PlanetGeo: The Geology Podcast

Who Gets Credit? Oct 31, 2024

In this episode, we dive deep into the contentious and fascinating world of scientific credit in geoscience. Through engaging stories and discussions, we examine how key discoveries, like continental drift and seafloor spreading, were developed and often led to debates over who deserved recognition. We also explore the roles of lesser-known scientists and the impact of peer review on scientific advancement. Join us as we unravel the complexities of credit and recognition in the scientific community.

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Moving Boulders - The Geology of Fieldstones Oct 24, 2024

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Inspirational Geology - The Yale Peabody Museum Oct 17, 2024

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Is Geology Getting Worse? Oct 10, 2024

In this episode of "Planet Geo," we delve into whether geological events such as earthquakes, volcanoes, landslides, and extreme weather are becoming more common or severe. Through a lively and humorous discussion, including a guest appearance from Joyce!, we explore the statistical analysis of earthquakes over the past 35 years, concluding that large earthquakes are not increasing in frequency or severity. We also discuss the possible impacts of climate change on landslides and extreme weather events, the role of improved technology and social media in expanding awareness of these events, and touch on the intersection of geoscience with other fields like biology and planetary science. The episode is packed with insightful data analysis, relatable anecdotes, and a touch of personal banter.

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The Science of Elevation - Hypsometry Oct 03, 2024

In this episode, we delve into the fascinating concept of hypsometry and its applications in understanding Earth's topography. We start with a light-hearted email from a listener, but quickly transition into discussing the principles of hypsometric curves. We break down how these curves provide insights into the distribution and stability of Earth's crust, oceanic and continental. Through our conversation, we explore the role of plate tectonics and erosion in shaping the Earth's surface, making this complex scientific topic accessible and engaging, even touching on classroom applications and educational tools.

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Gymnast to Geoscientist - GeoGirl Dr. Rachel Phillips Sep 26, 2024

In this episode we engage in a lively conversation with Dr. Rachel Phillips, popularly known as GeoGirl on YouTube. Rachel shares her journey from resisting geology despite her geologist parents, to embracing it due to a chemistry class in college. She discusses her PhD research on ancient ocean chemistry and reveals her recent focus on geoscience education and communication through an NSF fellowship. With insights into her popular YouTube channel, survey findings on geoscience misconceptions, and upcoming projects, Rachel's passion for leveraging digital media to foster interest in geology shines through. Don't miss this engaging discussion that delves into the realms of geoscience, education, and innovative outreach!

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Smash and Grab - How Big of a Sample Do You Need? Sep 19, 2024

In this episode, we delve into the fascinating world of geological sampling. We start with a humorous discussion on episode titles and then transition into the complexities of geological sampling, including personal anecdotes about our own experiences and lessons learned. We discuss the importance of sample size, statistical models, and challenges in the field, as well as the significance of detailed documentation and the emotional connection to our rock collections. We also touch on the joy of inspiring others with our passion for geology and the responsibility of archiving valuable samples for future research.

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The Michigan Basin Sep 12, 2024

In this episode of Planet Geo, we delve into the geology of the Michigan Basin, focusing on its formation, sedimentary layers, and economic significance. We discuss the concept of a self-fulfilling prophecy in basin formation, explaining how deposition and subsidence work together to create and deepen basins over time. We also highlight the unique characteristics of the Michigan Basin, including its sedimentary composition, evaporite deposits, and the role it plays in housing aquifers. Additionally, we share personal favorites among Michigan's rock formations and reflect on the fascinating geological stories unraveled through drilling and mapping efforts. Join us as we explore the complex and captivating history of the Michigan Basin.

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The Garnets Have Eyes Sep 05, 2024

In this episode, we delve into the fascinating topic of garnet eyes, discussing how these unique geological features form and what they reveal about the history of metamorphic rocks. We explore different types of reaction rims and depletion halos, breaking down the complex processes that create these striking features. We also share personal stories and insights from our own experiences with garnet formations in places like the Tetons and Gore Mountain. Whether you're a seasoned geologist or just a curious listener, this episode is sure to deepen your appreciation for the incredible stories rocks can tell.

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The Geology of Eskers Aug 29, 2024

In this episode of PlanetGeo, we delve into the fascinating world of eskers, exploring their formation, significance, and economic importance. We explain how eskers, sinuous ridges formed by pressurized meltwater channels at the base of glaciers, provide crucial geological insights and serve as valuable tools in mineral exploration, such as in diamond mining. We share personal anecdotes and compelling visuals to illustrate how these unique glacial features reveal past glacial activity and help in tracing mineral deposits. Additionally, we emphasize the broader relevance of geology, highlighting the educational and practical applications of understanding geological processes.

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Field Observations - a How-To Aug 22, 2024

Dr. Jesse Reimink and Chris Bolhuis share their firsthand experiences and insights from recent fieldwork. The episode delves into their fascinating observations and discussions about various geological features, including lava inflation structures, such as tumuli and inflation pits, the stunning landscapes shaped by fjords in Iceland, and the deposits of eskers in the Northwest Territories. They highlight the importance of careful, methodical analysis in geology and discuss how to draw conclusions in the field accurately. Additionally, they emphasize the complexities and challenges of fieldwork, as well as the beauty and excitement of discovering geological phenomena in remote locations. The episode concludes with practical tips for supporting their work and engaging with further educational resources through their Camp Geo app.

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Columnar Jointing - Icelandic Version Aug 15, 2024

Dr. Jesse Reimink and Chris Bolhuis delve into the fascinating geological phenomenon of columnar jointing, sharing insights from Chris's recent trip to Iceland. They discuss the formation, size variations, and unique patterns of these striking hexagonal columns found in basaltic lava flows, addressing questions such as why they form, why some flows exhibit them while others don't, and the conditions that lead to different column orientations. The conversation also covers historical theories and modern understanding of the physics behind columnar jointing. Listeners are encouraged to support the podcast via the Camp Geo app and send in any questions they may have about the topic.

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The Unknown Early Earth - Jack Hills Zircons Part II Aug 08, 2024

In this episode, Chris Bolhuis and Dr. Jesse Reimink delve into the intricacies of the Jack Hills zircons from Western Australia, discussing their formation, significance, and the ongoing scientific debates surrounding them. They explore topics like plate tectonics, the age of zircons, and the methodologies used to study these ancient grains, and connect the importance of this research to broader planetary science and philosophical implications.
Learn more, and see all the images with exclusive access on the CampGeo App - download at the link below!

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The Big Fill Slide - And Landslides Generally Aug 01, 2024

In this episode of Planet Geo, Dr. Jesse Reimink and Chris Bolhuis delve into the fascinating and sometimes perilous world of landslides, focusing on a recent landslide known as the Big Fill landslide that occurred in the Teton Pass. They discuss the various triggers and mechanisms behind landslides, including the impact of water, earthquakes, and human activities. The hosts also highlight key historical landslides in the Teton region, such as the Gros Ventre and the Quake Lake slides, and explore the ongoing geological activity that makes this area particularly prone to such events. This episode is both timely and informative, shedding light on the delicate balance between human infrastructure and natural forces.

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Kickstarting Continents - The Acasta Gneiss Complex Part II Jul 25, 2024

In this podcast episode, Dr. Jesse Reimink and Chris Bolhuis delve into part two of their discussion on Earth's oldest rocks, specifically the Acasta Gneiss. They explore the origin, complex history, and significance of these ancient rocks, including insights from Dr. Reimink's PhD research which suggests an Icelandic rather than subduction zone setting for their formation. The conversation covers the challenges of studying such remote and deformed rocks, the iterative process of geological fieldwork, and the ongoing debates about their exact ages. They also discuss the logistical difficulties of accessing the Acasta Gneiss and the commercialization of samples.
Access this episode with images, and more, in the CampGeo app - download now at the link below!

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Cave Decorations - Mammoth Size Jul 18, 2024

Dive into the fascinating world of Mammoth Cave with Dr. Jesse Reimink and Chris Bolhuis in this episode of Planet Geo. From understanding the types of passageways formed by ancient underground rivers to exploring the intricate and beautiful cave decorations like stalactites, stalagmites, and flowstone, this episode provides a comprehensive and engaging look at one of the natural wonders of the world. Whether you’re preparing for a visit or just curious about subterranean geology, this in-depth discussion is sure to satisfy your curiosity.
Don't forget to check out the additional images and resources available on the Camp Geo app for a more visual experience.

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Earth's Oldest Fragments - Jack Hills Zircons Part I Jul 11, 2024

In this episode, Chris Bolhuis and Dr. Jesse Reimink dive into the complexities of Zircon grains from the Jack Hills conglomerate in Western Australia—some of the Earth's oldest fragments. They discuss the environmental conditions necessary for their formation and survival, the role of magma differentiation in creating intermediate to felsic rocks, and the geochemical analysis using oxygen and hafnium isotopes which indicate the presence of water on Earth's surface over 4 billion years ago. The episode also explores the scientific debates surrounding these ancient minerals and their implications for our understanding of early Earth's geological history.
Stay tuned for more information, and find this episode, along with the images, on our CampGeo app below!

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Home Away From Home - The Grand Tetons Jul 04, 2024

In this episode of Planet Geo, Chris Bolhuis and Dr. Jesse Reimink dive deep into the geology of the Grand Teton National Park. They cover the park's ancient rock formations, from the Archean gneiss to the granites formed around 2.5 billion years ago. The discussion also explores significant geological events like the Severe and Laramide orogenies, the impact of the Yellowstone Hotspot Track, and the glacial activity that sculpted the dramatic landscapes of the Tetons.
Get access to The Geology of the Grand Tetons on the CampGeo app now - link below!

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Discovering Earth's Oldest Rocks Jun 27, 2024

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Making a Mammoth Cave Jun 20, 2024

This episode is Part 2 of our Mammoth Cave series - where we discuss the geological setup that enabled creation of the longest cave system in the world.
The geology of the region, including the Green River, set the stage for the formation of Mammoth Cave, the largest cave system that has been mapped.
Stay tuned for our third installment on Mammoth Cave, where we discuss the cave 'decorations' or mineral formations.

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The Geology of Clay Jun 13, 2024

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The Longest Cave System in the World Jun 06, 2024

This is the first episode in a series of 3 on the world's longest cave system - Mammoth Cave in Kentucky. In this episode, Chris and Jesse talk a little about Mammoth and some of its impressive statistics. The focus however, is more about the necessary ingredients for cave development in general. We talk about the 4 general ingredients: suitable rock type, a solvent, hydraulic gradient, and time. We also go into some detail on what each of these really mean. We hope you enjoy. In the next episode in this series, we'll talk about Mammoth specifics.

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The Uniqueness of Iceland May 30, 2024

In this episode, Jesse and Chris talk about the geology of Iceland - although we keep it at a high level. We're going to come back to this - Iceland - later after Chris returns from his trip. Then, we'll get into some of detail that makes Iceland so unique. Here, we discuss how Iceland might be a prototype for the formation of continents and also talk a bit about the diversity of igneous rocks that make up the Island. The diversity of rocks speaks to the diversity of volcanic activity. We finish up the episode with a short discussion about what Chris is most looking forward to and how the planning is going. We hope you enjoy.

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Tough Soil - The Geology of Hardpan May 23, 2024

Hardpan! Where did this idea for an episode come from? Chris has been doing a ton of yard work lately and it’s not uncommon come across a layer when digging a hole that is next to impossible to penetrate. He has to bust out my pick axe to get through it. It's Called Hardpan.

Really dense layer that often occurs below the topsoil.
Problems:
- Roots can’t penetrate into the hardpan (Hayden Valley in YNP). Trees are easily blown over if they can even grow here.
- Water can’t penetrate so the soil layer above is easily saturated.
- Safe to say that farmers and gardeners generally don’t like it.
- Can even cause drainfield failure - creates an impervious layer
- These are just a couple of problems - there are more.
In this episode, Chris and Jesse do a deep dive into the geology of hardpan. We hope you enjoy.

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Some Rocks You SHOULD Know - Metamorphism and Plate Tectonics May 16, 2024

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When Continents Became Stable May 09, 2024

Today we really go into the weeds.
Jesse and a colleague just published a paper in the journal Nature that proposes a new model for how continents became stable. Stable continents have all the granite at the surface, which contains all the heat producing elements like U and Th and K - elements that decay away.
Today, we discuss that paper in detail, and along the way learn a bit about the early Earth, what we know and don't know!
Here is a link to the paper, which is open access and can be downloaded by anyone without paying.

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Earth's Oldest Stuff May 02, 2024

Today, Chris and Jesse get into a discussion about Earth’s oldest material. Earth is 4.568 Billion years old. First of all, that’s amazing the geochronologists have refined this down to 3 decimal places. How do we know this? The oldest grains ever found are 4.38 billion years old. If that’s the case, then how do we know the Earth is significantly older than that? Join us as we answer that and many other important questions about Earth’s oldest stuff.

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Geo-Tripping - A How-To Guide Apr 25, 2024

In this episode, we tackle a listener question regarding planning a geology trip for students. Both Chris and Jesse have quite a bit of experience in planning and executing field excursions for students. We believe that seeing geology in the field is one of the most powerful learning opportunities for students of all levels. In our discussion, we talk about the difficulties in convincing the higher-ups that this is actually a good idea. We also get into some of the struggles in finding excellent teacher resources. In the end, we get a little philosophical on the importance of getting comfortable with not having all of the answers. We think that sometimes it's important for students to know that instructors don't know it all and together we can perhaps think about things different and come to new conclusions. We hope you enjoy.

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The Rocks You Need to Know Apr 18, 2024

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Cutting the Grand Canyon - Dr. John Douglass Apr 11, 2024

Join us as we have the honor of interviewing Dr. John Douglas. Jesse and Chris have been following his research on how the Grand Canyon was actually formed for some time. We have recently finished our audio-visual book on the Grand Canyon (Link above) and we have a chapter dedicated to the actual cutting of the Canyon. The answer to this question has been elusive, but there are a few leading theories. John has been leading the way on the Spillover Theory as a mechanism for carving the young Canyon. It's a great geologic discussion and we hope you enjoy.

