The Department of Geological and Mining Engineering Sciences offers our congratulations and best wishes to Theodore J. Bornhorst on his retirement after a long and productive career as Director for the A. E. Seaman Mineral Museum and professor at the Department of GMES! He has inspired many with his passion for mineralogy and Keweenaw geoheritage.
We are happy that he will continue his research at our department as a professor emeritus.
Aleksey Smirnov (GMES) was named one of the American Geophysical Union’s Outstanding Reviewers of 2019. Smirnov was cited for his service to Geophysical Research Letters.
In 2019, AGU received over 16,700 submissions and published over 7,000. AGU is working to highlight the valuable role of reviewers through events (though they may be virtual) at the Fall Meeting and other meetings.
Thomas Oommen (GMES/EPSSI) is the principal investigator on a project that received a $41,167 research and development contract with the University of Nebraska-Omaha.
The project is titled “Flood Hazard Map to Water Management & Planning.” This is a one-year project.
By Sponsored Programs.
Simon Carn (GMES/EPSSI) is the principal investigator on a project that has received a $117,411 research and development grant from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.
The project is titled “Multi-Decadel Trends in Volcanic Emissions: Extending the Aura Record into the Past and Future”. This is a potential three-year project totaling $375,789.
Simon Carn (GMES) was quoted in the story “NASA asked the public to choose its all-time best photos of Earth. Here are 17 of them,” in UPWorthy.
An unexpected series of blasts from a remote volcano in the Kuril Islands sent ash and volcanic gases streaming high over the North Pacific Ocean.
“What a spectacular image. It reminds me of the classic Sarychev Peak astronaut photograph of an eruption in the Kuriles from about ten years ago,” said Simon Carn, a volcanologist at Michigan Tech. “The ring of white puffy clouds at the base of the column might be a sign of ambient air being drawn into the column and the condensation of water vapor. Or it could be a rising plume from interaction between magma and seawater because Raikoke is a small island and flows likely entered the water.”
Aleksey Smirnov (GMES) is a co-author on the paper “Paleomagnetic evidence for modern-like plate motion velocities at 3.2 Ga” published in Science Advances on April 22, 2020. This collaborative study (with Harvard University and Yale University) demonstrates that the drifting of tectonic plates (plate tectonics) may have started at least 3.2 billion years ago, earlier than previously thought.
Plate tectonics has been the dominant surface geodynamical regime throughout Earth’s recent geological history. One defining feature of modern plate tectonics is the differential horizontal motion of rigid lithospheric plates
The mode and rates of tectonic processes and lithospheric growth during the Archean [4.0 to 2.5 billion years (Ga) ago] are subjects of considerable debate. Paleomagnetism may contribute to the discussion by quantifying past plate velocities.
While plate tectonics have characterized Earth’s geodynamics in recent geologic time, it is unknown whether long-range horizontal motion of lithospheric plates occurred before ~2.7 Ga. Resolving this uncertainty would fundamentally contribute to understanding the formation settings of Earth’s earliest crust and nascent biosphere and the evolution of geodynamics in terrestrial planets in general.
Paleomagnetic evidence for modern-like plate motion velocities at 3.2 Ga
BY ALEC R. BRENNER, ROGER R. FU, DAVID A.D. EVANS, ALEKSEY V. SMIRNOV, RAISA TRUBKO, IAN R. ROSE
Science Advances 22 Apr 2020:
Vol. 6, no. 17, eaaz8670
DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.aaz8670
Archean basalts from the Pilbara Craton, Western Australia record the oldest long-range lithospheric motion identified to date.
The Geological & Mining Engineering & Sciences (GMES) Department invites Michigan Tech alumni and families for a pasty social in Phoenix, Arizona. Join us on Sunday, Feb. 23, from 6-9 pm, at the Cornish Pasty Co., 7 West Monroe St. in downtown Phoenix, Arizona.
The GMES Department will provide the first round and some appetizers. Alumni prizes to be raffled off with no purchase required. For those attending the SME Conference, this event is in lieu of the traditional conference social on Tuesday.
All alumni & friends are welcome to join us for this casual evening out! Faculty and students will be in attendance. We hope that alumni and friends attending SME or are otherwise in the local area will join us and bring your families. Please register here: http://www.cvent.com/d/mnq8v8
We are so pleased to announce that our first design team in the SME/NSSGA Student Design Competition has advanced to the second phase of the competition, which occurs at the upcoming SME Conference. Our team was among the top six to advance. Read more here.
Craving a pasty and curious about the history and recipes? Check out this article from MTU Archives: “There’s something about a pasty that is fine, fine, fine!”
Ted Bornhorst (GMES), executive director of the A.E. Seaman Mineral Museum was quoted in the story “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Stone!” in Michigan Blue. The story involved fluorescent rocks, popularly known as Yooperlites.
To find the fluorescing stones, Erik Rintamaki recommends Lake Superior beaches anywhere “from Whitefish Point west.” Theodore Bornhorst suggests scouring the Keweenaw Peninsula shoreline from Copper Harbor to Ontonagon. Prime picking comes in early spring after winter ice picks up stones from deeper water and transports them to the beach.
James DeGraff (GMES/EPSSI) is the principal investigator on a project that has received a $83,995 research and development cooperative agreement with Western Michigan University. This project is titled, “Bedrock Map, Dickinson County Quadrangle and Portions of Quadrangles, Earth MRI Project (Carney Lake, Felch, Foster City, Vulcan, Waucedah, Faithorn, and Cunard, 7.5 Minute Quadrangles), Central UP Michigan.”
Aleksey Smirnov, (GMES/EPSSI) and Chad Deering (GMES/EPSSI) are Co-PI’s on this potential two-year project.
Simon Carn (GMES) was quoted in the article “Map shows Taal Volcano spewing sulfur into atmosphere,” in the Philippine Star. Carn was also quoted in “Taal volcano eruption: NASA satellite scans reveal TOXIC sulphur clouds spewing from Taal,” in the Express (UK).
Although the levels of SO2 released by Taal have so far been tolerable, Michigan volcanologist Simon Carn fears more of the toxic gas could be still be released.
He said: “However, it is possible that the Taal eruption could continue and produce more SO2 in the coming days.”
Read more at Express (UK), by Sebastian Kettley.
Simon Carn (GMES) was quoted in the story “Huge Taal volcano eruption is seen from SPACE by Japan’s satellite,” in the Daily Mail (UK).
Carn was quoted in the story “The Taal Eruption Looks Even More Massive When Seen From Space,” in spot.ph.