The judicial consequences of using drugs: A substance abuse education program

Recent surveys indicate that there is good reason to be concerned about drug abuse in the nation\u27s school-age population (Bangert-Drowns, 1988). Twenty-seven percent of high school seniors surveyed in 1986 said they were using drugs other than alcohol and seventeen percent reported already trying cocaine (Johnston, Bachman, and O\u27Malley 1987). With substance abuse being a serious problem among students, concerned adults have looked to the schools for help, and many schools have responded by creating substance abuse education programs (Bangert-Drowns, 1988)

The stratigraphic basis of the Anthropocene Event

This paper outlines the stratigraphic basis of a proposed Anthropocene Event. It considers a diachronous event framework to be more appropriate for understanding the Anthropocene than treating it as a new geological series/epoch. Four general categories of material evidence are identified as of particular relevance: ‘artificial’ strata with natural constituents; humanly modified ground; legacy sediments; and ‘natural’ geo-deposits containing artefactual material. All these arise from the interaction and mixing of human, natural, and hybrid human-natural forces. Taken together, such stratigraphic evidence supports the case for recognising the Anthropocene as an unfolding event

Alkaline rains on the Tibetan Plateau and their implication for the original pH of natural rainfall

Natural rains are generally considered as weakly acidic. Long-term measurement in the Tibetan capital city, Lhasa, reveals that alkaline rain is also natural. For the last 3 years the volume-weighted mean pH of rainwater is 7.5. Earlier observation shows even higher average pH values, such as 8.36 in the 1987-1988 period. The major cause of alkaline rain is the alkaline and soil-borne continental dusts in this semiarid area. Bicarbonate is the dominant anion in the water samples. The analysis also shows that the rainwater in this city contains few pollutants, compared with other places in the world. Measurements carried out in two additional industrial cities on the northern and northeastern Tibetan Plateau, Xining and Germu, demonstrate how fast human activities such as industrial development may increase rainwater acidity. In a period of 13 years the rainfall pH value of Germu has dropped from 8.03 to 6.8, representing a manyfold increase of the H+ concentration. Such an increase was caused by rising contents of NO3 - and SO4 -2 in the atmosphere. On the basis of the measurements on the Tibetan Plateau, evidence from other places around the world, and the experiments and calculation, the authors believe that the original pH of natural rainwater in arid and semiarid areas on this planet should be weakly alkaline because of the influence of alkaline dusts. Copyright 2002 by the American Geophysical Union.published_or_final_versio

Forecasting the response of Earth's surface to future climatic and land use changes: a review of methods and research needs

In the future, Earth will be warmer, precipitation events will be more extreme, global mean sea level will rise, and many arid and semiarid regions will be drier. Human modifications of landscapes will also occur at an accelerated rate as developed areas increase in size and population density. We now have gridded global forecasts, being continually improved, of the climatic and land use changes (C&LUC) that are likely to occur in the coming decades. However, besides a few exceptions, consensus forecasts do not exist for how these C&LUC will likely impact Earth-surface processes and hazards. In some cases, we have the tools to forecast the geomorphic responses to likely future C&LUC. Fully exploiting these models and utilizing these tools will require close collaboration among Earth-surface scientists and Earth-system modelers. This paper assesses the state-of-the-art tools and data that are being used or could be used to forecast changes in the state of Earth's surface as a result of likely future C&LUC. We also propose strategies for filling key knowledge gaps, emphasizing where additional basic research and/or collaboration across disciplines are necessary. The main body of the paper addresses cross-cutting issues, including the importance of nonlinear/threshold-dominated interactions among topography, vegetation, and sediment transport, as well as the importance of alternate stable states and extreme, rare events for understanding and forecasting Earth-surface response to C&LUC. Five supplements delve into different scales or process zones (global-scale assessments and fluvial, aeolian, glacial/periglacial, and coastal process zones) in detail

Flood magnitude-frequency and lithologic control on bedrock river incision in post-orogenic terrain

