of dissertation thesis Exogenic alteration of geomaterials with anomalous content of hazardous elements The research of waste materials from high temperature processes belongs to current issues solved in the field of modern environmental geochemistry. Current research has mainly been focused on fly ash and bottom ash coming from metallurgy, combustion and other industrial processes. In these wastes of different grain size, accumulation of hazardous elements occurs. These elements may be present in low concentrations in combusted coal or municipal solid waste or it may come from ore processing. Hazardous compounds are also intentionally added during the technological process (e.g. making of lead glass). Modern industrial plants are equipped with effective filtration systems, but this might not be in the past. In the Czech Republic and elsewhere in the world old environmental burdens are and will be addressed. Current modern filtration systems are never 100% efficient. Contamination of surrounding environment in a lesser extent can still occur. The production of lead glass (Bohemian Crystal) is based on the addition of lead compounds in the glass raw material. Additions of these substances providing a high refractive index of the finished product. Also compounds containing other hazardous elements...

In exploration, a lithogeochemical approach can be used to aid the characterisation of rocks surrounding metamorphosed and hydrothermally altered deposits. Accurate description of the geological setting of deposits is crucial for understanding the ore forming processes and identifying targets for exploration. The Svärdsjö Zn-Pb-Cu deposit is located in the heavily mineralised and metamorphosed Bergslagen ore province of south-central Sweden. The deposit and surrounding minor occurrences were actively mined for over 500 years, producing more than 1 Mt of Zn-Pb-Cu-Ag massive sulphide ore. The combination of strongly metamorphosed and hydrothermally altered rocks in Svärdsjö makes geological interpretation challenging. Therefore, an approach combining lithogeochemical and petrographic methods is used in this study. The characterisation of the rocks and hydrothermal alteration surrounding the deposit allowed for an interpretation of ore formation and its implications for further exploration in the Svärdsjö area. The results verified that the Svärdsjö mineralisations are hosted by 2–15 m thick dolomitic marble units, commonly altered to skarn. Surrounding the deposit are subvolcanic intrusions and volcanoclastic rocks of mainly dacitic composition. The combined approach also helped identifying a strong to intense hydrothermal chlorite-sericite alteration enveloping the mineralised marble units and resulted in large mass gains of Fe and Mg whereas Na was depleted. Multiple episodes of alteration and metamorphism are evident from cross-cutting relationships with less altered dykes and overprint by metamorphic minerals such as cordierite and anthophyllite. An ore formation model involving sub-seafloor volcanic-associated replacement is suggested for the Svärdsjö deposit based on (i) the presence of a zoned hydrothermal alteration system within a volcanoclastic rock sequence and (ii) the irregular stratabound sulphide lenses hosted by thin marble units in the centre of the alteration system. Additionally, it is inferred that the stratabound nature of the deposit is caused by the neutralisation of a hot acidic fluid, resulting in precipitation of the sulphides within the marble. Finally, two geochemically distinct lithological units have been identified adjacent to the mineralised zones, providing new, larger exploration targets in the area. Mass change calculations reveal that Fe and Mg enrichment and Na depletion are useful vectors towards mineralisation, with detectable changes extending for up to 100 m from the mineralised lenses. These findings showcase the usefulness of the incorporation and careful interpretation of lithogeochemical data when exploring for metamorphosed hydrothermal ore deposits in mineralised provinces of the Fennoscandian Shield or elsewhere in the world.

