GEOLOGY!

[Tiredretiredlawyer]

Happy Geologists Day, Mr. Gneiss!

https://nationaldaycalendar.com/geologi ... -in-april/

GEOLOGISTS DAY

From the Earth’s crust to deep into its core, we recognize Geologists Day on the first Sunday in April.

Geologists study the history, structure, and impact of other processes on the Earth. Their discoveries and research play an essential role in our daily lives. Geology blends well with other sciences such as chemistry and physics. In fact, they are necessary for agriculture, architecture, and weather prediction.

Those who pursue a geology degree open up a wide range of careers. From oceanography to NASA, education, government, and research, geology offers a worldview to applicants.

Hobbyists and enthusiasts have a place in geology, too. Even amateur geologists contribute to the science from time to time. That is part of the intrigue of geology and why we celebrate the day.

Families and educators, challenge students to identify these rocks and minerals. https://nationaldaycalendar.com/wp-cont ... llenge.png
Download and print the worksheet or view it on the web. When you finish, discover other rocks and minerals and keep the fascination alive.

IMG_2980.JPG (94.48 KiB) Viewed 3921 times

► Show Spoiler

HOW TO OBSERVE #GeologistsDay

Learn something from a geologist or about one of their discoveries.

Visit a museum to learn about paleontology or how our Earth is changing.

If you’re a geologist, share your knowledge and skills with someone interested in geology.

Families and educators, challenge students to identify these rocks and minerals. https://nationaldaycalendar.com/wp-cont ... llenge.png
Download and print the worksheet or view it on the web. When you finish, discover other rocks and minerals and keep the fascination alive.

[Uninformed]

“Making minerals: Crushed, zapped, boiled and baked”:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-62013806

[Tiredretiredlawyer]

Coooooooooooooool!!!!!

[Liz]

“Making minerals: Crushed, zapped, boiled and baked”:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-62013806

As I understand it, iron/nickel meteorites are the cores of proto planets that were destroyed in the early formation of our solar system. ... or from outside our solar system like Oumuamua (which passed by) and CNEOS 2014-01-08 which hit Earth in January 2014 at more than 1,00,000 miles per hour.

A team of researchers in Canada say they have discovered two new minerals – and potentially a third – after analysing a slice of a 15-tonne meteorite that landed in east Africa.
The meteorite, the ninth largest recorded at over 2 metres wide, was unearthed in Somalia in 2020, although local camel herders say it was well known to them for generations and named Nightfall in their songs and poems.

Dr Chris Herd, a professor in the department of earth and atmospheric sciences and the curator of the collection, said that while he was classifying the rock he noticed “unusual” minerals. Herd asked Andrew Locock, the head of the university’s electron microprobe laboratory, to investigate.

“The very first day he did some analyses, he said, ‘You’ve got at least two new minerals in there’,” said Herd. “That was phenomenal. Most of the time it takes a lot more work than that to say there’s a new mineral.”
Similar minerals had been synthetically created in a lab in the 1980s but never recorded as appearing in nature, Herd said, adding that these new minerals could help understand how “nature’s laboratory” works and may have as yet unknown real-world uses. A third potentially new mineral is being analysed.

The meteorite was found near the town of El Ali in Somalia. Photograph: Courtesy of Global Resources

“That’s what makes this exciting: in this particular meteorite you have two officially described minerals that are new to science.” They have been named elaliite, after the location of the meteorite, and elkinstantonite, after Lindy Elkins-Tanton, principal investigator of Nasa’s upcoming Psyche mission that aims to send a spacecraft to a metal-rich asteroid.

https://www.theguardian.com/science/202 ... in-somalia

https://www.livemint.com/science/news/m ... 71208.html

[AndyinPA]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/science/ ... e-slowing/

In the mid-1990s scientists found evidence that Earth’s inner core, a superheated ball of iron slightly smaller than the moon, was spinning at its own pace, just a bit faster than the rest of the planet. Now a study published in Nature Geoscience suggests that around 2009, the core slowed its rotation to whirl in sync with the surface for a time — and is now lagging behind it.

The provocative findings come after years of research and deep scientific disagreements about the core and how it influences some of the most fundamental aspects of our planet, including the length of a day and fluctuations in Earth’s magnetic field.

Three thousand miles below the surface, a scorching hot ball of solid iron floats inside a liquid outer core. Geologists believe that the energy released by the inner core causes the liquid in the outer core to move, generating electrical currents that in turn spawn a magnetic field surrounding the planet. This magnetic shielding protects organisms on the surface from the most damaging cosmic radiation.

[RTH10260]

UK

The Birth Of The British Island

The secession from the North American continent

(Videos uploaded nine years ago, the presentation may be somewhat older)

[RTH10260]

[RTH10260]

[much ado]

It's Baldrick!

[shannon]

I'll have to see about posting pictures from my geology classwork

[shannon]

So my first quarter of Geology graduate student classes are now registered at CWU

The three required ones for first year Geo grad students are:
GEOL 501 - Current Topics in Geology (3 units)
GEOL 502 - Regional Field Geology NW (this is a nine day, multiple field trip that starts before the quarter, some camping) (2 units)
GEOL 504 - Geological Sciences Seminar (1 unit)

Since I have to take a minimum of 10 units, and 14-16 is preferred, I've added to that:
GEOL 492A - Lab Experence Teaching High Level Geology classes (2, and I may knock this one off the table for now)
GEOL 532 - Field Geodetic Techniques (This is a 4 day car camping field trip to South Sister near Bend, Oregon, followed by a quarter spent analysing the data) (3 units)
GEOL 584 - Geochronology (5 units)

And according to the department co-chair, my faculty advisor for the next couple of years will be Dr. Breanyn MacInnes.

