Geology In

Scientists Identified Three Reasons Responsible for Earth’s Spin Axis Drift

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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The observed direction of polar motion, shown as a light blue line, compared with the sum (pink line) of the influence of Greenland ice loss (blue), postglacial rebound (yellow) and deep mantle convection (red). The contribution of mantle convection is highly uncertain. Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">A typical desk globe is designed to be a geometric sphere and to rotate smoothly when you spin it. Our actual planet is far less perfect—in both shape and in rotation.</span><br />
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Earth is not a perfect sphere. When it rotates on its spin axis—an imaginary line that passes through the North and South Poles—it drifts and wobbles. These spin-axis movements are scientifically referred to as "polar motion." Measurements for the 20th century show that the spin axis drifted about 4 inches (10 centimeters) per year. Over the course of a century, that becomes more than 11 yards (10 meters).<br />
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Using observational and model-based data spanning the entire 20th century, NASA scientists have for the first time identified three broadly-categorized processes responsible for this drift—contemporary mass loss primarily in Greenland, glacial rebound, and mantle convection.<br />
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"The traditional explanation is that one process, glacial rebound, is responsible for this motion of Earth's spin axis. But recently, many researchers have speculated that other processes could have potentially large effects on it as well," said first author Surendra Adhikari of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.<br />
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"We assembled models for a suite of processes that are thought to be important for driving the motion of the spin axis. We identified not one but three sets of processes that are crucial—and melting of the global cryosphere (especially Greenland) over the course of the 20th century is one of them."<br />
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In general, the redistribution of mass on and within Earth—like changes to land, ice sheets, oceans and mantle flow—affects the planet's rotation. As temperatures increased throughout the 20th century, Greenland's ice mass decreased. In fact, a total of about 7,500 gigatons—the weight of more than 20 million Empire State Buildings—of Greenland's ice melted into the ocean during this time period. This makes Greenland one of the top contributors of mass being transferred to the oceans, causing sea level to rise and, consequently, a drift in Earth's spin axis.<br />
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While ice melt is occurring in other places (like Antarctica), Greenland's location makes it a more significant contributor to polar motion.<br />
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"There is a geometrical effect that if you have a mass that is 45 degrees from the North Pole—which Greenland is—or from the South Pole (like Patagonian glaciers), it will have a bigger impact on shifting Earth's spin axis than a mass that is right near the Pole," said coauthor Eric Ivins, also of JPL.<br />
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Previous studies identified glacial rebound as the key contributor to long-term polar motion. And what is glacial rebound? During the last ice age, heavy glaciers depressed Earth's surface much like a mattress depresses when you sit on it. As that ice melts, or is removed, the land slowly rises back to its original position. In the new study, which relied heavily on a statistical analysis of such rebound, scientists figured out that glacial rebound is likely to be responsible for only about a third of the polar drift in the 20th century.<br />
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The authors argue that mantle convection makes up the final third. Mantle convection is responsible for the movement of tectonic plates on Earth's surface. It is basically the circulation of material in the mantle caused by heat from Earth's core. Ivins describes it as similar to a pot of soup placed on the stove. As the pot, or mantle, heats, the pieces of the soup begin to rise and fall, essentially forming a vertical circulation pattern—just like the rocks moving through Earth's mantle.<br />
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With these three broad contributors identified, scientists can distinguish mass changes and polar motion caused by long-term Earth processes over which we have little control from those caused by climate change. They now know that if Greenland's ice loss accelerates, polar motion likely will, too.<br />
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<u><i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The paper is published in the <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0012821X18305314" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Earth and Planetary Science Letters</a>.</span></i></u></div>

Scientists Identified Three Reasons Responsible for Earth’s Spin Axis Drift

The observed direction of polar motion, shown as a light blue line, compared with the sum (pink line) of the influence of Greenland ice l...

Thawing Permafrost May Release More CO2 Than Previously Thought

climate, Environment 5:51 PM

Thawing Permafrost May Release More CO2 Than Previously Thought

Pictured here is a permafrost thaw slump that is exposing sediment- and ice-rich permafrost on the Peel Plateau in Canada's Northwest...

