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By St. John, JOHN Ancel

AT THE New York meeting of the Institute of Metals Division in February, 1927, Jeffries and Tarasov presented a paper on Tungsten and Thoria,1 in which the experimental facts were interpreted in accordance with the prevailing point of view that the thorium is present as the oxide, thoria. In discussing that paper the writer of this article stated that his own investigations, which had been unavailable to Messrs. Jeffries and Tarasov, showed that the so-called "thoriated" tungsten filament failed to disclose any sign of the oxide when subjected to X-ray diffraction analysis, but did give plenty of evidence of the presence of metallic thorium and, in certain cases, of a material believed to bean alloy of tungsten in thorium. Since these results were completely at variance with the results reported in the paper under discussion and with other papers which had preceded it from time to time in the past, it was felt that further discussion should be withheld until the new evidence could be presented adequately. Arrangements were therefore made to present that evidence at this meeting. MATERIAL EXAMINED The material examined was high-emission filament such as is used in radio tubes, supposed to contain about 0.75 per cent. thoria. The actual analysis was not stated.

Jan 1, 1927

By R. W. Zeindler, D. A. Fawcett

"A summary is presented of the report completed by the Coal Mining Research Centre in 1980. This report was of a cross-pit conveyor system applied as an auxiliary mining complement to the major stripping unit, a dragline. The purpose of the CMRC report was to evaluate selective mining and replacement of the upper horizons of the strata as an aid in reclamation. These strata were the topsoil, subsoil and glacial till.Past utilization of cross-pit conveyor systems and related engineering studies were assessed. The parameters of the study were based on the mining and geological conditions of the Alberta prairie coal mines. The principal excavator for stripping was a dragline. Excavation of the upper horizons was done by a bucket-wheel excavator discharging onto the crosspit conveyor. Alternative equipment applications were economically compared. Four cases or geological sections were evaluated in detail. The economics of the alternative mining systems for each of the cases were determined. In all instances, the most economical solution was a tandem system utilizing a dragline with a bucket-wheel excavator/ cross-pit conveyor system."

Jan 1, 1981

THOMAS T. READ, Palmerton, Pa. (communication to the Secretary*). -It is much to he regretted that in presenting a further discussion of these deposits, first described by myself' and later discussed by C. M. Weld,2 Mr. Wang bas not made a more complete presentation of the evidence on which he bases his conclusions as to their origin. Mr. Weld said in his paper that his visit was confined to a few hours, that he saw only one of the several exposures, and that he took away no samples for further study. My own visit was brief, and for another purpose than the study of the geological features of 'the deposits, so the fact that Mr. Weld described as a hornblende-granite the rock which I described as a "dark gray syenitic rock," and which Mr. Wang identifies as a hornblende-syenite, seems of no great importance, since this rock is generally decomposed along the contact, presumably the only place in which Mr. Weld observed it. Later in the same paper (p. 31), Mr. Weld says that his opinion is that the magnetite of the deposits is primary, but Mr. Wang makes no mention of this in stating his own conclusion to the same effect. When Mr. Weld's paper appeared, I did not discuss it, because, although I considered the evidence- that he brought forward to support his belief that the magnetite is primary too slender to support the hypothesis, my own evidence to the contrary was equally tenuous. .The opportunities for observation and study open to Mr. Wang must have provided him with

Jan 6, 1917

By Roger Amato

The 1982 United Nations Convention on the Low of the Sea includes provisions under Article 76 for extending a coastal State's jurisdiction beyond the 200-nautical-mile (nm) Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) and for establishing the seaward limits of sovereign rights over natural resources. Article 76 prescribes a set of methodologies for determining these outer limits based on physiography and sediment thickness. The methodologies were applied to each of the five continental* margin areas of the United States - Atlantic, Pacific, Gulf of Mexico, Alaska, and Pacific Islands-using existing digital hydrographic and geologic data. Figures 1 and 2 show the results of applying the methodologies to the Atlantic, Pacific, Alaskan, and Gulf of Mexico continental shelves. Figure 1 depicts the preliminary limits of each of the Article 76 determinations for the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico continental shelves. The Atlantic limits were described by Carpenter, Thormahlen, and Amato (1995) at the 26th Underwater Mining Institute.1 The limits for the Alaskan continental shelves are shown in Figure 2. Additional areas beyond the 200 nm EEZ are highlighted. These include a small area north of the U.S. - Canada boundary, containing 7,000 km2, a large area north of Point barrow (395,000 km2), and a third area north of the Aleutian Islands (178,000 km2). The shelf between the first two areas appears to have sediments thick enough to qualify for the 1 percent method (Irish Formula); however, year-round ice cover has prevented acquisition of seismic or drill data. The entire northern Alaska shelf is prospective for petroleum The Gulf of Mexico (Figure 1) has two small areas beyond the EEZ known as "doughnut holes." One is south of Louisiana and includes part of the Sigsbee Escarpment, an area believed to have potential for oil and gas. Oil was found on Sigsbee Knoll in cores from Deep Sea Drilling Project's Leg 1 cruise in 1968. The Sigsbee areas contains about 6,000 km2. The second area is south of the Florida panhandle and contains about 12,000 km2.

