Erosion, sediment production, and routing on a tectonically active continental margin reflect both tectonic and climatic processes; partitioning the relative importance of these processes remains controversial. Gulf of Alaska contains a preserved sedimentary record of the Yakutat Terrane collision with North America. Because tectonic convergence in the coastal St. Elias orogen has been roughly constant for 6 My, variations in its eroded sediments preserved in the offshore Surveyor Fan constrain a budget of tectonic material influx, erosion, and sediment output. Seismically imaged sediment volumes calibrated with chronologies derived from Integrated Ocean Drilling Program boreholes show that erosion accelerated in response to Northern Hemisphere glacial intensification (∼2.7 Ma) and that the 900-km-long Surveyor Channel inception appears to correlate with this event. However, tectonic influx exceeded integrated sediment efflux over the interval 2.8-1.2 Ma. Volumetric erosion accelerated following the onset of quasi-periodic (∼100-ky) glacial cycles in the mid-Pleistocene climate transition (1.2-0.7 Ma). Since then, erosion and transport of material out of the orogen has outpaced tectonic influx by 50-80%. Such a rapid net mass loss explains apparent increases in exhumation rates inferred onshore from exposure dates and mapped out-of-sequence fault patterns. The 1.2-My mass budget imbalance must relax back toward equilibrium in balance with tectonic influx over the timescale of orogenic wedge response (millions of years). The St. Elias Range provides a key example of how active orogenic systems respond to transient mass fluxes, and of the possible influence of climate-driven erosive processes that diverge from equilibrium on the million-year scale. O rogenesis reflects the balance of crustal material entering a mountain belt to undergo shortening and uplift versus material leaving the orogen through exhumation, erosion, and sediment transport (1-5). Perturbations in the influx/efflux from the orogen are expected to result in predictable changes in deformation within the orogen as it attempts to reestablish equilibrium (3). The long-term sink for sediment transported out of mountain belts is often in the deep sea, particularly in large submarine fans where sediments accumulate at anomalously high rates (>10 cm/ky) compared with deep-sea pelagic sedimentation (6-8). Even higher sedimentation rates (>100 cm/ky) proximal to glacially eroded regions (9-14) imply that wet-based glaciers are extremely efficient agents of erosion. Observations and modeling have argued that erosion rates can influence tectonic processes (15)(16)(17)(18)(19), but the timescales of adjustment, and the role of landscape disequilibrium, remain unclear. For example, exceptionally high local sedimentation rates (100-1000 cm/ky) recorded on the century timescale (13) SignificanceIn coastal Alaska and the St. Elias orogen, over the past 1.2 million years, mass flux leaving the mountains due to glacial erosion exceeds the plate tectonic input. This...

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Use policyThe full-text may be used and/or reproduced, and given to third parties in any format or medium, without prior permission or charge, for personal research or study, educational, or not-for-prot purposes provided that:• a full bibliographic reference is made to the original source • a link is made to the metadata record in DRO • the full-text is not changed in any way The full-text must not be sold in any format or medium without the formal permission of the copyright holders.Please consult the full DRO policy for further details. ABSTRACTThe Nankai-Suruga Trough, the subduction zone that lies immediately south of Japan's densely populated southern coastline, generates devastating great earthquakes (magnitude > 8) characterised by intense shaking, crustal deformation and tsunami generation. Forecasting the hazards associated with future earthquakes along this >700 km long fault requires a comprehensive understanding of past fault behaviour. While the region benefits from a long and detailed historical record, palaeoseismology has the potential to provide a longer-term perspective and additional crucial insights. In this paper, we summarise the current state of knowledge regarding geological evidence for past earthquakes and tsunamis along the Nankai-Suruga Trough. Incorporating literature originally published in both Japanese and English and enhancing available results with new age modelling approaches, we summarise and critically evaluate evidence from a wide variety of sources. Palaeoseismic evidence includes uplifted marine terraces and biota, marine and lacustrine turbidites, liquefaction features, subsided marshes and tsunami deposits in coastal lakes and lowlands. While 75 publications describe proposed evidence from more than 70 sites, only a limited number provide compelling, well-dated evidence. The best available records enable us to map the most likely rupture zones of twelve earthquakes that occurred during the historical period. This spatiotemporal compilation suggests that the AD 1707 earthquake ruptured almost the full length of the subduction zone and that earthquakes in AD 1361 and 684 may have been predecessors of similar magnitude. Intervening earthquakes were of lesser magnitude, highlighting the variability in rupture mode that characterises the Nankai-Suruga Trough. Intervals between ruptures of the same seismic segment range from less than 100 to more than 450 years during the historical period. Over longer timescales, palaeoseismic evidence suggests intervals between earthquakes ranging from 100 to 700 years, however these figures reflect a range of thresholds controlling the creation and preservation of evidence at any given site as well as the genuine intervals between earthquakes. At present, there is no geological data that suggest the occurrence of a larger magnitude earthquake than that experienced in AD 1707, however few studies have sought to establish the relative magnitudes of different earthquake and tsunami events along the Nankai-Suruga Trough. Alongside the lack of...

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A variety of cathode materials in lithium ion batteries exhibit phase separations during electrochemical reactions, where two phases with different Li compositions are in equilibrium across the phase interface. Because of the lattice mismatch between these phases, large structural distortions are introduced around the interface region. To characterize their potential effect upon the Li migration behavior, the phase interface structure should be determined accurately. In this study, we perform sophisticated structural analyses for phase interfaces in the well-known cathode material Li x FePO4, using atomic resolution scanning transmission electron microscopy. The lattice deformation behavior and Li composition gradient are separately measured across the interface and superimposed after spatial calibrations. The combined result reveals that their relationship significantly deviates from simple models, such as Vegard’s law or other higher order interpolations. Notably, the interface region has small lattice sizes comparable to the FePO4 phase, while having intermediate Li compositions. The origin of observed structure is discussed considering the local phase stability by estimating the pair distance variations of dominant attractive/repulsive ionic couples. Because of the nonlinear variations of each structural parameter, well-optimized experiments with high spatial resolutions and sufficient accuracies are required to correctly understand the phase interface structures.

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Erosional and sedimentary features associated with flooding have been documented in both modern and past cases. However, only a few studies have demonstrated the relationship between these features and the corresponding hydraulic conditions that produced them, making it difficult to evaluate the magnitude of paleo-flooding. This study describes the characteristics associated with inundation depth and flow direction, as well as the erosional and sedimentary features resulting from the disastrous flooding of the Kinu River, central Japan, in September 2015. Water levels rose rapidly due to heavy rainfall that eventually overtopped, and subsequently breached, a levee in Joso City, causing destructive flooding on the surrounding floodplain. Distinctive erosional features are found next to the breached levee, while depositional features, such as a sandy crevasse-splay deposit are found further away from the breach. The deposit can be divided into three units based on sedimentary facies. The vertical and lateral changes of these sedimentary facies may be the result of temporal and spatial changes associated with flow during the single flooding event. These observations and quantitative data provide information that can be used to reveal the paleohydrology of flood deposits in the stratigraphic record, leading to improved mitigation of future flooding disasters.

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