Unsaturated Flow Influences the Response of Leaky Aquifer to Earth Tides

Most studies about the tidal response of leaky aquifers have treated the layered groundwater system as a classical unconfined aquifer without unsaturated flow. However, a recent study has shown that the conventional hypothesis of free drainage of groundwater to the watertable may be defective and the unsaturated flow may strongly affect their tidal response. Hence, it is critical to examine if unsaturated flow may also affect the tidal response of a layered groundwater system. In this study, we apply two-dimensional multilayered numerical simulations to examine the tidal response of unsaturated flow in a leaky aquifer. The results show that unsaturated flow on the watertable may significantly affect the tidal response of deeply buried aquifers, and the thicker the unsaturated zone is, the greater influence on the groundwater response to earth tide would be. Besides, a dimensionless quality ω∗ is introduced to estimate the effect of the unsaturated flow. When ω∗>10−0.5, the effect of the unsaturated flow on the tidal response of the water level is evidently; otherwise, the effect can be neglected. We then apply the numerical model to interpret the tidal response of a well installed in Lijiang, Yunnan province, China. It perfectly explains that the phase shift and amplitude ratio, respectively, decrease and increase exponentially when the watertable is below the ground surface. This study emphasizes the necessity of considering unsaturated flow in the multilayered model to improve the accuracy of predicting the permeability of the leaky aquifer.

Dynamical evolution of voids with surrounding gravitational tidal field

ABSTRACT The void ellipticity distribution today can be well explained by the tidal field. Going a step further from the overall distribution, we investigate individuality on the tidal response of void shape in non-linear dynamical evolution. We perform an N-body simulation and trace individual voids using particle ID. The voids are defined based on Voronoi tessellation and watershed algorithm, using public code vide. A positive correlation is found between the time variation of void ellipticity and tidal field around a void if the void maintains its constituent particles. Such voids tend to have smaller mass densities. Conversely, not a few voids significantly deform by particle exchange, rather than the tidal field. Those voids may prevent us from correctly probing a quadrupole field of gravity out of a void shape.

Capillary effect on the tidal response of buried aquifers – an interaction between shallow and deep groundwater systems

<p>The interaction between the shallow and deep groundwater systems is important for a number of issues on water resources and the environment but is difficult to evaluate directly. Here we use two-dimensional numerical simulations to show that the tidal response of deep aquifers may be significantly affected by capillary force on the water table. We propose a criterion to evaluate the capillary effect and apply the model to interpret the tidal response of the Arbuckle aquifer in a USGS deep monitoring well in Oklahoma. Our study suggests that the shallow and deep groundwater systems may interact across thick layers of intervening aquitards and that the analysis of the tidal response of deep aquifers may be an effective means to evaluate such interaction.</p>

Solid tidal friction in multi-layer planets: Application to Earth, Venus, a Super Earth and the TRAPPIST-1 planets

With the discovery of TRAPPIST-1 and its seven planets residing within 0.06 au, it is becoming increasingly necessary to carry out correct treatments of tidal interactions. The eccentricity, rotation, and obliquity of the planets of TRAPPIST-1 do indeed result from the tidal evolution over the lifetime of the system. Tidal interactions can also lead to tidal heating in the interior of the planets (as for Io), which may then be responsible for volcanism or surface deformation. In the majority of studies aimed at estimating the rotation of close-in planets or their tidal heating, the planets are considered as homogeneous bodies and their rheology is often taken to be a Maxwell rheology. Here, we investigate the impact of taking into account a multi-layer structure and an Andrade rheology in the way planets dissipate tidal energy as a function of the excitation frequency. We use an internal structure model, which provides the radial profile of structural and rheological quantities (such as density, shear modulus, and viscosity) to compute the tidal response of multi-layered bodies. We then compare the outcome to the dissipation of a homogeneous planet (which only take a uniform value for shear modulus and viscosity). We find that for purely rocky bodies, it is possible to approximate the response of a multi-layer planet by that of a homogeneous planet. However, using average profiles of shear modulus and viscosity to compute the homogeneous planet response leads to an overestimation of the averaged dissipation. We provide fitted values of shear modulus and viscosity that are capable of reproducing the response of various types of rocky planets. However, we find that if the planet has an icy layer, its tidal response can no longer be approximated by a homogeneous body because of the very different properties of the icy layers (in particular, their viscosity), which leads to a second dissipation peak at higher frequencies. We also compute the tidal heating profiles for the outer TRAPPIST-1 planets (e to h).