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1. The Intraplate Stress Field of West Africa

   https://doi.org/10.1029/2023GL107614  

   Legre, Jean‐Joel; Qin, Yan; Kolawole, Folarin; Olugboji, Tolulope (June 2024, Geophysical Research Letters)

   Abstract West Africa continues to host a growing number of low and intermediate‐magnitude earthquakes (M2‐5) along its passive margins, and its continental interior. Earthquake activity in these regions raises the need to comprehend the causes and the tectonic controls of the seismicity. Unfortunately, such studies are rare. Here, we apply single‐station inversion techniques to constrain fourteen focal mechanisms, computed after compiling a set of high‐quality waveforms. We describe the connection between seismicity, the contemporary stress field, anthropogenic activity and Holocene fault scarps in the region. Our results indicate transpressive stresses acting on the inherited brittle structures in the passive margins. We also observe a compressive regime in the intracontinental failed rifts. We attribute the seismicity to the reactivation of “weak” faults in the Neoproterozoic and Mesozoic failed rifts, the passive transform structures, and the intracratonic Precambrian brittle shear zones. 

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2. Spatial spread of the West Africa Ebola epidemic

   https://doi.org/10.1098/rsos.160294  

   Kramer, Andrew M.; Pulliam, J. Tomlin; Alexander, Laura W.; Park, Andrew W.; Rohani, Pejman; Drake, John M. (August 2016, Royal Society Open Science)
3. Geology of West Antarctica

   Siddoway, Christine Smith (January 2021, Beiträge zur regionalen Geologie der Erde)

   Kleinschmidt, Georg (Ed.)

   The work is Chapter Three in a volume that provides a comprehensive overview of the geology of the Antarctic continent. The book represents the first comprehensive update of Antarctic geology in 25 years or more. Knowledge of the geology of Antarctica -- even if based on the meager <2% of rock exposure for this continent-- has immeasurably increased over that quarter-century. Individual chapters cover the regional geology of the seven main physiographic regions of Antarctica: -the Antarctic Peninsula, -West Antarctica (Marie Byrd Land and Enderby Land), -Transantarctic Mountains, -the Shackleton Range and its surroundings (including the Bertrab, Littlewood and Moltke Nunataks), -Dronning Maud Land, -Lambert Glacier and the area surrounding it, -East Antarctica from Kaiser-Wilhelm-II.-Land to George V Land/Terre Adélie. Each chapter contains a topographic, historical and geological overview, a description of the respective geological units, their stratigraphy and related data and the tectonic structure of the respective region. The seven chapters were written by acknowledged specialists in their field who place the regional geology into a continent-wide/plate tectonic/geological context. 

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4. Meanders of the West Greenland Current near Cape Farewell

   https://doi.org/10.1016/j.dsr.2021.103664  

   Pacini, Astrid; Pickart, Robert S. (January 2022, Deep Sea Research Part I: Oceanographic Research Papers)
5. Genesis of the Antarctic Slope Current in West Antarctica

   Thompson, A. F. (January 2020, Geophysical research letters)

   null (Ed.)

   The stability of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS) depends on ocean heat transport toward its base and remains a source of uncertainty in sea level rise prediction. The Antarctic Slope Current (ASC), a major boundary current of the ocean's global circulation, serves as a dynamic gateway for heat transport toward Antarctica. Here, we use observations collected from the Bellingshausen Sea to propose a mechanistic explanation for the initiation of the westward-flowing ASC. Waters modified throughout the Bellingshausen Sea by ocean-sea-ice and ocean-ice-shelf interactions are exported to the continental slope in a narrow, topographically steered western boundary current. This focused outflow produces a localized front at the shelf break that supports the emerging ASC. This mechanism emphasizes the importance of buoyancy forcing, integrated over the continental shelf, as opposed to local wind forcing, in the generation mechanism and suggests the potential for remote control of melt rates of WAIS' largest ice shelves. 

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