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Uranium and the Start of the Earth? - How Geochronology Works Apr 04, 2024

The idea for this episode came from the comment section of a social media post. It has it's roots in one of the biggest misconceptions in Geology and also Geochronology. The comment was about radio-carbon dating and how it's been "proven" to be unreliable. In this episode, Jesse and Chris have a discussion about the "toolbox" for geochronoligists and we also spend a lot of time talking about Uranium to Lead decay. We hope you enjoy.

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The History of Granite - Dr. Mike Ackerson Mar 28, 2024

In charge of the Nations Rock Collection. That's a pretty sweet job description. Join us as we have the honor of interviewing Dr. Mike Ackerson. In this episode, we certainly get into some detail about igneous petrology. Mike and Jesse are good friends and have spent some time discussing things that introductory geology classes take for granted. For instance, there are some questions on the formation of granite. This might seem ridiculous because this topic is covered in any intro level geology class, but there are some problems.
We also talk philosophically about geoscience education and scientific research. In all, this discussion spans too many areas to summarize here. We hope you enjoy!

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The Devil's Metal - The Geology of Nickel Mar 21, 2024

Today, Jesse and Chris discuss the geology of Nickel - The Devil’s Metal. Surprisingly, Earth’s core has a high percentage of Nickel - 10 to 20% of the core is nickel. We allow ourselves the luxury of getting into the details on nickel and why the core has so much. Of all the metals we’ve discussed on the podcast, the geology of nickel is the most complicated. In addition to discussing the geologic settings that form or concentrate nickel, we also spend some time discussing the history and uses. We hope you enjoy the discussion.

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Geology From Above - Dr. Anji Shah Mar 14, 2024

Today, we have the another great interview - Dr. Anji Shah. She works for the USGS and has done a lot of work on heavy-mineral sands and critical elements. In this discussion, we talk about the paleo-environment that could concentrate critical minerals in heavy sands. Dr. Shah also tells us how "airborn geophysics" is important in looking for mineral deposits over huge areas that are often canopy covered. We hope you enjoy!

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The Fast Carbon Cycle Mar 07, 2024

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The Geology of Asbestos Feb 29, 2024

In this episode, Jesse and Chris discuss the geology of asbestos. Really, we cover all things related - history, past uses (some of which are mind boggling), health issues, and of course the mineralogy. If you want the datail, this episode is for you. Jesse goes off the deep end a little as he nerds out on some geochemistry. We hope you enjoy.

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We Just Don't Have Enough - Prof. Adam Simon Feb 22, 2024

Dr. Adam Simon joins PlanetGeo to discuss many topics. One of the most interesting topics of discussion is the copper dilemma facing the world. If we want to transition to green energy like Electric Vehicles, we will face a shortage of copper. Dr. Simon describes Copper as the artery of a green transition. However, he's done the math and it doesn't add up. There isn't enough to make the transition. We hope you enjoy this extremely informative and entertaining interview.

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How Do Rocks Really Crystallize? Feb 15, 2024

Today, Chris and Jesse once again revisit the topic of Bowen's Reaction Series. We've never approached the topic in such a before. The heart of our discussion centers around 1- What is Bowen's Reaction Series? and 2- How do we approach this highly idealized concept in an introductory class. How rocks really crystallize in a geologic setting is far more complex than Bowen's Reaction Series. This can lead to confusion when students progress in their geologic studies when they learn that Bowen's is the whole story (or even the correct story). We hope you enjoy this technical and philosophical discussion.

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Why is Water "Hard"? Feb 08, 2024

Today is our latest episode in our series on climate. Jesse and Chris discuss the meaning of "Hard Water". Chris and Jesse both have hard water at our houses and we talk about how that happens. We wrap up this episode by talking about how the topic of hard water fits into our series and climate. We hope you enjoy!

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Exploration and Mining Geology - Dr. Steph Mrozek Feb 01, 2024

Join us as we interview Dr. Steph Mrozek. Steph is an economic geologist with interests in interests in skarn and porphyry deposits and geochemistry applied to mineral exploration. In our interview, the discussion turns to degrees in geoscience and educational pursuits. We’ve received a number of questions from listeners about what degree to pursue and how far to go. Steph offers unique perspectives on this topic that many of our listeners will find very useful.

Then our discussion turns to a niche geologic topic - Skarns. Jesse and I learned a ton. We (Jesse and I) have some personal experience with Skarn deposits, but Steph is the expert in the room for sure.

In the end, we have an in depth discussion about a career in exploration and mining geology. This episode has so much to offer. Listeners will learn about a topic that many aren’t familiar with and will also learn about the life and times of an exploration geologist. We know you will enjoy this episode.

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The Epic Earthlings Grand Canyon Questions - Answered! Jan 25, 2024

Join Chris and Jesse as we tackle questions about the Grand Canyon. A 4th grade class, Bronx Little School, reached out in a letter with a list of fantastic questions. We knew right away we wanted to make an episode about this. These questions, and our responses, provide a great introduction to the geology of The Grand Canyon. Below are the questions - asked and answered:
1. How deep is the Grand Canyon?
2- Why are the rocks orange, red, and black? How were the rocks made?
3- Why is the Grand Canyon so steep?
4- How old is each layer in the Grand Canyon?
5- They didn't ask this question, but Jesse and I couldn't resist. So we posed the question: How did the Grand Canyon get cut? Maybe one of these awesome students will find the answer.
We hope you all enjoy learning a little more about one of the Natural Wonders of the World. Cheers

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And...We're Back! The Greenhouse Effect Jan 18, 2024

Today, we re-visit one our earliest episodes that we recorded when this whole thing began. We've decided to do a small series on Earth's climate and feel that this is the best kickoff point for that topic.
We begin by discussing the forgotten history of climate science. This is important because we have known the physics of greenhouse gases for over 200 years. This pre-dates excessive fossil fuel consumption and any thought of political ideology around climate change. We talk about following the radiation from the sun and the change that takes place when certain photons are absorbed at the Earth's surface. That change in energy is what gets absorbed by the various greenhouse gases. We round out the discussion by talking about several of the important gases and why carbon dioxide is the "big dog" in the discussion. We hope you enjoy!

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Cure the Winter Blues - Yosemite National Park (ReRelease) Jan 11, 2024

We are on a break, but you can join us now on a virtual Summer Science Institute trip! Follow the virtual Mr. Bolhuis as we go on a geo-tour of many of the premier National Parks in the US.

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Cure the Winter Blues - The Grand Canyon (ReRelease) Jan 04, 2024

We are happy to announce the release of our new Geology of the Grand Canyon book on the CampGeo mobile app - Download now to start listening!
We are on a break, but you can join us now on a virtual Summer Science Institute trip! Follow the virtual Mr. Bolhuis as we go on a geo-tour of many of the premier National Parks in the US.

Download the CampGeo app now at this link.
On the app you can get tons of free content, exclusive images, and access to our Geology of National Parks series.
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Cure the Winter Blues - Glacier National Park (ReRelease) Dec 28, 2023

We are on a break, but you can join us now on a virtual Summer Science Institute trip! Follow the virtual Mr. Bolhuis as we go on a geo-tour of many of the premier National Parks in the US.

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Cure the Winter Blues - Yellowstone National Park (ReRelease) Dec 21, 2023

We are on a break, but you can join us now on a virtual Summer Science Institute trip! Follow the virtual Mr. Bolhuis as we go on a geo-tour of many of the premier National Parks in the US.

Download the CampGeo app now at this link.
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Cure the Winter Blues - Grand Teton National Park (ReRelease) Dec 14, 2023

We are on a break, but you can join us now on a virtual Summer Science Institute trip! Follow the virtual Mr. Bolhuis as we go on a geo-tour of many of the premier National Parks in the US.
We are also excited to announce that we have just released a new audiobook on our CampGeo mobile app on Earth's Climate. It's a five-part series with all the images you need to really learn how Earth's climate works and what we can do about some issues we have with it.
You can access our CampGeo mobile app on any App Store, or just click on this link!

Download the CampGeo app now at this link.
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Cure the Winter Blues - Devil's Tower National Monument (ReRelease) Dec 07, 2023

We are on a break, but you can join us now on a virtual Summer Science Institute trip! Follow the virtual Mr. Bolhuis as we go on a geo-tour of many of the premier National Parks in the US.

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Cure the Winter Blues - The Black Hills (ReRelease) Nov 30, 2023

We are on a break, but you can join us now on a virtual Summer Science Institute trip! Follow the virtual Mr. Bolhuis as we go on a geo-tour of many of the premier National Parks in the US.

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Cure the Winter Blues - Badlands National Park (ReRelease) Nov 23, 2023

We are on a break, but you can join us now on a virtual Summer Science Institute trip! Follow the virtual Mr. Bolhuis as we go on a geo-tour of many of the premier National Parks in the US.

Download the CampGeo app now at this link.
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Slow Carbon - The Rock Carbon Cycle Nov 16, 2023

Today, Jesse and Chris tackle the topic of the Slow Carbon Cycle. We've been talking about this for a while now. This is a very complicate cycle that involves many variables. In this episode, we work through some scenarios such as the Himalayan uplift and plug them into the Carbon Cycle. It's a little bit of mental gymnastics. The ingredients for the Carbon Cycle to operate are freshly exposed rock, water (both in the oceans and the atmosphere), and plate tectonics. If one of these variables is taken out, the Carbon Cycle ceases.
Join us in this fun and interesting discussion.

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The Infiltration Game - Soils and Flooding Nov 09, 2023

In this episode, we tackle the issue of infiltration capacity. The idea came to us in the form of a listener question due to recent events. Infiltration capacity is simply a way of describing the ability of soil and regolith to soak up water during storm events that drop a lot of rain in a short period of time. There are several variables that must be accounted for in describing the infiltration capacity for a given area. Humans have also caused a significant change related to this topic. Join us in this fun conversation that has a lot of relevance in todays world.

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Forming Earth's Ocean - Office Hours Nov 02, 2023

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The Anthropocene Oct 26, 2023

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Remapping Yellowstone National Park Oct 19, 2023

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The Geology of Copper Oct 12, 2023

Today we talk about Copper!
The metal that is essential to all our lives, but goes largely underrated.
Here is a link to the article Chris references in the podcast talking about the sources of copper deposits.

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Explore or Optimize? Interview with Erica Dalman Oct 05, 2023

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Chris and Jesse Finally Agree Sep 28, 2023

This week, we are asking you to do us a favor. We are really exited because we just launched our brand new campGeo mobile app. So, we would really appreciate if you clicked on This Link, downloaded the campGeo mobile app, and left us a rating and review on there.
This week we talk about the origin of this concept, why we are excited about this mobile app, and what types of content can be found there today.
Also, if you have suggestions for new types of visual audiobooks please send us an email! Or, if you have a better name for these things than 'visual audiobooks' let us know that too (we are horrible at naming things...)!

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Are You Karsty? Sinkholes and Karst Sep 21, 2023

Today, Jesse and Chris discuss the distinction between sinkholes and karst topography. There is a surprisingly large portion of the U.S. that has potential to be affected by karst. It is also extremely important as a source of drinking water. We also discuss the distinction between the technical definition of karst and what is called pseudokarst. Below is a link to the article and diagram we allude to in the show. We hope you enjoy.
https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/feart.2023.1207689/full

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Geoscience is EVEN MORE Important Sep 14, 2023

We get a bit reflective today and discuss the importance of Geoscience to society - and how it has changed in the last three years. Jesse recently went to a conference on economic mining and came away newly excited. If the world is going to make the energy transition, certain elements are critical in allowing us to meet that demand. Today, we talk about the issues surrounding the energy transition and how geoscientists are playing an integral role (and will continue to do so) in society. We hope you enjoy!
If you are interested in Yellowstone National Park, or want to learn all the basics of geology, visit our newly updated CampGEO content, including a new Geology of Yellowstone National Park, available now at our web app - here!

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Going, Going, Gone - Disappearing Streams Sep 07, 2023

Today, we each give our take on disappearing streams. When the idea was first pitched, we were thinking about 2 different things. The result - we talked about each. Join us as we continue our series on water.

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Geoscience Careers #1 - Renewable Consulting with Andrew DeWitt Aug 31, 2023

Today we have the great pleasure to interview a close friend of the podcast - Andrew Dewitt. Andrew has had a long career in the environmental consulting industry and provides insights into what it take to be a geoscientist working in this field and gives lots of excellent advice. This is a must-listen episode for any aspiring young geoscientist.

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Petrification Aug 24, 2023

Today, we are talking about the process of making petrified wood. Basically, wood has to be quickly buried in a wet setting where the water is also saturated in certain minerals - usually silica. Also, there must be little oxygen present or oxidation reactions have to occur to use up all of the available oxygen. This prevents the wood from getting eaten by decomposers. We will also get into the geologic settings where this is likely to occur.
Finally, we talk a little about how we come up with ages of petrified wood and use this to kick off a series on Geochronology. Enjoy!

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Creepy Soil Aug 17, 2023

Today, we talk about all things soil creep. Have you ever been on a steep slope and seen bent or curved trees, slanted fence posts, slanted headstones or signs? Look closely and you can often see the surface has a rippled appearance. Soil Creep is a form of what we call Mass Wasting in Geology. Mud flows, avalanche, and rockfall are also examples of Mass Wasting. Creep just happens very, very slowly. Join us and learn how this fascinating process works!

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Stream Drainage Patterns Aug 10, 2023

Just as in so many aspects of the way the world works, geology determines the drainage patterns (or watershed) of rivers. Today, we discuss the major types of drainage patterns - they're not random and we also get into how the geology at the surface determines this shape. This is a continuation of our series on water.

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Earth's Geological MRI Scan Aug 03, 2023

Today, we cover something very interesting - a new initiative by the United States Geological Survey to map Earth's resources at a new level. Geology is newly relevant to society and. some people argue we are entering a new 'golden age' of geology - how exciting!

