Co-seismic changes of well water level and volume strain meter in capital area and its vicinity,due to the Nov.14,2001 Ms8.1 Kunlun Mountain earthquake,China

The Kunlunshan Mountain Ms8.1 earthquake, occurred in Nov.14, 2001, is the first event with magnitude more than 8 in the China earthquake monitoring history, specifically at the beginning of digital techniques in precursor monitoring networks. Any investigation of recorded data on this earthquake is very important for testing the operation of the digital monitoring networks and understanding the preparation, occurrence, and adjustment of stress/strain of strong continental earthquakes. In this paper we investigated the coseismic response changes of well water level of groundwater and volume strain meter of bore hole in digital earthquake monitoring network of Capital area and its vicinity, due to the Nov.14, 2001 Ms8.1 Kunlun Mountain earthquake. The responding time, shapes or manners, amplitudes, and lasting time of well water level and strain-meters to seismic wave are studied in comparison. Then we discussed the possibility that the response changes of groundwater to strong distant earthquakes can be understood as one kind of observing evidence of stress/strain changes induced by distant earthquake.

Performance prediction of expressway pavement in high maintenance level areas based on cosine deterioration equation: A case study of Zhejiang Province in China

Accurate prediction of performance decay law is an important basis for long-term planning of maintenance strategy.The statistical regression prediction model is the most widely employed method to calculate pavement performance due to its advantages such as the small amount of calculation and good accuracy,but the traditional prediction model seems not applicable to the high maintenance level areas with excellent pavement conditions.In this paper,the service life and the cumulative number of the axle load were determined as the independent variables of prediction models of pavement performance.The pavement condition index(PCI)and rutting depth index(RDI)were selected as maintenance decision control indexes to establish the unified prediction model of PCI and RDI respectively by applying the cosine deterioration equation.Results reveal that the deterioration law of PCI presents an anti-S type or concave type and the deterioration law of RDI shows an obvious concave type.The prediction model proposed in this study added the pavement maintenance standard factor d,which brings the model parameterα(reflecting the road life)and the deterioration equations are more applicable than the traditional standard equations.It is found that the fitting effects of PCI and RDI prediction models with different traffic grades are relatively similar to the actual service state of the pavements.

The monitoring and analysis of the coastal lowland subsidence in the southern Hangzhou Bay with an advanced time-series InSAR method

Time-series InSAR analysis（e.g., permanent scatterers（PSInSAR）） has been proven as an effective technology in monitoring ground deformation over urban areas. However, it is a big challenge to apply this technology in coastal regions due to the lack of man-made targets. An distributed scatterers interferometric synthetic aperture radar（DSInSAR） is developed to solve the problem of insufficient samples and low reliability in monitoring coastal lowland subsidence, by applying a spatially adaptive filter and an eigendecomposition algorithm to estimating the optimal phase of statistically homogeneous distributed scatterers（DSs）. Twenty-four scenes of COSMO-Sky Med images acquired between 2013 and 2015 are used to retrieve the land subsidence over the Shangyu District on south coast of the Hangzhou Bay, Zhejiang Province, China. The spatial pattern of the land subsidence obtained by the PS-InSAR and the DSInSAR coincides with each other, but the density of the DSs is three point five times higher than the permanent scatterers（PSs）. Validated by precise levelling data over the same period, the DSInSAR method achieves an accuracy of ±5.0 mm/a which is superior to the PS-InSAR with±5.5 mm/a. The land subsidence in the Shangyu District is mainly distributed in the urban areas, industrial towns and land reclamation zones, with a maximum subsidence rate -30.2 mm/a. The analysis of geological data, field investigation and historical reclamation data indicates that human activities and natural compaction of reclamation material are major causes of the detected land subsidence. The results demonstrate that the DSInSAR method has a great potential in monitoring the coastal lowland subsidence and can be used to further investigate subsidence-related environmental issues in coastal regions.

Seawater Intrusion in the Longkou-Laizhou Area, Shandong

The extensive intrusion （covering an area of 83.7-238.3 km;and accounting for 18.6-31.5% of the total area of the plain）, the presence of a transitional zone 1.5-6.0 km in width, and the interconnection in distribution between the seawater intrusion district and the region lower than the sea level caused by the strong drop of the groundwater level are major characteristics of the seawater intrusion in the study area. Cation exchange played an important role during the formation of chemical composition of the groundwater in the seawater intrusion district.

Mechanism of Suppressing ASR Using Ground Reactive Sandstone Powders instead of Cement

In order to understand the effect of powders ground from reactive sandstone replacing cement on reducing or suppressing alkali-silica reaction（ASR）, and to identify the mechanism of suppressing ASR by this powders, mortar and paste containing reactive sandstone powders of four replacement levels ranging from 10wt% to 40wt% and four specific surfaces areas ranging from 210 m^2/kg to 860 m^2/kg were studied. The experimental results showed that incorporation of 40wt% reactive sandstone powders could suppress ASR effectively except for mortar containing reactive sandstone powders with specific surface area of 610 m^2/kg, which disagreed with the most results reported that the higher reactive powder specific surface area, the smaller ASR expansion. By means of fl ame photometry, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy（FT-IR） and thermo gravimetric analysis（TG）, the mechanism of reactive sandstone powders on reducing or suppressing ASR was soluble alkalis type of reactive sandstone powders and the competition of liberating and bonding alkali of cement paste containing reactive sandstone powders,when the ability of alkali bonding was greater than the ability of alkali liberation, ASR caused by reactive sandstone was supressed effectively.

Changes in lake area and water level in response to hydroclimate variations in the source area of the Yellow River:a case study from Lake Ngoring

In the north-eastern Qinghai-Tibet Plateau(QTP),the source area of the Yellow River(SAYR)has been experiencing significant changes in climatic and environmental conditions in recent decades.To date,few studies have combined modern hydrological conditions with paleoclimate records to explore the mechanism(s)of these changes.This study seeks to improve understanding of hydrological variability on decadal and centennial timescales in the SAYR and to identify its general cause.We first determined annual fluctuations in the surface area of Lake Ngoring from 1985 to 2020 using multi-temporal Landsat images.The results show that lake surface area changes were generally consistent with variations in precipitation,streamflow and the regional dry-wet index in the SAYR,suggesting that the water balance of the Lake Ngoring area is closely associated with regional hydroclimate changes.These records are also comparable to the stalagmite δ^(18)O monsoon record,as well fluctuations in the Southern Oscillation Index(SOI).Moreover,an association of high TSI(total solar insolation)anomalies and sunspot numbers with the expansion of Lake Ngoring surface area is observed,implying that solar activity is the key driving factor for hydrologic variability in the SAYR on a decadal timescale.Following this line of reasoning,we compared the δ^(13)C org-based lake level fluctuations of Lake Ngoring for the last millennium,as previously reported,with the hydroclimatic history and the reconstructed TSI record.We conclude that the hydrological regime of Lake Ngoring has been mainly controlled by centennial fluctuations in precipitation for the last millennium,which is also dominated by solar activity.In general,it appears that solar activity has exerted a dominant influence on the hydrological regime of the SAYR on both decadal and centennial timescales,which is clearly manifested in the variations of lake area and water level of Lake Ngoring.