Geoscientists Find Unexpected 'Deep Creep' Near San Andreas, San Jacinto Faults

Earthquakes, San Andreas, Tectonic 5:55 PM

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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A cartoon showing how anomalous earthquakes near the San Andreas and San Jacinto faults in southern California work in regions deep below the Earth's surface. A UMass Amherst analysis shows this enigmatic pattern in the San Bernardino basin is not typical, and the authors encourage geoscientists to account for them in assessing future fault loading. Credit: UMass Amherst/Michele Cooke</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">Thousands of tiny earthquakes have helped expose unusual rumblings taking place beneath the surface of southern California.</span><br />
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A new analysis of thousands of very small earthquakes that have occurred in the San Bernardino basin near the San Andreas and San Jacinto faults suggests that the unusual deformation of some—they move in a different way than expected—may be due to "deep creep" 10 km below the Earth's surface, say geoscientists at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.<br />
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The new understanding should support more refined assessments of fault loading and earthquake rupture risk in the region, they add. Writing in the current online Geophysical Research Letters, doctoral student Jennifer Beyer and her advisor, geosciences professor Michele Cooke say the enigmatic behavior is seen in about one third of the hundreds of tiny quakes recorded during the lull between big damaging quakes, and their possible significance had not been appreciated until now.<br />
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Cooke says, "These little earthquakes are a really rich data set to work with, and going forward if we pay more attention than we have in the past to the details they are telling us, we can learn more about active fault behavior that will help us better understand the loading that leads up to large damaging earthquakes."<br />
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Over the past 36 years, the authors point out, seismic stations have recorded the style of deformation for thousands of small earthquakes in California's San Bernardino basin. They state, "Findings of this study demonstrate that small earthquakes that occur adjacent to and between faults can have very different style of deformation than the large ground rupturing earthquakes produced along active faults. This means that scientists should not use the information recorded by these small earthquakes in the San Bernardino basin to predict loading of the nearby San Andreas and San Jacinto faults."<br />
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Cooke explains that the usual type of fault in the region is called a strike-slip fault, where the motion is one of blocks sliding past each other. The less common kind, with "anomalous slip-sense," is an extending fault, where the motion between blocks is like a wave pulling away from the beach, one block dropping at an angle away from the other, "extending" the fault. "These only occur in this one small area, and nobody knew why," she points out. "We did the modeling that helps to explain the enigmatic data."<br />
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This is an area where Cooke, an expert in 3-D fault modeling, has done research of her own and where she is familiar with the broader research field, so she decided to try to model what is happening. She began with a hypothesis based on her earlier 3-D modeling in the area that had replicated long-term deformation over thousands of years.<br />
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"I noticed that this basin was in extension in those models unlike the surrounding regions of strike-slip," she says. "The extension was limited to within the basin just like the pattern of the anomalous extensional earthquakes. That gave me a clue that maybe those faults weren't locked as they should be between big earthquakes, but that at depths below 10 km, they were creeping."<br />
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"The typical way we look for creep is to use GPS stations set up on each side of the fault. Over time, you can note that there is movement; the faults are creeping slowly apart. The problem here is that the San Andreas and the San Jacinto faults are so close together that the GPS is unable to resolve if there is creep or not. That's why no one had seen this before. The traditional way to detect it was not able to do so."<br />
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Cooke adds, "In this paper we've shown that there is a way to have these weird tiny earthquakes all the time next to the San Jacinto Fault below 10 km, which is where deep creep may be happening. We show that it's plausible and can account for nearby enigmatic earthquakes. The model may not be perfectly correct, but it's consistent with observations."<br />
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As noted, this work has implications for assessing fault loading, Beyer and Cooke point out. Until now, seismologists have assumed that faults in the region are locked—no creep is taking place—and they use data from all the little earthquakes to infer loading on the primary faults. However, Cooke and Beyer write, "scientists should not use the information recorded by these small earthquakes in the San Bernardino basin to predict loading of the nearby San Andreas and San Jacinto faults."<br />
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Cooke adds, "Our earthquake catalog is growing every year; we can see smaller and smaller ones every year, so we thought why not take advantage of the networks we've built and we can look at them in more detail.<br />
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We don't want to wait around for the faults to move in a damaging earthquake, we want to take advantage of all the tinier earthquakes happening all the time in order to understand how the San Andreas and San Jacinto are loaded. If we can understand how they are being loaded maybe we can understand better when these faults will going to rupture."<br />
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<u><i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The study was published in the journal <a href="https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1029/2018GL078932" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Geophysical Research Letters</a>.</span></i></u></div>

Geoscientists Find Unexpected 'Deep Creep' Near San Andreas, San Jacinto Faults

A cartoon showing how anomalous earthquakes near the San Andreas and San Jacinto faults in southern California work in regions deep below...

