On the optimal operation of groundwater basins: A calculus of variations approach     

V.V. Palciauskas  P.A. Domenico 《Journal of Hydrology》1973,20(2):181-189

An ordinary differential equation for the groundwater allocation problem is derived by variational techniques and solved by specifying either the length of a mining period, or the total volume to be mined. Specifying either of these uniquely determines the other in terms of the economic parameters entering through the benefit function. An infinite mining period sets an upper limit to the total volume to be optimally extracted, and provides for the greatest economic benefit. As the mining period is shortened, the one-time exploitable volume is reduced. Although most of the calculations have been carried out for a quadratic benefit function, the detected competition between marginal productivity and the rate of interest insofar as they influence the optimal storage volume and its allocation through use rates appears to be valid in general.  相似文献   

Rate of soil erosion processes on vineyards in central Piedmont (NW Italy)     

Domenico Tropeano 《地球表面变化过程与地形》1984,9(3):253-266

The ‘Tertiary Basin of Piedmont’ is a hilly region, mainly composed of marine sediments, such as marls, silts and sands. The slopes, largely devoted to grape production, are usually kept bare of vegetation and are thus prone to soil erosion processes. For two years we have measured soil loss in relation to rainfall on experimental plots located in vineyards. In all the plots considered erosion started with low rainfall intensities (0·07 mm/min), and above 0·4 mm/min the amount of soil loss dramatically increased (to over 1800 g/m in one event). Most of the erosion occurs during summer rainstorms, but the behaviour of the soil under erosive rainfalls is very different from one site to another, depending only in part upon the various rainfall rates, soil and geometrical characteristics of the plots. It can be seen that soil loss varies from nearly negligible values (20 g/m/yr) to unacceptably high levels (to over 4·7 kg/m/yr), according to the different types of land cultivation. Deep ploughing and heavy herbicide treatment give rise to accelerated erosion processes leading to soil losses much higher than in other vineyard plots in Europe.  相似文献   

Evaluating Earthquake-Triggered Landslide Hazard at the Basin Scale Through Gis in the Upper Sele River Valley   总被引：6，自引：0，他引：6  

Domenico Capolongo  Alberto Refice  Joseph Mankelow 《Surveys in Geophysics》2002,23(6):595-625

To evaluate techniques for assessing earthquake-triggeredlandslide hazard in the Southern Apennines (Italy), a GIS-based analysis was used to modelseismically induced slope deformations. Geological, geotechnical, geomorphological and seismologicaldata were integrated into a standard earthquake slope stability model. The model assessed thelandslide potential that existed during the 1980 Irpinian earthquake in the Upper Sele river Valley.The standard Newmark displacement analysis, widely used for predicting the location of shallowunstable slopes, does not take into account errors and/or uncertainties in the input parameters.Therefore, a probabilistic Newmark displacement analysis technique has been used. Probabilistictechniques allow, e.g., an estimation of the probability that a slope will exceed a certain criticalvalue of Newmark displacement. In our probabilistic method, a Monte-Carlo based simulation modelis used in conjunction with a GIS. The random variability of geotechnical data is modelled by probabilitydensity functions (pdfs), while for the seismic input three different regression laws wereconsidered. Input probability distributions are sampled and the resulting values input into empiricalrelations for estimating Newmark displacement. The outcome is a map in which to each siteis related a spatial probability distribution for the expected displacement in response to seismic loading.Results of the experiments show a high grade of uncertainty in the application of the Newmarkanalysis both for the deterministic and probabilistic approach in a complex geological setting suchas the high Sele valley, quite common in the Southern Apennines. They show a strong dependence onthe reliability of the spatial data used in input, so that, when the model is used at basin scale,results are strongly influenced by local environmental condition (e.g., topography, lithology, groundwatercondition) and decrease the model performance.  相似文献   

