Hasil untuk "Geology"

Niccolò Perrone, Fanny Lehmann, Hugo Gabrielidis et al.

Nuclear reactor buildings must be designed to withstand the dynamic load induced by strong ground motion earthquakes. For this reason, their structural behavior must be assessed in multiple realistic ground shaking scenarios (e.g., the Maximum Credible Earthquake). However, earthquake catalogs and recorded seismograms may not always be available in the region of interest. Therefore, synthetic earthquake ground motion is progressively being employed, although with some due precautions: earthquake physics is sometimes not well enough understood to be accurately reproduced with numerical tools, and the underlying epistemic uncertainties lead to prohibitive computational costs related to model calibration. In this study, we propose an AI physics-based approach to generate synthetic ground motion, based on the combination of a neural operator that approximates the elastodynamics Green's operator in arbitrary source-geology setups, enhanced by a denoising diffusion probabilistic model. The diffusion model is trained to correct the ground motion time series generated by the neural operator. Our results show that such an approach promisingly enhances the realism of the generated synthetic seismograms, with frequency biases and Goodness-Of-Fit (GOF) scores being improved by the diffusion model. This indicates that the latter is capable to mitigate the mid-frequency spectral falloff observed in the time series generated by the neural operator. Our method showcases fast and cheap inference in different site and source conditions.

Suman Lata Yadav

The concept of life skills is related to the way of life that emphasises the mutual exchange of knowledge, attitudes, and interpersonal skills in education. Its objective is to develop diverse skills among students and prepare them to face life’s challenges with determination. The World Health Organization has defined life skills as “the positive behaviours and tendencies that enable a person to adapt in day-to-day life.” Life skills are the abilities that enable a person to adapt and exhibit positive behaviour, allowing them to deal effectively with the problems and challenges of daily life. Life is a unique gift. Therefore, by equipping life with various skills, happiness, peace, and prosperity are created. In this research, with the objectives of the study in mind, an analytical examination of life skills among secondary-level students has been conducted. This research study examines the effects of living conditions, gender, and social class on students’ life skills and presents the findings. Future researchers can build upon this, and other factors affecting the research can also be explored.

Hans-Dieter Sues, Rainer R. Schoch

Triassic strata in the portion of the Central European Basin (CEB) that cover parts of conterminous Germany have yielded a long if discontinuous record of continental tetrapods spanning this period. The classic Germanic Triassic succession comprises two mostly terrestrial units, the Buntsandstein and Keuper groups, separated by the predominantly marine Muschelkalk Group (Fig. 1). Thus, it is not possible to trace lineages of terrestrial tetrapods continuously through the entire Triassic Period. Skeletal remains of Early and early Middle Triassic (Induan-early Anisian) reptiles are rare in the Buntsandstein Group and mainly known from the Upper Buntsandstein Subgroup. The Middle Triassic (Anisian-Ladinian) marine carbonates of the Muschelkalk Group have yielded a considerable diversity of sauropterygians together with a few ichthyopterygians, a possible thalattosaurian, and the long-necked tanysaurian archosauromorph Tanystropheus. The late Middle and Late Triassic continental deposits of the Keuper Group preserve a substantial record of the rapidly diversifying crocodile-line and bird-line archosaurs together with stem-forms of some tetrapod crown clades such as turtles and lepidosaurs. In recent years, many new discoveries have greatly increased our knowledge of reptiles from the Keuper Group, especially from the Ladinian-age Lower Keuper Subgroup. The latest Triassic (Rhaetian) is represented by bonebeds containing bones and teeth of marine and continental vertebrates including reptiles that were deposited before the Early Jurassic transgression completely inundated the CEB. This paper provides a detailed overview of the currently known taxa of reptiles from the Triassic of conterminous Germany and explores some more general aspects of this fossil record.

Hongtao Li, Lin Liu, Gao Li et al.

