NASA’s future missions will focus on looking for evidence of life under extreme environments, such as cold arid planets (Mars) and icy moons (Eurpoa). There is particular interest in studying localized geo-chemical systems that host gradients with the potential for harboring evidence of past or present life. Such gradient-driven systems include, for example, layering of minerals of varying oxidation states in the Martian subsurface or in Earth’s seafloor sediments; chemical precipitates separating fluids of different pH or Eh such as in a hydrothermal vent; or radiation-induced oxidant production in planetary ices. A challenge is that these simulated precipitates are redox sensitive and evolve over a relatively short lifetime (1-4 hrs) necessitating viable in-situ, non-destructive analytical techniques. Promising techniques for such studies are electrochemical methods, which are particularly suited for characterizing interfaces and chem-ical gradients. Combined with recent advances in electrochemical instrument technologies, new methods have been developed toward integrating portable, electrochemical systems for ex-situ and/or in-situ chemical characterization. JPL has already made significant progress in developing these new technologies, particularly electro-chemical impedance spectroscopies (EIS) for in-situ characterization of geochemical materials (i.e., soils ice mineralogy, and brines) and even life detection sensoring. Currently, we are exploring further appli-cations of electrical spectroscopy techniques in developing an electrochemistry-based framework using planetary analog systems based on MRO/CRISM and Cassini/INMS observations in attempts to distin-guish abiotic vs biotic environments, and with active and inactive containing organics from electrical properties characterization. We will highlight some of our group’s successes and preliminary results of geochemical experimentation using various electrochemical techniques.

Irrigation parameterizations in land surface models have been advanced over the past decade, but the newly available data from the Soil Moisture Active Passive (SMAP) satellite has seldom been used to improve irrigation modeling. Here, we investigate the potential of assimilating SMAP soil moisture (SM) data into the Community Land Model (CLM) to improve irrigation representation. Simulations are conducted at 3 arc-minute resolution over the highly irrigated region in the central US, fully enclosing the upstream areas of the river basins draining over the High Plains Aquifer (i.e., the Missouri and Arkansas), and Colorado River basins. We test the original CLM4.5 irrigation scheme and two new irrigation parameterizations using SMAP data assimilation by: (1) directly integrating raw SMAP data, and (2) integrating SMAP data using 1-D Kalman Filter (KF) smoother. An a priori scaling approach is also used to account for bias correction of the shortly-recorded SMAP data based on the ground observations, enabling us to use SMAP for out-of-sample tests (i.e., assessment of the new parameterizations during a non-SMAP period). The ground-based SM observations from three monitoring networks, namely Soil Climate Analysis Network (SCAN), US Climate Reference Network (USCRN), and SNOwpack TELemetry (SNOTEL) are employed for bias correcting SMAP data and validating SM simulations. Results show that SMAP data assimilation using 1-D KF significantly improves irrigation simulations. Bias correction of SMAP data further improves results from KF assimilation in some regions. However, the improvements are small compared to those achieved from 1-D KF application alone, indicating the robustness of using SMAP data and KF globally even for the regions where ground-based data are not available for bias correction. The data assimilation also improves the accuracy of the temporal dynamics and vertical profile of simulated SM. These results are expected to provide a basis for improved modeling of irrigation water use and land-atmosphere interactions.