The Snake River Plain is located in the southern part of the state of Idaho. The eastern plain, on which this study focuses, is a trail of volcanics from the Yellowstone hotspot. Three exploratory geothermal wells were drilled on the Snake River Plain. This project analyzes basaltic core from the first well at Kimama, north of Burley, Idaho. The objectives of this project are to establish zones of geothermal alteration and analyze the potential for geothermal power production using sub-aquifer resources on the axial volcanic zone of the Snake River Plain. Thirty samples from 1,912 m of core were sampled and analyzed for clay content and composition using X-ray diffraction. Observations from core samples and geophysical logs are also used to establish alteration zones. Mineralogical data, geophysical log data and physical characteristics of the core suggest that the base of the Snake River Plain aquifer at the axial zone is located 960m below the surface, much deeper than previously suspected. Swelling smectite clay clogs pore spaces and reduces porosity and permeability to create a natural base to the aquifer. Increased temperatures favor the formation of smectite clay and other secondary minerals to the bottom of the hole. Below 960 m the core shows signs of alteration including color change, formation of clay, and filling of other secondary minerals in vesicles and fractured zones of the core. The smectite clay observed is Fe-rich clay that is authigenic in some places. Geothermal power generation may be feasible using a low temperature hot water geothermal system if thermal fluids can be attained near the bottom of the Kimama well. (113 pages)

This study area provides a unique opportunity to study the intersection of the Elsinore and West Salton detachment faults in southern California, effusing warm springs, and alteration products in the midst of the fault intersection. Structural mapping and compiling previous maps supply an interpretation of the fault zone geometries within the Tierra Blanca Mountains. Geochemical analysis of the crystalline basement and altered protolith help determine the effects of faulting and fluid flow in the study area. In the Tierra Blanca Mountains, the Elsinore strike-slip fault system transitions from the double-stranded Julian segment and Earthquake Valley fault in the northwest, to the single-stranded Coyote Mountain segment in the southeast. A network of cross faults striking northeast connects the fault segments. The Coyote Mountain segment encounters the inactive West Salton detachment fault in the study area. The detachment fault is a barrier to fluid flow and exhibits primarily brittle deformation, while the Coyote Mountain segment is a conduit for fluid flow along the northeastern flank of the Tierra Blanca Mountains. The damage zone of the Coyote Mountain segment reaches widths up to 500 m and contains intense fracturing and subsidiary faults striking parallel to the main trace. The tonalite protolith is bleached, stained, and altered from water-rock interactions. The most intense bleaching is at a county park, where the protolith is altered to clays and zeolites while the mineralogy of the stained regions contains iron oxides and clinochlore in addition to quartz, Ca-rich albite, and biotite preserved from the protolith. The water chemistry at Agua Caliente hot springs shows the fluid is partially equilibrated. Groundwater temperatures likely reached 75-85°C at depths up to 2.14 km before rising to the surface. Frequent seismicity in the study region is related to the spring characteristics including water level, conductivity, and temperatures. Spring temperature and conductivity displayed three behaviors during the summer 2011 logging period, attributed to seasonal changes and most likely local seismicity as well. Conductivity seems to be the property most influenced by earthquake activity in the area. Changes in fluid chemistry between sampling periods may indicate mixture with other fluid sources.

The Glass Buttes volcanic complex consists of many domes and individual vents that erupted both rhyolitic and basaltic lavas during the late Miocene to early Pliocene. The east half of the complex, in the vicinity of Little Glass Butte, contains interfingering, finely flow-banded rhyolite and black obsidian flows. The youngest unit, an obsidian, has been dated at 4.9 m.y. East of Little Glass Butte lie two northwest-trending ridges, Antelope and Cascade Ridges, composed of two or more overlapping exogenous domes that formed along northwest-trending faults.

Honorable mention, degree project in architecture 2022 Beginning with the adjustment of a single room and culminating through an addition to the dwelling itself, this thesis describes the incremental development of a residential point-block in Hökarängen, a southern suburb of Stockholm. With a careful approach to alteration and addition, the project aims to build on the richness and social ambition of the neighbourhood’s original 1944 urban plan. Striving to reinstate as well as update those ideals of democracy, community and diversity by working in a way that sits outside the current ‘marketized’ mode of production of our cities. Striving towards a kind of symbiosis, the proposed ‘extension’ to the tower is an exploration in both typology at the building scale as well as living conditions at the scale of the apartment.