Mixed bedrock-alluvial rivers - bedrock channels lined with a discontinuous alluvial cover - are key agents in the shaping of mountain belt topography by bedrock fluvial incision. Whereas much research focuses upon the erosional dynamics of such rivers in the context of rapidly uplifting orogenic landscapes, the present study investigates river incision processes in a post-orogenic (cratonic) landscape undergoing extremely low rates of incision (> 5 m/Ma). River incision processes are examined as a function of substrate lithology and the magnitude and frequency of formative flows along Sandy Creek gorge, a mixed bedrock-alluvial stream in arid SE-central Australia. Incision is focused along a bedrock channel with a partial alluvial cover arranged into riffle-pool macrobedforms that reflect interactions between rock structure and large-flood hydraulics. Variations in channel width and gradient determine longitudinal trends in mean shear stress (τb) and therefore also patterns of sediment transport and deposition. A steep and narrow, non-propagating knickzone (with 5% alluvial cover) coincides with a resistant quartzite unit that subdivides the gorge into three reaches according to different rock erodibility and channel morphology. The three reaches also separate distinct erosional styles: bedrock plucking (i.e. detachment-limited erosion) prevails along the knickzone, whereas along the upper and lower gorge rock incision is dependent upon large formative floods exceeding critical erosion thresholds (τc) for coarse boulder deposits that line 70% of the channel thalweg (i.e. transport-limited erosion). The mobility of coarse bed materials (up to 2 m diameter) during late Holocene palaeofloods of known magnitude and age is evaluated using step-backwater flow modelling in conjunction with two selective entrainment equations. A new approach for quantifying the formative flood magnitude in mixed bedrock-alluvial rivers is described here based on the mobility of a key coarse fraction of the bed materials; in this case the d84 size fraction. A 350 m3/s formative flood fully mobilises the coarse alluvial cover with τb200-300 N/m2 across the upper and lower gorge riffles, peaking over 500 N/m2 in the knickzone. Such floods have an annual exceedance probability much less than 10- 2 and possibly as low as 10- 3. The role of coarse alluvial cover in the gorge is discussed at two scales: (1) modulation of bedrock exposure at the reach-scale, coupled with adjustment to channel width and gradient, accommodates uniform incision across rocks of different erodibility in steady-state fashion; and (2) at the sub-reach scale where coarse boulder deposits (corresponding to <i>τ</i><sub>b</sub> minima) cap topographic convexities in the rock floor, thereby restricting bedrock incision to rare large floods. While recent studies postulate that decreasing uplift rates during post-orogenic topographic decay might drive a shift to transport-limited conditions in river networks, observations here and elsewhere in post-orogenic settings suggest, to the contrary, that extremely low erosion rates are maintained with substantial bedrock channel exposure. Although bed material mobility is known to be rate-limiting for bedrock river incision under low sediment flux conditions, exactly how a partial alluvial cover might be spatially distributed to either optimise or impede the rate of bedrock incision is open to speculation. Observations here suggest that the small volume of very stable bed materials lining Sandy Creek gorge is distributed so as to minimise the rate of bedrock fluvial incision over time

Forecasting the Response of Earth\u27s Surface to Future Climatic and Land Use Changes: A Review of Methods and Research Needs

In the future, Earth will be warmer, precipitation events will be more extreme, global mean sea level will rise, and many arid and semiarid regions will be drier. Human modifications of landscapes will also occur at an accelerated rate as developed areas increase in size and population density. We now have gridded global forecasts, being continually improved, of the climatic and land use changes (C&LUC) that are likely to occur in the coming decades. However, besides a few exceptions, consensus forecasts do not exist for how these C&LUC will likely impact Earth-surface processes and hazards. In some cases, we have the tools to forecast the geomorphic responses to likely future C&LUC. Fully exploiting these models and utilizing these tools will require close collaboration among Earth-surface scientists and Earth-system modelers. This paper assesses the state-of-the-art tools and data that are being used or could be used to forecast changes in the state of Earth\u27s surface as a result of likely future C&LUC. We also propose strategies for filling key knowledge gaps, emphasizing where additional basic research and/or collaboration across disciplines are necessary. The main body of the paper addresses cross-cutting issues, including the importance of nonlinear/threshold-dominated interactions among topography, vegetation, and sediment transport, as well as the importance of alternate stable states and extreme, rare events for understanding and forecasting Earth-surface response to C&LUC. Five supplements delve into different scales or process zones (global-scale assessments and fluvial, aeolian, glacial/periglacial, and coastal process zones) in detail