Shale formations display heterogeneous characteristics, and the current methods for assessing the stability of adjacent wells using drilling data have limitations. This paper presents a regional wellbore stability prediction method for shale formations using geomechanics, with a case study on the Longmaxi formation in the Yongchuan area. A 3D structural model was constructed using seismic data and incorporated into finite element software to replicate the heterogeneous mechanical parameters. Numerical simulations were employed to determine the regional in situ stress and predict fracture development based on rock failure criteria. The findings indicate that the maximum and minimum principal stresses in the Longmaxi formation within the Yongchuan area range from 75 to 117 MPa and 54–102 MPa, respectively. The in situ stress is elevated in the dip and fault areas, with fractures primarily occurring in the fault and anticline regions. Both the in situ stress and fracture distribution display significant heterogeneity. Collapse pressure varies from 1.07 to 1.61 g/cm3, with higher values in the fractured zone and maxima in the fault area. Experimental validation supports the simulation results. In addition, this paper examines the influence of elastic modulus, Poisson’s ratio, cohesion, and fracture angle on fracture development and collapse pressure. The results indicate that elastic modulus, cohesion, and fracture angle have a substantial impact, whereas Poisson’s ratio has a minor effect. These findings provide new insights into wellbore stability assessment in shale formations.

Muhammad Afaq Hussain, Zhanlong Chen, Biswajeet Pradhan et al.

Study region: The National Highways 85 and 50, key routes of the China–Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) in Balochistan, Pakistan. Study focus: Flooding is a natural disaster that is becoming increasingly frequent and severe. The National Highways 85 and 50 are vulnerable, necessitating accurate flood susceptibility mapping (FSM). Current machine learning (ML) models for FSM often suffer from low efficiency and overfitting. This study introduces an innovative hybrid FSM approach using four heterogeneous ensemble learning (HEL) techniques combined with three ML models: Random Forest (RF), Support Vector Machine (SVM), and Light Gradient Boosting Machine (LGBM). The proposed method was tested using satellite data from Sentinel-1, Sentinel-2, and Landsat-8, analyzing 1371 flood locations and 12 contributing variables. RF, variable importance factors (VIF), and information gain ratio (IGR) were applied to assess multicollinearity. The dataset was split (70:30) for model training and testing, with HEL-based models achieving superior performance over single ML models. New hydrological insights for the region: The stacking model yielded the highest AUROC (0.98), Kappa (0.82), accuracy (0.927), precision (0.963), Matthew’s correlation coefficient (0.820), and F1-score (0.950). HEL-based models proved more stable and resistant to overfitting. IGR analysis identified slope and distance from streams as key factors in FSM. The resulting flood-prone maps provide insights for disaster management adaptation strategies, demonstrating the broader applicability of the developed approach to enhance FSM accuracy and reliability.

Sebastian Baum, Patrick Huber, Patrick Stengel et al.

The second "Mineral Detection of Neutrinos and Dark Matter" (MDvDM'24) meeting was held January 8-11, 2024 in Arlington, VA, USA, hosted by Virginia Tech's Center for Neutrino Physics. This document collects contributions from this workshop, providing an overview of activities in the field. MDvDM'24 was the second topical workshop dedicated to the emerging field of mineral detection of neutrinos and dark matter, following a meeting hosted by IFPU in Trieste, Italy in October 2022. Mineral detectors have been proposed for a wide variety of applications, including searching for dark matter, measuring various fluxes of astrophysical neutrinos over gigayear timescales, monitoring nuclear reactors, and nuclear disarmament protocols; both as paleo-detectors using natural minerals that could have recorded the traces of nuclear recoils for timescales as long as a billion years and as detectors recording nuclear recoil events on laboratory timescales using natural or artificial minerals. Contributions to this proceedings discuss the vast physics potential, the progress in experimental studies, and the numerous challenges lying ahead on the path towards mineral detection. These include a better understanding of the formation and annealing of recoil defects in crystals; identifying the best classes of minerals and, for paleo-detectors, understanding their geology; modeling and control of the relevant backgrounds; developing, combining, and scaling up imaging and data analysis techniques; and many others. During the last years, MDvDM has grown rapidly and gained attention. Small-scale experimental efforts focused on establishing various microscopic readout techniques are underway at institutions in North America, Europe and Asia. We are looking ahead to an exciting future full of challenges to overcome, surprises to be encountered, and discoveries lying ahead of us.