Study: Kidney Stones Have Distinct Geological Histories

Researches 6:08 PM

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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A human kidney stones from Mayo Clinic.</td></tr>
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A geologist, a microscopist and a doctor walk into a lab and, with their colleagues from across the nation, make a discovery that overturns centuries of thought about the nature and composition of kidney stones. The team's key insight, reported in the journal Scientific Reports, is that kidney stones are built up in calcium-rich layers that resemble other mineralizations in nature, such as those forming coral reefs or arising in hot springs, Roman aqueducts or subsurface oil fields.<br />
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Most importantly for human health, the researchers found, kidney stones partially dissolve and regrow again and again as they form.<br />
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This contradicts the widely held notion that kidney stones are homogenous rocks that never dissolve and are different from all other rocks in nature, said University of Illinois geology and microbiology professor Bruce Fouke, who led the new research with Jessica Saw, an M.D. student at the Mayo Clinic School of Medicine and Ph.D. student at the U. of I.; and Mayandi Sivaguru, an associate director of the Carl Zeiss Laboratories@Location at the Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology at the U. of I.<br />
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"Contrary to what doctors learn in their medical training, we found that kidney stones undergo a dynamic process of growing and dissolving, growing and dissolving," Fouke said. "This means that one day we may be able to intervene to fully dissolve the stones right in the patient's kidney, something most doctors today would say is impossible.<br />
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"Instead of being worthless crystalline lumps, kidney stones are a minute-by-minute record of the health and functioning of a person's kidney," he said.<br />
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The findings were the result of looking at kidney stones much more closely and with a broader array of light and electron microscopy techniques than others had employed before, said Sivaguru, the lead author of the study who led the microscopy work. The methods included bright-field, phase-contrast, polarization, confocal, fluorescence and electron microscopy, with newly invented combinations of these tools and X-ray spectroscopy.<br />
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Many of the techniques are commonly employed in geology and geobiology, but have not been used to study mineralizations in living organisms, like the kidney stones and gallstones that form in the human body, Fouke said. In particular, the use of ultraviolet light, which causes some minerals and proteins to fluoresce at different wavelengths, offered a vast new treasure trove of information.<br />
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A recently developed technology, Airyscan super-resolution microscopy, allowed the team to view the samples at 140-nanometer resolution, a much higher magnification than is normally possible with light microscopy.<br />
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The effort resulted in spectacularly clear, colorful images of the interior growth history of the kidney stones, revealing that they are built up in alternating thin layers of organic matter and crystals, interrupted in places with jutting interior crystals.<br />
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In the earliest stages of kidney stone development, the researchers found, crystals of a hydrated form of calcium oxalate adhere to one another, forming a big, irregular clump. Layers of organic matter and crystals build up on top of this inner core, creating an outer shell. The stones continue to dissolve and grow. Being able to see the layers clearly for the first time made it possible to recreate this geological history, Fouke said.<br />
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"In geology, when you see layers, that means that something older is underneath something younger," he said. "One layer may be deposited over the course of very short to very long periods of time."<br />
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But many of the layers were disrupted, revealing that part of the stones -- usually the interior dihydrate crystals -- had dissolved. New crystals of a dehydrated form of calcium oxalate had begun to grow again within those voids.<br />
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"Therefore, just one rock represents a whole series of events over time that are critical to deciphering the history of kidney stone disease," Fouke said.<br />
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"Researchers and doctors who study and treat kidney disease will now need to rethink their basic assumptions," Saw said.<br />
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"Before this study, it was thought that a kidney stone is just a simple crystal that gets bigger over time," she said. "What we're seeing here is that it's dynamic. The stone is growing and dissolving, growing and dissolving. It's very rich with many components. It's very much alive."<br />
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<u><i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The above story is based on <a href="https://news.illinois.edu/view/6367/693531" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Materials</a> provided by <a href="http://www.illinois.edu/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign</a>. Original written by Diana Yates.</span></i></u></div>

Study: Kidney Stones Have Distinct Geological Histories

A human kidney stones from Mayo Clinic. A geologist, a microscopist and a doctor walk into a lab and, with their colleagues from acro...