Jan 1, 1996

MERLIN, the Queensland Department of Minerals and Energy's corporate geographic information system, provides ready access to all georeferenced data held by the department. Its aim is to provide a consistent, current, statewide coverage of timely information to assist in tenures management, exploration targeting and competing land use decision-making. Initially developed in 1988 and under continual enhancement since then, its functionality is the result of on-going close consultation with a wide range of departmental clients and potential users. A true geographic information system, MERLIN maintains both graphical data with linked textual information on a wide range of features of interest. The proprietary software products Arclnfo and Oracle are used to hold the graphics and attribute information respectively. Access to information is provided by a specially designed graphical user interface programed in-house. Hardcopy output of graphics displays including related attribute data as well as detailed reports of textual information can be retrieved at any departmental office. MERLIN is a network of computer systems which link each of the Department's regional offices and head office in Brisbane. The current state of exploration and mining is maintained by departmental officers processing tenure applications, transactions and dealings directly into the system. Data entered at regional offices are transferred overnight to head office to up-date central records and maintain a currency of data statewide as at the close of business the previous day. Through MERLIN the Department of Minerals and Energy now offers a much streamlined tenures management service as well as access to information about past exploration and mining, Queensland's mineral and energy occurrences and resources, and up-to-date information on the state's geology including maps, boreholes, geophysical surveys and field observations. In the future, this Geographic Information system will be invaluable to the mining industry in the development of mining projects.

Jan 1, 1995

By M. Bevis, A. G. Crocker

A. G. Crocker and M. Bevis (Battersea College of Technology)— Richman and Richman and conard17 have recently published the very interesting results of their studies on the plastic deformation of Fe-Ni-C martensites and of an Fe-5 wt pct Be alloy. Other work on the range of Fe-Be alloys containing between 16 and 27 at. pct Be has also been reported by Richman." One of the fascinating features of this work is that the materials investigated deform primarily by means of twinning and that several twinning modes are operative in addition to the well-established (112 ) mode of bcc materials The composition planes of these unusual twins were determined using a single-surface analysis and reported as (0131, "{045)" or "{089)", and "{2,3,10)" or "(127)". (It is now thought1' that the "{0,1,13)" habit reported for the Fe-Ni-C alloys'' is more likely to be near "{127)". Although the full twinning elements of these unusual twinning modes could not be determined directly from the experimental results, the authors attempt to deduce the elements by considering twin intersectionslQ and by using the projection technique of Jaswon and Dove.' The basic assumption of their approach is that the (013) habits are truly rational planes but that the other habits are irrational and merely approximated to by the indices quoted above. They thus deduce that the twinning mode describing the (013) habit is either Type I or compound and that the modes describing the other habits are Type 11. This deduction must however be false as all twinning modes in cubic structures obeying the classical orientation relationships of deformation twinning must be compound. Type-I and Type-I1 modes can occur in all of the other crystal systems (indeed in the triclinic system compound modes are not allowed), but in the cubic system only compound modes can arise. This fact, which does not appear to be well-known, fol- lows immediately from the relations between the four twinning elements defining a twinning mode. Thus for a Type-I mode which is uniquely defined by the rational twinning elements K1 = hi and tj2 = vi (i = 1, 2, 3), the Kz qd 771 elements are given by: where the summation convention of the tensor calculus has been adopted. For cubic materials the metrics cij Iand cij reduce to the unit tensors 6ij and 6ij so that we have It is clear from these equations that both ki and ui must take on integral values; i.e., Kz, and ql must be rational, if hi and vi are integers, i.e., if K1 and 77~ are rational. Thus for cubic materials a Type-I mode must degenerate into a compound mode and the same result also arises for Type-II modes. The apparently irrational habits observed by the authors can thus not be explained in terms of Type-I1 twinning if the classical laws of deformation twinning are to be obeyed. An alternative explanation of the irrational habits is that they may arise from twinning modes with four irrational twinning elements. These modes, which do not obey the classical orientation relationships associated with deformation twinning, have been shown to arise as the result of double twinning processes in magnesium,22 but may also describe a simple shear on an irrational plane in an irrational direction. Indeed double twinning processes in bcc

