July 2013 on EARTH Magazine

Energy Notes: March 2012-2013

Tue, 19 Jun 2018 14:55:27 -0400

Credit: The American Geosciences Institute

U.S. Oil & Petroleum Imports (millions of barrels per day)

Oil and petroleum imports data are preliminary numbers taken from the American Petroleum Institute’s Monthly Statistical Report. For more information visit www.api.org.

Mineral Resource of the Month: Bismuth

Wed, 13 Jun 2018 10:40:50 -0400

James F. Carlin, Jr., a mineral commodity specialist for the U.S. Geological Survey, compiled the following information about bismuth, an essential commodity for the cosmetic, foundry, pharmaceutical, aluminum and steel industries.

Bismuth is a brittle, silvery-white metal with a low melting point and a high density approaching that of lead. Alloys of the metal with lead and tin are known to have been used since the Middle Ages. The metal was referred to as wismuth, and at the end of the 16th century, Georgus Agricola, an early mineralogist, Latinized the Germanic name to bisemutum.

Travels in Geology: The Canary Islands: Touring the "Hawaii of Europe"

Thu, 24 May 2018 15:45:21 -0400

Credit: ©Shutterstock.com/Roman Sigaev

I was standing on top of the world. No matter which direction I looked, steep cinder slopes dropped away sharply, merging with the thick white billows of sea fog below. A chilly wind swirled around me. In the distance, the dark peaks of other great mountains poked above the clouds, and I glimpsed shining patches of deep blue sea.

Mass wasting

Thu, 24 May 2018 15:26:20 -0400

Credit: ©Shutterstock.com/Anibal Trejo

Like all volcanic islands, Tenerife represents a balance between constructional and erosional forces. Over millions of years, repeated eruptions of magma pile up, slowly building the shield volcanoes. Occasionally, however, this long-term construction is punctuated by destruction in the form of massive, lightning-fast landslides.

Getting There and Getting Around Spain

Thu, 24 May 2018 15:24:22 -0400

Credit: ©Shutterstock.com/ArenaPhotoUK

Two airports serve Tenerife, which is a 2.5-hour plane ride away from Spain’s capital, Madrid. Most inter-island flights, plus those from mainland Spain, arrive at Tenerife Norte (Los Rodeos), 11 kilometers from Santa Cruz, the island’s largest city. Nearly all international flights (even those on Ryanair) arrive at the larger Tenerife Sur airport (Reina Sofía), located about 60 kilometers south of Santa Cruz. Although there are established bus routes across the island, the most convenient way to explore it is by car. A number of local and international agencies have depots at both airports.

Down to Earth With: Anna Henderson

Tue, 16 Dec 2014 12:22:28 -0500

Politicians and pundits communicate with talking points. In Washington, D.C., a catchy sound bite often trumps a filibustering speech, and a grandiose idea must usually fit into only a few sentences. In science, however, communication occurs as dense journal articles or professional textbooks that flesh out complexities in minute detail. Bridging the gap between these two diverse communication styles in order to convey scientific issues to policymakers is the job of the American Geosciences Institute’s William L. Fisher Congressional Geoscience Fellows.

July 28, 1996: Kennewick man is discovered

Thu, 11 Sep 2014 08:35:04 -0400

On the evening of July 28, 1996, archaeologist James Chatters received an unexpected call at his home in Richland, Wash., from the local coroner. Two spectators at the local hydroplane races had found a skull in Columbia Park on the banks of the Columbia River near Kennewick, Wash. The coroner wanted Chatters, a paleontologist and forensic anthropologist affiliated with Central Washington University who often consulted for Benton County, to look at the skull and determine if it belonged to a recent murder victim. When the coroner arrived with the skull in a 5-gallon bucket, Chatters had scant notion that the discovery would end up challenging the reigning theory of the origins of the first Americans and would embroil scientists in a protracted, precedent-setting legal battle against the federal government.

Blogging on EARTH: A letter from field camp

Wed, 24 Jul 2013 18:30:37 -0400

Bryce Mitsunaga at field camp in Montana. Bryce Mitsunaga

The 2013 University of Houston-YBRA field camp participants exploring glacial features atop the Beartooth Range. Bryce Mitsunaga

University of Houston-YBRA field camp, summer 2013. Bryce Mitsunaga

Learning the basics of mapping includes how to take a strike and dip. Bryce Mitsunaga

Bryce Mitsunaga, a recent graduate of Williams College in Williamstown, Mass., is currently attending field camp at the Yellowstone-Bighorn Research Association camp located in the Beartooth Mountain Range outside of Red Lodge, Mont. In honor of EARTH's August feature on field camps, Bryce wrote in with some reflections on his experiences so far.

