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Books in Earth and planetary sciences

Elsevier's Earth and Planetary Sciences collection brings together pioneering research on the complexities of our planet and beyond. Covering topics from Earth's structural dynamics and ecosystems to planetary exploration, these titles support advancements in geoscience, environmental science, and space studies, offering essential insights for researchers, professionals, and students.

  • Contourites

    • 1st Edition
    • Volume 60
    • M. Rebesco + 1 more
    • English
    Contourites are sediments deposited or substantially reworked by bottom currents. The study of contourites is crucial for several fields of fundamental and applied research: paleoclimatology and paleo-oceanography, since these fairly continuous and relatively high-resolution sediments hold the key for priceless information on the variability in circulation patter, current velocity, oceanographic history and basin interconnectivity; hydrocarbon exploration, since accumulation of source rocks may be favored by weak bottom currents, whereas "clean" deep-sea sands may be formed by robust flows; and slope stability, since low-permeability fine-grained contourites facilitate the formation of overpressurized gliding planes when fresh contourites with a high pore-water content becomes rapidly loaded, or when their rigid biosiliceous microfabric collapses due to diagenetic conditions. Despite its significance, this group of sediments is poorly known by the majority of non-specialists. Notwithstanding the growing interest and the intensified research in contourites, a textbook that might also serve as a reference book on contourites was missing until now. This book addresses all aspects of the knowledge in the field of contourites and provides an authoritative and comprehensive coverage of the subject. It also can serve as a standard reference work for non-specialists, and in particular postgraduate students, university teachers and lecturers, researchers and professionals who are seeking an authoritative source of information about contourites.
  • Shore Processes and their Palaeoenvironmental Applications

    • 1st Edition
    • Volume 4
    • Edward J. Anthony
    • English
    The last five years have been marked by rapid technological and analytical developments in the study of shore processes and in the comprehension of shore deposits and forms, and shoreline change over time. These developments have generated a considerable body of literature in a wide range of professional journals, thus illustrating the cross-disciplinary nature of shore processes and the palaeo-environmental dimension of shore change. The justification of the book lies in bringing together these developments using an objective approach that synthesises current advances, technical progress in the analysis of shores and shore processes, contradictory interpretations, and potential advances using future-generation developments in techniques. The book provides a comprehensive state-of-the-art presentation of shore processes and deposits across ranges of wave energy and tide-range environments, sediment supply and textural conditions, sea-level change, exceptional events and longer-term climate change, based on the most recently published literature in the marine sciences. The book insists on the nested time and spatial scales through which are inter-linked shore processes and deposits, thus providing a better understanding of the way shores change over time. The approach is thus cross-disciplinary, and gap-bridging between processes and deposits, between analytical techniques, and between timescales. The audience is from graduate level upwards, and the book is intended as a comprehensive reference source for professionals in a wide range of coastal science fields (geologists, sedimentologists, geomorphologists, oceanographers, engineers, managers, archaeologists…).
  • Principles of the Magnetic Methods in Geophysics

    • 1st Edition
    • English
    Magnetic methods are widely used in exploration, engineering, borehole and global geophysics, and the subjects of this book are the physical and mathematical principles of these methods regardless of the area of application. Beginning with Ampere's law, the force of interaction between currents is analyzed, and then the concept of the magnetic field is introduced and the fundamental features are discussed.Special attention is paid to measurements of relaxation processes, including topics as the spin echoes or refocusing. Also the special role of the magnetic method in the development of the plate tectonic theory is described.
  • Advances in Geophysics

    Earth Heterogeneity and Scattering Effects on Seismic Waves
    • 1st Edition
    • Volume 50
    • Haruo Sato + 1 more
    • English
    Seismic waves generated by earthquakes have been interpreted to provide us information about the Earth’s structure across a variety of scales. For short periods of less than 1 second, the envelope of seismograms changes significantly with increased travel distance and coda waves are excited by scattering due to randomly distributed heterogeneities in the Earth. Deterministic structures such as horizontally uniform velocity layer models in traditional seismology cannot explain these phenomena. This book focuses on the Earth heterogeneity and scattering effects on seismic waves. Topics covered are recent developments in wave theory and observation including: coda wave analysis for mapping medium heterogeneity and monitoring temporal variation of physical properties, radiation of short-period seismic waves from an earthquake fault, weak localization of seismic waves, attenuation of seismic waves in randomly porous media, synthesis of seismic wave envelopes in short periods, and laboratory investigations of ultrasonic wave propagation in rock samples.
  • The Sedimentary Basins of the United States and Canada

