New geochemical evidence for the origin of North America's largest dune field, the Nebraska Sand Hills, central Great Plains, USA

Muhs, Daniel R.; Budahn, James R.

doi:10.1016/j.geomorph.2019.02.023

Cited by 23 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 67 publications

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“…Grain sizes are typically ~200 µm ( 23 ). The source of the Sand Hills eolian deposits may be the Ogallala Group [Miocene to Pliocene ( 27 )] or other Pleistocene alluviums ( 28 ). The dunes in the Sand Hills formed in the Holocene [5,000 to 8,000 y before present ( 29 )].…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Electrical discharge triggers quasicrystal formation in an eolian dune

Bindi

Pasek

et al. 2022

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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We report the discovery of a dodecagonal quasicrystal Mn 72.3 Si 15.6 Cr 9.7 Al 1.8 Ni 0.6 —composed of a periodic stacking of atomic planes with quasiperiodic translational order and 12-fold symmetry along the two directions perpendicular to the planes—accidentally formed by an electrical discharge event in an eolian dune in the Sand Hills near Hyannis, Nebraska, United States. The quasicrystal, coexisting with a cubic crystalline phase with composition Mn 68.9 Si 19.9 Ni 7.6 Cr 2.2 Al 1.4 , was found in a fulgurite consisting predominantly of fused and melted sand along with traces of melted conductor metal from a nearby downed power line. The fulgurite may have been created by a lightning strike that combined sand with material from downed power line or from electrical discharges from the downed power line alone. Extreme temperatures of at least 1,710 °C were reached, as indicated by the presence of SiO 2 glass in the sample. The dodecagonal quasicrystal is an example of a quasicrystal of any kind formed by electrical discharge, suggesting other places to search for quasicrystals on Earth or in space and for synthesizing them in the laboratory.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Electrical discharge triggers quasicrystal formation in an eolian dune

Bindi

Pasek

et al. 2022

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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“…Likewise, existing drift potential studies and datasets from the region have demonstrated the relatively high drift potentials experienced locally (e.g. Muhs et al, 2000;Muhs and Budahn, 2019). Given this, wind speed has not been considered a limiting factor on sediment transport when surfaces are bare and has not been included as a key controlling variable on sediment movement in this location.…”

Section: Vegetation Cover Driversmentioning

confidence: 99%

Complex disturbance‐driven reactivation of near‐surface sediments in the largest dunefield in North America during the last 200 years

Buckland

Thomas

Bailey

2019

Earth Surf Processes Landf

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Understanding the historical activity of desert dune systems is important for identifying both the palaeoenvironmental drivers of change and the likelihood of future reactivation. Dating dune sediments in the Nebraska Sandhills has identified regional‐scale dune activity over centennial and millennial timescales during the Holocene, occurring at 9.6–6.5, 3.8 and 2.5 ka, and most recently spanning the Medieval Climatic Anomaly 1050–650 years BP. These periods have been interpreted as palaeoclimatic evidence of intense aridity lasting decadal and centennial timescales. A detailed record of dune activity in the historical period, since EuroAmerican arrival, is lacking however, yet important for interpreting the role of human agency amongst the factors influencing disturbance. Without a high‐resolution record of short‐term, historical, local sediment mobilization, it is not possible to distinguish the environmental factor(s) responsible for local reactivation. In this paper, the individual drivers of vegetation disturbance are reviewed and presented alongside a luminescence‐dated reconstruction of dune sediment deposition ages. This allows an integrated assessment of the relationship between drivers and environmental response over a recorded period. We focused our investigation on the aeolian reactivations of surface dune sediments and blowout features around the Niobrara Valley Preserve in the northern limits of the Nebraska Sandhills. Results show a near‐continuous (within uncertainties) timeline of local reactivation across the sites studied, with variation between the individual features indicating that both regional (i.e. climatic) and local (i.e. land use) forcings contribute to surface disturbance. © 2019 The Authors. Earth Surface Processes and Landforms published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd. © 2019 The Authors. Earth Surface Processes and Landforms published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

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“…An alternative approach is to use source ngerprinting which is founded on the direct comparison of the properties, or composite ngerprints, of dune deposits and potential source areas. Early studies based on aeolian sediment properties used light and/or heavy mineral compositions as well as minor element geochemistry [11][12][13][14] . These studies did not, however, use an un-mixing model to estimate the contribution of each source on the basis of the ngerprint properties analysed.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The efficiency of elemental geochemistry and weathering indices as tracers in aeolian sediment provenance fingerprinting

Nosrati

Moradian

Dolatkordestani

et al. 2022

CATENA

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Eight geochemical elements (Al, Ca, Fe, K, Na, Mg, Si, Ti) and 17 associated weathering indices were measured in 34 aeolian source samples and 10 sand dune target sediment samples in three absolute particulate size fractions. For each fraction, three nal composite ngerprints (i.e., geochemical elements only, weathering indices only and a combination of the two) for discerning and ascribing the aeolian sediment sources were selected. The Modi ed MixSIR Bayesian un-mixing model was used to apportion aeolian source contributions using the nal composite ngerprints. Regardless of the composite ngerprint used, all results across the different size fractions suggested that the south-eastern alluvial fan is the dominant (average contribution 50.6%, SD 19.0%) source of the sand dune samples, with the western alluvial fan being the second most important (average contribution 38.4%, SD 20.4%) source. Comparisons of the posterior distributions for the predicted source proportions generated using the nine composite ngerprints (three kinds of composite ngerprints*three particle size fractions) showed that the composite ngerprints combining the geochemical elements and weathering indices generated the most powerful source material discrimination. Our results demonstrate the use of weathering indices alongside more conventional elemental geochemistry tracers for investigations into sand dune sediment provenance.* n.c. non-conservative; ** Critical p-value = 0.05. KW-H test, Kruskal-Wallis H-test.

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New geochemical evidence for the origin of North America's largest dune field, the Nebraska Sand Hills, central Great Plains, USA

Cited by 23 publications

References 67 publications

Electrical discharge triggers quasicrystal formation in an eolian dune

Electrical discharge triggers quasicrystal formation in an eolian dune

Complex disturbance‐driven reactivation of near‐surface sediments in the largest dunefield in North America during the last 200 years

The efficiency of elemental geochemistry and weathering indices as tracers in aeolian sediment provenance fingerprinting

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