Getting there and getting around in Cuba

Fri, 19 Jul 2013 17:23:49 -0400

Because of the U.S. embargo against Cuba, U.S. citizens must go through a travel agency licensed by the U.S. Treasury Department that provides “people-to-people” travel to Cuba for U.S. citizens. Because booking with this type of travel agency is required, the U.S. State Department’s website on visiting Cuba is a great place to start: http://travel.state.gov/travel/cis_pa_tw/cis/cis_1097.html.

Mediterranean mammals migrated prior to the Messinian Salinity Crisis

Fri, 19 Jul 2013 13:18:27 -0400

The people of the Iberian Peninsula and North Africa share a long and complicated history, evident in culinary and genetic similarities, due in large part to their close proximity. Now it appears that the animals of the region have shared an even longer history. Researchers studying mammal fossils in Spain and Morocco recently determined that a migration event between the Iberian Peninsula and North Africa occurred more than 6 million years ago — more than half a million years earlier than previously thought.

Travels in Geology: Journeying through Cuba's geology and culture

Fri, 19 Jul 2013 11:36:04 -0400

The Moncada Formation, which lies at the Cretaceous-Paleogene boundary, is a 2-meter-thick unit that records the Chicxulub impact event. Abundant shocked quartz and a high iridium concentration lend evidence to the formation's genesis from impact events. The Cretaceous-Paleogene contact in this section is indicated by the pen. Debra Hanneman

Our geologic guide, Manuel Iturralde-Vinent, shows the contact of Late Jurassic thick-bedded limestone with overlying, thin-bedded to laminated, chert-rich Cretaceous limestone, which outcrops north of Pinar del Río, in Los Órganos near Cueva del Indio. Debra Hanneman

Tobacco is big business in Cuba. A drying barn at a Viñales Valley tobacco farm is shown here. Debra Hanneman

Traveling by bicitaxis is a fun way to see the city of Remedios. Debra Hanneman

It’s not every day that you get the chance to go to Cuba, so when I found out that the Association for Women Geoscientists (AWG) was offering an organized trip there in March 2013, I jumped at the opportunity. The excursion — nearly two weeks of exploration of our southern neighbor’s geology and culture — did not disappoint.

Location, Location, Location

Fri, 19 Jul 2013 09:33:39 -0400

Although field camps based east of the Mississippi River do exist, and a handful of American schools run camps abroad in places like Ireland, Italy and parts of Africa, the vast majority of camps in the U.S. are still conducted out West. From the Black Hills and the Great Plains, across the Rockies and other mountain ranges, to the Desert Southwest, the western U.S. offers much in the way of beautifully exposed outcrops, distinctive landscapes and transects through long stretches of geologic time.
Naturally, every field camp director is partial to the plots of land to which he or she returns each year. Here’s what a few of them had to say about their particular field sites.

Home sweet home for field campers

Fri, 19 Jul 2013 09:27:16 -0400

A tent camp in the Chisos Mountains in Texas offers a temporary home for students during a regional geology field course run by the College of William and Mary. Jessica Ball

With a few exceptions — including available meal choices and entertainment options for when students have limited free time — accommodations at today’s field camps haven’t changed all that much, at least in the last few decades. Depending on the camp, however, lodging ranges from log cabins to college dorms to motels to the occasional traveling camps that still live and work out of “tent cities.”

Mapping field camp's past and present: Exploring a mainstay of geoscience education

Fri, 19 Jul 2013 09:02:41 -0400

A student at the University of Kentucky's field camp presents a geologic map that his group completed. Courtesy of Frank Ettensohn

Every spring, troops of geoscience students set out to observe firsthand the minerals, rocks, folds, faults, unconformities, ore bodies and other features that populate the geological landscape. And by this time each summer, they (and the instructors brave enough to have accompanied them) have mostly returned home, sporting unkempt hair and sun-tanned limbs. These students — after putting knowledge and skills learned over several years to the test — are the latest group to have survived the rigors of geology’s enduring rite of passage: field camp.

Bare Earth Elements: The field camp experience in photos

Tue, 16 Jul 2013 17:08:15 -0400

For the August issue of EARTH, I wrote about some of the ways in which geology's longstanding rite of passage — field camp — has changed over the years, as well as how it has remained the same. In the process of researching and reporting the story, I had the great pleasure to speak with past and present field camp directors (a couple of whom I knew already from my own time as a graduate student) about the camps they oversee and about their experiences both attending and leading field camps. I also collected many more photographs than we could run with the story, so I thought I'd put together a slideshow to showcase a few more. Enjoy!

