Mahabharata war occurred and Dharma and other rules changed, but the human beings survived.

Magnetic reversals don’t happen overnight. The process takes 1000 years to complete. Probably this is what Hindus called Yuga Sandhya (interval). The weakened field would expose us to higher levels of radiation, leaving power grids and satellites vulnerable

geomagnetic-field-orig

Earth is a Dynamo

Inside the earth there is molten iron. The churning of the core creates a magnetic field around the earth. (The churning is created by the rotation of the earth). This is what protects us from the Solar wind. If there is no magnetic field to protect us earth would have become desert like Mars. No life can exist.

Earth’s inner core is a 2400 km wide ball of solid iron with some nickel and sulphur and radioactive elements. Outer core is 6800 kms wide ball of liquid iron nickel and sulphur. The mantle is 2900 km deep mixture of semi molten rock. The crust is only 8 to 40 kms thick and we live on this crust. The earth is a magnetic dynamo. It is magnetic field generator.

After reading this bit of science we can sense some scientific truth in the Yuga classification and the interval periods between the Yugas. Scientists could study the weakening of magnetic fields or the flipping over (Change of polarity) by studying fossilised rocks.

Source for Science news: London metro with my interpretation of Chatur Yugas.

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The Studying magma formation beneath Mount St. Helens

Mount St. Helens as it appeared two years after its catastrophic eruption on May 18, 1980. Credit: U.S. Geological Survey

University and government scientists are embarking on a collaborative research expedition to improve volcanic eruption forecasting by learning more about how a deep-underground feeder system creates and supplies magma to Mount St. Helens.

They hope the research will produce science that will lead to better understanding of eruptions, which in turn could lead to greater public safety.

The Imaging Magma Under St. Helens project involves three distinct components: active-source seismic monitoring, passive-source seismic monitoring and magnetotelluric monitoring, using fluctuations in Earth's electromagnetic field to produce images of structures beneath the surface.
Researchers are beginning passive-source and magnetotelluric monitoring, while active-source monitoring -- measuring seismic waves generated by underground detonations -- will be conducted later.

Passive-source monitoring involves burying seismometers at 70 different sites throughout a 60-by-60-mile area centered on Mount St. Helens in southwestern Washington. The seismometers will record data from a variety of seismic events.

"We will record local earthquakes, as well as distant earthquakes. Patterns in the earthquake signatures will reveal in greater detail the geological structures beneath St. Helens," said John Vidale, director of the University of Washington-based Pacific Northwest Seismic Network.

Magnetotelluric monitoring will be done at 150 sites spread over an area running 125 miles north to south and 110 miles east to west, which includes both Mount Rainier and Mount Adams. Most of the sites will only be used for a day, with instruments recording electric and magnetic field signals that will produce images of subsurface structures.

Besides the UW, collaborating institutions are Oregon State University, Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory at Columbia University, Rice University, Columbia University, the U.S. Geological Survey and ETH-Zurich in Switzerland. The work is being funded by the National Science Foundation.
Mount St. Helens has been the most active volcano in the Cascade Range during the last 2,000 years and has erupted twice in the last 35 years. It also is more accessible than most volcanoes for people and equipment, making it a prime target for scientists trying to better understand how volcanoes get their supply of magma.

The magma that eventually comes to the surface probably originates 60 to 70 miles deep beneath St. Helens, at the interface between the Juan de Fuca and North American tectonic plates. The plates first come into contact off the Pacific Northwest coast, where the Juan de Fuca plate subducts beneath the North American plate and reaches great depth under the Cascades. As the magma works its way upward, it likely accumulates as a mass several miles beneath the surface.

As the molten rock works its way toward the surface, it is possible that it gathers in a large chamber a few miles beneath the surface. The path from great depth to this chamber is almost completely unknown and is a main subject of the study. The project is expected to conclude in the summer of 2016.

Source: University of Washington

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The New evidence for 'oceans' of water deep in Earth: Water bound in mantle rock alters view of Earth's composition

Schematic cross section of the Earth’s interior. The study by Steve Jacobsen and Brandon Schmandt used seismic waves to find magma generated at the base of the transition zone, around 410 miles deep. Dehydration melting at those conditions, also observed in the study’s high-pressure experiments, suggests the transition zone may contain oceans worth of H2O dissolved in high-pressure rock. The findings alter previous assumptions about the Earth’s composition.

Researchers from Northwestern University and the University of New Mexico report evidence for potentially oceans worth of water deep beneath the United States. Though not in the familiar liquid form -- the ingredients for water are bound up in rock deep in the Earth's mantle -- the discovery may represent the planet's largest water reservoir.