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Rockhounding 101 Jul 27, 2023

Today, we cover one of our favorite past times - RockHounding! It's a totally fun, engaging activity that gets you outside and learning about nature. And, who knows, you might find something spectacular along the way!

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How To Identify Rocks Jul 20, 2023

In this episode we start a looong conversation about how to identify rocks. We begin by outlining a few simple rules to go by, and how to start to think about identifying rocks when you find them out in the world!

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Yellowstone's "Rock" Music Jul 13, 2023

Listen to Yellowstone's rock music here!
Today we talk about the fun exercise of turning seismic activity recorded live from Yellowstone National Park, turning it into musical notes, and playing it for a live audience! As usual, we get into the geology behind the story!

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The Geology of Uranium Jul 06, 2023

Today, we talk about Uranium!
Uranium is a really interesting element and today we talk about how it's used, a bit about nuclear reactors, then dive into the geology. Uranium has two major oxidation states, 4+ and 6+ and the chemical differences between these really drive how Uranium deposits form!

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Yellowstone's Other Volcanoes Jun 29, 2023

In PlanetGeo today, we discuss one aspect of Yellowstone National Park Geology that goes under-appreciated - the Absaroka Volcanics. They are a geological curiosity, but a massive one at that - the volume of volcanic rocks produced by the Absaroka volcanoes dwarfs the Yellowstone hotspot.

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A Geologist in National Defense - Dr. Stefanie Tompkins - Director of DARPA Jun 22, 2023

Today we are extremely honored to get the opportunity to discuss all things geoscience and National Defense with Dr. Stefanie Tompkins, the Director of DARPA! Dr. Tompkins is the first Presidential Appointee we have ever had on our podcast and in this interview she clearly shows why she has achieved such an incredible level of success in her career.
With Dr. Tompkins we discuss the value of geoscience training, the role of research funding, and how varied geoscience careers can become. We hope you enjoy this conversation as much as we did!

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Drove the Chevy to the Levee - The Geology of Levees Jun 15, 2023

Today we talk all about Levees! They are a very important and under-appreciated aspect of our society, infrastructure, and river systems!
Here is a link to the excellent article that we mention in the podcast. Please let us know if you have questions!
Levee Link

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New York City is Sinking! Jun 08, 2023

Today, Jesse and Chris discuss a headline that's been making a splash lately. There was a paper recently published that looked into why some areas of New York City appear to be sinking. We took this as an opportunity to discuss an important geologic concept - Isostasy or Isostic Adjustment. Our conversation spanned glaciers, mountains, and cities. We hope you enjoy. Below is a link to the published paper. I've also included a link to one of the articles written about the published paper.
https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2022EF003465
https://time.com/6283322/new-york-city-sinking/

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Office Hours - Back-to-School and Mass Spectrometers Jun 01, 2023

Today, Jesse and Chris take on a couple of listener questions. One is regarding a passion for geoscience and would like to know our opinion on returning to school for a trajectory change.
The other question is more for Jesse. It regards recent changes in mass spectrometry so we re-visit this important topic. We hope you enjoy.

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Plants and Meanders - How to Read a Geoscience Paper May 25, 2023

Here is a link to the paper we discuss in this episode:
In this episode, we talk about meandering streams. Why don't rivers flow in straight paths? As soon as a river flattens out, it begins to meander. It’s these meanders that manage the energy of the water. How? They really do 2 things: 1- they increase the resistance (physics) and 2- they decrease the gradient. Essentially, the river is changing itself to minimize the energy it expends to maintain a state of equilibrium. We also get into some detail. Meanders are not random. They are directly related to the width of the river and also the radius of the meander curvature. It's a really cool aspects to river morphology.
We also talk about things that can start meanders. And finally, we briefly discuss one of geology's more beautiful features - entrenched meanders. We hope you enjoy!

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Not All Who Meander Are Lost - Meandering Streams May 18, 2023

In this episode, we talk about meandering streams. Why don't rivers flow in straight paths? As soon as a river flattens out, it begins to meander. It’s these meanders that manage the energy of the water. How? They really do 2 things: 1- they increase the resistance (physics) and 2- they decrease the gradient. Essentially, the river is changing itself to minimize the energy it expends to maintain a state of equilibrium. We also get into some detail. Meanders are not random. They are directly related to the width of the river and also the radius of the meander curvature. It's a really cool aspects to river morphology.
We also talk about things that can start meanders. And finally, we briefly discuss one of geology's more beautiful features - entrenched meanders. We hope you enjoy!

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The Geology of Oakland - Andrew Alden author of Deep Oakland May 11, 2023

In this episode, we interview author Andrew Alden. He wrote Deep Oakland: How Geology Shaped a City. This book is a wonderful read and it offers a unique lens in which to view a city. Jesse and Chris both think that this idea should become a series - much like the Roadside Geology series.
Andrew talks about his motivation for the monumental task. The 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake that shook the city of San Francisco and kind of woke him up to the idea. Deep Oakland is an intricate story involving the intersection of geology and humanity. Specifically, geology determined early decisions in the planning of Oakland. Join us in this interesting conversation.

You can purchase Andrew's book Deep Oakland HERE

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Office Hours - Pollution and Slab Pull May 04, 2023

Today, we answer some listener questions in what we call "office hours". We each chose a question for the other to answer. We did not know what questions we would be asked so our answers were on the fly. Jesse asks Chris a question from Joyce (his mom) about a new word that she needs to know. Chris chose paleomagnetism. Then, Jesse asked a more serious question regarding the potential for humans to influence the chemistry of magma in the geologic future.
Chris chose a question from Ava regarding the origin of slab pull as a mechanism for plate tectonics. We hope you enjoy!

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Banded Iron Formations - BIFs Apr 27, 2023

Join us today as we discuss one of the more important ancient rock formations - Banded Iron Formations or otherwise known as BIF's in the geologic community. Wherever found, they provide us with Iron ore - some of the best on the planet. In this episode, we delve into the geologic story of how these important and beautiful rocks formed. There is some newer research that has altered some earlier thinking on BIF formation. We hope you enjoy.

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Barrier Islands Apr 20, 2023

In this episode, we take on the topic of Barrier Islands. This is a very relevant topic because recent storms have devastated some of these Islands. The intersection between geology and humans is always an interesting topic.
Barrier Islands need three things:

Sand supply
Broad sloping coastline
Waves/tides/currents must be strong enough to move sand (high-ish energy)
- Waves must be dominant

In this context we discuss the 3 ways in which they form. Each Island has it's own unique story and all 3 scenarios play a role.
We also discuss the function of Barrier Islands in terms of protecting the mainland and also unique biological habitats.

We hope you enjoy, and as usual please send us any questions you have!

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Observing Yellowstone National Park - Scientist-in-Charge Yellowstone Volcano Observatory Dr. Mike Poland Apr 13, 2023

In this episode, Chris and Jesse give a live talk at Grand Valley State University. We were invited to speak by the student chapter of the AAPG - American Association of Petroleum Geologists. They were interested in hearing our "story" about how each of us came into the geoscience field and how PlanetGeo came about. There was also a Q and A session where we were asked a variety of questions that spanned many topics.

We hope you enjoy, and as usual please send us any questions you have!

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The Shape of Yellowstone - Dr. Mike Poland, Scientist-in-Charge, Yellowstone Volcano Observatory Apr 06, 2023

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We hope you enjoy, and as usual please send us any questions you have!

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PlanetGeo LIVE at Grand Valley State University Mar 30, 2023

Learn all the basics of geology in our new conversational textbook - campGEO!
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In this episode, Chris and Jesse give a live talk at Grand Valley State University. We were invited to speak by the student chapter of the AAPG - American Association of Petroleum Geologists. They were interested in hearing our "story" about how each of us came into the geoscience field and how PlanetGeo came about. There was also a Q and A session where we were asked a variety of questions that spanned many topics.

We hope you enjoy, and as usual please send us any questions you have!

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So You Think You Know Plate Tectonics? Part 7 - Rocks and Climate Mar 23, 2023

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Today, we talk about Rocks and climate. Specifically, we discuss the ways that ancient rocks would have interacted with our ancient atmosphere. We begin by talking a little about the Carbon Cycle and how it's affected by plate tectonics. We then discuss some ways that experimental researchers are making rocks in the lab and studying the ways that changing gas compositions affect the oxidation state of mafic minerals.

We hope you enjoy, and as usual please send us any questions you have!

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So You Think You Know Plate Tectonics? Part 6 - Interior of the Earth Mar 16, 2023

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Today, Jesse has a bone to pick with Chris. After he gets some issues off his chest, we tackle the topics of Internal Dynamics and Plate Tectonics. Specifically:

What is the interior structure of the Earth? Chemistry/ physical behavior
How do we know the interior structure of the Earth?
Why is the hottest layer of the Earth a solid?
Why is the LOC liquid?
What are the 4 main mechanisms for PT?

We hope you enjoy, and as usual please send us any questions you have!

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What's Inside That Rock? Rock Man Ethan Penner Mar 09, 2023

Learn all the basics of geology in our new conversational textbook - campGEO!
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Rock Man Ethan is a geoscience communicator and producer of the What's Inside That Rock video series - you can find Ethan on all the social media channels (TikTok, Instagram, Twitter) @rockmanethan. Make sure to check him out!
We hope you enjoy, and as usual please send us any questions you have!

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Mass Confusion - How to Name a Mineral Mar 02, 2023

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New minerals are being 'discovered' every year, and there are press articles about them all the time! In this episode we go behind the scenes and dive into what it takes to name a mineral, where new minerals are being found, and why it's important to our everyday lives.
We hope you enjoy, and as usual please send us any questions you have!

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So You Think You Know Plate Tectonics? Part 5 - Magnetism Feb 23, 2023

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We hope you enjoy!

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When Did Plate Tectonics Begin? Plate Tectonics Part 4 Feb 16, 2023

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In this episode, we tackle the issue of when plate tectonics started on Earth and why this is an important question. This is a large part of Jesse's research so he has a lot to say. In order to address this question, we first discuss some parameters and what defines plate tectonics.
We also get into some detail by discussing some variations on the plate tectonics model: Things like sagduction, squishy-lid tectonics, stagnant lid tectonics and episodic tectonics to name a few.
We hope you enjoy!

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Terroir - The Geology of Wine with Brenna Quigley Feb 09, 2023

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Do you like wine? Do you know what Terroir is? Our guest, Brenna Quigley, is a leader in the geology of wine and how the geology affects the flavor profile of the grapes - in other words, Terroir! She can be found here to learn more!

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So, You Think You Know Plate Tectonics?!? Part 3 Feb 02, 2023

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In today's episode, we continue with our series on 'So... You think you know plate tectonics?' - Part 3.
We tackle these questions regarding Planetary Tectonics:

What would the Earth look like if PT was not an active process?
- Mars has all of the solar system’s largest volcanoes. Why?
Is there granite on other planets?
- No water, no granites, no oceans, no continents
Why does PT make Earth a beautiful planet?

We also discuss some future episode ideas that happened to come up during the discussion - like doing an episode series on the Carbon Cycle.
We hope you enjoy!
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Making Magnets - The Geology of Neodymium Jan 26, 2023

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Rare Earth Elements are a huge topic in mining and geology now, and in technology. The most important at the moment is Neodymium (Nd) and it is also really important for geology research. Let’s cover the basics.
In this episode, we discuss Neodymium in two broad concepts: 1- the importance for society and geological research, and 2- the geology of Neodymium.
Some example of the societal importance are that these are the strongest commercially available magnets, they are used in electric and hybrid vehicle motors - the two motors in a Tesla that make it go fast! Toyota Prius said to contain ~ 1kg of Nd in it’s motor, it's used in wind turbines, Buckeyballs (banned because kids kept swallowing them, they're use in MRI machines. These are just a few examples.
Join us in this fun discussion about a very important REE.

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Elemental Geology 4 - Lithium, Making Batteries (ReRelease) Jan 19, 2023

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We are on a break still, but releasing episodes on the really important elements - where they are found, why the are found there, and why we care about these elements in our society! There is some really interesting stuff in here, so enjoy.
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Lithium is only becoming more important to our society, and demand for lithium continues to skyrocket since it is used in everything from Tesla batteries to ceramics. Your phone has ~3g of lithium in it!
We cover the geology of lithium in this episode - where it occurs and why!