The stratigraphic basis of the Anthropocene Event

This paper outlines the stratigraphic basis of a proposed Anthropocene Event. It considers a diachronous event framework to be more appropriate for understanding the Anthropocene than treating it as a new geological series/epoch. Four general categories of material evidence are identified as of particular relevance: ‘artificial’ strata with natural constituents; humanly modified ground; legacy sediments; and ‘natural’ geo-deposits containing artefactual material. All these arise from the interaction and mixing of human, natural, and hybrid human-natural forces. Taken together, such stratigraphic evidence supports the case for recognising the Anthropocene as an unfolding event

Episodic intraplate deformation of stable continental margins: evidence from Late Neogene and Quaternary marine terraces, Cape Liptrap, Southeastern Australia

The Waratah Fault is a northeast trending, high angle, reverse fault in the Late Paleozoic Lachlan Fold Belt at Cape Liptrap on the Southeastern Australian Coast. It is susceptible to reactivation in the modern intraplate stress field in Southeast Australia and exhibits Late Pliocene to Late Pleistocene reactivation. Radiocarbon, optically stimulated luminescence (OSL), and cosmogenic radionuclide (CRN) dating of marine terraces on Cape Liptrap are used to constrain rates of displacement across the reactivated Waratah Fault. Six marine terraces, numbered Qt<sub>6</sub>–Tt<sub>1</sub> (youngest to oldest), are well developed at Cape Liptrap with altitudes ranging from ∼1.5 m to ∼170 m amsl, respectively. On the lowest terrace, Qt<sub>6</sub>, barnacles in wave-cut notches ∼1.5 m amsl, yielded a radiocarbon age of 6090–5880 Cal BP, and reflect the local mid-Holocene sea level highstand. Qt<sub>5</sub> yielded four OSL ages from scattered locations around the cape ranging from ∼80 ka to ∼130 ka. It formed during the Last Interglacial sea level highstand (MIS 5e) at ∼125 ka. Inner edge elevations (approximate paleo high tide line) for Qt<sub>5</sub> occur at distinctly different elevations on opposite sides of the Waratah Fault. Offsets of the inner edges across the fault range from 1.3 m to 5.1 m with displacement rates ranging from 0.01 mm/a to 0.04 mm/a. The most extensive terrace, Tt<sub>4</sub>, yielded four Early Pleistocene cosmogenic radionuclide (CRN) ages: two apparent burial ages of 0.858 Ma ± 0.16 Ma and 1.25 Ma ± 0.265 Ma, and two apparent exposure ages of 1.071 Ma ± 0.071 Ma (<sup>10</sup>Be) and 0.798 Ma ± 0.066 Ma (<sup>26</sup>Al). Allowing for muonic production effects from insufficient burial depths, the depth corrected CRN burial ages are 1.8 Ma ± 0.56 Ma and 2.52 Ma ± 0.88 Ma, or Late Pliocene. A Late Pliocene age is our preferred age. Offsets of Tt<sub>4</sub> across the Waratah Fault range from a minimum of ∼20 m for terrace surface treads to a maximum of ∼70 m for terrace bedrock straths. Calculated displacement rates for Tt<sub>4</sub> range from 0.01 mm/a to 0.04 mm/a (using a Late Pliocene age, ∼2 Ma), identical to the rates calculated for the Last Interglacial terrace, Qt<sub>5</sub>. This indicates that deformation at Cape Liptrap has been ongoing at similar time-averaged rates at least since the Late Pliocene. The upper terraces in the sequence, Tt<sub>3</sub> (∼110 m amsl), Tt<sub>2</sub> (∼140 m) and Tt<sub>1</sub> (∼180 m) are undated, but most likely correlate to sea level highstands in the Neogene. Terraces Tt<sub>1</sub>–Tt<sub>4</sub> show an increasing northward tilt with age. The Waratah Fault forms a prominent structural boundary in the Lachlan Fold Belt discernible from airborne magnetic and bouger gravity anomalies. Seismicity and deformation are episodic. Episodic movement on the Waratah Fault may be coincident with sea level highstands since the Late Pliocene, possibly from increased loading and elevated pore pressure within the fault zone. This suggests that intervals between major seismic events could be on the order of 100 ka