High-resolution topographic data are used in geomorphic and hydrologic research for many purposes, including topographic change detection, development of computational meshes for hydraulic models, characterizing channel and hillslope geometry, measuring vegetation structure and density. These data can be collected in a variety of ways, ranging from manual surveying with a Total Station or GPS system, airborne LiDAR, terrestrial laser scanning (TLS), and Structure-from-Motion (SfM) photogrammetry using images collected from drones or pole-mounted cameras. These methods can be very time consuming to collect, and the equipment they require can be very costly. With the release of the 2020 iPad Pro and iPhone 12 Pro, Apple added a LiDAR sensor to their devices, enabling them to be used as hand-held 3D scanners. This new technology has the potential to enable very rapid collection of high-resolution topographic data at low cost. Here, we investigate how well iPad-based LiDAR characterizes topography and topographic change in hillslope and fluvial environments. A 2020 iPad Pro using two apps (3D Scanner and Polycam) was used to collect topographic data over areas ranging from about 100 – 600 m2. These same areas were scanned with a Topcon GLS-2000 TLS system, and aerial imagery were collected with a UAV and processed with Agisoft Metashape to create SfM point clouds. Ground-based targets visible in the datasets were surveyed with an RTK-GNSS system and used to register and scale the datasets. The datasets were aligned using the ICP algorithm in CloudCompare, and cross-sections and topographic differences were extracted from each dataset and compared. Our analysis indicates that transects collected with the iPad LiDAR have mean absolute differences with TLS and SfM data within 3 cm, making these data comparable to other high-resolution topographic data collection methods.

Regional crop production estimates are important in both public and private sectors to ensure the adequacy of a food supply and aid policymakers and farmers in managing harvest, storage, import/export, transportation, and anticipate market fluctuations. Food security will be progressively challenged by population growth and climate change. Thus, the prediction of accurate regional crop yield is essential for national food security and the sustainable development of the Indian agriculture sector. In this study, we have selected Punjab, the highest wheat yielding state in India. The district-wise wheat yield data were available for the year 2000 – 2019. We have used several covariates for crop health viz. normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), leaf area index (LAI), fraction of absorbed photosynthetically active radiation (fAPAR); meteorological indicators viz. land surface temperature (LST), and evapotranspiration (ET); and surface characteristics viz. protrusion coefficient (PC). These indicators were generated at 250 m spatial resolution from the MODIS data using Google Earth Engine. The whole data was divided into two groups for training (2000 – 2009, 2011, 2013, 2014, 2016 - 2019) and testing (2010, 2012, 2015), which were randomly selected. This study uses the random forest (RF) regression method to create a wheat yield prediction model. We created several combinations of covariates and found that fAPAR and ET are highly correlated with NDVI and do not have much influence on the model’s prediction accuracy. Hence, only four out of six covariates were selected for final training. The coefficient of determination between district-level yield vs. (NDVI/LAI/PC/LST) was 0.37/0.31/0.15/0.13 respectively. We used randomized search cross-validation as well as grid search cross-validation for hyper-parameter tuning. Furthermore, we used mean absolute error (MAE) and accuracy as quality metrics. The MAE for training was 0.1870 t/Ha with 95.81% accuracy, whereas the MAE on test data was obtained as 0.4293 t/Ha with 90.02% accuracy. The results of this study are within acceptable error limits of the published research articles. Overall, this study demonstrates that covariates derived from coarse resolution satellite data can predict district-level crop yield with reasonable accuracy.

A key benefit to the scientific community of a pathfinder to 542 AU is calibration data for an array of instruments on a flagship probe to interstellar space. There are fundamental processes and parameters of the near interstellar medium, whose estimated range of values could be greatly narrowed by in-situ sampling from a fast and small mission. By selecting an angle relative to the sun, plane of the ecliptic and a scientifically interesting target (such as Trappist-1), it is possible to perform initial optical measurements from the Solar Gravitational Lens (SGL) focal region on the same pathfinder. Doing so provides a basic set of data for larger follow-on missions to observe that (and other) solar systems in greater detail. By combining the datasets from 2 solar cycles (22 years) of space weather monitoring satellites, Voyager 1 and other deep space probes, the Practical Interplanetary Propulsion (PIP) Study constructed a radial profile for the solar wind ranging from 1 AU through the foreshock at 83 AU, to a notional heliopause at 123 AU, and the near interstellar medium out to 1,800 AU. The resulting matrix of plasma parameters was applied to a trajectory model “seed code,” to test flight paths for future probes. This paper presents an example pathfinder, consisting of a cubesat bus equipped with a Wind Rider propulsion system and radioisotope power system (RPS). A brief description of those subsystems and how they interact with the solar wind or interstellar medium is included. Trajectory simulation results estimate the trip time from 1 to 542 AU near the plane of the ecliptic takes 6.9 years. Adding a compact imaging instrument enables the probe to sample data from the vantage point of the Trappist-1 SGL, as well as PickUp Ions (PUI) for a 1 year science campaign. Total pathfinder mission time after launch is less than 8 years. A set of policy-making recommendations for enabling such small precursor-type missions is provided in the conclusions, as well as ways to extend the mission to communicate from 1,000 AU to 1,800 AU. Alternatively, a method to gradually decelerate to a near stop at the end of the mission, using the Wind Rider to drag against the interstellar plasma, is also included.