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Elemental Geology 3 - Critical Minerals with Dr. Nedal Nassar (ReRelease) Jan 12, 2023

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We are on a break still, but releasing episodes on the really important elements - where they are found, why the are found there, and why we care about these elements in our society! There is some really interesting stuff in here, so enjoy.
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Today we have the great pleasure of talking about a very important topic, while interviewing one of the best and most interesting people we've had the pleasure of speaking with!
Dr. Nedal Nassar is the Chief of the US Geological Survey’s Materials Flow Analysis Section, he has a PhD in Industrial Ecology from Yale and is a Leading member of the US National Science and Technology Council. In addition, he was awarded the 2019 Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers, which is a very VERY big deal!
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Elemental Geology 2: Iridium, the Meteorite Tracer (ReRelease) Jan 05, 2023

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You can also check out Jesse's Etsy shop here - JRRStonework and use promo code PLANETGEO10 for a 10% discount on all items.
We are on a break still, but releasing episodes on the really important elements - where they are found, why the are found there, and why we care about these elements in our society! There is some really interesting stuff in here, so enjoy.
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Elemental Geology 1 - Radon, the Unwelcome Houseguest (ReRelease) Dec 29, 2022

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You can also check out Jesse's Etsy shop here - JRRStonework and use promo code PLANETGEO10 for a 10% discount on all items.
We are on a break still, but releasing episodes on the really important elements - where they are found, why the are found there, and why we care about these elements in our society! There is some really interesting stuff in here, so enjoy.
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Volcanoes Revisited: Part 4 - Volcanology Director Tina Neal Dec 22, 2022

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We are on a break! But, we have so much great volcanology content from past episodes and interviews, we decided to release them all in a sequence. Four parts will be coming at you over the next few weeks, with interviews from some of the top volcanologists out there in the field. Let us know what you think!
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Volcanoes Revisited: Part 3 - Volcano Basics Dec 15, 2022

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We are on a break! But, we have so much great volcanology content from past episodes and interviews, we decided to release them all in a sequence. Four parts will be coming at you over the next few weeks, with interviews from some of the top volcanologists out there in the field. Let us know what you think!
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Volcanoes Revisited: Part 2 - Dr. Andrew Calvert ReRelease Dec 08, 2022

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We are on a break! But, we have so much great volcanology content from past episodes and interviews, we decided to release them all in a sequence. Four parts will be coming at you over the next few weeks, with interviews from some of the top volcanologists out there in the field. Let us know what you think!
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Volcanoes Revisited: Part 1 - Volcanologist Dr. Diana Roman Dec 01, 2022

Learn all the basics of geology in our new conversational textbook - campGEO!
Available here: geo.campcourses.com
We are on a break! But, we have so much great volcanology content from past episodes and interviews, we decided to release them all in a sequence. Four parts will be coming at you over the next few weeks, with interviews from some of the top volcanologists out there in the field. Let us know what you think!
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Office Hours: Plate Tectonics Questions/Thoughts Nov 25, 2022

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So You Think You Know Plate Tectonics? Part 2 Nov 17, 2022

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In today's episode, we continue with our series on 'So... You think you know plate tectonics?' - Part 2.
Can you answer the following questions?
1- How do sedimentary rocks relate to plate tectonics?
2- How does plate tectonics explain or relate to the formation of metamorphic rocks?
3- How does plate tectonics relate to the formation of very important mineral resources?
Jesse and Chris have a casual conversation centered around relating these questions to plate tectonics. We would love feedback and / or listener questions regarding this episode or the series in general. Enjoy!
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A Groovy Geologist - Cate Larsen Nov 10, 2022

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You can find out more about Cate Larsen and all her social media links here at groovygeologist.com!
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Cate - aka - groovygeologist is a geo-communicator. She utilizes the power of the internet to bring geology education to the masses. She has a B.S. in geology and a passion for teaching. Cate has her hands in a lot of things. She hosts a weekly livestream called Rocks and Hops where she teaches more structured lessons while drinking a craft beer. She also hosts a podcast called The Schist of It.
Jesse and Chris ran into Cate at the GSA meetings in Denver this past October. We knew right away that this would be a great opportunity to look at geoscience education in a very unique way. We hope you enjoy this entertaining interview.
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So... You Think You Know Plate Tectonics? Part 1 Nov 03, 2022

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One day, I (Chris) walked into class and announced that we were beginning plate tectonics. I was so excited to begin teaching this content. The response from my students was not at all what I expected. They let me know that they had all the plate tectonics they could handle in middle school and there wasn't anything left to learn. They knew the 3 basic types of plate boundaries (kind of) - divergent, convergent, and the T-one. I then started asking deeper level questions that tested their ability to apply this huge theory to make sense of the world around them.
During lunch that day, I began writing a series of questions about the unifying theory of plate tectonics. Needless to say, their understanding was skin deep and that's totally Okay. I wanted to show that we can take a basic understanding and use it to make so much more sense of our world.
That "event" gave me the idea to do a series on PlanetGeo covering a deep dive into plate tectonics. Jesse was not easy to convince. He felt like it was too massive. Anyway, I won and here comes the series. In this episode, we answer the following questions:
1. How does plate tectonics explain the formation of basalt?
2. How does plate tectonics explain the formation of andesite?
3. How does plate tectonics explain the formation of granite?
We hope you enjoy!
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Discovering Diamonds: The Story of Canada's Diamond Rush with Kevin Krajick Oct 27, 2022

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Link to: Barrenlands: The Epic Search for Diamonds in Canada's
Today, we get to interview author Kevin Krajick. Below is a small sample of his credentials and accolades.

Senior Editor Science News Communications, Columbia Climate School
Author at State of the Planet
Work has been featured in National Geographic, Newsweek, The New Yorker, Science, Smithsonian Mag, etc
Two time Winner of the American Geophysical Union's Walter Sullivan Award - excellence in science journalism
Finalist for the National Magazine Award for Public Service

We were interested in interviewing Kevin because of his book on Searching for diamonds in the Northwest Territories in Canada. This is a place near and dear to Jesse's heart because he does a lot of research up there. The book is exceptional and reads more like a novel mainly because of two featured individuals: Chuck Fipke and Stewart (Stu) Blusson. They are both Canadian geologists, prospectors, businessmen, helicopter pilot, etc. Check the link below for the book.
In addition to writing this book, Kevin is a writer for the Columbia Climate School (https://news.climate.columbia.edu/). He has written on an impressive array of topic from climate, Earth science, and society.
We hope you enjoy this interesting interview. Cheers.

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Communicating the Earth Observatory: Author Kevin Krajick Oct 20, 2022

Link to: Barrenlands: The Epic Search for Diamonds in Canada's
Today, we get to interview author Kevin Krajick. Below is a small sample of his credentials and accolades.

Senior Editor Science News Communications, Columbia Climate School
Author at State of the Planet
Work has been featured in National Geographic, Newsweek, The New Yorker, Science, Smithsonian Mag, etc
Two time Winner of the American Geophysical Union's Walter Sullivan Award - excellence in science journalism
Finalist for the National Magazine Award for Public Service

We were interested in interviewing Kevin because of his book on Searching for diamonds in the Northwest Territories in Canada. This is a place near and dear to Jesse's heart because he does a lot of research up there. The book is exceptional and reads more like a novel mainly because of two featured individuals: Chuck Fipke and Stewart (Stu) Blusson. They are both Canadian geologists, prospectors, businessmen, helicopter pilot, etc. Check the link below for the book.
In addition to writing this book, Kevin is a writer for the Columbia Climate School (https://news.climate.columbia.edu/). He has written on an impressive array of topic from climate, Earth science, and society.
We hope you enjoy this interesting interview. Cheers.

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Don't Take it For Granite - Geology of Countertops Oct 13, 2022

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In this episode, we tackle the confusing industry of "granite" countertops. It's confusing because it seems as though all rock countertops are called "granite". However, to a geologist, granite is a very specific type of rock and only a small percentage of countertops are actually granite.
There are maybe 5 or so major rock types that are all found in the "granite" countertop category. We spend some time talking about each major type:

Marble - this might be named accurately actually in most places. Is it very white with no distinct grains showing? Then it is probably marble. Especially if it has long dark wavys streaks
Granite - there is some real granite in there! Does it have pink, white, grey, and a few black flecks in it? Most of the grains are smaller than your fingernail? Then it may actually be granite. Can be white - no pink, too. Has to have some black flecks and some gray too.
Pegmatite - Does it have really really large grains? The size of your finger? Grey, white, black, with crazy textures in between them? It might be a pegmatite
Schist/gneiss - does it have a definite texture and pattern in one direction? Are their little waves of light and dark wavy patterns? Are there big deep purple garnets in it or blue flakes? What about dark and light bands with an overall darker color? It could be gneiss or schist.
Conglomerate - does it have a bunch of round or oblong grains in it of a variety of colors? Could be a conglomerate - these are spectacular.
There are others to be sure. These are just the most common.

We also talk about another type that is growing in popularity - Quartz counters. They aren't actually quartz though. We like this option a lot because it's a green product. No rock was mined for the specific purpose of making countertops. Quartz countertops are a form of engineered stone, made from ground-up particles of stone bound together with plastic resins. About 90% of the material is Crushed up waste granite, marble, and natural stone or recycled industrial wastes such as ceramic, silica, glass, mirrors, etc.

We hope you enjoy!
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Capturing Carbon - The Basics of Carbon Capture and Storage Oct 06, 2022

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In this episode, we dive into a very important topic that will play an increasing role in the climate change crisis. Carbon (CO2) capture and storage (CCS) is a big geoscience problem, and a possible solution to climate change. But, we need to understand these two terms well - it’s all about making rocks!
The oceans capture carbon for us, but we want to help this process along. In order to do that, we need to find ways to concentrate the Carbon because it's in such a low overall concentration in the atmosphere. We discuss some of the ways companies are trying to speed up the concentration process.
Once the Carbon is captured, we need to find ways to store it. Rocks such as limestone in the ocean is a natural way for Carbon storage. Again, we discuss some of the creative ways companies are researching to effectively store the captured carbon. We hope you enjoy our discussion on the very important topic.
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Introducing campGEO Oct 03, 2022

Click this link to try campGEO today!
Today, we are very excited to launch campGEO - our conversational textbook to help you learn geology.
This is a structured and image-based approach to learning. Geology is a visual field, so you need images to fully understand what we are talking about! Now you have them. Login to campGEO using the common social media logins, and access all our content for free!
You can also visit our website CampCourses where you can find the link and a QR code to share.
Remember, if you like what we do here, share with your friends, leave us a rating and a review, and follow us on social media!
www.campcourses.com
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The Doomsday Glacier - Professor Richard Alley Part 2 Sep 29, 2022

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This is a link to the video of the Quick Clay Slide at Dissa video Dr. Alley references. This shows what can also happen to a glacier when it loses it's toe-hold as described in this episode.
Dr. Richard Alley is a renowned glaciologist and paleoclimate scientist. He is also widely regarded as one of the best professors at Penn State University. Below is a list of his impressive credentials:

National Academy of Sciences
Foreign Member of the Royal Society
Evan Pugh University Professorship
Penn State’s top teaching award
Presidential Young Investigator Award
Earth - the Operator’s Manual -
Briefed senators, international legislators, and a sitting US Vice President
Published an unbelievable >310 papers/books/etc

Join us as we discuss climate change, glaciers, and sea level. Much of his current research is on a Western Antarctic glacier called Thwaites Glacier. It's been dubbed the doomsday glacier because of its likely impact on sea level. Alley is a gifted speaker and uses incredible analogies to paint a vivid picture.
Another big part of the discussion is how Carbon is the thermostat control knob for our atmosphere. We hope you enjoy the discussion. We did!

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Earth: The Operator's Manual - Professor Richard Alley Part 1 Sep 22, 2022

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Dr. Richard Alley is a renowned glaciologist and paleoclimate scientist. He is also widely regarded as one of the best professors at Penn State University. Below is a list of his impressive credentials:

National Academy of Sciences
Foreign Member of the Royal Society
Evan Pugh University Professorship
Penn State’s top teaching award
Presidential Young Investigator Award
Earth - the Operator’s Manual -
Briefed senators, international legislators, and a sitting US Vice President
Published an unbelievable >310 papers/books/etc

Join us as we discuss climate change, glaciers, and sea level. Much of his current research is on a Western Antarctic glacier called Thwaites Glacier. It's been dubbed the doomsday glacier because of its likely impact on sea level. Alley is a gifted speaker and uses incredible analogies to paint a vivid picture.
Another big part of the discussion is how Carbon is the thermostat control knob for our atmosphere. We hope you enjoy the discussion. We did!
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The Worst Year to Be Alive - 536 AD Sep 15, 2022

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536 AD was not a good year to be to be a human - especially in Eastern Europe. Below are some written descriptions of what it was like:

Michael the Syrian, wrote: "[T]he sun became dark and its darkness lasted for one and a half years [...] Each day it shone for about four hours and still this light was only a feeble shadow [...] the fruits did not ripen and the wine tasted like sour grapes."
A prefect of Italy at the time, wrote: "so we have had a winter without storms, spring without mildness, summer without heat."
A roman politician wrote: “the sun had a buish color, the moon lost its luster and the seasons seem to be jumbled up together.

Global temperatures fell by 2.5 degrees C (5 degrees F) on average. The culprit was an Icelandic volcano that began eruption in early 536 AD. This was punctuated by another eruption in 540, the bubonic plague in 541, and another eruption in 547 to round out one of the worst decades to be alive on Earth. All of these events caused a combined effect that took the planet over a hundred years to recover.
In this episode, we discuss a little about the geology of Icelandic volcanoes and why they are so diverse. However, the main focus is on the process of scientific discovery. We dive into ice core analysis and tree ring data that helped researchers piece together the puzzle.
Join Jesse and Chris as we discuss what might have been the worst year, decade, or century to be a human in modern times.

