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Geology News
Interesting Current Events

Beach sand is much more than just little brown granules. It is comprised of microscopic shells, pieces of coral, tiny gems, mineral fragments, and more. This colorful and interesting slideshow displays the microphotography of Dr. Gary Greenberg.

NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory has helped scientists to find the most recent supernova yet discovered in our galaxy. Study of the 140-year-old remnants will aid in the understanding of stellar explosions.

Biofuel crops are under fire for worsening the global food crisis. However, it is worth noting that one aspect of the world’s food shortage problem has been largely overlooked: soil quality. This is an issue that can be remedied; the country of Malawi is a good example. After farmers were given fertilizers and better seeds, Malawi changed from a country receiving food aid to one that is now exporting crops.

Should the presidential candidates meet to debate science issues? Here are a couple of perspectives and references to more information.

Lee Allison comments on starting salaries in the oil industry based upon discussions with professors and students at the recent AAPG meeting in San Antonio.

Conventional wisdom says that Daylight Saving Time cuts energy costs and conserves resources. However, a new study suggests that it might cost more money than it saves. This article looks at the history of DST and how it works today.

This article by Erin Wayman looks at what is being done to learn more about Venus. NASA has not had a dedicated Venus mission for nearly two decades but the European Space Agency launched a Venus mission in 2005 and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency will launch another in 2010.

NASA has acquired images of powerful electrical storms on Saturn with lightning bolts 10,000 times more powerful than those on Earth. These resemble terrestrial thunderstorms, but have diameters of several thousand kilometers (thousands of miles) across.

The-Vug.com has a photo display of the Montana Moss Agate case by Brooks Britt from the Tucson Gem and Mineral Show. This is one of several mineral exhibit competition cases that they feature as articles on their website.

If you collect minerals they note mineral dealer website updates on their homepage.

NASA Image

An archive of NASA news releases, image galleries and articles on a variety of topics related to planetary geology, earth observation, global climate change, monitoring volcanoes, looking beyond our solar system, monitoring the oceans and more. A few of the most popular ones are:

• Monitoring Volcanoes from Space
• Photograph of Avalanches on Mars
• Glacial Sediments Add to Louisiana Coastal Subsidence
• Satellite Images of Marine Phytoplankton Blooms
• Sahara Dust Storms Lower Sea Surface Temperatures
• Satellite Measures Pollution From East Asia to North America

By studying the landscape around the Chesapeake, NASA spacecraft such as Landsat, Terra and Aqua are helping land managers figure out how to battle the harmful pollutants that have added to the destruction of the bay’s once legendary productivity. Many of these harmful pollutants come from the Chesapeake Bay’s watershed, an area of about 64,000 square miles that covers parts of six states.

Applications are now being accepted to participate in a 2-week online workshop (about an hour a day) that will create a framework of “Big ideas” and supporting concepts defining what all Americans need to know about the geosciences. All members of the Earth science community–especially research scientists and post-secondary educators–are invited to apply to participate in the online geoscience workshop, which will occur during 12-24 May 2008.

NASA has released an impressive collection of galaxy images, each showing galaxies in collision, interacting or about to collide. They have been released to celebrate the 18th anniversary of the Hubble Space Telescope launch.

“Astronomers are using NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope to dissect one of the largest structures in the universe as part of a quest to understand the violent lives of galaxies. Hubble is providing indirect evidence of unseen dark matter tugging on galaxies in the crowded, rough-and-tumble environment of a massive supercluster of hundreds of galaxies.” Quoted from the NASA release.

A radar instrument co-sponsored by NASA on the European Space Agency’s Mars Express orbiter has looked beneath the surface of Mars and opened up a new dimension for planetary exploration.

Rich Thompson and his wife were hiking in the field when attacked by a rabid bobcat. Both received bites and scratches in a ten minute battle. Thompson finally managed to pull a rock hammer out of his pack and end the encounter.

Here’s a Google map that serves USGS topo map tiles. You can browse topo maps in any of the 48 states and Canada and print a copy of these maps from a PDF document.

NPR’s “All Things Considered” program goes to the Colorado School of Mines where lots of students are getting hired well in advance of graduation at $80K+ salaries with signing bonuses.

More….
Geologist Salaries at Record Highs
Geologist Career Resources

A video that explains how Eratosthenes was able to calculate Earth’s circumference using observations made at two wells at different locations on the first day of summer.

A short (91 seconds) video of what appears to be a sand fountain near Al-Ahsae City in eastern Saudi Arabia. The sand was being lifted about 9 meters into the air. Submitted by Dr. Ajaz Karim.