Earth System Models (ESMs) traditionally operate at large horizontal resolutions, on the order of 100 km, which can obscure the effects of smaller scale heterogeneity. When examining land surface states and fluxes in ESMs, one common approach to mitigate this issue is to divide the sub-grid land surface into distinct homogeneous clusters and then resolve the water, energy, and biogeochemical processes on each cluster or tile. The literature, as well as work in the Coupling of Land and Atmospheric Subgrid Parameterizations (CLASP) project, indicates that surface heterogeneity has important implications for atmospheric processes as well. Previous work using large-eddy simulation (LES) shows that spatial variability in surface heating can produce significant secondary circulations closely related to the type and scale of heterogeneity that are not captured by single column models. This presentation aims to address this persistent weakness by using a clustering or tiling approach, similar to that used with land surface processes, for the atmosphere. To accomplish this task, we run the Cloud Layers Unified By Binomials (CLUBB) single column model, a sub-grid turbulence and cloud parameterization scheme, over a 100 km box centered at the Southern Great Plains site in Oklahoma for a variety of surface and atmospheric conditions. The model is run independently over multiple surface clusters defined by surface sensible heat fluxes in the given domain. Results indicate that significant differences exist for some cases between the single column and multicolumn cases for liquid water path (LWP) as well as the turbulent kinetic energy (TKE) budget, and that results converge on consistent results with a fairly low number of clusters (i.e., atmospheric columns). We follow this up with a connected multicolumn setup where each column is dynamically connected with the other columns throughout the run to qualitatively capture the circulations observed in the LES output. The existing results show promise for capturing the effects of subgrid scale surface flux heterogeneity on the lower atmosphere in ESMs with the application of a multicolumn CLUBB setup.

There is a need to better characterize aerosol absorption due to its remarkable radiative effects on climate. In particular, we need to understand the separation of total absorption between the two main components, the black carbon (BC) and brown carbon (BrC), especially in places where the anthropic influence is little, such as in pristine regions like Central Amazonia. The mechanisms that control the formation and evolution of BC and BrC in tropical forests remain unclear. In this study, we have performed detailed measurements at the Amazon Tall Tower Observatory (ATTO) tower on aerosols collected in Nuclepore filters and analyzed them with high-resolution optical spectrometers with a wide spectral range (300 to 2500 nm). Thus, we determined the absorption characteristics of BrC as a function of wavelength. The results show that BrC absorption is spectrally significant below 660 nm and is maximum at wavelengths close to 370 nm. Combining the measured spectral dependency with MIE modeling of the BC contribution, we determined that the BrC accounts for 14.8% of the total absorption. A similar fraction of BrC to total absorption was obtained through a similar analysis of in-situ measurements. Elemental chemical analysis of the filters, cluster, and factor analysis shows that the BrC is associated with airborne dust. The different methods to quantify BC and BrC are consistent and show similar results. This study will allow the quantification of the role of BrC and BC in aerosol absorption of radiation in Amazonia.