Tianyang Zhong, Zhengliang Liu, Yi Pan et al.

This comprehensive study evaluates the performance of OpenAI's o1-preview large language model across a diverse array of complex reasoning tasks, spanning multiple domains, including computer science, mathematics, natural sciences, medicine, linguistics, and social sciences. Through rigorous testing, o1-preview demonstrated remarkable capabilities, often achieving human-level or superior performance in areas ranging from coding challenges to scientific reasoning and from language processing to creative problem-solving. Key findings include: -83.3% success rate in solving complex competitive programming problems, surpassing many human experts. -Superior ability in generating coherent and accurate radiology reports, outperforming other evaluated models. -100% accuracy in high school-level mathematical reasoning tasks, providing detailed step-by-step solutions. -Advanced natural language inference capabilities across general and specialized domains like medicine. -Impressive performance in chip design tasks, outperforming specialized models in areas such as EDA script generation and bug analysis. -Remarkable proficiency in anthropology and geology, demonstrating deep understanding and reasoning in these specialized fields. -Strong capabilities in quantitative investing. O1 has comprehensive financial knowledge and statistical modeling skills. -Effective performance in social media analysis, including sentiment analysis and emotion recognition. The model excelled particularly in tasks requiring intricate reasoning and knowledge integration across various fields. While some limitations were observed, including occasional errors on simpler problems and challenges with certain highly specialized concepts, the overall results indicate significant progress towards artificial general intelligence.

Denton S. Ebel, Lawrence Grossman

Formation of the giant Chicxulub crater off Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula coincided with deposition of the global Ir-rich Cretaceous-Tertiary (K-T) stratigraphic boundary layer at ca. 65 Ma. The boundary is marked most sharply by abundant spherules containing unaltered grains of magnesioferrite spinel. Here we predict for the first time the sequential condensation of solids and liquids from the plume of vaporized rock expected from oblique K-T impacts. We predict highly oxidizing plumes that condense silicate liquid droplets bearing spinel grains whose compositions closely match those marking the actual boundary. Systematic global variations in spinel composition are consistent with higher condensation temperatures for spinels found at Atlantic and European sites than for those in the Pacific.

Xiaoming Bi, Jan Harms

The response of the Moon to gravitational waves (GWs) is used by some of the proposed lunar GW detectors like the Lunar Gravitational-wave Antenna (LGWA) to turn the Moon into an antenna for GWs. The deep connection between the lunar internal structure, its geophysical environment and the study of the Universe is intriguing, but given our limited understanding of the Moon today, it also makes it very difficult to predict the science potential of lunar GW detectors accurately. Lunar response models have been developed since the Apollo program, but there is evidence coming from seismic measurements during the Apollo missions that the models are not good enough and possibly underestimating the lunar GW response especially in the decihertz frequency band. In this paper, we will provide an extension of Freeman Dyson's half-space model to include horizontally layered geologies, which allows us to carry out computationally efficient calculations of the lunar GW response above 0.1\,Hz compared to the normal-mode simulations used in the past. We analyze how the results depend on the values of geometric and elastic parameters of the layered geological model, and we find that modifications of the geological model as required to explain Apollo seismic observations can boost the lunar GW response.

Degfie Teku, Nega Kesete, Abebaw Abebe

Soil erosion is the most challenging and major environmental problems in the Upper Meki Sub catchment. Therefore, this work aims to determine the relative influences of erosion governing factors and to estimate the annual soil loss in the sub catchment area using RUSLE model. The model variables including rainfall erosivity (R), soil erodibility (K), topography (LS), cover and management (C), and support practices (P) were implemented into the GIS environment and a layer of each of these factors was prepared. The estimated value of R, K, LS, C, and P for the sub catchment area ranges from 512 to 604 MJ mm ha-1 h-1 yr-1, 0.137 to 0.169 tons/ha, 0 to 59, 0.001 to 0.4 and 0.10 – 1.00 respectively. The raster values of all these factors were multiplied by using GIS calculator. Based on the results from GIS raster calculation and RUSLE model, the total annual potential soil loss from the sub catchment area is about 2,756,540 tons per year with a mean estimated soil loss rate of 28.12 + 34.77 t/ha/yr and the total actual annual soil loss is 492929 tons with an estimated erosion rate of 37.05 + 46.7 t/ha/yr. Rainfall is identified as the most sensitive factor of soil erosion in the sub catchment area. Our estimation of soil erosion provides notional basses that the area needs immediate action to sustain the soil. Nevertheless, further research on severity analysis and area prioritization, and sediment loss estimation in this watershed is highly recommended to develop practical way of conserving practices.