Here’s a source of printable polar coordinate graph paper that can be used to plot things like joint and fracture orientations, current directions, fossil orientations or any type of data that is collected in degrees. These are .pdf files that you can easily download and print. Bookmark it for easy access when you need it.

Brian Romans has a summary of the USGS fact sheet on the Bakken Formation petroleum reserves. He also has some commentary on the different categories of reserves and what what those numbers really mean.

USGS Fact Sheet on Bakken Formation Oil

NASA Image

NASA has released images of Phobos, the larger of Mars’ two moons. These were captured by the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera aboard the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter on March 23, 2008. They show interesting geological features such as landslides and crater chains.

Using a geology-based assessment methodology, the U.S. Geological Survey estimated mean undiscovered volumes of 3.65 billion barrels of oil, 1.85 trillion cubic feet of associated/dissolved natural gas, and 148 million barrels of natural gas liquids in the Bakken Formation of the Williston Basin Province, Montana and North Dakota.

GEOTIMES has an article that explores how Google (the search engine company) is getting involved in energy. Their goal is to develop renewable energy sources that are cost-competitive with coal.

“M83 is located 15 million light-years away in the southern constellation Hydra. Astronomers speculate that young stars seen far out in M83 could have formed under conditions resembling those of the early universe.”

India’s Lonar Crater began causing confusion soon after it was identified in 1823 by a British officer named C.J.E. Alexander. However, scientists established Lonar’s status as an impact crater based on several lines of evidence, perhaps the most compelling being the presence of maskelynite.

We recently updated our geology jobs page adding links to over 200 employers, headhunters and articles relevant to the job market for geologists. If you know anyone looking for earth science employement or anyone who advises geology students we invite you to share the URL with them.
http://geology.com/jobs.htm

A collection of images representing some of the most impressive views in our universe. Included are the Orion Nebula, a dying star, spiral galaxy, birth of a star, the Eagle Nebula, extrasolar planet, a galaxy pair and the Cartwheel Galaxy.

In a new NASA study, researchers taking advantage of improvements in satellite sensor capabilities, offer the first measurement-based estimate of the amount of pollution from East Asian forest fires, urban exhaust, and industrial production that makes its way to western North America. (NASA Image)

Using the latest satellite observations, NASA researchers and others report that the Arctic is still on “thin ice” when it comes to the condition of sea ice cover in the region. A colder-than-average winter in some regions of the Arctic this year has yielded an increase in the area of new sea ice, while the older sea ice that lasts for several years has continued to decline.

The-Vug.com has photos of the Amazonite and Smoky Quartz exhibit from the Tucson Gem and Mineral Show. Included are photos from the Pike’s Peak County, Colorado mine where some were collected and also from the Collector’s Edge Cleaning Lab where some of the specimens were prepared.

NASA’s Cassini spacecraft has discovered evidence that points to the existence of an underground ocean of water and ammonia on Saturn’s moon Titan. The findings were made using radar measurements of Titan’s rotation.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration invites you to take a virtual tour of the National Hurricane Center. If you are interested in hurricanes and tropical cyclones you might learn some interesting things about forecasting them.

Omega Centauri is the biggest and brightest of the 150 or so globular clusters that orbit around the outside of our Milky Way galaxy. Stargazers at southern latitudes can spot the stellar gem with the naked eye in the constellation Centaurus. You can see an infrared image of Omega Centauri at the NASA website.

There are now a few vendors selling relatively inexpensive GPS tracking devices, some providing the data to you in near real time via a website. People use them to track kids and pets. FedEx and UPS are using them to study the effectiveness of shipping routes, and plumbing services use them to know the progress of plumbers on daily calls.

Reuters has created an excellent slideshow of 37 photos from around the world. See a rainbow in Afghanistan, storks in Spain, cherry blossoms in Japan, an avalanche in Switzerland, and much more. Don’t miss it!

Google has added contour lines to their terrain maps. They are not quite as detailed as USGS topos but for free-to-use maps they are very nice. Contour intervals vary depending upon local relief.

This article at GEOTIMES explores offshore wind as a renewable energy source. Already being developed off the coast of England and other locations, this power source seems to have promise.

Early this year researchers surprised everyone with a resource estimate for the Marcellus Shale beneath Pennsylvania, West Virginia, New York and surrounding states. They estimated that the Marcellus might contain more than 50 trillion cubic feet of recoverable natural gas. That volume of natural gas would be enough to supply the entire United States for about two years and have a wellhead value of about one trillion dollars!