A recent study categorized the Madden-Julian Oscillation (MJO) during the boreal winter season into four types including stand, jump, slow eastward propagating, and fast eastward propagating MJO. This study focuses on the stand and jump MJO events. Based on whether their convection penetrates the Maritime Continent (MC), stand and jump MJO are combined as non-penetrating (NP) MJO, while the rest two types are combined as eastward-penetrating (EP) MJO. Results reveal the relative roles of the westward-propagating wave (WPW), as well as the QBO and ENSO, in limiting MJO propagation. Lack of the pre-moistening over the southern sea surface of MC is responsible for NP MJO’s failure to penetrate MC. The active convection of WPW hinders the NP MJO descending branch over the Pacific and therfore leads to the insufficient meridional advective moistening over the southern sea surface of the MC. The overall drying over the MC for jump MJO also comes from the intraseasonal dry amonalies induced by WPW over the western Pacific, which are then advected to MC by the superposed seasonal mean northern easterlies. The independent convection over the Pacific for jump MJO is influenced by a combined effect of the QBO and ENSO. Under the influence of the preferred QBO westerly (QBOW) phase, the tropopause instability of NP MJO is decoupled with its convection. The decoupled tropopause instability propagates eastward into the Pacific, and amplifies the local WPW convection there for jump MJO. For stand MJO, however, the La Nina-like seasonal mean cool sea surface temperature (SST) anmalies confine WPW within the western Pacific. Therefore, the decoupled tropopause instability of stand MJO is out phase of WPW over the central Pacific, and fails to induce an independent convection as a result. The similar diagnosis is further applied to the CESM2 and E3SM CMIP6 historical simulations to investigate the MJO diversity and propagation in climate models. Four MJO types as in the observation are successfully categorized in these two models. The accompanied westward propagating waves over the central-western Pacific for NP MJO events are also evident. However, models suffer from some biases in MJO propagation such as too many NP MJO events than the observation.

Cratons are stable parts of the Earth’s continental lithosphere that have remained largely undeformed for several billion years. These consist of crustal granite-greenstone terrains coupled to roots of strong, buoyant cratonic lithospheric mantle that extend up to several hundreds of kms depth. Due to their stability, cratons preserve a record of the tectonics and the thermal evolution of the mantle in the early Earth. These observations suggest that the highly viscous (strong) character of cratons hampered the viability of early Earth tectonics, thereby affecting mantle convection patterns and cooling. In this study, we investigate the controls of stiff cratons on the initiation of subduction and mantle thermal evolution on the early Earth. Using numerical models, we simulate the effects of strong and buoyant cratons on mantle convection. We vary a set of parameters including (i) width and thickness of cratons, and (ii) viscosity ratio between cratonic lithosphere and cratonic crust. We test initial conditions varying the number of cratons, which is unconstrained for early Earth and associated it to mantle cooling rates. Our preliminary results show that the mantle cooling rate decreases with increasing number of cratons. Because mantle cooling rates affect the early Earth transition from a basaltic drip regime to initiation of subduction, we show that the craton coverage on the early Earth controls the time of onset of plate tectonics. Furthermore, we observe that cratons will remain separate or combine depending on the convective cell size, which is function of mantle cooling.

With observational data becoming widely available, researchers struggle to find information enabling assessment for its reliable use. A small first-step toward enabling data quality assessment of observational data is to associate the data with the sensor used to make the observations and to have the sensor description machine-harvestable. In the latest additions to the X-DOMES (Cross-Domain Observational Metadata for Enviromental Sensing) toolset, we have created targeted editors for creating SensorML documents to describe sensor models. The team has adjusted its delivery to enable integration of the X-DOMES content with the GEOCODES (JSON-LD/schema.org) EarthCube project. At our poster-session, we will highlight the new changes and capabilities and demonstrate the use of new X-DOMES tools.

The Chiapanecan Volcanic Arc it is located in the central portion of Chiapas in southern Mexico. This volcanic arc it is merge in a geological complex zone where the interaction of the North American, Caribbean and Cocos plates, near the Motagua-Polochic fault system takes place. The central part of the Chiapanecan Volcanic Arc it is conformed by at least 10 volcanic structures. In this study we focus on five volcanic domes known as La Iglesia, La Mispía, La Lanza, Venustiano Carranza and Santotón. It is described that the volcanic activity in the Chiapanecan Volcanic Arc was effusive accompanied by explosive and phreatomagmatic events. The main lithology varies from andesitic to dacitic rocks with porphyric texture. Both lithologies are mainly composed of euhedral amphibole, pyroxene subhedral plagioclase, as well as subhedral biotite as accessory mineral. It is possible to recognize mafic microgranular enclaves with ovoidal shapes within the andesitic rocks. This work aims to understand the petrological composition, the magmatic activity and its relationship with the subduction of the Cocos plate under the North American plate.

