A typical debris flow is a torrential flow of a mixture of water, mud and debris that suddenly pushes ahead with a vanguard of huge, jostling and roaring boulders. It is certainly a very fearful phenomenon that causes disasters, but it is also truly a wonder of nature exciting the curiosity of researchers as to how such a phenomenon can arise. The phenomena themselves had been recognized since ancient times in Japan and given various mnemonic names to make people aware of the dangers. Although there were several detailed witness records around in 1965 when I began working for the Disaster Prevention Research Institute of Kyoto University (hereafter called DPRI), the characteristics and mechanisms of debris flows were still vague, and it was called a ‘phantasmal disaster’.

Part I: T hermal Strucure of Deep Earth 1

1 Melting of Fe Alloys and the Thermal Structure of the Core

2 Temperature of the Lower Mantle and Core Based on Ab Initio Mineral Physics Data

3 Heat Transfer in the Core and Mantle

4 Thermal State and Evolution of the Earth Core and Deep Mantle

Part II: S tructures, Anisotropy, and Plasticity of Deep Earth Materials 

5 Crystal Structures of Core Materials

Torsten Bickert Zentrum fu¨r Marine Umweltwissenschaften, Universita¨t Bremen, Germany
Steven N. Carey Graduate School of Oceanography, University of Rhode Island, Narragansett,
Rhode Island, USA Jean-Claude Fauge`res Universite´ de Bordeaux, UMR CNRS 5805 EPOC, Talence Cedex, France
Rudiger Henrich Department of Sedimentology and Paleoceanography, Faculty of Geosciences, University of Bremen, klagenfurter Straße, Bremen, and Fachbereich Geowissenschaften, Universita¨t Bremen, Germany
Reinhard Hesse Earth and Planetary Sciences, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada

The Gres d'Annot (Annot Sandstone) Formation of SE France includes some of the world's best exposures of sandy turbidites and has been the source of highly influential models of turbidite system development. This formation is now considered as a model example of a tectonically-controlled confined turbiditic ramp, and the Gres d'Annot outcrops constitute a classic area for academic and industrial field courses on deep-water gravity flow deposits. From the early 1930s, the focus of research on these extensive exposures has moved progressively from lithostratigraphy and structural interpretation to sedimentology, seismic-scale architecture of turbidite bodies, evaluation of tectonic controls, and more recently to detailed characterization of the turbidite units as hydrocarbon reservoir analogues <...>