The Sacramento San Joaquin Delta has been highly altered by human activity since the mid-1800s from mining, agriculture, dredging, and urbanization. Did the resulting modifications to channel width, depth, and length alter tidal range in the Sacramento San Joaquin Delta? In this study, archival tidal records were evaluated at many stations throughout the San Francisco Bay and Delta, with a focus on San Francisco, Rio Vista, Sacramento, and Stockton daily, monthly, and annual tidal ranges. Monthly and seasonally averaged tidal ranges were analyzed to determine seasonal changes. In addition, tidal range was compared to daily Delta discharge to consider the effects of river flow. Results show that the spatial pattern of tidal amplitude through the San Francisco Bay and Delta system have changed since the mid-nineteenth century and the changes are consistent with human and climate change impacts on the Delta landscape. There is a general 7% increase in mean annual tidal range in San Francisco from 1860 to 2018. In Stockton, mean annual tidal range increased from 0.6 meters to 0.9 meters between 1908 and the 1930s but decreased approximately 9% from the 1930s to 2011. Mean annual tidal range in Sacramento increased from zero to 0.5 meters between 1890 and the late 1930s and then decreased by 50% through the early 2000s to approximately 0.25 meters. Lower tidal ranges in the early 1900s are consistent with the effects of hydraulic mining. Increased tidal ranges in the mid-20th century are consistent with dredging throughout the system. Recent decreases in tidal ranges are consistent with wetland restoration, increased water storage, and further modifications to the geometry and management of the Delta. A peak river flow shift from late spring/early summer to early spring has contributed to increased tidal range between February and June by 0.1 and 0.6 meters in San Francisco and Stockton, respectively. In Sacramento, the least decrease in tidal range between 1939 and the present occurred during spring months, due to the decrease in river discharge during this period. Tides have recorded the history of environmental change within the highly altered San Francisco Bay and Sacramento San Joaquin system. While not as notable as similarly altered systems, the changes described here were most significant in Sacramento where mean annual tidal range has ranged between zero and 0.5 meters since 1890 and, for any discharge below 1,000 cubic meters per second, mean daily tidal range is higher from 1938 to 1939 than from 1997 to 2018. Change in tidal range implies potential change in tidal velocities, salinity intrusion dynamics, and flood risk within the system, especially in Sacramento.

The J-M Reef of the Stillwater Complex, Montana (a large layered mafic intrusion), is one of the highest grade platinum group element (PGE) deposits known in the world, producing primarily palladium and platinum in a 3.4:1 ratio. "Ballrooms" of the Stillwater Complex are anomalously wide areas within or stratigraphically below the J-M Reef that host platinum group element mineralization. Ballrooms have two typical morphologies (type 1 and type 2); the first is an abrupt thickening of the mineralization that extends below the Reef Package and the second is a gentle widening of the Reef Package and associated reef mineralization to a width of over 6 m. Ballrooms are highly variable in size. Minimum dimensions for ballroom designation are a thickness (perpendicular to strike) of 6 meters and a length of 5 meters (parallel to strike). Mineralization contacts are irregular but sharp and are characterized by a dramatic decrease in sulfide content (from one to two percent in ballrooms to only trace amounts, Whole rock major and trace element compositions of rocks from ballrooms exhibit a strong geochemical control by cumulus phases. There are no significant major or trace element differences in the rocks from the two ballroom types. Moreover, cumulate mineralogy in ballrooms shows no variation from cumulate mineralogy in the JM Reef. Magnesium, Fe, and Cr exhibit a strong correlation with one another and the other major elements but do not correlate with Cu, Ni, and S. This indicates that Cu, Ni, and S were controlled by processes other than those controlling the distribution of the major elements in cumulus phases. Cl-rich hydrous phases in the ballrooms (apatite and phlogopite) are evidence for the presence of Cl-rich fluids that interacted with melt in the mineralized zone, inferred to coincide with the growth of cumulus silicate phases. Pegmatitic textures also evidence the presence of fluid. The concentrated fluids played the major role in the formation of these anomalously rich ore morphologies. This fluid likely originated when intercumulate melt became fluid saturated during crystallization of the cumulate pile at the base of the magma chamber and migrated upward as Boudreau (1999) suggests. This fluid appears to have been concentrated in some areas to form locally enriched areas of PGE mineralization (ballrooms). Areas of extensive fluid-melt interaction could produce type 2 ballrooms, while type 1 ballrooms were formed where there was little or no melt present when the upwelling fluid became sulfide saturated. The fluid generation and migration may have been caused by an eruption of flood lava from the crystallizing magma chamber. It is possible that even a small eruption from the chamber could generate a large enough pressure decease to induce fluid saturation in the melt remaining in the cumulate pile. This process may have repeated each time lava erupted from the evolving chamber and created multiple sulfide horizons in the Stillwater Complex. Evidence of sulfide remobilization and low temperature secondary alteration is abundant in ballrooms. The secondary alteration phases include sericite, zoisite/clinozoisite, serpentine, magnetite, pyrite, talc, and chlorite. A regional metamorphic event at 1.7 Ga that changed the Pb isotopic composition of the sulfides is likely the cause of the alteration. This low temperature hydrothermal event locally remobilized sulfides, chalcophile elements, and PGEs in the J-M Reef and ballrooms and may have variably depleted or enriched parts of the mineralization. This remobilization of sulfides, chalcophile elements, and PGEs has had a significant influence on the local distribution (centimeters to a few meters) of PGE bearing sulfides.