Boxiao Yu, Reagan Tibbetts, Titon Barua et al.

Underwater caves are challenging environments that are crucial for water resource management, and for our understanding of hydro-geology and history. Mapping underwater caves is a time-consuming, labor-intensive, and hazardous operation. For autonomous cave mapping by underwater robots, the major challenge lies in vision-based estimation in the complete absence of ambient light, which results in constantly moving shadows due to the motion of the camera-light setup. Thus, detecting and following the caveline as navigation guidance is paramount for robots in autonomous cave mapping missions. In this paper, we present a computationally light caveline detection model based on a novel Vision Transformer (ViT)-based learning pipeline. We address the problem of scarce annotated training data by a weakly supervised formulation where the learning is reinforced through a series of noisy predictions from intermediate sub-optimal models. We validate the utility and effectiveness of such weak supervision for caveline detection and tracking in three different cave locations: USA, Mexico, and Spain. Experimental results demonstrate that our proposed model, CL-ViT, balances the robustness-efficiency trade-off, ensuring good generalization performance while offering 10+ FPS on single-board (Jetson TX2) devices.

Xiaoying Zhuang, Shuwei Zhou, Mao Sheng et al.

In the hydraulic fracturing of natural rocks, understanding and predicting crack penetrations into the neighboring layers is crucial and relevant in terms of cost-efficiency in engineering and environmental protection. This study constitutes a phase field framework to examine hydraulic fracture propagation in naturally-layered porous media. Biot's poroelasticity theory is used to couple the displacement and flow field, while a phase field method helps characterize fracture growth behavior. Additional fracture criteria are not required and fracture propagation is governed by the equation of phase field evolution. Thus, penetration criteria are not required when hydraulic fractures reach the material interfaces. The phase field method is implemented within a staggered scheme that sequentially solves the displacement, phase field, and fluid pressure. We consider the soft-to-stiff and the stiff-to-soft configurations, where the layer interface exhibits different inclination angles $θ$. Penetration, singly-deflected, and doubly-deflected fracture scenarios can be predicted by our simulations. In the soft-to-stiff configuration, $θ=0^\circ$ exhibits penetration or symmetrical doubly-deflected scenarios, and $θ=15^\circ$ exhibits singly-deflected or asymmetric doubly-deflected scenarios. Only the singly-deflected scenario is obtained for $θ=30^\circ$. In the stiff-to-soft configuration, only the penetration scenario is obtained with widening fractures when hydraulic fractures penetrate into the soft layer.