Jan 1, 1963

By Michael T. Lambert

The purpose of the this paper is to demonstrate the benefits of using additional instrumentation during load tests of auger-cast-in-place piles. Traditionally, only load and butt displacement are determined during load tests. The results from and methods used to instrument 15 auger-cast-in-place (ACEP) piles as part of six projects are included herein. By instrumenting the piles, the distribution of load along the pile length and load transfer can be determined, allowing the pile capacity to be adjusted or the length/diameter of the pile to be adjusted for the a given required load. The majority of the piles tested were designed as end bearing piles on either shale or limestone bedrock. No discussion of Geotechnical Instrumentation can be started without acknowledgement of the "Red Book." The actual title of the book is Geotechnical Instrumentation for Monitoring Field Performance, by Mr. John Dunnicliff, John Wiley and Sons, 1993. Anyone undertaking an instrumentation program should thoroughly review the Red Book, paying particular attention to Chapters 3 and 4. Instrumentation should not be done just because it can be done. There must be an unanswered question or questions that can be answered with measured data before instrumentation should be considered.

Jan 1, 2000

Techniques and results achieved during the excavation of the Melbourne Underground Rail Loop (HURL) are summarised and discussed in the context of the various restraints present in a typical urban construction project. Mechanical methods (as distinct from those utilising blasting)accounted for the bulk of the excavation. Ground support was critical in this particular geological excavation setting, but is not discussed in detail except insofar as it constitutes a restraint to excavation progress.

Jan 1, 1978

By J. E. Pavlick, W. W. Mullins, H. W. Paxton

The growth of nitrogen-austenite during nitriding of large-gvained ferrite between 650" and 800°C has been studied as a functimz oJ time and nitrogen potential of the atmosphere for a variety of alloying elements dissolved in the ferrite. Whereas no preferential grain boundary penetration by aistenite takes place in zone-refined iron, the addition of aboit I zot pct oj' V, Ti, Cr. Si, or A1 produces significant protrusion of austenite down former 0-0 boundaries. This group of elernents also produces ragged y-0 interfaces in the a grains which advance more slozuly than those in zone-refined iron. 1 zut pct of Ni, Co, Mn, or Mo dissolved in ferrite leads to essentially smooth 7-a interfaces, which advance at rates very sinzilar to those in zone-refined iron. The reasons for this effect are not clear. Two possible limiting hypotheses, not necessarily exclusive, are discussed. One involves p.referentia1 grain bozindary diffusion of nitrogen. the other the production of a zone of ferrite, stpersatcirated with respect to nitrogen, from which austenite precipitates helerogeneozisly on the a-a gyain boundaries. In many phase transformations which occur by nu-cleation and diffusion-controlled growth, information on the parameters which control the rates of nuclea-tion and of growth is frequently not quantititative. The present work describes a continuation of efforts to obtain quantitative data on growth rates in systems where thermodynamic and kinetic factors are known independently, and thus where comparison with models of the growth process is possible. The work has been conducted on iron-base systems for two reasons. Firstly, there are several interesting transformations in this system, many of which are of practical importance. Secondly, the information on phase diagrams, activities, and diffusion coefficients is more complete in this system than in any other. These data are still inadequate to check all the effects of alloying elements, but at worst it is possible to make estimates and thus examine order-of-magni-tude agreement with proposed models. It will be necessary to do this in the present work. The problem studied was the growth of nitrogen-austenite in from the surface of large-grained columnar crystals of alloyed ferrite exposed to an NHs/Hz atmosphere. Earlier work by Grozier et al.' had suggested that growth of austenite may occur preferentially along grain boundaries of alloyed ferrite, whereas zone-refined (ZR) iron shows no such effect, Fig. 1. Growth of nitrogen-austenite into single crystals of zone-refined ferrite is planar provided sufficient nu-cleation sites for austenite are present, and is controlled by volume diffusion of nitrogen through the