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Canyonlands National Park Sep 08, 2022

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Canyonlands National Park is the (big) sibling to Arches - the geology is very similar but the view you get on that geology is completely different!
Here we discuss some of the differences, and give a quick rundown of where to go to see some of that spectacular geology.
As always, send us any questions you may have!
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Arches National Park Sep 01, 2022

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Arches are an amazing geologic feature and they occur in very high density in Arches National Park - located in Utah!
In this episode we discuss the regional geology of the area, the Paradox Basin, and then get into some of the detailed processes that form arches throughout the park!
As always, send us any questions you may have!
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Great Rocks, Summer Excursions, and Confusing Minerals Aug 25, 2022

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After a long break from recording, Chris and Jesse return to our studios to discuss our extremely busy summer. Jesse recaps his trip to Hawaii where he saw some amazing geology. He also talks about teaching field camp in Idaho to some of the Penn State undergrads. His favorite though, was continuing his field research in the Northwest Territories of Canada. He and his PhD student collected over 1,000 pounds of rocks. When asked about his favorite rocks seen this summer, Jesse didn't hesitate - the ancient rocks in Northern Canada. The toothpaste rocks won out over the much younger pahoehoe rocks of Hawaii.
Chris talked about taking 26 high school seniors out West for 3 weeks on the field course that he teaches. They went to the South Dakota Badlands, Black Hills, Devils Tower, Grand Tetons, Yellowstone, and Glacier National Park. The floods that ravaged Yellowstone in early June didn't prevent the students from learning about the incredible geology of Yellowstone. Following this, Chris returned to the West with his family to hike and climb. They went to the flatirons of Red Rocks and then on to Long's Peak. The Long's Peak granite was easily his favorite rock of the summer. The rock is interesting because it is a porphyritic granite. The huge phenocrysts are peculiar because they are not randomly oriented. Instead, they are aligned in a preferred direction which is a topic of current research. After leaving Colorado, Chris and family spent the next two weeks banging around in the Tetons.
We wrap up the episode by discussing a couple of mineral pairs that can be confusing to identify in the field. Join us as we have a casual conversation about some incredible geology!
As always, send us any questions you may have!
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Only the Strong Survive - Sand Aug 18, 2022

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Sand comes from chemical and/or physical weathering of rocks, and is critically important to our society!
Most sand formation begins in the soil - soil has water to further break down the pieces. And the location where sand is formed plays a really important role in how useful sand is for concrete and ceramics. Most beach sand and desert sand is too rounded to be used!
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Rocks and Rules - Putting Things in Order Aug 11, 2022

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Today we talk about the basic Principles of Geology - the basic observations that allow us to put geologic events in a relative order of when they occurred.
The five principles are 1) Superposition, 2) Original Horizontality, 3) Cross-cutting Relationships, 4) Inclusions, and 5) Correlation/Continuity.
Armed with these five rules, you can understand a lot more about the history of the world around you!
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Red River Gorge, Kentucky Aug 04, 2022

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Age of the Earth - or, How to Build a Planet Jul 28, 2022

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The Earth is old...very old. But, the Solar System is older!
We discuss how we know the age of the Earth, what the age of a planet means anyways, and how planets form!
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Magma Oceans and Triple Junctions - Listener Questions Part 2! Jul 21, 2022

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Thank you Valeria, Chelsea and Natalia for the excellent questions! Keep them coming!
Today we answer some of your very interesting geoscience questions ranging from how the moon formed to what's going on in Vinicunca Peru!
We talk about the Mendocino Triple Junction, one of the most rapidly rising places on Earth, the magma ocean's that formed the moon, and how sedimentary rocks can get such spectacularly beautiful coloring to them!
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Making Batteries: The Geology of Lithium Jul 14, 2022

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Lithium is only becoming more important to our society, and demand for lithium continues to skyrocket since it is used in everything from Tesla batteries to ceramics. Your phone has ~3g of lithium in it!
We cover the geology of lithium in this episode - where it occurs and why!
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Earth's Leaky Core and Michigan Geology - Your Questions Part 1 Jul 07, 2022

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Thank you Cathy and Matt for the excellent questions! Cathy sent us a question associated with This Article and Matt asked about Michigan geology (perhaps not knowing the long-winded answer he was in for!).
We received a TON of excellent questions from you all so we will have a Part 2 coming out soon - stay tuned to hear answers to your questions!
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Devils Tower National Monument Jun 30, 2022

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Devils Tower National Monument is a must see on any road trip in South Dakota! In fact, you can think of Chris Bolhuis while you are listening, as he is currently teaching 26 lucky high school students at Devils Tower at the moment!
The geology of this amazing spectacle has it all - beautiful sedimentary rocks, unique volcanic rocks, and great columnar joints that make the Tower look utterly striking.
Devils Tower is a unique rock called a phonolite, and it represents some part of an ancient volcano's plumbing system - a 40 million year old volcano!
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Badlands National Park Jun 23, 2022

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Badlands National Park is a spectacular place to visit! If you are traveling to the Rocky Mountains, it is a great stop to get started.
Fossils are everywhere in the Badlands National Park, and the rocks have really amazing colorations to them.
However, badlands are a geologic feature! There are a few specific things required to form badlands and we discuss those key traits, as well as some of the basic principles of badlands generally.
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Breakthrough Energy: Ashley Grosh Jun 16, 2022

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After Listening back on this episode (both the short and the full interview), my wife and I had a conversation. I asked her what she thought. Her reply was that she was full of hope after listening. Join us as we have an incredible conversation with Ashley Grosh. She is Vice President of the Breakthrough Energy Fellows program which is designed to find and fund innovators working to bring climate technology solutions to the market. She worked at Wells Fargo for 15 years where she managed a $100 million impact program and was largely involved as a thought leader in the company's overall ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) and sustainable finance strategies and commitments.
Ashely is a former athlete and avid sports fan. She played Division 1 soccer for University of Colorado. She now coaches soccer for Colorado Elevation FC - academy soccer program.
Team sports, and the lessons one can learn, have always been a huge part of her life. In the Short episode, Ashley talks about the parallels between team sports and professional teams. She also wanted to sneak in some geology to the conversation by talking about a new way to mine from the seafloor. Here is the link that was alluded to in the episode: https://impossiblemining.com/

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Soccer, Mining, and Investing: Ashley Grosh of Breakthrough Energy Fellows Jun 09, 2022

Learn all the basics of geology in our new conversational textbook - campGEO!
Available here: geo.campcourses.com
After Listening back on this episode (both the short and the full interview), my wife and I had a conversation. I asked her what she thought. Her reply was that she was full of hope after listening. Join us as we have an incredible conversation with Ashley Grosh. She is Vice President of the Breakthrough Energy Fellows program which is designed to find and fund innovators working to bring climate technology solutions to the market. She worked at Wells Fargo for 15 years where she managed a $100 million impact program and was largely involved as a thought leader in the company's overall ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) and sustainable finance strategies and commitments.
Ashely is a former athlete and avid sports fan. She played Division 1 soccer for University of Colorado. She now coaches soccer for Colorado Elevation FC - academy soccer program.
Team sports, and the lessons one can learn, have always been a huge part of her life. In the Short episode, Ashley talks about the parallels between team sports and professional teams. She also wanted to sneak in some geology to the conversation by talking about a new way to mine from the seafloor. Here is the link that was alluded to in the episode: https://impossiblemining.com/

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On the app you can get tons of free content, exclusive images, and access to our Geology of National Parks series.
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Carbon Dating: The Method and Misconceptions Jun 02, 2022

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People often wonder, why can't we date diamonds? Today, we answer that!
Here, we talk through the basics of Carbon Dating, also called RadioCarbon Dating! Radiocarbon is an awesome technique that also has some really common misconceptions about it. We go through the basics of this amazing method, with great analogies as usual, and we cover all those misconceptions!
Carbon dating is a great tool for dating things that were once alive. However, the half-life of Carbon-14 is 5,730 years. This means that after something has been dead for over 50,000 years, there is virtually no Carbon-14 left to date. This is why Carbon dating can't be used on dinosaurs (or diamonds) - no Carbon-14 remains.
Also, Carbon dating is not an appropriate tool for dating most rocks for two reasons. First, most rocks don't have abundant Carbon-14 when they formed. Second, most rocks are very, very old. Fortunately, there are many other appropriate tools that scientists can use to date rocks. Jesse is definitely the expert in the room in this discussion. His research involves different dating methods that he's been using for years. We hope you enjoy the discussion.
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Geoscience News this Week! May 26, 2022

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Available here: geo.campcourses.com
In todays episode, Jesse and Chris re-visit an idea on GeoScience in the news. This was fun for us. We didn't talk before we picked our topics. We realized that there are so many geoscience topics in the news and that we need to do more of this type of thing. Here are the links to our articles we chose. Sit back and enjoy!!
Link to Chris's Article
Link to Jesse's article
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Super_Volcanoes: Dr. Robin George Andrews May 19, 2022

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Join us this week for our interview of Dr. Robin George Andrews. Robin George Andrews is a freelance science journalist based in London. His work has appeared in National Geographic, The New York Times, The Atlantic, Scientific American, Gizmodo, Atlas Obscura and elsewhere. He trained as a volcanologist, earning a doctorate in the subject, but then realized that telling people stories of spectacular eruptions and off-world scientific shenanigans brought him more joy than academia ever could. His upcoming book — Super Volcanoes: What They Reveal about Earth and the Worlds Beyond is out now - go buy a copy!
I must admit, it took Jesse and I a while to realize that the book is called Super Volcanoes - two words. In other words, all volcanoes are super. Most volcanologists strongly dislike the term Supervolcanoes - one word, that is typically used to describe Yellowstone National Park.
Robin has a huge personality which made for a very fun interview. We talked about Hawaii, Yellowstone, deep ocean volcanoes, Tonga, and Marie Tharp to name just a few. Tune in to get all the details. You won't be disappointed.
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Who Becomes a Volcanologist? Dr. Robin Andrews May 12, 2022

Learn all the basics of geology in our new conversational textbook - campGEO!
Available here: geo.campcourses.com
Join us this week for our interview of Dr. Robin George Andrews. Robin George Andrews is a freelance science journalist based in London. His work has appeared in National Geographic, The New York Times, The Atlantic, Scientific American, Gizmodo, Atlas Obscura and elsewhere. He trained as a volcanologist, earning a doctorate in the subject, but then realized that telling people stories of spectacular eruptions and off-world scientific shenanigans brought him more joy than academia ever could. His upcoming book — Super Volcanoes: What They Reveal about Earth and the Worlds Beyond is out now - go buy a copy!
I must admit, it took Jesse and I a while to realize that the book is called Super Volcanoes - two words. In other words, all volcanoes are super. Most volcanologists strongly dislike the term Supervolcanoes - one word, that is typically used to describe Yellowstone National Park.
Robin has a huge personality which made for a very fun interview. We talked about Hawaii, Yellowstone, deep ocean volcanoes, Tonga, and Marie Tharp to name just a few. Tune in to get all the details. You won't be disappointed.
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Download the CampGeo app now at this link.
On the app you can get tons of free content, exclusive images, and access to our Geology of National Parks series.
You can also learn the basics of geology at the college level in our FREE CampGeo content series - get learning now!
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Hiking Great Smoky Mountain National Park May 05, 2022

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Great Smoky Mountain National Park Apr 28, 2022

The air is clearing!

In this episode, we discuss the geology of Great Smoky Mountain National Park. We've been neglectful of this region of the U.S. and it's time to do these amazing mountains justice.
We begin by discussing why the Smokies are Smoky. It's an interesting and natural phenomenon that involves the immense pine forests.
After we get the biology out of the way, we dive into the geology. We broke it down to 3 major geologic events: 1- the bedrock geology and the accumulation of a massive amount of sediment from the breakup of Rodinia (a super-continent that preceded Pangaea). 2- Deformation and mountain building from the Pangaea collision. 3- Erosion as Pangaea broke apart.
We hope you enjoy!
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Industrial Ecology and Critical Minerals: Dr. Nedal Nassar Apr 21, 2022

Today we have the great pleasure of talking about a very important topic, while interviewing one of the best and most interesting people we've had the pleasure of speaking with!
Dr. Nedal Nassar is the Chief of the US Geological Survey’s Materials Flow Analysis Section, he has a PhD in Industrial Ecology from Yale and is a Leading member of the US National Science and Technology Council. In addition, he was awarded the 2019 Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers, which is a very VERY big deal!
Please enjoy this amazing conversation with Dr. Nassar, and send us any questions you have!!

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What is a Critical Mineral? Dr. Nedal Nassar Apr 14, 2022

Today we have the great pleasure of talking about a very important topic, while interviewing one of the best!
Dr. Nedal Nassar is the Chief of the US Geological Survey’s Materials Flow Analysis Section, he has a PhD in Industrial Ecology from Yale and is a Leading member of the US National Science and Technology Council. In addition, he was awarded the 2019 Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers, which is a very VERY big deal!
Join us next week to hear more from Dr. Nassar!
** Just a quick note - Dr. Nassar slightly misspoke in this episode when talking about Tantalum and corrected himself later. Tantalum is actually combined with niobium, vanadium, and zirconium. Tellurium is combined with elemental boron.

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Radon: The Unwelcome Houseguest Apr 07, 2022

Are you worried about Radon in your home?
Here are a few valuable links to learn more about it and some resources to get a test -
United States Environmental Protection Agency page
United States Geological Survey FAQ
United States Map of Radon Risk (get your home checked!)
Today we talk about Radon!

Radon is something you have probably heard of, but may not know much about. It is a really important aspect of geoscience that touches our lives everyday.
Radon is an element that is radioactive. It is formed from the decay of Uranium as Uranium breaks down into Lead. Radon is special because it is a Noble Gas, which means it is an element that doesn't bond with other elements, so it can move around easily. When Uranium decays, it goes through several steps of decay and eventually gets to Radon.
Once Radon is formed, it can move. Radon is a gas and can flow through soils, in water, or even seep through concrete. So, it can make it into your house! Once there, Radon can hang around for a few days until it decays again and eventually produces Pb.
Radon can move easier if

The soil is permeable - stuff can flow through it
The soil is porous - there is a lot of space in the soil
Soil is dry - water slows down Radon movement

There are several ways for Radon to get into your house if it can move quickly through the soil. First it can seep through concrete foundations slowly. Second, it can flow from the high pressure soil to the low pressure air in your house through cracks in the foundation. And third, it can be dissolved in groundwater and get released when that water is agitated (showers, faucet running, etc).
It's easy to test for Radon in your home, and relatively inexpensive to get it fixed - so if you are unsure, get your home tested!!

Also, we have a new website!! Check it out or send us an email at our email address planetgeocast@gmail.com
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Your Questions! Road Collapse in the United Kingdom (GeoShort) Mar 31, 2022

Thanks to our UK listener Valeria for this excellent question!
Valeria wondered what was going on with road collapses in the UK recently! Luckily, some experts have looked into this and wrote this recent blog post that proposes some ideas, and suggests further research is necessary.
In this Geoshort, we discuss these options, as well as explain what Solifluction is, and how it moves soil in a very powerful and slow process.
Thanks Valeria for an excellent question! We look forward to many more from you and other listeners of PlanetGeo.
As usual, please follow us on all the social media accounts or shoot us an email!

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National Geographic and Geoscience Writing - Dr. Maya Wei-Haas Mar 24, 2022

Join us as we interview Dr. Maya Wei-Haas who works as a science journalist for National Geographic. Dr. Wei-Haas has a PhD in geoscience, has done top-tier research. In our discussion, she explains why she decided to pivot and use her extensive background to write interesting articles about our amazing planet. This was not an easy decision for Dr. Wei-Haas to make as writing did not come naturally - just another obstacle for her to overcome. Sit back and listen to this intriguing discussion about Earth science, writing, and life.
Dr. Maya Wei-Haas has an impressive CV: She has a PhD in Geoscience, but now works as a science journalist for National Geographic. Here are some of the awards Dr. Wei-Haas has won!