M. J. Prather, H. Guo, H. Guo et al.

<p>The NASA Atmospheric Tomography Mission (ATom) completed four seasonal deployments (August 2016, February 2017, October 2017, May 2018), each with regular 0.2–12 km profiling by transecting the remote Pacific Ocean and Atlantic Ocean basins. Additional data were also acquired for the Southern Ocean, the Arctic basin, and two flights over Antarctica. ATom in situ measurements provide a near-complete chemical characterization of the <span class="inline-formula">∼</span> 140 000 10 s (80 m by 2 km) air parcels measured along the flight path. This paper presents the Modeling Data Stream (MDS), a continuous gap-filled record of the 10 s parcels containing the chemical species needed to initialize a gas-phase chemistry model for the budgets of tropospheric ozone and methane. Global 3D models have been used to calculate the Reactivity Data Stream (RDS), which is comprised of the chemical reactivities (production and loss) for methane, ozone, and carbon monoxide, through 24 h integration of the 10 s parcels. These parcels accurately sample tropospheric heterogeneity and allow us to partially deconstruct the spatial scales and variability that define tropospheric chemistry from composition to reactions. This paper provides a first look at and analysis of the up-to-date MDS and RDS data including all four deployments (Prather et al., 2023, <a href="https://doi.org/10.7280/D1B12H">https://doi.org/10.7280/D1B12H</a>).</p> <p>ATom's regular profiling of the ocean basins allows for weighted averages to build probability densities for the key species and reactivities presented here. These statistics provide climatological metrics for global chemistry models, e.g., the large-scale pattern of ozone and methane loss in the lower troposphere and the more sporadic hotspots of ozone production in the upper troposphere. The profiling curtains of reactivity also identify meteorologically variable and hence deployment-specific hotspots of photochemical activity. Added calculations of the sensitivities of the production and loss terms relative to each species emphasize the few dominant species that control the ozone and methane budgets and whose statistical patterns should be key model–measurement metrics. From the sensitivities, we also derive linearized lifetimes of ozone and methane on a parcel-by-parcel basis and average over the basins, providing an observational basis for these previously model-only diagnostics. We had found that most model differences in the ozone and methane budgets are caused by the models calculating different climatologies for the key species such as O<span class="inline-formula">₃</span>, CO, H<span class="inline-formula">₂</span>O, NO<span class="inline-formula">_<i>x</i></span>, CH<span class="inline-formula">₄</span>, and <span class="inline-formula"><i>T</i></span>, and thus these ATom measurements make a substantial contribution to the understanding of model differences and even identifying model errors in global tropospheric chemistry.</p>

Azizollah Khormali, Soroush Ahmadi

Abstract Scale precipitation is one of the major problems in the petroleum industry during waterflooding. The possibility of salt formation and precipitation should be monitored and analyzed under dynamic conditions to improve production performance. Scale precipitation and its dependence on production parameters should be investigated before using scale inhibitors. In this study, the precipitation of barium sulfate salt was investigated through dynamic tube blocking tests at different injection rates and times. For this purpose, the pressure drop caused by salt deposition was evaluated at injection rates of 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 mL/min. The software determined the worst conditions (temperature, pressure, and water mixing ratio) for barium sulfate precipitation. Moreover, during the experiments, the pressure drop caused by barium sulfate precipitation was measured without using scale inhibitors. The pressure drop data were evaluated by the response surface method and analysis of variance to develop a new model for predicting the pressure drop depending on the injection rate and time. The novelty of this study lies in the development of a new high-precision correlation to predict barium sulfate precipitation under dynamic conditions using the response surface methodology that evaluates the effect of injection rate and time on the possibility of salt precipitation. The accuracy and adequacy of the obtained model were confirmed by using R2 statistics (including R2-coefficient of determination, adjusted R2, and predicted R2), adequate precision, and diagnostic charts. The results showed that the proposed model could fully and accurately predict the pressure drop. Increasing the time and decreasing the injection rate caused an increase in pressure drop and precipitation of barium sulfate salt, which was related to the formation of more salt due to the contact of ions. In addition, in a short period of the injection process, the pressure drop due to salt deposition increased sharply, which confirms the need to use a suitable scale inhibitor to control salt deposition. Finally, the dynamic tube blocking tests were repeated in the presence of two well-known scale inhibitors, which prevented salt deposition in the tubes. At the same time, no pressure drop was observed in the presence of scale inhibitors at all injection rates during a long period of injection. The obtained results can be used for the evaluation of salt precipitation during oil production in the reservoirs, in which barium sulfate is precipitated during waterflooding. For this purpose, knowing the flow rate and injection time, it is possible to determine the amount of pressure drop caused by salt deposition.

