Calcium isotopic composition of high-latitude proxy carrier Neogloboquadrina pachyderma (sin.)

The accurate reconstruction of sea surface temperature (SST) history in climate-sensitive regions (e.g. tropical and polar oceans) became a challenging task in palaeoceanographic research. Biogenic shell carbonate SST proxies successfully developed for tropical regions often fail in cool water environments. Their major regional shortcomings and the cryptic diversity now found within the major high latitude proxy carrier Neogloboquadrina pachyderma (sin.) highlight an urgent need to explore complementary SST proxies for these cool-water regions. Here we incorporate the genetic component into a calibration study of a new SST proxy for the high latitudes. We found that the calcium isotopic composition (δ44/40Ca) of calcite from genotyped net catches and core-top samples of the planktonic foraminifera Neogloboquadrina pachyderma (sin.) is related to temperature and unaffected by genetic variations. The temperature sensitivity has been found to be 0.17 (±0.02)‰ per 1°C, highlighting its potential for downcore applications in open marine cool-water environments. Our results further indicate that in extreme polar environments, below a critical threshold temperature of 2.0 (±0.5)°C associated with salinities below 33.0 (±0.5)‰, a prominent shift in biomineralization affects the δ44/40Ca of genotyped and core-top N. pachyderma (sin.), becoming insensitive to temperature. These findings highlight the need of more systematic calibration studies on single planktonic foraminiferal species in order to unravel species-specific factors influencing the temperature sensitivity of Ca isotope fractionation and to validate the proxies' applicability

Sublattice Asymmetric Reductions of Spin Values on Stacked Triangular Lattice Antiferromagnet CsCoBr3_3

We study the reductions of spin values of the ground state on a stacked triangular antiferromagnet using the spin-wave approach. We find that the spin reductions have sublattice asymmetry due to the cancellation of the molecular field. The sublattice asymmetry qualitatively analyzes the NMR results of CsCoBr$_3$.Comment: 5pages, 5figure

Experimental Observation of Continuous Melting into a Hexatic Phase

This paper reports the results of an x-ray diffuse scattering study of the melting transition of monolayer xenon on the surface of single crystals of exfoliated graphite. It is found that the two-dimensional xenon solid melts into an orientationally ordered liquid (or hexatic) phase. The temperature dependence of the orientational correlations suggests that the hexatic phase exists as a consequence of the continuous melting process, not the substrate

A Novel Longitudinal Mode in the Coupled Quantum Chain Compound KCuF3

Inelastic neutron scattering measurements are reported that show a new longitudinal mode in the antiferromagnetically ordered phase of the spin-1/2 quasi-one-dimensional antiferromagnet KCuF3. This mode signals the cross-over from one-dimensional to three-dimensional behavior and indicates a reduction in the ordered spin moment of a spin-1/2 antiferromagnet. The measurements are compared with recent quantum field theory results and are found to be in excellent agreement. A feature of the data not predicted by theory is a damping of the mode by decay processes to the transverse spin-wave branches.Comment: 9 pages of text plus 4 postscript figures (1 color

Three different glacier surges at a spot: What satellites observe and what not

In the Karakoram, dozens of glacier surges occurred in the past 2 decades, making the region a global hotspot. Detailed analyses of dense time series from optical and radar satellite images revealed a wide range of surge behaviour in this region: from slow advances longer than a decade at low flow velocities to short, pulse-like advances over 1 or 2 years with high velocities. In this study, we present an analysis of three currently surging glaciers in the central Karakoram: North and South Chongtar Glaciers and an unnamed glacier referred to as NN9. All three glaciers flow towards the same small region but differ strongly in surge behaviour. A full suite of satellites (e.g. Landsat, Sentinel-1 and 2, Planet, TerraSAR-X, ICESat-2) and digital elevation models (DEMs) from different sources (e.g. Shuttle Radar Topography Mission, SRTM; Satellite Pour l'Observation de la Terre, SPOT; High Mountain Asia DEM, HMA DEM) are used to (a) obtain comprehensive information about the evolution of the surges from 2000 to 2021 and (b) to compare and evaluate capabilities and limitations of the different satellite sensors for monitoring surges of relatively small glaciers in steep terrain. A strongly contrasting evolution of advance rates and flow velocities is found, though the elevation change pattern is more similar. For example, South Chongtar Glacier had short-lived advance rates above 10 yr-1, velocities up to 30 d-1, and surface elevations increasing by 170 m. In contrast, the neighbouring and 3-times-smaller North Chongtar Glacier had a slow and near-linear increase in advance rates (up to 500 yr-1), flow velocities below 1 d-1 and elevation increases up to 100 m. The even smaller glacier NN9 changed from a slow advance to a full surge within a year, reaching advance rates higher than 1 yr-1. It seems that, despite a similar climatic setting, different surge mechanisms are at play, and a transition from one mechanism to another can occur during a single surge. The sensor inter-comparison revealed a high agreement across sensors for deriving flow velocities, but limitations are found on small and narrow glaciers in steep terrain, in particular for Sentinel-1. All investigated DEMs have the required accuracy to clearly show the volume changes during the surges, and elevations from ICESat-2 ATL03 data fit neatly to the other DEMs. We conclude that the available satellite data allow for a comprehensive observation of glacier surges from space when combining different sensors to determine the temporal evolution of length, elevation and velocity changes

Orientational order in xenon fluid monolayers on single crystals of exfoliated graphite

The melting transition of Xe monolayers adsorbed on a single-crystal exfoliated graphite substrate has been studied by high-resolution synchrotron x-ray scattering. At temperatures slightly above the melting transition the fluid phase has a high degree of orientational order. The results are discussed in the context of current theories of two-dimensional melting including the effects of the substrate

Level Statistics of XXZ Spin Chains with Discrete Symmetries: Analysis through Finite-size Effects

Level statistics is discussed for XXZ spin chains with discrete symmetries for some values of the next-nearest-neighbor (NNN) coupling parameter. We show how the level statistics of the finite-size systems depends on the NNN coupling and the XXZ anisotropy, which should reflect competition among quantum chaos, integrability and finite-size effects. Here discrete symmetries play a central role in our analysis. Evaluating the level-spacing distribution, the spectral rigidity and the number variance, we confirm the correspondence between non-integrability and Wigner behavior in the spectrum. We also show that non-Wigner behavior appears due to mixed symmetries and finite-size effects in some nonintegrable cases.Comment: 19 pages, 6 figure

Long-range antiferromagnetic order in the S=1 chain compound LiVGe2O6

The phase transition in the compound LiVGe2O6 has been proposed as a unique example of a spin-Peierls transition in an S=1 antiferromagnetic chain. We report neutron and x-ray diffraction measurements of LiVGe2O6 above and below the phase transition at T=24 K. No evidence is seen for any structural distortion associated with the transition. The neutron results indicate that the low temperature state is antiferromagnetic, driven by ferromagnetic interchain couplings.Comment: 4 pages, 4 ps figures, REVTEX, submitted to PR