Science Journalist for National Geographic - particular affection for Rocks and Reactions,
Assistant Editor - Smithsonian Magazine
American Academy for the Advancement of Science Fellow in 2015
PhD in Earth Science from Ohio State University
ASCE Excellence in Journalism Award 2021
AGU’s Perlman Award for Excellence in Science Journalism (2020)
National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellow (2010-2015)

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Daylight Saving Time: Interview with Dr. Maya Wei-Haas Mar 17, 2022

Dr. Maya Wei-Haas has an impressive CV: See below. She has a PhD in Geoscience, but now works as a science journalist for National Geographic. Dr. Wei-Haas has had to overcome some major obstacles to become a professional journalist. Join us in this interesting discussion about a recent article on Daylight Saving Time.
Science Journalist for National Geographic - particular affection for Rocks and Reactions,

Assistant Editor - Smithsonian Magazine

American Academy for the Advancement of Science Fellow in 2015

PhD in Earth Science from Ohio State University

ASCE Excellence in Journalism Award 2021

AGU’s Perlman Award for Excellence in Science Journalism (2020)

National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellow (2010-2015)

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A Geology Bullseye: The Black Hills of South Dakota Mar 10, 2022

The Black Hills happens to be one of our favorite places. We thought it was the right time to talk about them as people are getting the itch for summer to arrive so we can play in the mountains. The Black Hills is the perfect area to orient a young family to a life of adventure and respect for the outdoors. You can't get into too much trouble here and these mountains and the surrounding area offers so much to do. The Black Hills of South Dakota are a destination - not a speed bump on your way out West. Sit back and enjoy!
Geology of the Hills

The geology is complex but there are 3 basic suites of rock formations. The igneous and metamorphic core in the southern part of the Hills (Black Elk Peak, Mount Rushmore), some intrusive and extrusive igneous activity in the northern part of the hills (Bear butte and Devils Tower), and the sedimentary rocks that rim and surround the entire area (Racetrack and Wind Cave). From a 30,000 foot perspective, everythings looks like a huge oval shaped bullseye.
The granite core, that has tons of awesome pegmatite was formed between 2 by and 1.8 by ago in the Trans-Hudson Orogeny. This is ancient mountain building event that formed the Canadian shield and the North American Craton (Jesse, you probably know a lot about this). The pegmatite makes for a climbing meca.
Surrounding the Granite, is a diverse group of metamorphic rocks. These are the oldest in the area, because they were formerly sedimentary rocks that were metamorphosed into schists and gneisses by the THO. These rocks were intensely heated and squeezed enormously. In some areas of the hills, the metamorphic rocks are tilted 90 degrees (upended) and have been heavily eroded since. (Jesse, we love this stuff because we LOVE schist - garnet, staurolite, etc)
The PreC core was eventually brought to the surface. How did this happen and How do we know?
- It was relatively flat, and then covered by a shallow sea and eventually the Western Interior Seaway.
- The sedimentary rocks that circle the BH are oldest near the core and get progressively younger further out. You can always tell where you are in the BH by the types of rocks around you - core vs. unaltered sed. rx.
Over 7500 feet of vertically accumulated rocks here

Then the Laramide Orogeny began to influence this area. This is the famous event that formed the Rocky Mountains far to the West. But a stray blob of magma rose way to the East under the Black Hills - pushing up the PreC core and the sedimentary strata covering them.

The highest parts of the BH are 7200 feet above sea level. The sed rx were 7500 feet thick so the total uplift is near 15,000 feet, but they were not likely ever that tall. As uplift was going on, so was erosion.
The blob of magma was like a piston, shoving up the rocks from below. As the PreC core poked through, the sedimentary rocks were folded and upended. This

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Eruption, The Untold Story of Mount St. Helens: Author Steve Olson Mar 03, 2022

Join us as we interview science writer Steve Olson about his book Eruption: The Untold Story of Mount St. Helens. For his outstanding work on this book, he won the Washington State Book Award and was named one of the best nonfiction books of 2016 by Amazon. Steve is also the author of the book The Apocalypse Factory: Plutonium and the Making of the Atomic Age, a new history of the nuclear era told from the perspective of the Hanford nuclear reservation. He also is the author of Mapping Human History: Genes, Race, and Our Common Origins, which was nominated for the National Book Award, and other books, and he has written for the Atlantic Monthly, Science, the Smithsonian, and many other magazines. Since 1979, he has been a consultant writer for the National Academy of Sciences, the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, and other national scientific organizations.

In the book, Steve writes about the forestry industry, the history of the National Forest, and he tells the human side of the story before, during, and after the eruption. In this interview, we ask Steve a series of questions that came to mind as we read his book. So sit back, relax, and enjoy this outstanding conversation with author Steve Olson. The stories are fantastic.

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Modern Mount St. Helens: Author Steve Olson (GeoShort) Feb 24, 2022

Join us in a preview to our full interview with science writer Steve Olson!
In this GeoShort, we cover the modern science of Mount St. Helens, a bit about Steve's writing career, and discuss the importance of geoscience!
Tune in next week for the full interview.

In the book, Steve writes about the forestry industry, the history of the National Forest, and he tells the human side of the story before, during, and after the eruption. In this interview, we ask Steve a series of questions that came to mind as we read his book. So sit back, relax, and enjoy this outstanding conversation with author Steve Olson. The stories are fantastic.

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Volcanoes Around the World: Tina Neal - Director of the United States Volcano Science Center Feb 17, 2022

Join Jesse and Chris as we interview Christina (Tina) Neal. Tina has 38 years of experience as a volcanologist for the USGS. She is the Volcano Science Center Director and is in charge of all 5 of the U.S. volcano observatories.
Yes, that's right - there are 5 volcano observatories in the U.S.: California Volcano Observatory, Cascade Volcano Observatory, Alaska Volcano Observatory, Yellowstone Volcano Observatory, and Hawaii Volcano Observatory. Neal oversees 170 employees and is responsible for science and operational planning; workforce development; improving diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility; and preparing the USGS for U.S. volcanic eruptions.
In 2018, Neal was the Scientist in Charge at the Hawaii Observatory. She paints a vivid picture of what it was like to be there for this historic eruption and also the incredible responsibility to forecast and communicate during this time. She was a finalist for the Samuel Haymen Service to America Medal for her and her teams outstanding work during the eruption.
This interview was a lot of fun for us, because Tina Neal has seen and done a lot in her career. She talks about magma chambers, seismic activity, forecasting eruptions, careers in volcanology, and some scary moments. Enjoy.
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The Geology of Iridium, The Meteorite Tracker Feb 10, 2022

In this episode, Jesse and Chris follow up on the K-T Extinction episode from last week. Why is Iridium so important in this story? Our show notes summary is below.
Why is Iridium identified in these layers?

Well, it’s higher in meteorites - but not really high.
Why is it higher in meteorites though?
- It’s not actually high in meteorites, it’s low in the Earth’s crust! Very very very low.
Yet, Earth is made of meteorites, so where did the Ir go?
- Most of it is in the core and we talk about why.
Very rare on the surface of the Earth - only three metric tons mined and used yearly
- The most corrosion resistant substance known - even at high temperatures
- If it's so corrosion resistant, what is it used for?

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Meteors+Dinosaurs+Geology = Extinction! Feb 03, 2022

Join Jesse and Chris as we explore the hypothesis that an asteroid ended the Cretaceous AND the age of the reptiles. It's a very compelling scientific story of discovery.

This has been hotly debated back and forth for a long long time, with consensus being reached only recently (since I was in graduate school)

Other options include a massive volcanic outpouring - Deccan Traps in India erupted >1 million cubic km of lava in a million year period, with 50% of that coming before the mass extinction event.
The question is really about what killed so much stuff? How does the Earth respond to massive impacts? There have been other large meteorite impacts (and big volcanic eruptions) with no mass extinction - why this one?
- Was the Earth already in a sorry state (lots of CO2 and mercury in the atmosphere) before the extinction?
Flood basalt volcanism is tied to other major mass extinction events (end-Permian and end-Triassic)

As we look at the evidence, we bounce around the globe. We begin in Italy.
1- Gubbio, Italy. Layers of ancient limestone that are now folded and uplifted. Working from bottom to top- site became a magnet. Why? It has a thin layer of dark clay. Walter Alverez became v. Interested in this. He studied the foraminifera below and above. He found that at the top of the white limestone, the vast diversity of the forams abruptly went missing.

2- Spain - 1500km away. On the Atlantic coast outside of Zumaia. 2 beaches here which are of interest to geologists because they are situated among the longest set of continuous rock strata in the world. Jan Smit was studying the forams here. In these layers, Smit found a strange clay layer - just like Alvarez. In these rocks, they were steady, consistent, for over a million years, then all of the sudden, the clay layer. There is no evidence of anything happening and then all of the sudden, the clay layer and bang, they’re gone.

How long did this take to change?

3- Walter brought in his dad, Louie Alverez. He brought in his knowledge of Astrophysics. He found the layer to be rich in IR (also iron, nickel and cobalt). It contained over 30 X the amount in surrounding rock (measured from the clay at Gubbio). Could it come from an Asteroid. He hypothesized that the IR would be spread all over the world as a blanket. So he could calc. The amount that was laid down all over Earth. Knowing the amount that is in Asteroids and Comets, they can calc. The size of the Asteroid.

5- Texas on the Brazos River. 65 my this was the bottom of a sea. We found, Allen Hildebrand, strange sed deposits across the basin. 7 million years of boring mud there. This was under water. Then suddenly, we see the mud got eroded. Suddenly, there were huge boulders in the mud. Only a giant Tsunami could do this.

6- Haiti: Report of volcanic rocks. They were actually ejecta full of shocked qtr and spherules. They were also full of melted rocks called tektites.

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Water Issues Part 4: The Geology of Hard Water (Re-Release) Jan 27, 2022

Chris and Jesse are recording this intro face to face in Michigan! We had a lot of fun actually recording together rather than from 600 miles apart. Join us in our final Re-release series on water.
Show notes are below:
This week we tackle a big question: why is the ocean so salty? Spoiler alert: it's because of the hard water you may have running through your house!
In this episode we cover three major questions: 1) Why is the ocean salty? 2) Why do rivers keep flowing all the time? and 3) What is hard water? Guess what...they are all related!
Hard water is water that is "hard" to make a lather with. This is caused by dissolved ions in the groundwater. Those ions get there because groundwater interacts with rocks under... wait for it... the ground! This groundwater feeds rivers, which then flow into lakes and ultimately the oceans. The ocean water then evaporates, leaves behind the salty stuff from dissolved rocks, forms clouds and rain, and starts the whole process over again. Except, the salty ions are left behind in the ocean and accumulate over time.
Hard water is extremely important to pay attention to because it can severely damage industrial equipment as well as cost you thousands of dollars in home repairs if you don't get it taken care of it. Here is a link to a United States Geological Survey article that outlines hard water, where it is found, and what it can cause. Check out that picture of the clogged pipe!
https://www.usgs.gov/special-topic/water-science-school/science/hardness-water?qt-science_center_objects=0#qt-science_center_objects
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The Volcano Heard Around the World: Literally! Jan 20, 2022

Join us as we interrupt our water series re-release to talk about a major current event - the eruption of Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha'apai volcano in Tonga.

It was a huge eruption in the South Pacific from a very active volcano. Its had some smaller eruptions in the last few months, but Saturday morning took the lid off.
In fact, some instrumented Cascade volcanoes - Mt Hood, Mt Saint Helens, and Mt Ranier, detected infrasound records (essentially specialized microphones). The second longer but lower-magnitude signal that shows up later in the plot - is the airwave passing by the station again -- having come from the other direction! That’s right, the airwave has wrapped around the planet! The first wave traveled a distance of ~8500 km (~5300 miles). The second traveled ~32,500 km (20,200 miles)! In fact, barometers at O'hare airport in Chicago picked up the compression sound waves.

You may be wondering: why was there a volcano here in the first place? The answer is: plate tectonics! Tonga is one of the volcanic islands located on top of the Tonga Kermadec subduction zone! This is the convergent plate boundary where the Pacific Plate sinks below the Australian Plate. The Pacific Plate is made of old, cold, and dense rock material that sinks beneath the Australian Plate, where the subducted rocks heat up and melt as crust is recycled. The water and other volatiles rise up as the rocks are melting -- contributing to the "Big Boom" of the eruption.

Why are the eruptions so violent? Potentially? It’s not always violent, but about every thousand years, it let’s loose with huge eruptions. Why doesn’t the cool ocean water cool the magma? If magma rises slowly, there will be a thin layer of steam between the water and the magma. This will allow the outer edge of the magma to cool. If the magma rises fast, the magma is in direct contact with the water. The result is much like a weapons grade chemical explosion that starts a chain reaction where fresh magma is exposed to new water. So this is a combination of magma/water interaction as well as gas charged sticky magma that has been building for the last 1000 yrs. By studying deposits from past eruptions, we know that we might be in for several weeks (or years) of intense volcanic activity.

The violence of the blast triggered tsunamis. About 1.2 meters (4 feet) on the country of Tonga. Hard to get a clear picture of devastation yet because of ongoing eruptions. I don’t think this story is done yet.

Ash reached 20km into the sky and it produced a ton of lightning ~ 100 bolts/sec!

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Water Issues Part 3: Dams Revisited (A Geology Re-Release) Jan 13, 2022

Jesse and Chris are recording face to face in Michigan. Join us as we follow the water issues theme in our re-release series.
Show notes below:
We liked talking about dams so much we did it again! Join our discussion on streams, how the normally operate, and how dams disrupt the way that streams function.
We highlight a few things in this episode, including a recent Eos article on sediment accumulation behind dams - expertly written by Tullos et al., the Paonia Reservoir where sediment accumulation has filled in the reservoir in record time, and another article on contaminated sediment releases from the Milltown Dam and the Hudson River that have caused big problems in the past, written by James Evans.
Chris also gets his long but warranted rant on the famous Aswan High Dam, and key example of the debates around the pros and cons of dams.
Also check out our previous episode on Dams at this link or anywhere you get your podcasts.