Jan 1, 1967

By William S. Pintz, William A. Vogely, Charles J. Johnson

This chapter on the role of minerals in developing economies is oriented toward economic policy issues. The discussion and analysis cut across the technical, economic, legal, and policy fields. The goal of this chapter is to pro- vide relevant background information important to individuals involved with the minerals sector in developing countries. Where possible, trends are shown to provide a basis for understanding the evolving role of minerals in developing economies. This chapter is divided into the following five sections: (1) characteristics of developing countries (which presents selected statistical comparisons); (2) government objectives in developing countries; (3) government policy formulation in developing countries; (4) determinants of future trends, and (5) a summary of the chapter's major points combined with the authors' view. CHARACTERISTICS OF DEVELOPING COUNTRIES There are 155 nations in the world categorized as "developing countries." In total these nations represent about one third of the value of the world's mineral production, three quarters of the world's population, and over half of the world's land surface area. The group of so-called developing countries is quite diverse and there are exceptions to almost any general observation about the group as a whole. Most definitions of the term "developing country" are based on levels of per capita income. However, if per capita income is the sole criterion used in categorization, then several oil-exporting countries would jump from the category of developing country to the category of developed country.a Obviously, this results in a poor fit with respect to other measures. In general, the majority of developing countries can be characterized by relatively low per capita income, high population growth rates, high levels of unemployment, low levels of education, short average life ex- pectancies, income distribution skewed toward the highest 20% of the population, and a large share of exports represented by primary commodities. b For the purposes of this chapter a slightly modified version of the widely used World Bank system of classification (shown in Table 1.2.1) is used. As summarized in Table 1.2.1, developing countries are divided into three main groups based on estimated gross national product (GNP) per capita. It should be noted that the high- income, oil-exporting countries have characteristics of both developing and industrialized countries; however they are included for most statistical comparisons within the group of developing countries. Of the 155 developing countries in the world, approximately half produce minerals other than common building materials, and only 32 account for more than five percent of world pro-

Jan 1, 1985

By Joseph P. Brennan, Robert L. Vines

A historical comparison of the frequency of fatal coal mining accidents occurring underground in mines of various size ranges in the United States and in member countries of the Commission of the European Communities is presented. Frequencies are normalized on hours-worked and tons-produced bases. The comparisons rely on published and confirmed data and on theory for selective treatment of data in an effort to overcome reporting differences and basic differences in the mining conditions and system employed. Trends are identified ad projections made of the effect on accident records of various industry growth patterns. Conclusions are drawn regarding the reasons for differences between the records of U.S. underground coal mines and the records of those mines in European countries.

