9. Life On Earth... And Elsewhere?     

Thierry Montmerle  Philippe Claeys  Muriel Gargaud  Purificatión López-García  Hervé Martin  Robert Pascal  Jacques Reisse  Franck Selsis 《Earth, Moon, and Planets》2006,98(1-4):299-312

This concluding chapter is divided into two main parts. The first part is a summary of the main facts and events which constitute the present body of knowledge of the chronology of life in the solar system, in the form of “highlights” in astronomy, geology, chemistry and biology. The second part raises the interrogation “Is life universal?”, and tries to provide answers based on these facts and events. These answers turn out to differ widely among the various disciplines, depending on how far they feel able to extrapolate their current knowledge.  相似文献   

Cold Dust and Very Cold Excess Emission in the Galaxy   总被引：2，自引：0，他引：2  

Hervé Bourdin  Françcois Boulanger  Jean-Philippe Bernard  Guilaine Lagache 《Astrophysics and Space Science》2002,281(1-2):243-246

We provide insight in the origin of the far-IR to mm emission from galaxies by presenting a decomposition of the Galaxy emission where we separate the contributions from dust in the atomic gas and dust associated with quiescent molecular gas as a function of Galacto-centric distance. This decomposition leaves a puzzling very cold emission excess with a brightness independent of Galactic longitude that might be pointing at interstellar matter in the outer Galaxy not traced by H I nor CO emission. This revised version was published online in September 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.  相似文献   

Analysis of the tropical climate variability in a two-column framework     

Gilles Bellon  Guillaume Gastineau  Aur��lien Ribes  Herv�� Le Treut 《Climate Dynamics》2011,37(1-2):73-81

This work examines the relevance of a classical two-column modeling framework of the tropical climate in terms of observed natural variability. A method is developed to analyze the observed tropical climate in a simple framework that features a moist, ascending column and a dry, subsiding one. This method is used to analyze the natural variability of the tropical climate in the ERA40 reanalysis and in ISCCP satellite data. It appears that the seasonal cycle of the tropic-wide sea surface temperature (SST) is almost linearly linked to the seasonal cycle of the relative area of the moist regions, as predicted by the sensitivity of the two-column models. A more detailed analysis shows that this link is the product of a complex interaction and adjustments between the moist and dry regions. The seasonal cycle of low-cloud cover in the dry regions also appears to interact with the SST seasonal cycle: the low-cloud cover influences the tropic-wide SST via its direct radiative forcing on the local SST and it appears to be controlled by the SST difference between moist and dry regions. By contrast, the SST interannual variability appears to be driven by the El Ni?o Southern Oscillation (ENSO), with no significant impact from the changes in the relative area of the moist regions or in the low-cloud cover in the dry regions independently of the ENSO. ENSO-related changes in the area of moist regions and low-cloud cover constitute negative feedbacks on the ENSO-related SST variability.  相似文献   

Diagnosing GCM errors over West Africa using relaxation experiments. Part I: summer monsoon climatology and interannual variability     

Benjamin Pohl  Herv�� Douville 《Climate Dynamics》2011,37(7-8):1293-1312

The CNRM atmospheric general circulation model Arpege-Climat is relaxed towards atmospheric reanalyses outside the 10°S?C32°N 30°W?C50°E domain in order to disentangle the regional versus large-scale sources of climatological biases and interannual variability of the West African monsoon (WAM). On the one hand, the main climatological features of the monsoon, including the spatial distribution of summer precipitation, are only weakly improved by the nudging, thereby suggesting the regional origin of the Arpege-Climat biases. On the other hand, the nudging technique is relatively efficient to control the interannual variability of the WAM dynamics, though the impact on rainfall variability is less clear. Additional sensitivity experiments focusing on the strong 1994 summer monsoon suggest that the weak sensitivity of the model biases is not an artifact of the nudging design, but the evidence that regional physical processes are the main limiting factors for a realistic simulation of monsoon circulation and precipitation in the Arpege-Climat model. Sensitivity experiments to soil moisture boundary conditions are also conducted and highlight the relevance of land?Catmosphere coupling for the amplification of precipitation biases. Nevertheless, the land surface hydrology is not the main explanation for the model errors that are rather due to deficiencies in the atmospheric physics. The intraseasonal timescale and the model internal variability are discussed in a companion paper.  相似文献   