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Water Issues Part 2: Dammed if We Do, Dammed if We Don't (Geology Re-Release) Jan 06, 2022

This is a re-release of a much earlier episode on Dams. In our newly recorded intro, Jesse and I are in person and sitting across from each other as we give a little prelude to the episode. We also decide to re-release our dams revisited episode from earlier this past summer. Enjoy!
In this episode we cover....you guessed it, dams! Dams are incredible manmade features that can not only dominate the landscape but also dominate the river system and fundamentally change how the rivers operate.
We discuss everything from the amount of dams in the United States to major dam failures in the recent past, and highlight some of the basics of how dams fundamentally affect streams when they are installed.
Here are some highlights of the statistics we cover!

There are roughly 91,000 Dams in the US
They Impound over 600,000 miles of river or 17% of rivers
The average age is 59 years
The number of high-hazard potential dams is over 15,000 and increasing
It is estimated that over 70 billion dollars is needed to properly upgrade these dams. For perspective, 425 billion dollars are spent each year on Road Infrastructure. About 75% of that comes from state and local governments. 25% comes from Federal.
Dam regulation is largely up to each state and each person is responsible for about 200 dams.
All too many are suffering from a neglected investment in infrastructure.
Dams are this interesting intersection between geology, engineering, government oversight, and humanity.
So why do we build them? So many reasons: hydroelectric, irrigation, flood mitigation, recreation, municipal water

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Water Issues Part 1: Where is the World's Water? (A Geology Re-Release) Dec 30, 2021

A geology re-release of our talk about the worlds water and the issues we face. Jesse and Chris are face to face recording this time which presented some challenges as you'll soon hear. We had fun re-capping our water episode and we hope you have fun too as you hopefully learn a bit.
In this episode, Jesse and Chris talk about water. That's right - water. Where is the worlds water? We begin by lumping all of the worlds water into 6 geological basins: oceans, glaciers, groundwater, lakes, atmosphere, and rivers. We then assign relative percentages to each reservoir and then demonstrate how much water each would hold if all of the worlds water were scaled down to 5 gallons (19 Liters).
What comes to light is that less than 1% of all the worlds water is useable for human consumption - less than a half of a cup on a 5 gallon scale! That "1/2 cup of water" is enough to keep 9 billion people alive, but it is not evenly distributed over the planet.
We use the Great Lakes in the Mid-West United States to illustrate the "haves and have nots". The Great Lakes contain 21% of all the standing fresh surface water on Earth. Despite having this incredible amount of water, the Great Lakes Basin is already dealing with water issues. Our groundwater is being depleted and our standing water is being diverted.
We use the Chicago River diversion to illustrate some of the issues and concerns about moving Great Lakes water out of the Basin. We also use Waukesha, Wisconsin as an example of an area that has a poor groundwater source but has been granted access to Great Lakes water to avert their needs.
Although we talk a lot about the Great Lakes region in this episode, the issues here are an analogy for the entire planet. World population might reach 9 billion in 20 years. Fresh water is finite and we need to be aware of the issues we will face - and are already facing while we still have time!

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Energy and Climate Part 4: Geothermal Energy (Re-Release). Dec 23, 2021

This is Part 4 of our re-released Climate and Energy series! We are on a break right now, but there is always great geoscience information to learn about!
Today we get to talk about something really relevant to our everyday lives, and the future - Geothermal Energy!
Geothermal Energy is a term that means a few different things, but it all relies on the Earth being somewhat hot. So, before we dive into the question of what Geothermal Energy is, we need to figure out why the Earth is hot!
The Earth produces a ton of heat, which is really important to understand how our planet operates over long times (remember plate tectonics??). The heat comes from several sources, and some of it is left over from when the Earth formed - so some of the geothermal energy is tapping into 4.5 billion-year-old heat!
Geothermal energy takes two major forms: 1) passive geothermal heat pumps, often used in residential houses like Jesse's and 2) more active geothermal power plants that use lots of heat from the Earth!
As usual, follow us on social media and let us know what you think by sending us an email!

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Energy and Climate Part 3: Ancient Nuclear Reactors (Re-Release). Dec 16, 2021

This is Part III of our re-released Climate and Energy series! We are on a break right now, but there is always great geoscience information to learn about!
Did you know that nuclear fission reactions are natural? Uranium fission drives many types of nuclear power plants as well as nuclear weapons. However, these types of reactions occurred on Earth naturally, just billions of years ago. Today, we discuss the Oklo natural fission reactors in Gabon, Africa.
These natural reactors are not only amazingly cool, but they have a really interesting discovery story and they can teach us a lot about the overlap between nuclear physics and geoscience, how uranium deposits form, and what Earth's ancient atmosphere looked like!
These are important for several reasons:

Geology and nuclear physics have a very intimate relationship.
1. Basically all radiometric dating we use on Earth was developed on the back of research on Uranium nuclear physics and research into nuclear weapons/reactors.
Geoscience and national security are intimately related:
1. Nuclear forensics, or using isotope analyses to look for people enriching uranium, use the same techniques and instruments as geochronology
2. Many PhD geoscientists go to work in national security labs/jobs
These natural nuclear reactors help us explain Earth’s history and where Uranium deposits occur.

Another cool feature of these ancient nuclear reactors is that they may have looked much like geysers in Yellowstone National Park! They were moderated by natural groundwater, and they cycled on and off in ~30 minute cycles.
All told, these natural nuclear reactors are one of the single coolest geoscience factoid we know of!

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Energy and Climate Part 2: Professor Michael Mann (Re-Release). Dec 09, 2021

Join us as we re-release of our favorite interviews that we have done, with one of the truly great climate scientists and communicators, Professor Michael Mann!
Michael Mann, Distinguished Professor at The Pennsylvania State University, has a long history of studying and discussion climate change. His new book, titled The New Climate War, is out now!
In this episode we interview Mike about his journey in academia, what the new climate war is all about, and what he sees as the best path towards solutions. We discuss how last climate war has ended, what we all can do to fix the problem, and how Dr. Mann sees the future working out.
Remember to leave us a rating and a review, and share PlanetGeo with your friends! Follow us on all the social medias @planetgeocast.
Dr. Michael E. Mann received his undergraduate degrees in Physics and Applied Math from the University of California at Berkeley, an M.S. degree in Physics from Yale University, and a Ph.D. in Geology & Geophysics from Yale University.

Dr. Mann was a Lead Author on the Observed Climate Variability and Change chapter of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Third Scientific Assessment Report in 2001 and was organizing committee chair for the National Academy of Sciences Frontiers of Science in 2003. He has received a number of honors and awards including NOAA's outstanding publication award in 2002 and selection by Scientific American as one of the fifty leading visionaries in science and technology in 2002. He contributed, with other IPCC authors, to the award of the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize. He was awarded the Hans Oeschger Medal of the European Geosciences Union in 2012 and was awarded the National Conservation Achievement Award for science by the National Wildlife Federation in 2013. He made Bloomberg News' list of fifty most influential people in 2013. In 2014, he was named Highly Cited Researcher by the Institute for Scientific Information (ISI) and received the Friend of the Planet Award from the National Center for Science Education. He received the Stephen H. Schneider Award for Outstanding Climate Science Communication from Climate One in 2017, the Award for Public Engagement with Science from the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2018 and the Climate Communication Prize from the American Geophysical Union in 2018. In 2019 he received the Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement and in 2020 he received the World Sustainability Award of the MDPI Sustainability Foundation. He was elected to the U.S. National Academy of Sciences in 2020. He is a Fellow of the American Geophysical Union, the American Meteorological Society, the Geological Society of America, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry. He is also a co-founder of the award-winning science website RealClimate.org.

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Twi

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Energy and Climate Part 1: The Greenhouse Effect (Re-Release). Dec 02, 2021

Join us as we discuss the science behind the greenhouse effect and how it all works.
This is a re-release of a much earlier episode. As we take a SHORT break, we decided to release a theme of episodes surrounding Energy and Climate. They are in the news often right now, especially with the COP26 conference. This past fall, we have rising energy costs, wild fires, devastating hurricanes, etc. Energy and climate is on our minds.
In this episode, we talk about the forgotten history of the greenhouse gases. The science behind greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide and water is 200 years old. What we began to understand two centuries ago came long before humans had any impact on the composition of our atmosphere and it certainly never occurred to Joseph Fourier and John Tyndall that humans could ever influence the greenhouse effect. The discussion then turns to what scientists know about the greenhouse effect and, more precisely, how it works. This natural phenomenon is a good thing as it makes our planet habitable by keeping it warm and preventing the oceans from freezing.
We then turn our attention to the chemistry of burning fossil fuels using coal, natural gas, and gasoline as examples. The main gases produced by burning fossil fuels are carbon dioxide and water. We use this knowledge to talk about the carbon cycle. By following Carbon atoms as they make their way through the atmosphere, geosphere, hydrosphere, and biosphere, we can clearly identify a Carbon cycle. Specifically, we discuss a long carbon cycle (can take 100,000's of years for this cycle) and a fast Carbon cycle (years or even seasons). Through this part of our discussion, we have only discussed what science has established as fact. The greenhouse effect, the gases involved, and the ways Earth regulates Carbon in cycles is a good thing for our planet. We can't help but point out that through continued Carbon emissions, humans will upset this balance. In fact, we have a nearby example in Venus as a case study of a runaway greenhouse effect.
We hope you enjoy this episode. We sure had fun making it. Cheers!
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Where to see Yosemite Geoscience (GeoShort) Nov 23, 2021

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Yosemite National Park Nov 18, 2021

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Today, we talk about the geology of Yosemite National Park. Specifically, we dive into 4 different aspects:
1- What's the story behind all this granite?
2- Why do these mountains look the way they do? Glaciers
3- What are all the cracks in the granite about?
4- Rockfall!
The formation of granite is taught in a very traditional way. Magma intrudes deep inside the Earth and then cools slowly as the minerals grow larger. Jesse says that's a very debatable and a hotly researched area now. Jesse schools us on how magma is believed to cool and how we know.
Then we get into the glacial part of Yosemite. There are so many glacial features that are perhaps more obvious here than anywhere. We talk about U-shaped valleys, hanging valleys, horns, and aretes.
Exfoliation is so prevalent here that it is impossible to miss. We get into how exfoliation happens including an example that was caught on Camera - Twain Harte Rock.
Lastly, we end with a brief discussion on the prevalence of Rockfall in YNP. There are many rockfalls - some very large that occur with a stunning frequency.
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Can Aliens See Us? Dr. Jackie Faherty Nov 11, 2021

Astronomers can detect other planets orbiting around stars in the sky. But, can those planets see us? That's the question, and Dr. Jackie Faherty has answers! This conversation is based on a paper that Dr. Faherty coauthored recently, found here.
We interviewed Dr. Jackie Faherty about it! You can follow Dr. Faherty on Twitter and visit her website to learn more!
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Manhatten-henge - Dr. Jackie Faherty (GeoShort) Nov 04, 2021

Have you heard of Manhattan-Henge? It's a totally cool phenomenon that occurs in The Big Apple every spring and summer.
We interviewed Dr. Jackie Faherty about it! You can follow Dr. Faherty on Twitter and visit her website to learn more!
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What's in a Name? Volcano Edition Oct 28, 2021

In this episode, we discuss the categories - or different types of volcanoes in the world. We begin by discussing how the traditional categories, as found in most textbooks, are not adequate. There are too many exceptions to the rules. So we begin by discussing the typical 3 - Shield, stratovolcanoes, and cinder cones. Then, we expand the categories to include rhyolite caldera complexes (often called supervolcanoes), monogenetic fields, flood basalts, and mid-ocean ridge systems. Even with this expanded category list, not all volcanoes fit nicely. Each volcano is its' own snowflake.
With volcanoes, there are exceptions to our categories and some will fall into more than one category. Many students get confused by this because the 3 category system doesn’t allow for exceptions. I think this is Ok, but only if they’re taught that exceptions definitely exist - OR - let’s be more extensive with our categories. To be honest, I’m bothered by the exclusivity of the “3” type system. AND, even with a more extensive category list, there are exceptions and students need to know this is OK.
With each type, we discuss it's geomorphology, the eruptive personality, the tectonic setting, and an example or tow of where they occur.
We also spend some time discussing the plumbing system of volcanoes and how complicated this can be. If we can begin to understand the plumbing system, then we can begin to study how magma traverses the crust. This traverse can lead to a diversity of magma composition - even within the same volcano. This discussion is crucial to student understanding.
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Mount St. Helens and Volcano Plumbing Systems (GeoShort) Oct 21, 2021

In this GeoShort, we discuss Mount St. Helens, one of Chris' favorite volcanoes and probably the reason he got into geoscience!
This is the Scientific American article, written by Steve Olson, about Mount St. Helens that serves as the backbone for much of our discussion.
Mount St. Helens is a famous volcano in Washington State that erupted in 1980. Scientists have been studying Mount St. Helens for a long time, and it is one location where magma plumbing systems are studied to try to understand how magma reaches the surface in a volcano.
Magma plumbing systems are really complicated but they control the composition of the lava as well as how explosive the volcanic eruptions are! So, this is important to understand.
As usual, follow us on social media and let us know what you think by sending us an email!
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Earth's Toxic Twin: An Interview About Venus With Professor Martha Gilmore Oct 14, 2021

Today we are talking about all things Venus! Our host - Professor Martha Gilmore of Wesleyan University - is a world expert on Earth's Toxic Twin planet, Venus.
Venus is the second planet from the sun and the target for newly announced NASA Missions in the coming decade! Venus has a super thick atmosphere that is dominated by CO2, it may or may not have continents, and studying Venus may help us understand Earth much better! As we have covered in previous episodes of PlanetGeo, Venus is the super greenhouse planet, so it may hold lessons for climate change on our own planet.
We hope you enjoy this discussion with Professor Martha Gilmore!
As usual, follow us on social media and let us know what you think by sending us an email
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Testing Venus - Preview to Interview with Professor Martha Gilmore Oct 07, 2021