S. Ghuffar, S. Ghuffar, O. King et al.

<p>The panoramic cameras (PCs) on board Hexagon KH-9 (KH-9PC) satellite missions from 1971–1984 captured very high-resolution stereo imagery with up to 60 cm spatial resolution. This study explores the potential of this imagery for glacier mapping and change estimation. We assess KH-9PC imagery using data from the KH-9 mapping camera (KH-9MC), KH-4PC, and SPOT and Pléiades satellite imagery. The high resolution of KH-9PC leads to higher-quality DEMs, which better resolve the accumulation region of the glaciers in comparison to the KH-9MC. On stable terrain, KH-9PC DEMs achieve an elevation accuracy of <span class="inline-formula">&lt;4</span> m with respect to SPOT and Pléiades DEMs. While the estimated geodetic mass balances using PC and MC data are similar after outlier filtering, the elevation change data show superior spatial coverage and considerably less noise when using KH-9PC data.</p>

Oisín A. P. Mac Conamhna

A historical record of a seismic tsunami is identified in the Irish annals for October 720 (all dates herein CE). It is contained in the earliest stratum of the annals, which survives in the form of a handful of iterated scribal copies of the foundational text of the tradition. This was compiled by the contemporary observation of noteworthy events for the years c. 563-740 at the monastery of Iona in the Scottish Hebrides. The 720 event is close outside the 2$σ$ radiocarbon terminus ante quem date ranges for tsunami deposits identified at Dury Voe (530-660) and Basta Voe (430-650) in the Shetland Isles, and is identified as a candidate progenitor. The possibility of the existence of associated tsunami deposits in Scotland or on the north coast of Ireland is highlighted.

Wolfgang Dreybrodt, Jens Fohlmeister

Degassing of CO2 and precipitation of calcite to the surface of stalagmites can strongly impact isotope signals imprinted into the calcite of these speleothems. Here, we show that in all the variety of conditions occurring in nature only two distinct types of degassing exist. First, when a thin film of calcareous solution comes in contact to cave air lower pCO2 value than that of the aqueous CO2 in the water, molecular CO2 escapes by physical diffusion in several seconds. In a next step lasting several ten seconds, pH and DIC in the solution achieve chemical equilibrium with respect to the CO2 in the cave atmosphere. This solution becomes supersaturated with respect to calcite. During precipitation for each unit CaCO3 deposited one molecule of CO2 is generated and escapes from the solution. This precipitation driven degassing is active during precipitation only. We show that all variations of out gassing proposed in the literature are either diffusive outgassing or precipitation driven degassing and that diffusive outgassing has no influence on the isotope composition of the HCO3 - pool and consequently on that of calcite. Its isotope imprint is determined solely by precipitation driven degassing in contrast to most explanations in the literature. We present a theoretical model of d13C and d18O that explains the contributions of various parameters such as changes in temperature, changes of pCO2 in the cave atmosphere, and changes in the drip intervals to the isotope composition of calcite precipitated to the apex of the stalagmite. We use this model to calculate quantitatively changes of d13C and d18O observed in field experiments (Carlson et al., 2020) in agreement to their experimental data. We also apply our model to prior calcite precipitation (PCP) in the field as reported by Mickler et al. (2019). We discuss how PCP influences isotope composition signals. ...

Matheus Rufino, Sandro Guedes

Fission-track annealing models aim to extrapolate laboratory annealing kinetics to the geological timescale for application to geological studies. Model trends empirically capture the mechanisms of track length reduction. To facilitate the interpretation of the fission-track annealing trends, a formalism, based on quantities already in use for the study of physicochemical processes, is developed and allows for the calculation of rate constants, Arrhenius activation energies, and transitivity functions for the fission-track annealing models. These quantities are then obtained for the parallel Arrhenius, parallel curvilinear, fanning Arrhenius, and fanning curvilinear models, fitted with Durango apatite data. Parallel models showed to be consistent with a single activation energy mechanism and a reaction order model of order ~ -4. However, the fanning curvilinear model is the one that results in better fits laboratory data and predictions in better agreement with geological evidence. Fanning models seem to describe a more complex picture, with concurrent recombination mechanisms presenting activation energies varying with time and temperature, and the reaction order model seems not to be the most appropriate. It is apparent from the transitivity analysis that the dominant mechanisms described by the fanning models are classical (not quantum) energy barrier transitions.

