KALMAR: "Kurile-Kamchatka and Aleutean Marginal Sea-Island Arc Systems: Geodynamic and Climate Interaction in Space and Time“ : an integrated Polar science approach between Russia and Germany

EGU2011-4204-1 The Russian German Cooperation in polar marine science has a long tradition. Since the last decade of the last century, there is a continous joint effort for geoscientific studies in the arctic and subarctic Far East. The new initiative of KALMAR II will concentrate on the complex geosystem of the Kurile-Kamchatka-Aleutean arc including the adjacent regions of the arctic Bering Sea and the NW Pacific. This giant and unique natural laboratory will allow the study of interactions and fluxes between the asthenosphere, the lithosphere, the hydrosphere, the cryosphere, and the atmosphere in order to provide detailed insights into natural risks (volcanic eruptions, tsunamis) and regional dynamics of the climate impacting on the global system. The envisaged integrated investigation will built upon the existing network of scientists from both countries who studied geodynamic and volcanologic as well paleoceanographic and paleoclimatic issues successfully in the past in the Far East. Two main research foci, ocean and climate dynamics as well as volcanisms and geodynamics, form the scientific backbone of the new KALMAR II initiative which will comprise in total five interlinked subprojects: Two subprojects will focus on the paleoclimatic and paleoceanographic evolution of this arctic region in relation to the development of the NW Pacific on millennial and decadal as well as seasonal times scales. This approach will test existing hypothesis with respect to water mass structure and water mass exchange through the Bering Strait, intermediate water mass formation, which, until know, is still not understood, marine productivity and their impact on the CO2 cycle, the glaciation history of Kamchatka and the continental oceanic (arctic) teleconnection between Atlantic and Pacific. The closely linked terrestrial subproject will study the marine influenced arctic region of Northern Kamchatka focusing on the geomorphologic and paleoclimatic evolution within the context of the northern hemisphere climate. One subproject within the volcanic and geodynamic focus will study experimentally petrologic and magmatic processes to better understand the evolution of magma and their volatiles in this volcanic arc system and how eruptions impact on the regional and global climate. Extremely linked to this subproject is the second one, which concentrates on the differentiation and alteration of volcanic rocks and their related volatile production. Special emphasis will be laid on fluid rock interactions in order to provide information about the input of fluids into the atmosphere and the hydrosphere. In a third aspect we envisage to study the origin of the volcanism within the western segment of the Aleutean Arc. This young volcanic activity ranging from Attu Island to Kamchatka was recently discovered from KALMAR scientists. The investigation of these volcanic rocks may reveal the transition from intraplate volcanism (North Kamchatka) to island arc volcanism (Attu Island) and may also shed light on the influence of the inclination of the subducting plate on the composition and intensity of the volcanic activity. All three magmatic and volcanological subprojects will use off shore as well as on shore material. To investigate the influence of major volcanic eruptions on the atmosphere and ocean, climate models will be employed

Cold-water corals and hydrochemistry - is there a unifying link?

Physical and chemical parameters were measured in five different regions of the Northeast Atlantic with known occurrences of cold-water coral reefs and mounds and in the Mediterranean, where these corals form living carpets over existing morphologies. In this study we analyzed 282 bottom water samples regarding delta13CDIC, delta18O, and DIC. The hydrochemical data reveal characteristic patterns and differences for cold-water coral sites with living coral communities and ongoing reef and mound growth at the Irish and Norwegian sites. While the localities in the Mediterranean, in the Gulf of Cadiz, and off Mauritania show only patchy coral growth on mound-like reliefs and various substrates. The analysis of delta13C/delta18O reveals distinct clusters for the different regions and the respective bottom water masses bathing the delta18O, and especially between delta13CDIC and DIC shows that DIC is a parameter with high sensitivity to the mixing of bottom water masses. It varies distinctively between sites with living reefs/mounds and sites with restricted patchy growth or dead corals. Results suggest that DIC and delta13CDIC can provide additional insights into the mixing of bottom water masses. Prolific cold-water coral growth forming giant biogenic structures plot into a narrow geochemical window characterized by a variation of delta13CDIC between 0.45 and 0.79 per mille being associated with the water mass having a density of sigma-theta of 27.5+-0.15 kg m-3

A remarkably large depleted core in the Abell 2029 BCG IC 1101

We report the discovery of an extremely large (R_b ~ 2"77 ~ 4.2 kpc) core in the brightest cluster galaxy, IC 1101, of the rich galaxy cluster Abell 2029. Luminous core-S\'ersic galaxies contain depleted cores---with sizes (R_b) typically 20 - 500 pc---that are thought to be formed by coalescing black hole binaries. We fit a (double nucleus) + (spheroid) + (intermediate-scale component) + (stellar halo) model to the HST surface brightness profile of IC 1101, finding the largest core size measured in any galaxy to date. This core is an order of magnitude larger than those typically measured for core-S\'ersic galaxies. We find that the spheroid's V-band absolute magnitude (M_V) of -23.8 mag (~ 25% of the total galaxy light, i.e., including the stellar halo) is faint for the large R_b, such that the observed core is 1.02 dex ~ 3.4 sigma_s (rms scatter) larger than that estimated from the R_ b -M_V relation. The suspected scouring process has produced a large stellar mass deficit (M_def) ~ 4.9 X 10^11 M_sun, i.e., a luminosity deficit ~ 28% of the spheroid's luminosity prior to the depletion. Using IC 1101's black hole mass (M_BH) estimated from the M_BH-$\sigma$, M_BH-L and M_BH-M_* relations, we measure an excessive and unrealistically high number of dry major mergers for IC 1101 (i.e., \mathcal{N} \ga 76) as traced by the large M_def/M_ BH ratios of 38-101. The large core, high mass deficit and oversized M_def/M_ BH ratio of IC 1101 suggest that the depleted core was scoured by overmassive SMBH binaries with a final coalesced mass M_BH ~ (4 -10) X 10^10 M_sun, i.e., ~ (1.7- 3.2) X sigma_s larger than the black hole masses estimated using the spheroid's $\sigma$, L and M_*. The large core might be partly due to oscillatory core passages by a gravitational radiation-recoiled black hole.Comment: 17 pages, 9 figures, accepted for publication in MNRA