Introduction to ground surface self-potential tomography     

Domenico Patella 《Geophysical Prospecting》1997,45(4):653-681

A new approach to self-potential (SP) data interpretation for the recognition of a buried causative SP source system is presented. The general model considered is characterized by the presence of primary electric sources or sinks, located within any complex resistivity structure with a flat air-earth boundary. First, using physical considerations of the nature of the electric potential generated by any arbitrary distribution of primary source charges and the related secondary induced charges over the buried resistivity discontinuity planes, a general formula is derived for the potential and the electric field component along any fixed direction on the ground surface. The total effect is written as a sum of elementary contributions, all of the same simple mathematical form. It is then demonstrated that the total electric power associated with the standing natural electric field component can be written in the space domain as a sum of cross-correlation integrals between the observed component of the total electric field and the component of the field due to each single constitutive elementary charge. By means of the cross-correlation bounding inequality, the concept of a scanning function is introduced as the key to the new interpretation procedure. In the space domain, the scanning function is the unit strength electric field component generated by an elementary positive charge. Next, the concept of charge occurrence probability is introduced as a suitable function for the tomographic imaging of the charge distribution geometry underground. This function is defined as the cross-correlation product of the total observed electric field component and the scanning function, divided by the square root of the product of the respective variances. Using this physical scheme, the tomographic procedure is described. It consists of scanning the section, through any SP survey profile, by the unit strength elementary charge, which is given a regular grid of space coordinates within the section, at each point of which the charge occurrence probability function is calculated. The complete set of calculated grid values can be used to draw contour lines in order to single out the zones of highest probability of concentrations of polarized, primary and secondary electric charges. An extension to the wavenumber domain and to three-dimensional tomography is also presented and discussed. A few simple synthetic examples are given to demonstrate the resolution power of the new SP inversion procedure.  相似文献   

Topographical controls on small‐volume pyroclastic flows     

Joan Martí  Domenico M. Doronzo  Dario Pedrazzi  Ferran Colombo 《Sedimentology》2019,66(6):2297-2317

Emplacement of small‐volume (<0·1 km³) pyroclastic flows is significantly influenced by topography. The Arico ignimbrite on Tenerife (Canary Islands) is a characteristic small‐volume pyroclastic flow deposit emplaced on high relief topography. The pyroclastic flow flowed down pre‐existing valleys on the southern slopes of the island. In proximal areas deep (up to 100 m) valleys acted as efficient conduits for the pyroclastic flow, which was mostly channelled; in this particular area the ignimbrite corresponds to a homogeneous, moderately welded deposit, consisting of flattened pumices in an abundant ashy matrix with a relatively low lithic fragment content. In intermediate zones significant changes occur in the steepness of the slope and, although still channelled, here the pyroclastic flow was influenced by hydraulic jumps. In this area, two different units can be clearly distinguished in the ignimbrite: the lower unit is composed of a lithic‐rich ground‐layer deposit that formed at the turbulent, highly concentrated head of the flow; the upper unit consists of a well welded pumice‐rich deposit that occasionally reveals a basal layer formed by shearing with the lower part. This division into two units is maintained as far as distal areas near the present‐day coastline, where the slope is very gentle or null and the ignimbrite is not channelled. The ground layer is not found in distal areas. The ignimbrite here only consists of the upper unit, which is occasionally repeated due to a surging process provoked by the lower flow speed, as the pyroclastic flow spread out of the channelled zone. A theoretical model on how topography controlled the deposition of the Arico ignimbrite is derived by interpreting the observed lithological and sedimentological variations in terms of changes in topography and bedrock morphology. This new model is of general applicability and will help to explain other deposits of similar characteristics.  相似文献   

Exploiting historical rainfall and landslide data in a spatial database for the derivation of critical rainfall thresholds     

Domenico Caracciolo  Elisa Arnone  Francesco Lo Conti  Leonardo Valerio Noto 《Environmental Earth Sciences》2017,76(5):222

Critical rainfall thresholds for landslides are powerful tools for preventing landslide hazard. The thresholds are commonly estimated empirically starting from rainfall events that triggered landslides in the past. The creation of the appropriate rainfall–landslide database is one of the main efforts in this approach. In fact, an accurate agreement between the landslide and rainfall information, in terms of location and timing, is essential in order to correctly estimate the rainfall–landslide relationships. A further issue is taking into account the average moisture conditions prior the triggering event, which reasonably may be crucial in determining the sufficient amount of precipitation. In this context, the aim of this paper is exploiting historical landslide and rainfall data in a spatial database for the derivation of critical rainfall thresholds for landslide occurrence in Sicily, southern Italy. The hourly rainfall events that caused landslides occurred in the twentieth century were specifically identified and reconstructed. A procedure was proposed to automatically convert rain guages charts recorded on paper tape into digital format and then to provide the cumulative rainfall hyetograph in digital format. This procedure is based on a segmentation followed by signal recognition techniques which allow to digitalize and to recognize the hyetograph automatically. The role of rainfall prior to the landslide events was taken into account by including in the analysis the rainfall occurred 5, 15 and 30 days before each landslide. Finally, cumulated rainfall duration thresholds for different exceedance probability levels were determined. The obtained thresholds resulted in agreement with the regional curves proposed by other authors for the same area; antecedent rainfall turned out to be particularly important in triggering landslides.  相似文献   