Jan 1, 1984

By M. Bevis, A. G. Crocker

A. G. Crocker and M. Bevis (Battersea College of Technology)— Richman and Richman and conard17 have recently published the very interesting results of their studies on the plastic deformation of Fe-Ni-C martensites and of an Fe-5 wt pct Be alloy. Other work on the range of Fe-Be alloys containing between 16 and 27 at. pct Be has also been reported by Richman." One of the fascinating features of this work is that the materials investigated deform primarily by means of twinning and that several twinning modes are operative in addition to the well-established (112 ) mode of bcc materials The composition planes of these unusual twins were determined using a single-surface analysis and reported as (0131, "{045)" or "{089)", and It is now thought1' that the "{0,1,13)" habit reported for the Fe-Ni-C alloys'' is more likely to be near "{127)". Although the full twinning elements of these unusual twinning modes could not be determined directly from the experimental results, the authors attempt to deduce the elements by considering twin intersectionslQ and by using the projection technique of Jaswon and Dove. The basic assumption of their approach is that the (013) habits are truly rational planes but that the other habits are irrational and merely approximated to by the indices quoted above. They thus deduce that the twinning mode describing the (013) habit is either Type I or compound and that the modes describing the other habits are Type 11. This deduction must however be false as all twinning modes in cubic structures obeying the classical orientation relationships of deformation twinning must be compound. Type-I and Type-I1 modes can occur in all of the other crystal systems (indeed in the triclinic system compound modes are not allowed), but in the cubic system only compound modes can arise. This fact, which does not appear to be well-known, fol- lows immediately from the relations between the four twinning elements defining a twinning mode. Thus for a Type-I mode which is uniquely defined by the rational twinning elements K1 = hi and given by: where the summation convention of the tensor calculus has been adopted. For cubic materials the metrics and reduce to the unit tensors and j so that we have It is clear from these equations that both ki and ui must take on integral values; i.e., Kz, and ql must be rational, if hi and vi are integers, i.e., if K1 and are rational. Thus for cubic materials a Type-I mode must degenerate into a compound mode and the same result also arises for Type-II modes. The apparently irrational habits observed by the authors can thus not be explained in terms of Type-I1 twinning if the classical laws of deformation twinning are to be obeyed. An alternative explanation of the irrational habits is that they may arise from twinning modes with four irrational twinning elements. These modes, which do not obey the classical orientation relationships associated with deformation twinning, have been shown to arise as the result of double twinning processes in magnesium,22 but may also describe a simple shear on an irrational plane in an irrational direction. Indeed double twinning processes in bcc

Jan 1, 1963

By Louis Huntoon

HISTORY of the Porcupine area has been pub-lished in detail by the Ontario Bureau. of Mines in several issues of its annual reports. An. interesting volume could be written on: this topic; especially if personalities were introduced, such as the. transaction whereby the original title to the Hollinger group of claims was settled between Ben Hollinger and Alex Gillies by the toss of a coin. The early history of the McIntyre mine also had its thrilling events, such as its manager, R. J. Ennis, dodging the sheriff and deposit-ing red-hot gold bricks in the bank to meet his pay-roll. The occurrence of quartz veins containing low gold values was reported in 1896 by E. M. Burwash and again in 1899 by W. A. Parks. The first application for a mining claim appears to have been applied for on Dec. 30, 1906, by W. 0. Taylor, of Toronto, one of the old employees of the Hudson Bay Co. On the recom-mendation of Mr. Taylor, early prospecting was done on the shores of Porcupine Lake. It. was not until the spectacular discovery of the surface croppings at the Dome mine, by J. S. Wilson in 1909, that a rush to the district took place. Exploration was carried on during 1910 and 1911. The big boom was on in 1911, when claims sold on the evidence of mere rock croppings, owing to the prevailing heavy overburden. Rock croppings with specks of gold brought big prices. The country was heavily timbered and most difficult to prospect. My first trip was made during the summer of 1911, while the railroad was under construction from Porquis Junction to South Porcupine. I published my observations in the Canadian Mining Journal, Dec. 15, 1911, discussing in particular the character of the ore deposits and the future prospects of the camp. The first mills were erected in 1911, only to be destroyed by the disastrous fire in July of that year. They were rebuilt and the first important shipments are recorded in 1912. The history of the camp from the discovery of the Dome to the present consists of alternate chapters of great optimism and those of a more non-committal nature. For the engineer unfamiliar with the character of the deposits of this area, and the north country in general, it is at times most difficult to draw conclusions and submit definite recommendations. When valuable orebodies apex at depth, with no surface showings other than slightly mineralized veins of quartz or quartz containing a little visible gold; when at depth valuable veins and ore deposits, paralleling the one being explored, are developed by cross-cutting, such as Nos. 85-58 on the Hollinger, which have been its largest producers, the engineer assumes responsibilities rarely called for in other mining districts. This fluctuating aspect is exemplified in the three large producers, and may be duplicated with some of the old producers now being explored.

Jan 8, 1923

By Lars Lövgren, Jörgen Jönsson

Heavy metals may be retained within deposits of sulfide minerals under oxidation and in the nearest recipients of drainage water by sorption to secondary iron precipitates. The extent of sorption is strongly influenced by solution pH and presence of complexing ligands, such as sulfate and natural organic acids. Desorption of metals and organidinorganic anions to recent secondary Fe precipitates, collected at the Kristineberg mine, Sweden, has been investigated under different geochemical conditions. Elemental composition and structural characterization (X-ray powder diffraction) indicate presence of schwertmannite. While metals such as Ni and Pb were fractionally desorbed from the precipitates under acidic conditions, oxyanions, e.g. arsenatdarsenite and sulfate were desorbed preferably under alkaline conditions. In a separate study the adsorption of NOM onto synthetic goethite was investigated. NOM adsorption showed a strong pH dependence, 95% was adsorbed at pH 3 and 40 % was adsorbed at pH 9. Addition of 2 mM of sulfate desorbed about 10 % of the adsorbed NOM.