Tropical influence on boreal summer mid-latitude stationary waves     

Herv�� Douville  S. Bielli  C. Cassou  M. D��qu��  N. M. J. Hall  S. Tyteca  A. Voldoire 《Climate Dynamics》2011,37(9-10):1783-1798

While organized tropical convection is a well-known source of extratropical planetary waves, state-of-the-art climate models still show serious deficiencies in simulating accurately the atmospheric response to tropical sea surface temperature (SST) anomalies and the associated teleconnections. In the present study, the remote influence of the tropical atmospheric circulation is evaluated in ensembles of global boreal summer simulations in which the Arpege-Climat atmospheric General Circulation Model (GCM) is nudged towards 6-h reanalyses. The nudging is applied either in the whole tropical band or in a regional summer monsoon domain. Sensitivity tests to the experimental design are first conducted using prescribed climatological SST. They show that the tropical relaxation does not improve the zonal mean extratropical climatology but does lead to a significantly improved representation of the mid-latitude stationary waves in both hemispheres. Low-pass filtering of the relaxation fields has no major effect on the model response, suggesting that high-frequency tropical variability is not responsible for extratropical biases. Dividing the nudging strength by a factor 10 only decreases the magnitude of the response. Model errors in each monsoon domain contribute to deficiencies in the model??s mid-latitude climatology, although an exaggerated large-scale subsidence in the central equatorial Pacific appears as the main source of errors for the representation of stationary waves in the Arpege-Climat model. Case studies are then conducted using either climatological or observed SST. The focus is first on summer 2003 characterized by a strong and persistent anticyclonic anomaly over western Europe. This pattern is more realistic in nudging experiments than in simulations only driven by observed SST, especially when the nudging domain is centred over Central America. Other case studies also show a significant tropical forcing of the summer mid-latitude stationary waves and suggest a weak influence of prescribed observed SST in the northern extratropics. Results therefore indicate that improving the tropical divergent circulation and its response to tropical SST anomalies remains a key issue for increasing the skill of extratropical seasonal predictions, not only in the winter hemisphere but also in the boreal summer hemisphere where the prediction of heatwave and drought likelihood is expected to become an important challenge with increasing concentrations of greenhouse gases.  相似文献   

Volcanic Markers of the Post-Subduction Evolution of Baja California and Sonora, Mexico: Slab Tearing Versus Lithospheric Rupture of the Gulf of California     

Thierry Calmus  Carlos Pallares  Ren�� C. Maury  Alfredo Aguill��n-Robles  Herv�� Bellon  Mathieu Benoit  Fran?ois Michaud 《Pure and Applied Geophysics》2011,168(8-9):1303-1330