We propose a new numerical code based on a new multi-species theoretical model to study the mass, momentum and energy exchanges (MMEE) that happen across the magnetospheric boundaries. We use two distinct populations for ions, one cold and one hot (plus one neutralising electron population), to take into account the differences between the properties of the plasmas coming from the magnetosphere and from the solar wind. This approach represents a step forward in the context of the study of coupled large-scale plasma systems being a new and efficient compromise between fluid and kinetic codes in tracing the different plasma contributions during MMEE. Due to the very important role that magnetic reconnection plays in connecting the shocked Solar Wind to the Earth’s magnetosphere, we show and discuss the results we obtained about the simulations of the tearing mode instability occurring across an Earth’s magnetopause that we modelled thanks to our most recents MMS observations [Rezeau 2018]. Rezeau, Belmont, Manuzzo, Aunai, Dargent, 2018, Journal of Geophysical Research: Space Physics, 123, doi: 10.1002/2017JA024526.

New and recently published U-Pb, muscovite-biotite 40Ar/39Ar, K-feldspar MDD 40Ar/39Ar, zircon and apatite (U-Th)/He, and apatite fission-track data were compiled and inverted for a comprehensive, thermal history of southern Baffin Island, Canada. This work is a contribution to the Geo-mapping for Energy and Minerals (GEM) Baffin Island initiative and Trans-GEM synthesis of the Phanerozoic exhumation history of the Canadian Shield. Southern Baffin Island is comprised of Archean plutonic basement metamorphosed during the Trans-Hudson Orogeny. Monazite U-Pb dating on the Hall Peninsula suggest peak metamorphic conditions were at ca. 1850-1820 Ma and remained at >550ºC ca. 100 My after the thermal peak [1], while 40Ar/39Ar hydrous mineral ages and modeling suggest temperatures remained at >420-450ºC ca. 150-200 My after peak conditions [2]. New apatite U-Pb age populations are in agreement and range from 1674 ± 35 Ma to 1796 ± 75 Ma (2σ), suggesting elevated post-THO temperatures at ~450ºC. During the Meso- to Neoproterozoic the Hall Peninsula region experienced prolonged slow cooling on the order of ≤0.5ºC/My until ca. 1000 Ma when cooling accelerated to ~1ºC/My due to supercontinent Rodinia assembly. Sedimentary sequences place minimum timing constraints on basement rocks being at near-surface conditions in the early Paleozoic. Preliminary results from apatite fission-track data suggest that southwest Baffin (Meta-Incognita and Hall Peninsula) was fully exhumed by Paleozoic time during basement uplift that likely exploited preexisting, regional structures. Nearby Foxe Basin sediments suggest this region of the Canadian Shield was exhumed by the Late Ordovician (ca. 450 Ma) and either remained topographically high, or experienced minor burial during subsequent continental-wide transgression and shallow marine carbonate deposition in the Silurian-Devonian. AFT data from a >1890 Ma volcanic tuff cutting the Paleoproterozoic Hoare Bay Group sediments on the easternmost Cumberland Peninsula record rapid cooling in the Jurassic. The cooling signal recorded along Cumberland Peninsula is likely due to early crustal thinning related to rifting of Greenland from mainland Canada during Pangaea breakup and aligns with a model of rift-flank uplift. AFT models are in agreement with ages of dike swarms in West Greenland given as evidence by [3] for the onset of rift extension. The summarized cooling history of southern Baffin Island suggests post-THO cooling rates of ~1-3ºC/My from ca. 1700-1500 Ma, followed by slow cooling and Mesoproterozoic cooling pulses at ca. 1300 Ma and ca. 1000-950 Ma, likely due to Rodinia assembly. Rocks have been at temperatures <100ºC since ca. 500 Ma. [1] Skipton et al., 2016, J. of Petrology, v.57(8); [2] Skipton et al., 2017, Lithos, v.284; [3] Larsen et al., 2009, J. Geol. Soc., v.166.