Geologists Reveal Ancient Connection Between England and France

Earth History, Tectonic 6:59 PM

Geologists Reveal Ancient Connection Between England and France

This graphic shows how the ancient land masses of Laurentia, Avalonia and Armorica would have collided to create the countries of England...

Elephant Bird Mystery Solved? Discovery May Explain Demise of World's Largest-ever Birds

Earth History, extinction, Fossils 6:45 PM

Elephant Bird Mystery Solved? Discovery May Explain Demise of World's Largest-ever Birds

Aepyornis maximus. Analysis of bones, from what was once the world's largest bird, has revealed that humans arrived on the tropica...

Lava Flow Seen on Restless Alaska Volcano

USA, volcano 8:34 PM

Lava Flow Seen on Restless Alaska Volcano

Veniaminof volcano Mount Veniaminof, 772 kilometres southwest of Anchorage, is one of the state's most active volcanoes A...

Michigan Man Discovers Glowing, Florescent Rocks Called "Yooperlites"

Mining, News, Rocks, USA 7:49 PM

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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A Michigan man who discovered a new rock type uses a black light to search for the distinctive glowing rocks along the beaches of Lake Superior. FACEBOOK/YOOPERLITES</td></tr>
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Erik Rintamaki was searching for rocks on a Michigan beach last summer when he made what he calls a "mind blowing" discovery. Resting among the thousands of pebbles covering the Lake Superior beach, Rintamaki saw a glowing rock.<br />
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The gem and mineral dealer told CBS News he often goes rock hunting. But on this particular June night, he found a rock unlike any other — a florescent orb that he later named "Yooperlite." Like lava glowing through cracks in the earth, a glowing light seeped out of the lines in the small rock. <br />
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Rintamaki knew this couldn't be the only Yooperlite out there, but he couldn't find any information about glowing rocks online. He knows many people in the gem and mineral field, but everyone he asked had no clue what these mysterious rocks were. <br />
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Rinktamaki went back to the beach night after night, carrying a black light which helped illuminated the glowing rocks. "I was blown away," he said. "It's insane how many are on the beaches up here." He started collecting Yooperlites by the bagful and sold them online. Michigan State University messaged Rinktamaki with an interest in buying some of the rocks to study.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A Michigan man who discovered a new rock type uses a black light to search for the distinctive glowing rocks along the beaches of Lake Superior. FACEBOOK/YOOPERLITES<br /></td></tr>
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Michigan State, along with the University of Saskatewan, researched the Yooperlites for months. The universities determined that Rintamaki did, indeed, discover a new type of rock. He says other people may have spotted these gems before, but he was the first person to get Yooperlites verified — making him the self-proclaimed "Christopher Columbus of rocks."<br />
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Rintamaki said Michigan State gave the rocks a scientific name: syenite clasts containing fluorescent sodalite. <br />
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The name he gave them — Yooperlites — comes from the nickname "Yoopers," which refers to people who live in Michigan's Upper Peninsula, according to Mineral News, a newsletter for mineral collectors that reported on Rintamaki's discovery.<br />
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When his discovery was verified and made public in May 2018, Rintamaki says life as he knew it changed. "I've had thousands of messages and I can't get to them all," he told CBS News. He now gives Yooperlite tours on the beaches along Lake Superior. <br />
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"I've never had anyone not find stones," Rintamaki said of his tour groups. He takes groups out near dusk and they use black lights to search for Yooperlites for about four hours, he says. He also still sells Yooperlites and bought a machine that can buff them into perfect, smooth orbs.<br />
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When he's not with a tour group, he finds himself looking for Yooperlites alone all night long. "I work the night shift at a casino, so when I get out of work at 2 a.m., I get to the beach ... I search until the sun comes up," he said.<br />
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Rintamaki's passion has made him a local celebrity. He says his tours are booked solid through 2019 and the videos of his rock hunting have gone viral.<br />
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Michigan Man Discovers Glowing, Florescent Rocks Called "Yooperlites"

A Michigan man who discovered a new rock type uses a black light to search for the distinctive glowing rocks along the beaches of Lake Su...

Gold 'Mother Lode' Unearthed Underground in Australia Delivers $15 Million in Just Four Days

Gold, Mining 8:13 PM

Gold 'Mother Lode' Unearthed Underground in Australia Delivers $15 Million in Just Four Days

These gold-covered rocks weigh in at 90kg and 60kg respectively. Workers at the Beta Hunt mine near the small town of Kambalda, 630 k...