The presence of liquid water on the surface is what makes our "blue planet" habitable, and scientists have long been trying to figure out just how much water may be cycling between Earth's surface and interior reservoirs through plate tectonics.

Northwestern geophysicist Steve Jacobsen and University of New Mexico seismologist Brandon Schmandt have found deep pockets of magma located about 400 miles beneath North America, a likely signature of the presence of water at these depths. The discovery suggests water from the Earth's surface can be driven to such great depths by plate tectonics, eventually causing partial melting of the rocks found deep in the mantle.

The findings, to be published June 13 in the journal Science, will aid scientists in understanding how the Earth formed, what its current composition and inner workings are and how much water is trapped in mantle rock.

"Geological processes on the Earth's surface, such as earthquakes or erupting volcanoes, are an expression of what is going on inside the Earth, out of our sight," said Jacobsen, a co-author of the paper. "I think we are finally seeing evidence for a whole-Earth water cycle, which may help explain the vast amount of liquid water on the surface of our habitable planet. Scientists have been looking for this missing deep water for decades."

Scientists have long speculated that water is trapped in a rocky layer of the Earth's mantle located between the lower mantle and upper mantle, at depths between 250 miles and 410 miles. Jacobsen and Schmandt are the first to provide direct evidence that there may be water in this area of the mantle, known as the "transition zone," on a regional scale. The region extends across most of the interior of the United States.

Schmandt, an assistant professor of geophysics at the University of New Mexico, uses seismic waves from earthquakes to investigate the structure of the deep crust and mantle. Jacobsen, an associate professor of Earth and planetary sciences at Northwestern's Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences, uses observations in the laboratory to make predictions about geophysical processes occurring far beyond our direct observation.

The study combined Jacobsen's lab experiments in which he studies mantle rock under the simulated high pressures of 400 miles below the Earth's surface with Schmandt's observations using vast amounts of seismic data from the USArray, a dense network of more than 2,000 seismometers across the United States.

Jacobsen's and Schmandt's findings converged to produce evidence that melting may occur about 400 miles deep in the Earth. H2O stored in mantle rocks, such as those containing the mineral ringwoodite, likely is the key to the process, the researchers said.

"Melting of rock at this depth is remarkable because most melting in the mantle occurs much shallower, in the upper 50 miles," said Schmandt, a co-author of the paper. "If there is a substantial amount of H2O in the transition zone, then some melting should take place in areas where there is flow into the lower mantle, and that is consistent with what we found."

If just one percent of the weight of mantle rock located in the transition zone is H2O, that would be equivalent to nearly three times the amount of water in our oceans, the researchers said.

This water is not in a form familiar to us -- it is not liquid, ice or vapor. This fourth form is water trapped inside the molecular structure of the minerals in the mantle rock. The weight of 250 miles of solid rock creates such high pressure, along with temperatures above 2,000 degrees Fahrenheit, that a water molecule splits to form a hydroxyl radical (OH), which can be bound into a mineral's crystal structure.

Schmandt and Jacobsen's findings build on a discovery reported in March in the journal Nature in which scientists discovered a piece of the mineral ringwoodite inside a diamond brought up from a depth of 400 miles by a volcano in Brazil. That tiny piece of ringwoodite -- the only sample in existence from within the Earth -- contained a surprising amount of water bound in solid form in the mineral.
"Whether or not this unique sample is representative of the Earth's interior composition is not known, however," Jacobsen said. "Now we have found evidence for extensive melting beneath North America at the same depths corresponding to the dehydration of ringwoodite, which is exactly what has been happening in my experiments."

For years, Jacobsen has been synthesizing ringwoodite, colored sapphire-like blue, in his Northwestern lab by reacting the green mineral olivine with water at high-pressure conditions. (The Earth's upper mantle is rich in olivine.) He found that more than one percent of the weight of the ringwoodite's crystal structure can consist of water -- roughly the same amount of water as was found in the sample reported in the Nature paper.

"The ringwoodite is like a sponge, soaking up water," Jacobsen said. "There is something very special about the crystal structure of ringwoodite that allows it to attract hydrogen and trap water. This mineral can contain a lot of water under conditions of the deep mantle."

For the study reported in Science, Jacobsen subjected his synthesized ringwoodite to conditions around 400 miles below the Earth's surface and found it forms small amounts of partial melt when pushed to these conditions. He detected the melt in experiments conducted at the Advanced Photon Source of Argonne National Laboratory and at the National Synchrotron Light Source of Brookhaven National Laboratory.

Jacobsen uses small gem diamonds as hard anvils to compress minerals to deep-Earth conditions. "Because the diamond windows are transparent, we can look into the high-pressure device and watch reactions occurring at conditions of the deep mantle," he said. "We used intense beams of X-rays, electrons and infrared light to study the chemical reactions taking place in the diamond cell."