Pulse-like ruptures tend to be more sensitive to stress heterogeneity than crack-like ones. For instance, a stress-barrier can more easily stop the propagation of a pulse than that of a crack. While crack-like ruptures tend to homogenize the stress field within their rupture area, pulse-like ruptures develop heterogeneous stress fields. This feature of pulse-like ruptures can potentially lead to complex seismicity with a wide range of magnitudes akin to the Gutenberg-Richter law. Previous models required a friction law with severe velocity-weakening to develop pulses and complex seismicity. Recent dynamic rupture simulations show that the presence of a damaged zone around a fault can induce pulse-like rupture, even under a simple slip-weakening friction law, although the mechanism depends strongly on initial stress conditions. Here we aim at testing if fault zone damage is a sufficient ingredient to generate complex seismicity. In particular, we investigate the effects of damaged fault zones on the emergence and sustainability of pulse-like ruptures throughout multiple earthquake cycles, regardless of initial conditions. We consider a fault bisecting a homogeneous low-rigidity layer (the damaged zone) embedded in an intact medium. We conduct a series of earthquake cycle simulations to investigate the effects of two fault zone properties: damage level D and thickness H. The simulations are based on classical rate-and-state friction, the quasi-dynamic approximation and the software QDYN (https://github.com/ydluo/qdyn). Selected fully-dynamic simulations are also performed with a spectral element method. Our numerical results show the development of complex rupture patterns in some damaged fault configurations, including events of different sizes, as well as pulse-like, multi-pulse and hybrid pulse-crack ruptures. We further apply elasto-static theory to assess how D and H affect ruptures with constant stress drop, in particular the flatness of their slip profile, which is an indicator of pulse-like rupture. We find qualitative agreement between our theoretical and computational results regarding the range of damaged zone properties that enable pulse-like rupture.

ENSO events are the most significant interannual perturbation of the climate system. Previous attempts to link ENSO with volcanic eruptions failed because only large eruptions across the globe, which typically eject tephra into the stratosphere, were considered. I have analysed all volcanic eruptions in South Eastern (SE) Asia, about 10ºS to 10ºN and 90ºE to 160ºE (4d), the most volcanically active area in the world with over 23% of all eruptions in the Global Volcanism Program database since 1500 occurring here and with 5 volcanoes stated in the literature to have erupted nearly continuously for 30 years. SE Asia is also the region where the convective arm of the thermally direct Walker Circulation occurs driven by the intense equatorial solar radiation which creates the high surface temperature. The volcanic tephra plume intercepts some of the solar radiation by absorption/reflection which cools the surface and heats the atmosphere creating a temperature inversion compared to periods without the plume. This reduces convection and causes the Walker Circulation and Trade Winds to weaken. This reduced wind speed causes the central Pacific Ocean to warm creating convection there and further weakening the Walker Circulation. With the reduced wind stress the western Pacific warm pool migrates east. This creates an ENSO event which continues until the tephra plume reduces, typically when the SE Asian monsoon commences, and convection is re-established over SE Asia and the Pacific warm pool migrates back to the west. Correlations of SE Asian tephra and the ENSO indices are typically over 0.80 at ρ < 0.02 at 5c below. In recent decades the anthropogenic SE Asian aerosol Plume (SEAP) has intensified the volcanic plume in some years from September to November (SON). Using NASA satellite data and the NASA MERRA-2 reanalysis dataset I show correlation coefficients typically over 0.70 and up to 0.99 at ρ < 0.01 between the aerosol optical depth (AOD) or aerosol index (AI) and the ENSO indices on a detrended basis in SON at 5a. If two events A and B correlate 5 options are possible: (1) A causes B; (2) B causes A; (3) C, another event, causes A & B simultaneously; (4) It’s a coincidence; and (5) The relationship is complex with feedback. The volcanic results: only allow options 1 or 4 as ENSO cannot cause volcanic eruptions; and are backed up by 4 independent satellite datasets and NASA’s MERRA-2 reanalysis which assimilates aerosol observations. I conclude volcanic and anthropogenic aerosols over SE Asia are the sole cause of all ENSO events.