The study of the geochemical compositions and K-Ar or Ar-Ar ages of ca. 350 Neogene and Quaternary lavas from Baja California, the Gulf of California and Sonora allows us to discuss the nature of their mantle or crustal sources, the conditions of their melting and the tectonic regime prevailing during their genesis and emplacement. Nine petrographic/geochemical groups are distinguished: ??regular?? calc-alkaline lavas; adakites; magnesian andesites and related basalts and basaltic andesites; niobium-enriched basalts; alkali basalts and trachybasalts; oceanic (MORB-type) basalts; tholeiitic/transitional basalts and basaltic andesites; peralkaline rhyolites (comendites); and icelandites. We show that the spatial and temporal distribution of these lava types provides constraints on their sources and the geodynamic setting controlling their partial melting. Three successive stages are distinguished. Between 23 and 13 Ma, calc-alkaline lavas linked to the subduction of the Pacific-Farallon plate formed the Comondú and central coast of the Sonora volcanic arc. In the extensional domain of western Sonora, lithospheric mantle-derived tholeiitic to transitional basalts and basaltic andesites were emplaced within the southern extension of the Basin and Range province. The end of the Farallon subduction was marked by the emplacement of much more complex Middle to Late Miocene volcanic associations, between 13 and 7 Ma. Calc-alkaline activity became sporadic and was replaced by unusual post-subduction magma types including adakites, niobium-enriched basalts, magnesian andesites, comendites and icelandites. The spatial and temporal distribution of these lavas is consistent with the development of a slab tear, evolving into a 200-km-wide slab window sub-parallel to the trench, and extending from the Pacific coast of Baja California to coastal Sonora. Tholeiitic, transitional and alkali basalts of subslab origin ascended through this window, and adakites derived from the partial melting of its upper lip, relatively close to the trench. Calc-alkaline lavas, magnesian andesites and niobium-enriched basalts formed from hydrous melting of the supraslab mantle triggered by the uprise of hot Pacific asthenosphere through the window. During the Plio-Quaternary, the ??no-slab?? regime following the sinking of the old part of the Farallon plate within the deep mantle allowed the emplacement of alkali and tholeiitic/transitional basalts of deep asthenospheric origin in Baja California and Sonora. The lithospheric rupture connected with the opening of the Gulf of California generated a high thermal regime associated to asthenospheric uprise and emplaced Quaternary depleted MORB-type tholeiites. This thermal regime also induced partial melting of the thinned lithospheric mantle of the Gulf area, generating calc-alkaline lavas as well as adakites derived from slivers of oceanic crust incorporated within this mantle.  相似文献   

Diagnosing GCM errors over West Africa using relaxation experiments. Part II: intraseasonal variability and African easterly waves     

Benjamin Pohl  Herv�� Douville 《Climate Dynamics》2011,37(7-8):1313-1334

A near-global grid-point nudging of the Arpege-Climat atmospheric General Circulation Model towards ECMWF reanalyses is used to diagnose the regional versus remote origin of the summer model biases and variability over West Africa. First part of this study revealed a limited impact on the monsoon climatology compared to a control experiment without nudging, but a significant improvement of interannual variability, although the amplitude of the seasonal anomalies remained underestimated. Focus is given here on intraseasonal variability of monsoon rainfall and dynamics. The reproducible part of these signals is investigated through 30-member ensemble experiments computed for the 1994 rainy season, a year abnormally wet over the Sahel but representative of the model systematic biases. In the control experiment, Arpege-Climat simulates too few rainy days that are associated with too low rainfall amounts over the central and western Sahel, in line with the seasonal dry biases. Nudging the model outside Africa tends to slightly increase the number of rainy days over the Sahel, but has little effect on associated rainfall amounts. However, results do indicate that a significant part of the monsoon intraseasonal variability simulated by Arpege-Climat is controlled by lateral boundary conditions. Parts of the wet/dry spells over the Sahel occur in phase in the 30 members of the nudging experiment, and are therefore embedded in larger-scale variability patterns. Inter-member spread is however not constant across the selected summer season. It is partly controlled by African Easterly Waves, which show dissimilar amplitude from one member to another, but a coherent phasing in all members. A lowpass filtering of the nudging fields suggests that low frequency variations in the lateral boundary conditions can lead to eastward extensions of the African Easterly Jet, creating a favorable environment for easterly waves, while high frequency perturbations seem to control their phasing.  相似文献   

Debris-flow susceptibility of upland catchments     

Mélanie Bertrand  Frédéric Liébault  Hervé Piégay 《Natural Hazards》2013,67(2):497-511