Alaskan volcano doesn't just huff and puff, it screams

Tue, 16 Jul 2013 12:50:55 -0400

In March 2009, Alaska’s Mount Redoubt awoke from two decades of silence with something to say: A series of small earthquakes leading up to the eruption produced a seismic sound that staff at the U.S. Geological Survey's Alaska Volcano Observatory nicknamed “the screams.” Now, two new studies are eavesdropping on Redoubt’s inner workings and quantifying the forces needed to produce the unusual harmonic tremors.

Map provides clues to natural protection of U.S. coastal communities

Mon, 15 Jul 2013 19:38:57 -0400

Map of United States, indicating coastal areas of greatest exposure to future hazards as determined by the new study using a Hazard Index. Areas in blue are least exposed to hazards; areas in red are most exposed. The bar graph indicates the population highly exposed to hazard with protecting habitats present (black bars), and the increased population exposed to such hazards if coastal habitats were lost (white bars). Courtesy of Katie Arkema, in Nature Climate Change (2013)

Devastating storms like Hurricanes Sandy and Katrina have left many coastal residents wondering how to protect life and property from future catastrophes. In a study published this week in Nature Climate Change, researchers suggest the best protection from storms and rising sea levels in the U.S. may entail a combination of engineering and conservation.

Ancient Egyptian artifact is otherworldly

Mon, 01 Jul 2013 19:15:36 -0400

In ancient Egypt, iron was a rare and symbolic metal, but scientists and historians have long wondered about the prehistoric civilization’s knowledge of metallurgy. Now, one part of that mystery has been solved: The oldest-known iron artifacts were made from meteorites. The evidence comes in the form of iron beads from approximately 3300 B.C., more than 2,000 years before the Iron Age in Egypt, and before there is record of trade in iron goods with other civilizations.

Corn syrup model splits Yellowstone's plume in two

Thu, 13 Jun 2013 12:48:20 -0400

Yellowstone is renowned for its hot springs, geysers and for hosting one of the world’s most volatile supervolcanoes. Despite its popularity, the origin of all that volcanic activity remains poorly understood. A mantle plume seems like the most obvious source, but traditional plume models can’t explain the jumble of volcanic surface features. Now, a new study using corn syrup to replicate the mantle processes underlying Yellowstone offers a more complicated scenario: a bifurcated mantle plume, split by the Cascadia Subduction Zone.

Iowa impact crater confirmed

Thu, 13 Jun 2013 12:21:53 -0400

An airborne geophysical survey has confirmed the discovery of an impact crater under the town of Decorah in northeastern Iowa. Adam Kiel, U.S. Geological Survey

An airborne geophysical survey mapping mineral resources in the Midwest has confirmed that a 470-million-year-old impact crater nearly five times the size of Barringer (Meteor) Crater in Arizona lies buried several hundred meters beneath the town of Decorah, Iowa.

The energy-water nexus: Managing water in an energy-constrained world

Thu, 13 Jun 2013 11:06:16 -0400

Global water resource availability: The majority of Earth's water is in a form that is not convenient for human use. Only about 3 percent of it is freshwater, and nearly two-thirds of that exists as ice and permanent snow cover. The vast majority of the remaining freshwater exists in groundwater aquifers, much of which cannot be practically extracted. Kathleen Cantner, AGI

Water can be tricky. With too little, crops die, industries move away, power plants fail, ecosystems suffer and people go thirsty. With too much, floods ruin infrastructure, destroy crops, spread waterborne diseases, and disrupt flows of clean water, wastewater, power and transportation. We want water at the right time and in the right place because moving and storing water require effort. We also want it at the right quality and the right temperature. Saline water, brackish water and polluted water are abundant but costly to treat. Water that’s too warm won’t cool power plants effectively and can damage ecosystems, while water that’s too cold can burst pipes and damage infrastructure.

Droning on for science

Wed, 12 Jun 2013 14:27:47 -0400

The Sensor Integrated Environmental Remote Research Aircraft (SIERRA) on the tarmac at NASA's Crows Landing Airport in California. Courtesy of Jonathan Glen, USGS

A high-resolution aerial photograph of an alligator near Lake Okeechobee taken from the Nova 2.1 UAV. J. Martin et al., 2012, PLOS ONE

Amid rolling green pastureland dotted with livestock and the occasional cluster of trees, Costa Rica’s imposing Volcán Turrialba rises 600 meters above the surrounding landscape about 40 kilometers east-northeast of San José. On a clear day last March, a light column of volcanic steam rose from Turrialba — as it has steadily for several years — while a twin-propeller airplane made slow passes through the plume and over the mountain’s summit and flank.