    • 1st Edition
    • Volume 5
    • Andrew Miall
    • English
    In recent years there have been rapid strides in our understanding of plate-tectonic processes, many developments in methods of basin analysis, and the accumulation of much new surface and subsurface geological and geophysical data. Projects such as COCORP (in the United States) and Lithoprobe (in Canada) have provided essential insights into the deep crustal structure of the continent. Synthesis of all the available information about North America’s geological regions has not been attempted systematically since the “Decade of North American Geology” project undertaken by the Geological Society of America and the Geological Survey of Canada nearly twenty years ago. The book commences with a summary of the Phanerozoic geological history of the United States and Canada, illustrated with a suite of new paleogeographic maps, and tying in each of the subsequent regional chapters by the inclusion of numerous cross-references. This followed by a set of fifteen regional syntheses of the principal tectonic regions of the United States and Canada, focusing on the stratigraphic and tectonic history of the major sedimentary basins. Most of these chapters have been contributed by specialists, drawing on their own research, and providing interpretive summaries of a type not previously attempted.
  • Handbook of Stable Isotope Analytical Techniques Vol II

    • 1st Edition
    • Pier A. de Groot
    • English
    This two-volume reference serves as a handbook containing a wealth of information for all isotope chemists working in a wide range of disciplines including anthropology to ecology; drug detection methodology to toxicology; nutrition to food science; and the atmospheric sciences to geochemistry.Complem... the first volume, Volume II includes matters that are not strictly confined to the analytical techniques themselves, but relate to analysis of stable isotopes, such as the views on the development of mass spectrometers, isotopic scales, standards and references, and directives for setting up a laboratory.ALSO AVAILABLE:Volume I: Dec. 2004, 0444511148/978044451... $176.00Volume I and II (set): Oct. 2007, 0444511164/978044451... $205.00
  • Antarctic Climate Evolution

    • 1st Edition
    • Fabio Florindo + 1 more
    • English
    Antarctic Climate Evolution is the first book dedicated to furthering knowledge on the evolution of the world’s largest ice sheet over its ~34 million year history. This volume provides the latest information on subjects ranging from terrestrial and marine geology to sedimentology and glacier geophysics.
  • Wildland Fires and Air Pollution

    • 1st Edition
    • Volume 8
    • Andrzej Bytnerowicz + 3 more
    • English
    The interaction between smoke and air pollution creates a public health challenge. Fuels treatments proposed for National Forests are intended to reduce fuel accumulations and wildfire frequency and severity, as well as to protect property located in the wild land-urban interface. However, prescribed fires produce gases and aerosols that have instantaneous and long-term effects on air quality. If fuels treatment are not conducted, however, then wild land fires become more severe and frequent causing worse public health and wellfare effects. A better understanding of air pollution and smoke interactions is needed in order to protect the public health and allow for socially and ecologically acceptable use of fire as a management tool. Wildland Fires and Air Pollution offers such an understanding and examines innovative wide-scale monitoring efforts (field and remotely sensed), and development of models predicting spatial and temporal distribution of air pollution and smoke resulting from forests fires and other sources.
  • The Ore Minerals Under the Microscope

    An Optical Guide
    • 1st Edition
    • Volume 3
    • Bernhard Pracejus
    • English
    This is a very detailed colour atlas for ore/opaque minerals (ore microscopy) with the main emphasis on name and synonyms, mineral group, chemical composition, information about major formation environment, optical data, reflection colour/shade comparison with 4 common/standard minerals of a similar colour or grey shade, up to 5 high-quality photos for each mineral with scale, and a short description of the pictures. A compilation from some of the prominent publications in the field of ore microscopy yielded a list of 431 minerals are included in this atlas.
  • Geomorphometry

    Concepts, Software, Applications
    • 1st Edition
    • Volume 33
    • Tomislav Hengl + 1 more
    • English
    Geomorphometry is the science of quantitative land-surface analysis. It draws upon mathematical, statistical, and image-processing techniques to quantify the shape of earth's topography at various spatial scales. The focus of geomorphometry is the calculation of surface-form measures (land-surface parameters) and features (objects), which may be used to improve the mapping and modelling of landforms to assist in the evaluation of soils, vegetation, land use, natural hazards, and other information. This book provides a practical guide to preparing Digital Elevation Models (DEM) for analysis and extracting land-surface parameters and objects from DEMs through a variety of software. It further offers detailed instructions on applying parameters and objects in soil, agricultural, environmental and earth sciences. This is a manual of state-of-the-art methods to serve the various researchers who use geomorphometry.Soil scientists will use this book to further learn the methods for classifying and measuring the chemical, biological, and fertility properties of soils and gain a further understaing of the role of soil as a natural resource. Geologists will find value in the instruction this book provides for measuring the physical features of the soil such as elevation, porosity, and structure which geologists use to predict natural disasters such as earthquakes, volcanoes, and flooding.