Jacobsen's findings produced the same evidence of partial melt, or magma, that Schmandt detected beneath North America using seismic waves. Because the deep mantle is beyond the direct observation of scientists, they use seismic waves -- sound waves at different speeds -- to image the interior of the Earth.

"Seismic data from the USArray are giving us a clearer picture than ever before of the Earth's internal structure beneath North America," Schmandt said. "The melting we see appears to be driven by subduction -- the downwelling of mantle material from the surface."

The melting the researchers have detected is called dehydration melting. Rocks in the transition zone can hold a lot of H2O, but rocks in the top of the lower mantle can hold almost none. The water contained within ringwoodite in the transition zone is forced out when it goes deeper (into the lower mantle) and forms a higher-pressure mineral called silicate perovskite, which cannot absorb the water. This causes the rock at the boundary between the transition zone and lower mantle to partially melt.

"When a rock with a lot of H2O moves from the transition zone to the lower mantle it needs to get rid of the H2O somehow, so it melts a little bit," Schmandt said. "This is called dehydration melting."

"Once the water is released, much of it may become trapped there in the transition zone," Jacobsen added.

Just a little bit of melt, about one percent, is detectible with the new array of seismometers aimed at this region of the mantle because the melt slows the speed of seismic waves, Schmandt said.

The USArray is part of EarthScope, a program of the National Science Foundation that deploys thousands of seismic, GPS and other geophysical instruments to study the structure and evolution of the North American continent and the processes the cause earthquakes and volcanic eruptions.
The National Science Foundation (grants EAR-0748797 and EAR-1215720) and the David and Lucile Packard Foundation supported the research

Source: Northwestern University

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The Personal resiliency paramount for future disasters

A mayo Clinic researcher says individuals need to build disaster readiness and resiliency in order to better recover from the effects of earthquakes, tsunamis, hurricanes, tornadoes, wildfires and other natural disasters. Those who prepare well for disasters are more likely to have a sense of spiritual and emotional well-being and be satisfied with their life. Those findings appear in the journal Health and Quality of Life Outcomes.

Health scientist and geologist Monica Gowan, Ph.D., says how well people are prepared for adversity through the presence of meaning and purpose in their lives can play a positive role in how well they manage the uncertainties of disaster risk and recover from devastating experiences to regain health and quality of life.

"Even prior to the 2010-2014 New Zealand earthquakes and 2011 Japan tsunami, we recognized a need to explore how well-being was related to evacuation preparedness for future earthquake and tsunami disasters, Our findings are now relevant to any disaster experience, whether it's an earthquake or tsunami in the Pacific or a tornado in the American Midwest," says Dr. Gowan. She says if someone consciously cares about his or her well-being and that of others, and is aware and engaged enough to act on that basis, they have a stronger chance of being better off. She and her colleagues say this is the first scientific study of personal resilience and evacuation readiness prior to large disasters.

How to be resilient
* Decide you care enough to act. Your sense of personal agency, your desire to make choices and act, will be one of your greatest health assets.

* Know your resources. What are your greatest strengths? Physically? Mentally? Emotionally? Socially? Spiritually? Identify what you can do well and what helps you be well, and tuck this information in your mental "resilience toolkit."

* Optimize what you have. Creatively think about how, by combining two or more of your top resources or strengths, you can uncover new solutions to challenges.

* Imagine yourself acting. How might you respond when you're in crisis? Make a plan for how you can keep growing your resources and how you can deploy them in emergencies.

* Know your evacuation needs. If you had to flee or be displaced from home, what would be most essential for you? All disasters are local -- find out what your community recommends for an evacuation plan and go-kit. Then check your checklist and kit too.

*Just Do It. Act on your plans and communicate them to others. Let nature be natural. If the cause is natural, then nature is doing what nature does. Protect yourself and remember that everything is temporary.

"Along with the robust survey findings we obtained from our random sample of 695 adults, many people in the study shared anecdotes about why they were preparing for disaster," says Dr. Gowan. "Profoundly personal reasons were a common theme, whether due to their own vulnerabilities and desire to survive, to concern for a loved one, being part of a community, or wanting to serve some other greater good or higher purpose. A number had survived a prior disaster, with experiences ranging from the Holocaust to 9/11, and nearly every type of natural disaster. They all seemed to have found meaningful ways to transcend their unthinkable experiences."

The researchers say the study has far-reaching implications. Growing populations and global travel make everyone vulnerable to disaster, and so the need for resilience is universal.

Source: Mayo Clinic

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