[sugar magnolia]

So my first quarter of Geology graduate student classes are now registered at CWU

The three required ones for first year Geo grad students are:
GEOL 501 - Current Topics in Geology (3 units)
GEOL 502 - Regional Field Geology NW (this is a nine day, multiple field trip that starts before the quarter, some camping) (2 units)
GEOL 504 - Geological Sciences Seminar (1 unit)

Since I have to take a minimum of 10 units, and 14-16 is preferred, I've added to that:
GEOL 492A - Lab Experence Teaching High Level Geology classes (2, and I may knock this one off the table for now)
GEOL 532 - Field Geodetic Techniques (This is a 4 day car camping field trip to South Sister near Bend, Oregon, followed by a quarter spent analysing the data) (3 units)
GEOL 584 - Geochronology (5 units)

And according to the department co-chair, my faculty advisor for the next couple of years will be Dr. Breanyn MacInnes.

Nothing to do with geology, but Sisters, OR is on my bucket list for their outdoor quilt show every summer.

[Suranis]

That sounds Gneiss.

[AndyinPA]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/science/ ... tle-rocks/

At an underwater mountain in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, scientists have drilled nearly a mile beneath the ocean floor and pulled up an unprecedented scientific bounty — pieces of Earth’s rocky mantle.

The record-breaking achievement has electrified geoscientists, who for decades have dreamed of punching through miles of Earth’s crust to sample the mysterious realm that makes up most of the planet. The heat-driven churn of the mantle is what fuels plate tectonics in the crust, giving rise to mountains, volcanoes and earthquakes.

The new expedition, by an ocean drilling vessel called the JOIDES Resolution, did not technically drill into the mantle, and the hole isn’t the deepest ever drilled beneath the ocean floor. Instead, researchers cruised to a special “tectonic window” in the North Atlantic where drills don’t have to tunnel as far to strike pay dirt. Here, the rocks of the mantle have been pushed close to the surface as the ocean floor slowly pulls apart at the nearby Mid-Atlantic Ridge.

On May 1, they began drilling the hole, known as U1601C. Andrew McCaig, the expedition’s co-chief scientist, expected to make a shallow “pinprick” because the record for drilling in mantle rock, set in the 1990s, was a mere tenth of a mile. The researchers hoped to recover enough samples to help elucidate how chemical reactions between mantle rocks and water could have given rise to life on our planet. But ocean drilling can be an uncertain enterprise — drills get stuck, or the long cores of rock being recovered may be only partial samples.

This time, though, the drill yielded tube after tube of dark rock, many of them surprisingly complete.

[shannon]

So slightly over a week before my move for grad school. And I know what the field work is going to have me doing:

Sept. 7-10. 4-day, 3-night camping trip. We'll join a Friends of the Pleistocene trip exploring the interplay of tectonics, climate, and
topography in central Washington, including ice age megafloods, Columbia River flood basalts. Camping at Potholes State Park.

Sept. 11. Day trip to the Chelan Migmatite Complex, North Cascades

Sept. 12-13. 2-day, 1-night camping trip to Mt St Helens and vicinity, including the 1980 eruption, and various Tertiary to Quaternary volcanic and glacial features of the central Cascade Mountains. For the night of Sept. 12, we'll camp at Mt. St. Helens Institute's Windy Ridge camp

Sept. 15. Day trip to the geology and neotectonics of the Ellensburg area

Sept. 16-19, 4-day, 3-night camping trip. Placing and later retrieving geodetic GPS sensors on the southwest flank of South Sister, Oregon.

Sept. 20. Start of classes.

[Tiredretiredlawyer]

That's lots of traveling!

[AndyinPA]

Quite a lot of traveling. Sounds great!

[Annrc]

What a great trip! Have fun.

[RTH10260]

it's about a lithium deposit

The Most Valuable Plot Of Land In America

Morning Brew
15 Nov 2023

The McDermitt Caldera is a 28 by 22-mile wide area that spans across northern Nevada and southern Oregon. A recent discovery could make it the most important plot of land in the country. And with value comes conflict.

[AndyinPA]

Interesting, but ugh.

[shannon]

Coming up for air, since this summer I've been mostly working on my thesis research, running a GoFundMe to try and retire a debt that's interfering with my student aid, and documenting the changes that one year on HRT has brought me.

But I have to blow my own horn a bit. Last month was the American Association for the Advancement of Science (Pacific Division) conference in San Diego. I was invited to present a poster on my thesis research "Using lidar to examine tsunami traces on select sites in Alaska". (Basically I'm using lidar data to look at terrain "roughness" and changes in channel sinousity in landslide tsunami outwash plains).

There were 137 posters, 4 from Central Washington University. Mix of undergrads, grads, and PhDs.

I placed second in the physics, chemistry, and geosciences division.

Not a bad start.

Most of my second year is going to be writing my thesis, taking a couple of geomorphology classes, and applying for PhD programs. Yes, this girl has decided to try for a doctorate.

[jemcanada2]

Congratulations

That’s great news! Geomorphology was also my favourite subject in physical geography other than maybe meteorology.

Good luck with your thesis and year 2!

[Frater I*I]

"Using lidar to examine tsunami traces on select sites in Alaska". (Basically I'm using lidar data to look at terrain "roughness" and changes in channel sinousity in landslide tsunami outwash plains).

Forget layman's terms, do you speak English....?

[jemcanada2]

"Using lidar to examine tsunami traces on select sites in Alaska". (Basically I'm using lidar data to look at terrain "roughness" and changes in channel sinousity in landslide tsunami outwash plains).

Forget layman's terms, do you speak English....?

What? I understood everything she said

[Volkonski]

Way to go Shannon!