Jan 1, 2000

By R. T. Muller

Contribution to the above paper by R. T. Muller (Visitor) Demands are being made and pressure is being brought to bear on employers in South Africa to narrow or eliminate the wage gap between their White and Black employees. Few thinking people will dispute the fact that a constant improvement in the wages of Black personnel is essential, but this cannot be done merely by a redistribution of income in South Africa.

Jan 7, 1974

Comprehensive occupational health and safety legislation in Australia is comparatively recent. It follows the examples set in U.S.A. and U.K. a decade or more ago. In Western Australia the Occupational Health, Safety and Welfare Act was proclaimed in April 1985. It still has a long way to go before it achieves all its objectives. The mining industry has developed a substantial body of health and safety regulations under the Mines Regulation Act. Considerable practical expertise in such matters already exists, much of it developed from hard won experience. As a result it would prefer not to become engulfed in the new legislation. It would prefer to build upon the cooperatively developed policies and workable practices in the field of occupational health and safety with which it is familiar. Associated Minerals Consolidated Ltd. is a leading mineral sands producer in Western Australia and has continuously developed its occupational health and safety policy and practices. Under the banner of "Resource Control", AMC seeks to provide a safe and healthy working environment at all times. This is being achieved through a strategy of a policy, a defined organisational structure and a detailed programme, which together comprise the "Resource Control System". Some of the activities and achievements of AMC in the field of occupational health and safety are compared with the objectives of contemporary legislation, and details of some of the specialised areas of the Resource Control Programme are discussed. The paper will also highlight and discuss impractical areas of potential legislation.

Jan 1, 1986

Solid Energy New Zealand Limited owns and operates the Ohai coal field (Wairaki Coal Mining Licence, CML) in western Southland. The Morley Stream passes directly through the middle of the CML and has required diversion in the past to enable open cast mining to proceed. Solid Energy is evaluating two new open cast pits at Ohai. Commissioning these new pits would necessitate further diversion of the Morley Stream. One of these potential new mines is adjacent to an abandoned State Coal Mines (State Coal) pit and there is an opportunity to substantially rehabilitate this old pit as a corollary to the new mine and the stream diversion project.   Past Morley Stream diversions were undertaken by State Coal and so they predated the Resource Management Act 1991 and the degree of community environmental awareness and involvement that has become the norm these days. Not surprisingly the design and construction of the historic stream diversions was based purely upon mining (operational) and engineering considerations. This led to the stream being diverted in a manner that achieved the clinical conveyance of design volumes of water from points A and B.   Solid Energy realised that the proposed new diversions need to adopt more holistic and environmentally sustainable design principles while also including appropriate mining and engineering constraints. This project involved the design of a 1.7 km diversion of the Morley Stream (median flow of about 1000 litres/second) that would enable progressive prestripping and development of the new mines and would also address final rehabilitation (of the stream), geotechnical risks, hydrological and ecological issues. To address all of these factors the project required a multidisciplinary approach. Moreover, it required a clear understanding of how the mining operational constraints could be integrated with the environmental considerations. A significant aspect of the project was how to take account of fishery instream habitat needs, the resource consent requirements and most of all, the involvement of key stakeholders such as the Fish & Game Council, Department of Conservation, the Iwi and local community in the design process. This was achieved through coordinated consultation and stakeholder involvement in a technical design workshop.

Jan 1, 2005

By W. C. McBee, B. W. Jong, T. A. Sullivan

A sulfur concrete technology has been developed by the US Bureau of Mines, where chemically modified sulfur is used with suitable mineral aggregates to produce construction materials that are resistant to corrosion by acids and salts. This report presents a summary of the basic technology and results of testing the materials under actual operating conditions in 50 corrosive environments in 40 commercial plants. After four years of testing, there was essentially no evidence of material degradation or loss of strength. Regular concrete materials were attacked and, in some cases, completely destroyed under the same conditions. Testing is continuing to establish ultimate longevity and durability of the sulfur concretes. The materials are finding widespread applications in metallurgical, chemical, and fertilizer processing plants.