Purpose: Examine neuromechanical alterations due to isolated and/or combined knee pain and effusion in functional movements. Methods: A 4X3 randomised controlled laboratory study with repeated measures was used. Nineteen, healthy volunteers (age: 22.4 ± 2.4 years) underwent four different treatments (control, effusion, pain, and pain/effusion) with a week wash out period. Ten near-infrared cameras with 43 reflective markers, 12 surface EMG electrodes, and two ground-embedded force platforms were used to record neuromechanical changes during functional movements (walking and drop landing). To induce pain, 5% sodium chloride (1 ml) was injected into the infrapatellar fat pad. To induce effusion, 0.9% sodium chloride (50 ml) was injected into the knee joint capsule. To induce pain/effusion, both injections were employed. No injection was used for the control. Subjects performed walking and a single leg drop landing in three time intervals: precondition (prior to injection), condition (immediate post injection), and postcondition (30 min post injection). To quantify pain perception, the visual analogue scale was measured every two minutes. Results: Under pain/effusion treatment, subjects walked slowly with a shorter stride length. Joint moments of plantarflexion, knee extension, knee abduction, and hip abduction were reduced. Subjects also showed a decrease at 20% and 80% of stance phase, and an increase in 50% in vertical ground reaction force (VGRF). Under the same treatment, subjects landed with a less peak VGRF with increased time to peak VGRF, alterations of joint angles (ankle dorsiflexion, knee extension, and hip adduction), and moments (knee extension, knee abduction, and hip abduction). Conclusions: Joint pain and effusion cause neuromechanical alterations in the lower extremity during functional movements. These compensatory strategies may alter joint loading, potentially resulting in acceleration of the joint degenerative process. We also recommend use of crutches following injury to avoid modifications of movement strategies.

Prosody plays an important role in speech communication. Many individuals with motor speech disorders have decreased prosodic control and thus lower overall intelligibility. Few studies have examined the effect of a flattened prosodic contour on the intelligibility of dysarthric speech, and little is known about the role that listener gender plays in understanding disordered speech. The purpose of this study was to quantify the impact of artificial prosodic manipulation on the intelligibility of dysarthric speech as a function of the extent of fundamental frequency (F0) contour flattening. A further goal was to examine the influence of listener gender on intelligibility. Speech recordings from two speakers (one with mild dysarthria and one with severe dysarthria) were synthetically altered by reducing F0 variability by 50%, 75%, and 100%. Fifty listeners transcribed the sentences and rated the perceived difficulty of the task. Results of the study indicated that a flattened F0 contour led to decreases in the intelligibility of both speakers with dysarthria, both in terms of transcription accuracy and ratings of listener confidence. All altered conditions resulted in poorer intelligibility than the unaltered utterances. For the mild speaker, scores and ratings decreased predictably in proportion to the extent of F0 flattening, whereas for the severe speaker, there was not a steady decrease in intelligibility as the F0 was progressively flattened. The utterances were more intelligible to female than male listeners.