KALMAR - „Kurile-Kamchatka and Aleutean Marginal Sea-Island Arc Systems: Geodynamic and Climate Interaction in Space and Time” – an integrated science approach between Russia and Germany

EGU2010-2934 The exploration of the arctic seas require an integrated approach applying different infrastructures. In Fall 2009 German and Russian scientists performed a geo marine cruise off Kamchatka and in the western Bering Sea within the frame of the KALMAR-Project. Two main research subjects formed the scientific backbone of the cruise: The first objective focuses on the geodynamic and volcanological magmatic development of the Kuril-Kamchatka island arc system and the Kamchatka Aleutean Islands Triple-Junction. Very little is known about the composition of the mantle and the oceanic crust as well as of the seamounts including their ages. The best studied site is the Volcanologist’s Massif located between the Bering- and the Alpha Fracture Zone (Tsvetkov 1990, Volynets et al. 1992, Yogodzinsky et al. 1994), which structurally belongs to the Komandorsky Basin. The oldest rocks of the Volcanologist´s Massif show very similar trace element and isotope signatures like those rocks cropping out in the volcanoes on Kamchatka in the prolongation of the Alpha Fracture Zone (Portnyagin et al. 2005a), indicating similar conditions of magma formation. The top of the Volcanologist´s Massif is characterized by the young ( 85 Ma. The only existing basement rocks from this seamount were gained during DSDP Leg 19. These are basalts with MORB like trace element and isotope signatures (Keller et al. 2000, Regelous et al. 2003). These data indicate that the Hawaii-Hotspot was at a MOR in Cretaceous time and that large volumes of depleted mantle material played a´role during the magma formation. The second objective focuses on paleo-oceanographic investigations concentrating on the sediments along the eastern continental slope of Kamchatka, in the Komandorsky Basin, and on the Shirshov Ridge in order to explore paleoclimate archives to better understand the subpolar water mass transfer and the oceanographic and climatic development in the subarctic NW-Pacific. Comparisons of Late Pleistocene and Holocene temperature changes within the near surface water masses between the NW-Pacific and the N-Atlantic resulted in a new hypothesis, the "Atlantic-Pacific seesaw" (Kiefer et al. 2001, Kim et al. 2004, Kiefer and Kienast, 2005). This Atlantic-Pacific pattern of opposite temperature variations dominates the last 60ka on millennial timescales. Modelling results of Saenko et al. (2004) support the hypothesis of the "Atlantic-Pacific seesaw" and they postulate a mechanistic connection between the two regions driven by salinity variations, which couples both regions through the thermohaline circulation. A different model relates the Holocene Atlantic-Pacific dipole to the atmospheric tele-connection between the Arctic Oscillation/N-Atlantic Oscillation and the Pacific N-American Oscillation (Kim et al. 2004). http://kalmar.ifm-geomar.d

2. Wochenbericht SO201/2

SO 201 – KALMAR Leg 2: 30. 8. – 8. 9. 2009 Busan – Tomakomai 2. Wochenbericht (7.9. - 13.9

4. Wochenbericht SO201/2

SO 201 – KALMAR Leg 2: 30. 8. – 8. 9. 2009 Busan – Tomakomai 4. Wochenbericht (21.9. - 27.9

The Glacier Complexes of the Mountain Massifs of the North-West of Inner Asia and their Dynamics

The subject of this paper is the glaciation of the mountain massifs Mongun-Taiga, Tavan-Boghd-Ola, Turgeni- Nuru, and Harhira-Nuru. The glaciation is represented mostly by small forms that sometimes form a single complex of domeshaped peaks. According to the authors, the modern glaciated area of the mountain massifs is 21.2 km2 (Tavan-Boghd-Ola), 20.3 km2 (Mongun-Taiga), 42 km2 (Turgeni- Nuru), and 33.1 km2 (Harhira-Nuru). The area of the glaciers has been shrinking since the mid 1960’s. In 1995–2008, the rate of reduction of the glaciers’ area has grown considerably: valley glaciers were rapidly degrading and splitting; accumulation of morainic material in the lower parts of the glaciers accelerated. Small glaciers transformed into snowfields and rock glaciers. There has been also a degradation of the highest parts of the glaciers and the collapse of the glacial complexes with a single zone of accumulation into isolated from each other glaciers. Reduced snow cover area has led to a rise in the firn line and the disintegration of a common accumulation area of the glacial complex. In the of the Mongun-Taiga massif, in 1995– 2008, the firn line rose by 200–300 m. The reduction of the glaciers significantly lagged behind the change in the position of the accumulation area boundary. In the past two years, there has been a significant recovery of the glaciers that could eventually lead to their slower degradation or stabilization of the glaciers in the study area