scholarly journals Triton: Topography and Geology of a Probable Ocean World with Comparison to Pluto and Charon

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (17) ◽  
pp. 3476
Author(s):  
Paul Schenk ◽  
Chloe Beddingfield ◽  
Tanguy Bertrand ◽  
Carver Bierson ◽  
Ross Beyer ◽  
...  

The topography of Neptune’s large icy moon Triton could reveal important clues to its internal evolution, but has been difficult to determine. New global digital color maps for Triton have been produced as well as topographic data for <40% of the surface using stereogrammetry and photoclinometry. Triton is most likely a captured Kuiper Belt dwarf planet, similar though slightly larger in size and density to Pluto, and a likely ocean moon that exhibited plume activity during Voyager 2′s visit in 1989. No surface features or regional deviations of greater than ±1 km amplitude are found. Volatile ices in the southern terrains may take the form of extended lobate deposits 300–500 km across as well as dispersed bright materials that appear to embay local topography. Limb hazes may correlate with these deposits, indicating possible surface–atmosphere exchange. Triton’s topography contrasts with high relief up to 6 km observed by New Horizons on Pluto. Low relief of (cryo)volcanic features on Triton contrasts with high-standing massifs on Pluto, implying different viscosity materials. Solid-state convection occurs on both and at similar horizontal scales but in very different materials. Triton’s low relief is consistent with evolution of an ice shell subjected to high heat flow levels and may strengthen the case of an internal ocean on this active body.

Terra Nova ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rosa Maria Prol‐Ledesma ◽  
Juan Luis Carrillo De La Cruz ◽  
Marco‐Antonio Torres‐Vera ◽  
Alejandro Estradas‐Romero

1985 ◽  
Vol 22 (3) ◽  
pp. 416-421 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. H. Sass ◽  
L. A. Lawver ◽  
R. J. Munroe

Heat flow was measured at nine sites in crystalline and sedimentary rocks of southeastern Alaska. Seven of the sites, located between 115 and 155 km landward of the Queen Charlotte – Fairweather transform fault, have an average heat flow of 59 ± 6 mW m−2. This value is significantly higher than the mean of 42 mW m−2 in the coastal provinces between Cape Mendocino and the Queen Charlotte Islands, to the south, and is lower than the mean of 72 ± 2 mW m−2 for 81 values within 100 km of the San Andreas transform fault, even farther south. This intermediate value suggests the absence of significant heat sinks associated with Cenozoic subduction and of heat sources related to either late Cenozoic tectono-magmatic events or significant shear-strain heating. At Warm Springs Bay, 75 km from the plate boundary, an anomalously high heat flow of 150 mW m−2 can most plausibly be ascribed to the thermal spring activity from which its name is derived. At Quartz Hill, 240 km landward of the plate boundary, a value of 115 mW m−2 might indicate a transition to a province of high heat flow resulting from late Tertiary and Quaternary extension and volcanism.


1996 ◽  
Vol 23 (21) ◽  
pp. 3027-3030 ◽  
Author(s):  
L. Guillou-Frottier ◽  
C. Jaupart ◽  
J. C. Mareschal ◽  
C. Gariépy ◽  
G. Bienfait ◽  
...  

Minerals ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (7) ◽  
pp. 635
Author(s):  
Liam A. Bullock ◽  
John Parnell ◽  
Joseph G.T. Armstrong ◽  
Magali Perez ◽  
Sam Spinks

Gold grains, up to 40 μm in size and containing variable percentages of admixed platinum, have been identified in coals from the Leinster Coalfield, Castlecomer, SE Ireland, for the first time. Gold mineralisation occurs in sideritic nodules in coals and in association with pyrite and anomalous selenium content. Mineralisation here may have reflected very high heat flow in foreland basins north of the emerging Variscan orogenic front, responsible for gold occurrence in the South Wales Coalfield. At Castlecomer, gold (–platinum) is attributed to precipitation with replacive pyrite and selenium from groundwaters at redox interfaces, such as siderite nodules. Pyrite in the cores of the nodules indicates fluid ingress. The underlying Caledonian basement bedrock is mineralised by gold, and thus likely provided a source for gold. The combination of the gold occurrences in coal in Castlecomer and in South Wales, proximal to the Variscan orogenic front, suggests that these coals along the front could comprise an exploration target for low-temperature concentrations of precious metals.


2011 ◽  
Vol 11 (6) ◽  
pp. 1599-1603 ◽  
Author(s):  
E. Dologlou

Abstract. The seismicity of the last 15 years in the Aegean Sea revealed that earthquakes (Mw > 5) with epicentres falling within the Sporades basin and the confined area north of Samos island were preceded by electric seismic signals (SES) with a remarkably long lead time. A possible explanation of this behaviour by means of specific tectonics and geodynamics which characterise these two regions, such as a significant small crustal thickness and a high heat flow rate, has been attempted. New data seem to strengthen the above hypothesis.


Nature ◽  
1984 ◽  
Vol 307 (5946) ◽  
pp. 32-36 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jean Francheteau ◽  
Claude Jaupart ◽  
Shen Xian Jie ◽  
Kang Wen-Hua ◽  
Lee De-Lu ◽  
...  

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