ADAtools: Automatic Detection and Classification of Active Deformation Areas from PSI Displacement Maps

This work describes the set of tools developed, tested, and put into production in the context of the H2020 project Multi-scale Observation and Monitoring of Railway Infrastructure Threats (MOMIT). This project, which ended in 2019, aimed to show how the use of various remote sensing techniques could help to improve the monitoring of railway infrastructures, such as tracks or bridges, and thus, consequently, improve the detection of ground instabilities and facilitate their management. Several lines of work were opened by MOMIT, but the authors of this work concentrated their efforts in the design of tools to help the detection and identification of ground movements using synthetic aperture radar interferometry (InSAR) data. The main output of this activity was a set of tools able to detect the areas labelled active deformation areas (ADA), with the highest deformation rates and to connect them to a geological or anthropogenic process. ADAtools is the name given to the aforementioned set of tools. The description of these tools includes the definition of their targets, inputs, and outputs, as well as details on how the correctness of the applications was checked and on the benchmarks showing their performance. The ADAtools include the following applications: ADAfinder, los2hv, ADAclassifier, and THEXfinder. The toolset is targeted at the analysis and interpretation of InSAR results. Ancillary information supports the semi-automatic interpretation and classification process. Two real use-cases illustrating this statement are included at the end of this paper to show the kind of results that may be obtained with the ADAtools.

Evolution of anthropization in the “Corrente” river watershed between 1985 and 2010

This study aimed made a temporal evolution and intensity by anthropogenic process under native vegetation between 1985 and 2010, in the Corrente river watershed (1,887.24 km2), Piauí - Brazil. To make the image mosaics it was used images taken by the Landsat 5 TM sensor from different years (1985, 1990, 2000 and 2010). On the Landsat 5 TM images from basin was made the highlight of vegetation with Normalized Vegetation Difference Index (NVDI), and made a reclassification of NVDI images: disturbed and no disturbed areas. Then, it was processed the sum of all years of NVDI images classified. The results demonstrated rapid anthropogenic alteration in the area of the Corrente river watershed, main between the years 2000 to 2010. The reduction area of vegetation between 1985-2010 was 464.82 km2. Beside, there are areas with more than 20 years of anthropogenic process on the Corrente river watershed.

Petrifying Earth Process: The Stratigraphic Imprint of Key Earth System Parameters in the Anthropocene

The Anthropocene concept arose within the Earth System science (ESS) community, albeit explicitly as a geological (stratigraphical) time term. Its current analysis by the stratigraphical community, as a potential formal addition to the Geological Time Scale, necessitates comparison of the methodologies and patterns of enquiry of these two communities. One means of comparison is to consider some of the most widely used results of the ESS, the ‘planetary boundaries’ concept of Rockström and colleagues, and the ‘Great Acceleration’ graphs of Steffen and colleagues, in terms of their stratigraphical expression. This expression varies from virtually non-existent (stratospheric ozone depletion) to pronounced and many-faceted (primary energy use), while in some cases stratigraphical proxies may help constrain anthropogenic process (atmospheric aerosol loading). The Anthropocene concepts of the ESS and stratigraphy emerge as complementary, and effective stratigraphic definition should facilitate wider transdisciplinary communication.

Arsenic Release from Highly Contaminated Sediment during Resuspesion

Arsenic release mediated by biotic and abiotic activities from sediment during resuspension was investigated in laboratory. The results showed that arsenic was released strongly during resuspension, indicating highly contaminated sediment disturbed by wave or anthropogenic process may lead to strong arsenic release and threaten the local aquatic environment. Combine with change of solid species, we can conclude that oxidation of arsenic sulfides primarily contributed to arsenic release to the aqueous phase. Arsenic release was significantly accelerated by aerobic bacteria compared with uninoculated systems, suggesting biotic oxidation of arsenic sulfides may be the dominant mechanism responsible for partition of arsenic between solid and aqueous phase during resuspension.

The Salinization Problem of the Deep Groundwater Based on Multivariable Statistical Methods

To indentify the influence of human activities on groundwater chemistry, fifteen groundwater samples, from the mostly exploited aquifers, were collected at Tanghai County. Considering the multivariable statistical method is reliable to study the anthropogenic process affecting groundwater composition especially in the early stage, 10 measured hydrochemical variables were used in factor analysis and hierarchical cluster analysis. Factor 1 included EC, TDS, Cl-, and K+ is interpreted as relating to groundwater salinization. Factor 2 and factor 3 is mostly influenced by the water-rock interactions during the flow path and fertile contamination, respectively. Meanwhile, the Q-mode classification result reveals that the cluster 1 having high factor 1 scores also is related to the over-pumping of groundwater, in accordance with the factor analysis result. Generally, to protect freshwater resources and suitable development of this study, some related measures should be mitigated to limit groundwater mining.