Data quality is only one of many uncertainties involved in our attempt to understand, model and predict complex nonlinear systems and to identify the properties emerging from them. Perhaps not surprisingly, less than half of published scientific studies can be successfully reproduced, with the earth sciences occupying an intermediate position among the major disciplines. The uncertainty of data quality is only one factor that contributes to the relatively poor reproducibility of research studies and the resulting hypotheses. Potentially more important factors include unsuitably low thresholds for assessing statistical relevance, inappropriate data manipulation, inadequate research design, and outright fraud. Data quality for earth science data can be communicated via measurement errors (e.g., instrument accuracy, technician practices) and addressed by employing measurement quality codes, whereas the other aforementioned factors can be identified or controlled through rigor, methods selection and research competency. A more difficult source of uncertainty includes biases, assumptions, and environmental or social influences that affect the judgment and perceptions of scientists themselves. The difficulty is that many of these factors operate beyond one’s awareness or control, residing within automatic processes of the human brain. From continually seeking, interpreting and projecting patterns (spatial and temporal) to confabulating answers and relying on heuristics, we are largely at the mercy of what the brain has evolved to do, which is not necessarily to accurately perceive the natural world. Peer reviews, precision instruments, mathematical abstractions and digital computers certainly assist us in probing nature; nevertheless, we ultimately perceive the world as we are, rather than as it is. Consequently, a scientifically “objective” view of nature is being questioned in research ranging from quantum mechanics to human consciousness. To what extent are the peculiarities of human brain responsible for the uncertainty and nuances that we believe exist in nature? Are scientists fooled by a brain that constructs, rather than simply observes, the world around us? If so, do we have the tools to deal with this kind of uncertainty?

The ionospheric modification experiments are providing the means for understanding mechanisms and physical processes leading to the generation and evolution of ionospheric irregularities. We present experimental results concentrating on the features and evolution, generation conditions and mechanisms of small-scale field-aligned irregularities (FAIs) in the high latitude ionosphere F region induced by the controlled injection of the powerful HF radio waves from the ground into the ionosphere. Experiments have been carried out at the EISCAT HF Heating facility near Tromsø, Norway, at heater frequencies of 4.5 – 8.0 MHz with an effective radiated power of 200 – 750 MW. HF pump wave with ordinary (O-mode) or extraordinary (X-mode) polarization was injected along the magnetic field-aligned direction. Instrument diagnostics included the CUTLASS (Co-operative UK Twin Located Auroral Sounding System) radar, the European Incoherent Scatter (EISCAT) UHF radar at 931 MHz near Tromsø and the EISCAT ionosonde (dynasonde). It was found that the features and physical driving mechanisms of FAIs with the spatial scale across the geomagnetic field of 7.5 – 15 m are significantly different for O- and X-mode HF pumping, presenting challenges for understanding the relevant processes. The main attention is paid to the recently discovered X-mode FAIs. By a contrast to the O-mode FAIs excited by a thermal parametric (resonance) instability at the upper hybrid resonance altitude, the X-mode FAIs are generated via two-step process. In the first step the generation of elongated large-scale irregularities (with the spatial scale across the geomagnetic field of the order of 1 -10 km depending on the background geophysical conditions and the pump frequency) is occurred. As a second step, we suggest that the filamentation instability can be responsible for the generation of small-scale FAIs. As is found from EISCAT UHF radar measurements FAIs greatly impact on the development of strong artificial turbulence such as Langmuir and ion-acoustic plasma waves.

A newly developed physics-based earthquake simulation algorithm was applied to a seismogenic model in the Central Apennines Region. This model was derived from the last version of the Database of the Individual Seismogenic Sources (DISS), from which 54 seismogenic faults have been recognized. This simulator allowed the compilation of a synthetic seismic catalog lasting 100,000 years, and containing more than 300,000 events of 4.0