Mika Kivimäki, ProfFMedSci, G David Batty, ProfDSc, Jaana Pentti, MSc et al.

Summary: Background: Observational studies have identified a link between unfavourable neighbourhood characteristics and increased risk of morbidity, but it is unclear whether changes in neighbourhoods affect future disease risk. We used a data-driven approach to assess the impact of neighbourhood modification on 79 health outcomes. Methods: In this prospective cohort study, we used pooled, individual-level data from two Finnish cohort studies: the Health and Social Support study and the Finnish Public Sector study. Neighbourhood characteristics (mean educational level, median income, and employment rate of residents, and neighbourhood green space) and individual lifestyle factors of community-dwelling individuals were assessed at baseline (at different waves starting between 1998 and 2013). We repeated assessment of neighbourhood characteristics and lifestyle factors approximately 5 years from each baseline assessment, after which follow-up began for health conditions diagnosed according to the WHO International Classification of Diseases for 79 common health conditions using linkage to electronic health records. We used Cox proportional hazard regression models to compute adjusted hazard ratios (HRs) of incident disease associated with neighbourhood characteristics and changes in neighbourhood characteristics over time and logistic regression analysis to compute adjusted odds of association between changes in neighbourhood characteristics and individual lifestyle factors. Findings: 114 786 individuals (87 012 [75·8%] women; mean age 44·4 years [SD 11·1]) had complete data and were included in this cohort study. During 1·17 million person-years at risk, we recorded 164 368 new-onset health conditions and 3438 deaths. Favourable changes in neighbourhood characteristics were associated with reduced risk of all-cause mortality and incidence of 19 specific health conditions. Unfavourable changes were correspondingly associated with increased risk of mortality and 27 specific health conditions. Among participants who did not move residence during the observation period, relative to individuals who continually lived in disadvantaged neighbourhoods, those who experienced favourable modifications in neighbourhood characteristics had a lower risk of future diabetes (HR 0·84, 95% CI 0·75–0·93), stroke (0·49, 0·29–0·83), skin disease (0·72, 0·53–0·97), and osteoarthritis (0·87, 0·77–0·99). Living in a neighbourhood with improving characteristics was also associated with improvements in individual-level health-related lifestyle factors. Among participants who lived in advantaged residential environments at baseline, unfavourable changes in neighbourhood characteristics were associated with an increased risk of diabetes, stroke, skin disease, and osteoarthritis compared with individuals who lived in advantaged neighbourhoods throughout the study period. Interpretation: Favourable modifications to residential neighbourhoods showed robust, longitudinal associations with a range of improvements in health outcomes, including improved health behaviours and reduced risk of cardiometabolic, infectious, and orthopaedic conditions. Funding: UK Medical Research Council, US National Institute on Aging, NordForsk, and Academy of Finland.

A. Jacob, M. Peltz, S. Hale et al.

<p>Computer X-ray microtomography (<span class="inline-formula">µ</span>XCT) represents a powerful tool for investigating the physical properties of porous rocks. While calculated porosities determined by this method typically match experimental measurements, computed permeabilities are often overestimated by more than 1 order of magnitude. This effect increases towards smaller pore sizes, as shown in this study, in which nanostructural features related to clay minerals reduce the permeability of tight reservoir sandstone samples. Focussed ion beam scanning electron microscopy (FIB-SEM) tomography was applied to determine the permeability effects of illites at the nanometre scale, and Navier–Stokes equations were applied to calculate the permeability of these domains. With these data, microporous domains (porous voxels) were defined using microtomography images of a tight reservoir sample. The distribution of these domains could be extrapolated by calibration against size distributions measured in FIB-SEM images. For this, we assumed a mean permeability for the dominant clay mineral (illite) in the rock and assigned it to the microporous domains within the structure. The results prove the applicability of our novel approach by combining FIB-SEM with X-ray tomographic rock core scans to achieve a good correspondence between measured and simulated permeabilities. This methodology results in a more accurate representation of reservoir rock permeability in comparison to that estimated purely based on <span class="inline-formula">µ</span>XCT images.</p>