Assessment of water vapor retrievals from a GPS receiver network     

Stefania Bonafoni  Augusto Mazzoni  Domenico Cimini  Mario Montopoli  Nazzareno Pierdicca  Patrizia Basili  Piero Ciotti  Giovanni Carlesimo 《GPS Solutions》2013,17(4):475-484

We present an assessment of a GPS receiver operational network to produce accurate integrated precipitable water vapour (IPWV) during a two-week field experiment carried out in Central Italy around the city of Rome, where different instruments were operative. This experimental activity provided an excellent opportunity to compare the GPS products with independent measurements provided by ground-based and space-based sensors and to evaluate their quality in terms of absolute accuracy of IPWV, analyzing also the spatial scale of GPS estimates. For instance, the assimilation into Numerical Weather Prediction models of IPWV provided by a GPS network or its exploitation in space geodesy applications to correct tropospheric effects requires an accuracy in the order of 0.1 cm to be ascribed to IPWV observations. In this work, we assessed that the accuracy for GPS IPWV estimates is 0.07 cm. Moreover, this experiment has pointed out strengths and limitations of an operational network for the water vapor estimation, such as a proper receiver distribution to achieve the desired spatial resolution and a coverage of GPS stations in both flat and mountains regions.  相似文献   

Effect of the dilution process on the attenuation of contaminants in aquifers   总被引：1，自引：1，他引：0  

Manuela Lasagna  Domenico Antonio De Luca  Laura Debernardi  Paolo Clemente 《Environmental Earth Sciences》2013,70(6):2767-2784

This paper discusses the effects of the dilution process on levels of aquifer contamination attenuation, developing analytical equations for application in theoretical and practical cases. The key finding is that, in aquifers, the dilution process causes a reduction of the contaminant concentration. Analytical equations for the assessment of the contaminant attenuation capacity, by means of the dilution process in an aquifer, are put forward. In particular, the attenuation of the contaminant concentration in an aquifer, and thus the dilution, is described by the volumetric flow rate per unit width perpendicular to the flow direction (q _u). Moreover, a classification of q _u was developed, considering six classes of attenuation capacity due to dilution. For the equations validation, nitrate contamination attenuation due to dilution was analysed in two sample areas in Piedmont (North-West Italy). The results confirmed the hypothesis, evidencing high nitrate concentrations in areas with low q _u values, connected to low dilution rate of the contaminant in the groundwater; vice versa, low nitrate concentrations were evidenced in areas with high q _u values, due to a high nitrate dilution rate.  相似文献   

Motif Discovery on Seismic Amplitude Time Series: The Case Study of Mt Etna 2011 Eruptive Activity     

Carmelo Cassisi  Marco Aliotta  Andrea Cannata  Placido Montalto  Domenico Patanè  Alfredo Pulvirenti  Letizia Spampinato 《Pure and Applied Geophysics》2013,170(4):529-545

Algorithms searching for similar patterns are widely used in seismology both when the waveforms of the events of interest are known and when there is no a priori-knowledge. Such methods usually make use of the cross-correlation coefficient as a measure of similarity; if there is no a-priori knowledge, they behave as brute-force searching algorithms. The disadvantage of these methods, preventing or limiting their application to very large datasets, is computational complexity. The Mueen–Keogh (MK) algorithm overcomes this limitation by means of two optimization techniques—the early abandoning concept and space indexing. Here, we apply the MK algorithm to amplitude time series retrieved from seismic signals recorded during episodic eruptive activity of Mt Etna in 2011. By adequately tuning the input to the MK algorithm we found eight motif groups characterized by distinct seismic amplitude trends, each related to a different phenomenon. In particular, we observed that earthquakes are accompanied by sharp increases and decreases in seismic amplitude whereas lava fountains are accompanied by slower changes. These results demonstrate that the MK algorithm, because of its particular features, may have wide applicability in seismology.  相似文献   

Integrating computer simulations and experiments to study explosive volcanic eruptions     

Domenico M. Doronzo 《Natural Hazards》2012,60(2):785-788

Explosive eruptions cannot be directly measured because they are inaccessible, which is the reason why computer simulations are developing more and more in volcanology. Calculations of volcanic hazard take substantial advantage of the simulations, particularly when they are validated experimentally. Here, an integrated approach is proposed, which combines 3D simulations and large-scale experiments, in order to provide an effective tool that helps detailing actual explosive eruptions.  相似文献