Jan 1, 1986

By Kegomoditswe Koitsiwe, Tsuyoshi Adachi

"This paper characterizes quarterly LME copper price fundamentals from 1995 to 2011 by analyzing the transformation of the market mechanism based on structural change perspective. Using chow test for structural change based on the least square multiple regression, we divide the price fluctuation into: Stable price period (1995Q3-1999Q2), Low stable price period (1999Q3 – 2003Q3) and Price fluctuation period (2003Q4 – 2011Q2). The results show the existence of structural breaks disproves the investigation of the full sample period as a whole. In different structural breakpoints the main drivers of copper prices changes and their impact are significantly different. Moreover, the paper examines the role of speculation in copper price fluctuations.Introduction The rise in commodities price volatility and financial and economic crisis have led to questions over the organisation of futures and physical commodities markets. Spikes in commodity prices and volatility have coincided with a surge in financial speculators in the commodity markets inspiring a polarised and hotly debate among academics and practitioners about the role of investors in the development of physical markets. In his seminal work Kaldor (1939) focused primarily on whether speculative activity in the futures markets reduces the variance of commodity spot prices. Yet, part of the literature finds that the introduction of futures contracts destabilizes the spot market. IMF (2006) studied commodities boom and its causes concluding that there is little support for the hypothesis that speculative activity affects either price levels over the long run or price swings in the short-run. The impact of speculative activity on commodity prices remains a highly contentious topic. Other market analysts take the view that the supply and demand for physical commodities remain the major determinants of market trends (Krugman 2008). It is the aim of this study to contribute to the literature by examining the drivers of copper price changes from a structural change perspective. In this context we are attempting to answer to: What are the main drivers leading to copper price fluctuations? Are these factors having the same effect in different periods or not? It is meaningful to understand drivers of copper prices and thereby, their fluctuations because it will help developing countries depending on copper export to anticipate market situation and avoid bad economic development challenges that can result from price fluctuations. Moreover, this can ensure sustainable mineral supply."

Jan 1, 2017

By H. L. Luo, P. Duwez, C. C. Chao

BY rapidly cooling alloys from the liquid state, it is possible to obtain solid solutions beyond the equilibrium concentrations, provided that the components are miscible in the liquid state. Typical such cases include CU-Ag,1 Pt-Ag,2 CU-Rh,3 nickel-base alloys with silicon, germanium, and tin,4 and cobalt-base alloys with silicon, germanium, tin, aluminum, and gallium.5 In the present note it is shown that terminal solid solutions can be appreciably extended in A1-Mg alloys. The alloys whose compositions are given in Table I were prepared by induction melting in tantalum crucibles under an argon atmosphere. Both aluminum and magnesium were 99.99 pct pure. Weight losses after melting were less than 0.2 pct for the aluminum-rich alloys and less than 0.4 pct for the magnesium-rich alloys. From these weight losses it was estimated that the compositions of the ingots after melting were accurate within 0.3 at. pct for aluminum-rich alloys and within 0.5 at. pct for magnesium-rich alloys. As indicated in Table I, the compound AuCd10 in which there is an ionic contribution to the bonding. The authors thank Dr. J. H. Westbrook of the Research Laboratory, General Electric Co., for arranging the supply of materials and for his interest. This investigation was supported by the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission under Contract AT(30-1)-1002, Scope I. some of the alloys were also chemically analyzed and the results confirmed the limits of uncertainty based on weight losses. Rapid quenching from the liquid state was achieved by techniques previously described.8,7 The principle of these techniques consists of propelling a small globule of liquid alloy (about 20 mg) onto a copper substrate. The thin foils easily detached from the copper substrate were analyzed by X-ray diffraction using a Debye-Scherrer camera 114.6 mm in diameter and either nickel-filtered copper Ka or iron-filtered cobalt Ka radiation. Since the back-reflection doublets were resolved, the wavelengths used in the computatioas were CuKal = 1.54050A and CoKa1= 1.78892A. Lattice parameters were obtained by extrapolation of the Nelson-Riley function, and the tables compiled

Jan 1, 1964