Over the last three decades, many regional studies in mountain ranges under temperate climate revealed that it is possible to discriminate debris-flow and fluvial fans from morphometric indicators measured at the scale of the catchment and the fan itself. The most commonly used indicators are the Melton index (R), a normalized index of the gravitational energy of the catchment, and the fan slope (S). A wide range of thresholds have been proposed for discriminating purpose, but these are generally based on a small population of catchments and may be highly influenced by ambiguous fans included in the data set. A database of 620 upland catchments from several mountain ranges under temperate climate was compiled from the literature to propose robust discriminant morphometric thresholds for debris-flow versus fluvial responses. Linear discriminant analysis (LDA) and logistic regression (LR) were performed using the whole data set, and a leave-one-out cross-validation was used to evaluate performances of the models. Sensitivity and specificity scores obtained for LDA and LR were 0.96 and 0.73, and 0.95 and 0.75, respectively. It is also shown that the channel slope above which debris-flow is observed decreases with the gravitational energy of the catchment. Limitations of the morphometric discrimination are discussed.  相似文献   

Provenance variations in the Late Paleozoic accretionary complex of central Chile as indicated by detrital zircons     

F. Hervé  M. Calderón  C.M. Fanning  R.J. Pankhurst  E. Godoy 《Gondwana Research》2013,23(3):1122-1135

We present detrital zircon UPb SHRIMP age patterns for the central segment (34–42°S) of an extensive accretionary complex along coastal Chile together with ages for some relevant igneous rocks. The complex consists of a basally accreted high pressure/low temperature Western Series outboard of a frontally accreted Eastern Series that was overprinted by high temperature/low pressure metamorphism. Eleven new SHRIMP detrital zircon age patterns have been obtained for meta-turbidites from the central (34–42°S) segment of the accretionary complex, four from previously undated metamorphic complexes and associated intrusive rocks from the main Andean cordillera, and three from igneous rocks in Argentina that were considered as possible sediment source areas. There are no Mesozoic detrital zircons in the accretionary rocks. Early Paleozoic zircons are an essential component of the provenance, and Grenville-age zircons and isolated grains as old as 3 Ga occur in most rocks, although much less commonly in the Western Series of the southern sector. In the northernmost sector (34–38°30′S) Proterozoic zircon grains constitute more than 50% of the detrital spectra, in contrast with less than 10% in the southern sector (39–42°S). The youngest igneous detrital zircons in both the northern Western (307 Ma) and Eastern Series (345 Ma) are considered to closely date sedimentation of the protoliths. Both oxygen and LuHf isotopic analyses of a selection of Permian to Neoproterozoic detrital zircon grains indicate that the respective igneous source rocks had significant crustal contributions. The results suggest that Early Paleozoic orogenic belts (Pampean and Famatinian) containing material recycled from cratonic areas of South America supplied detritus to this part of the paleo-Pacific coast. In contrast, in the southern exposures of the Western Series studied here, Permian detrital zircons (253–295 Ma) dominate, indicating much younger deposition. The northern sector has scarce Early to Middle Devonian detrital zircons, prominent south of 39°S. The sedimentary protolith of the northern sector was probably deposited in a passive margin setting starved of Devonian (Achalian) detritus by a topographic barrier formed by the Precordillera, and possibly Chilenia, terranes. Devonian subduction-related metamorphic and plutonic rocks developed south of 39°S, beyond the possible southern limit of Chilenia, where sedimentation of accretionary rocks continued until Permian times.  相似文献   

Formation of drying crack patterns in soils: a deterministic approach     

Hervé Peron  Lyesse Laloui  Liang-Bo Hu  Tomasz Hueckel 《Acta Geotechnica》2013,8(2):215-221

Soils, as well as most of deformable multiphase porous materials, are likely to suffer from desiccation cracking, leading to the formation of regular crack patterns affecting their permeability. The ensuing crack spacing has often been related to a concept sometimes called “sequential infilling”: it is assumed that desiccation cracks are formed by successive generations. However, such a concept does not consider the pattern of a simultaneous crack formation at a given moment. Using our desiccation cracking test results and their numerical simulation, we propose a consistent explanation for the formation of desiccation crack patterns in soils. We show that the “sequential infilling” concept is suitable only when the position of the crack(s) clearly stems from the stress field. To derive an estimate of the desiccation crack spacing, the overall energy of the system needs to be considered. Statistical variability should be superimposed on the mean deterministic conditions discussed here.  相似文献