Well, we got to interview yet another amazing geoscientist - Professor Martha Gilmore of Wesleyan University!
Professor Gilmore is a world expert on Venus, the second planet from the sun and the target for newly announced NASA Missions in the coming decade! In this preview to the full interview with Dr. Gilmore, we discuss how she collects data on the composition of Venus - despite the atmosphere being way waaaaayyy harder to look through than Earth's!
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Geothermal Energy - The Basics Sep 30, 2021

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Today we get to talk about something really relevant to our everyday lives, and the future - Geothermal Energy!
Geothermal Energy is a term that means a few different things, but it all relies on the Earth being somewhat hot. So, before we dive into the question of what Geothermal Energy is, we need to figure out why the Earth is hot!
The Earth produces a ton of heat, which is really important to understand how our planet operates over long times (remember plate tectonics??). The heat comes from several sources, and some of it is left over from when the Earth formed - so some of the geothermal energy is tapping into 4.5 billion-year-old heat!
Geothermal energy takes two major forms: 1) passive geothermal heat pumps, often used in residential houses like Jesse's and 2) more active geothermal power plants that use lots of heat from the Earth!
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Common Misconceptions Part I (GeoShort) Sep 23, 2021

There are so many misconceptions out there!
In this Geoshort episode, Jesse interviews Chris about common Geoscience misconceptions that students have regarding our planet. Jesse is pulling the questions from a list of over 500 misconceptions (link here). Chris has not been given any clues to the questions he's being asked and nothing was discussed prior to recording - join us for a fun off-the-cuff conversation!
Many of the misconceptions deal with the interior of the Earth and plate tectonic related topics. That said, they really span a lot of the material from a typical introductory level geoscience course. Join us in this fun episode and see if you have or have come across the same misconceptions. Also, we welcome suggestions that we missed on this episode as we plan to revisit this at a later time!
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Gems, Museums, and Minerals: Interview with Dr. Gabriela Farfan Sep 16, 2021

This week is a really special one! We had the great pleasure of interviewing Dr. Gabriela Farfan, the Coralyn W. Whitney Curator of Gems and Minerals at the Smithsonian Natural History Museum, the United States National Museum.
Dr. Farfan is a world expert on gems and minerals, and we cover a lot! Everything from a personal look at how Dr. Farfan got into geology and minerals, the future of mineralogy as a field and in education, and why studying the mineralogy of modern corals is important! Her research is looking at how carbonate growing organisms are adapting to our changing oceans - particularly ocean acidification.
The field of mineralogy as a stand alone study is dwindling. Dr. Farfan has a great explanation as to why the study of mineralogy is important and why geology programs should keep it included.
Go back to last week's GeoShort to learn how the Smithsonian Museum gets its minerals and gems!
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How Museums Get Their Gemstones: Preview to Interview with Dr. Gabriela Farfan (GeoShort) Sep 09, 2021

This week is a really special one! We had the great pleasure of interviewing Dr. Gabriela Farfan, the Coralyn W. Whitney Curator of Gems and Minerals at the Smithsonian Natural History Museum, the United States National Museum.
Dr. Farfan is a world expert on gems and minerals, and the full interview (out next week) covers everything minerals!
In this GeoShort, Dr. Farfan tells us some amazing facts about how the Smithsonian Museum actually goes about obtaining the beautiful minerals and gemstones that you can see in the galleries.
Tune in next week for the full episode!
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Geoscience Across the Pond: Interview with Professor Chris Jackson Sep 02, 2021

Curious about how Geoscience goes into the future? Have you ever wondered what causes tsunamis? Ever thought about what it's like to be a minority in the Geosciences?
Professor Chris Jackson has something for everyone! Join us for one of the most interesting discussions we have had on PlanetGEO!
Professor Jackson is an incredible communicator, scientist, and steward of Geoscience. Follow him on Twitter or on his many other public talks! Also, stay tuned for Prof. Jackson's upcoming podcast series called An Adult's Guide to the Earth!
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What is Sustainable Geoscience? Preview to Interview with Professor Chris Jackson (GeoShort) Aug 26, 2021

This week we have an amazing guest! Professor Chris Jackson joins us for a short discussion on Sustainable Geoscience, what it means to him, and where he sees the future of Geoscience going.
Professor Jackson is an incredible communicator and has so many insightful thoughts that they wouldn't all fit into one single episode. So, join us next week for the full interview and until then enjoy this discussion with one of the great scientists and communicators in our field!
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The Geoscientific Method: Study Design and Mass Spectrometers Aug 19, 2021

Join us for a free-ranging conversation on how Geoscience Research happens (in one lab group at least)!
Today we talk about a mass spectrometer design project that Jesse is working on, how scientists typically need to fix and modify their own instruments to get them working perfectly, and touch on how scientific inquiry can be better taught to students!
We also describe the basics of a mass spectrometer, the device that has allowed geoscientists to determine the age of the Earth, the rates of plate tectonics, and even determine when supercontinents existed back in time!
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Are Continents Growing? (Geoshort) Aug 12, 2021

This is a GeoShort followup discussion based on our previous Episode on the origins of continents and Bowen's reaction series! While Bowen's reaction series explains many things — like why is Hawaii different from Yellowstone? — it makes some very interesting predictions!
Chris wonders, does the distillation of continents during Bowen's Reaction Series mean that continents are always growing? In other words, when water gets driven off a subducting slab, it generates magma that is chemically similar to continental crust. Since subduction is so common, the continents must be growing over geologic time. And, this opens up a large discussion with very few answers. Jesse offers up two theories on how continents get destroyed over time. Listen today and follow us on social media and our new webpage!
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Why Continents Exist: Bowen's Reaction Series Aug 05, 2021

In this episode, we discuss a fundamental principle in geology: Bowen's Reaction Series. This concept is taught in every introductory geology class as it provides answers to important questions such as why continents exist on Earth.
Bowens Reaction explains the relationship between certain minerals and the temperatures in which they form. He found that some minerals are commonly found together in igneous rocks while other minerals are excluded. In short, Bowens Reaction lays out an order in which minerals form as magma cools and also an order in which they melt as rocks are heated.
Also, knowing that minerals are most stable in the conditions in which they form, Bowens Reaction Series also explains mineral stability at the surface of Earth.
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The Great Salt Lake: Historically Low Water Levels Jul 29, 2021

For some background listen to our previous episode on hard water and why oceans are salty!
Join us on this GeoShort as we discuss the Great Salt Lake, which is going through a period of very, VERY low water levels. The average depth of the Great Salt Lake in Utah is now only 2.4 inches, or 5 cm! This low water level is mostly caused by the drought in the SouthWestern US, and impacts communities around the Great Salt Lake.
In this GeoShort we discuss why salty lakes occur, which is due to the fact that water coming into the lake can only leave by evaporation. And salt doesn't evaporate...it crystallizes. So, when water leaves, the salt stays behind and it just keeps building up in the lake. The particular geology of the SW United States means that there are several large rivers that feed into basins that do not feed into the ocean.
Check out our previous episode on Hard Water to learn how salt gets into water, and why oceans are salty! Remember, although the common table salt (NaCl) is part of the 'salt' we are talking about, there are other salts out there and we geologists use the term broadly!
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Geysers and Hot Springs: Why They Matter with Examples From Yellowstone National Park Jul 22, 2021

Today we talk about Geysers! And Hot Springs, Mudpots, and Fumaroles! These are extraordinary features that give any landscape a pretty dramatic look. They are also very prevalent in Yellowstone National Park, and we give some key examples from that area.
Hydrothermal features are really important to understand and monitor. So important that the United State Congress passed a law requiring all National Parks to monitor and document hydrothermal features! Hydrothermal features allow us to track heat and water deep within the Earth. This is becoming more important because heat and water give us Geothermal energy systems that might be growing during the coming energy transition.
Join us for a wide ranging discussion on hydrothermal features, how they work, and what they tell us about the Earth!
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Rock Circles: Geologically Curious Phenomena (GeoShort) Jul 15, 2021

Our GeoShort today focuses on Spherical Weathering, where normal rocks are turned into round shapes by chemical erosion.
Many rocks have cracks in them, called joints, and these joints often break the rocks up into little cubes or rectangular prisms. Cubes and prisms have a high surface area relative to their volume, and the corners especially.
So fluids that have weak acid in them preferentially eat away at the corners, eventually turning the cube of rock into a perfect sphere! Spheres have the lowest Surface Area/Volume of any shape, because they have no corners or edges left. The rock just gets made into a smaller and smaller sphere then.
While spherical weathering is not a common process, it is not rare either. So, keep an eye out when you are outside next, you may find some Spherical Weathering near you!

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Dammed Up Again: Streams and Dams Part Two Jul 08, 2021

We liked talking about dams so much we did it again! Join our discussion on streams, how the normally operate, and how dams disrupt the way that streams function.
We highlight a few things in this episode, including a recent Eos article on sediment accumulation behind dams - expertly written by Tullos et al., the Paonia Reservoir where sediment accumulation has filled in the reservoir in record time, and another article on contaminated sediment releases from the Milltown Dam and the Hudson River that have caused big problems in the past, written by James Evans.
Chris also gets his long but warranted rant on the famous Aswan High Dam, and key example of the debates around the pros and cons of dams.
Also check out our previous episode on Dams at this link or anywhere you get your podcasts.

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Big Valuable Crystals: Pegmatites (GeoShort) Jul 01, 2021

What type of rock has really big minerals and lots of uncommon elements? It's a pegmatite! Pegmatites contain lots of important elements and minerals, both for our economy and for mineral collectors.
Join us for a tour of pegmatites. We give quick low-down on how pegmatites form. They contain really large mineral grains, which usually implies that they cooled slowly. But, pegmatites form from the leftover fluids from magma chambers and contain all the uncommon (or unpopular!) elements that get concentrated. Once they reach a certain concentration they form rare minerals that are concentrated in things like Lithium, Cesium, or Beryllium!
The minerals in pegmatites grow so fast because the fluid they grow in is much less viscous (more watery) than magma. This means that atoms and ions can diffuse much more quickly to the sites of mineral nucleation, allowing for massive (really really massive, up to 30 ft) crystals of minerals like spodumene and beryl to form.

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The Spartans Last Stand: Geology of the Hot Gates Jun 24, 2021

Have you ever watched the movie 300 or heard of the Spartans making a stand against the Persian Empire? It's an amazing story right...but it has some amazing geology behind it too.
Geology has influenced historical events in momentous ways, and here on PlanetGeo we are going to start highlighting these ways. This incredible story of the Hot Gates is just the first part of that series.
In this episode we are going to cover

Let’s start out with the words: Hot Gates. First, the Gates part of that. What formed the gates? Well it’s a fault like the Grand Teton National Park, and the tectonics of this region are really complex! We will start narrow (at the gates themselves) and zoom out to the broader region and talk about how complex plate tectonics can be on the 3D surface of the planet.
We will talk about the Hot part of the Hot Gates, and highlight some hydrothermal activity in the region. This includes hot springs, steam, and volcanoes!
Lastly, the Hot Gates don’t exist anymore. The planet is always changing, sometimes rapidly. Sea level has changed over time in this region since 480 BC, 2500 years ago. The sea level change is not due to actual sea level changing though, it is due to a totally different process: the valley is filling up with sediment that pushes the shoreline back from the cliffs that used to form the Hot Gates. This is totally normal stream behavior in areas with active mountain belts!

So, here’s the backstory. The Persian Empire was massive and was interested in invading Greece. There were several major battles here but we are focusing on one in particular where 300 spartan warriors stood their ground against at least 50,000 persians and maybe many more (history is foggy here).

They were able to fend off so many adversaries by using the local geology to their advantage, they took a stand in the Hot Gates, which were a series of three narrow passes between a cliff face and the Aegean Sea. This is a really interesting part of geoscience in that much of history is shaped by geoscience.

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Shasta Tourism (Geoshort) Jun 17, 2021

We had such a great conversation with Dr. Andrew Calvert, Scientist-in-Charge of the California Volcano Observatory, that we decided to run it back one more time.
Mount Shasta is clearly a favorite of Dr. Calvert's, and is famous location for hiking, climbing, and skiing. However, it is not a National Park despite the best efforts of the famous John Muir, and is not a true tourist destination. When thinking about visiting Northern California, don't forget to check out Lassen Volcanic National Park to experience more amazing volcano geology! Also, check out our previous discussion with Dr. Calvert about Shastina, the spunky little sister to Mount Shasta. Shastina presents something of a geological conundrum as it doesn't quite fit with the rest of the Cascade volcanoes.
Here is a link to Dr. Calvert's research profile, and a short bio:

Education

Ph.D., University of California – Santa Barbara

Dissertation: Metamorphism and exhumation of mid-crustal gneiss domes in the Arctic Alaska Terrane

M.S./B.S., Stanford University (both degrees conferred June 1992)

Thesis: Structural Evolution and Thermochronology of the Kigluaik Mountains, Seward Peninsula, Alaska

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Observing Volcanoes: Dr. Andrew Calvert, Scientist-in-Charge of CalVO Jun 10, 2021

Today we have the great pleasure of interviewing Dr. Andrew Calvert, the Scientist-in-charge of the California Volcano Observatory. In this conversation we cover a huge range of topics from Mount Shasta, to how magmas form and become more silica rich, the role of federal institutes like CalVo in volcano hazard prediction and monitoring, and some details about potassium-argon (K-Ar, as argon-argon, Ar-Ar) geochronology using noble gases in minerals!
Dr. Calvert also gives and excellent description of how magnetometers are used to map lava flows on old volcanoes. This is an incredible tool that helps drive a deeper understanding of the volumes and rates of past volcanic eruptions, which is very valuable information that is used to help forecast volcano behavior!

Dr. Calvert is an excellent science communicator and has a wide variety of experiences studying volcanoes as well as directing observation and hazard prediction efforts. Join us for an amazing conversation with Dr. Andrew Calvert!
Here is a link to Dr. Calvert's research profile, and a short bio:

Education

Ph.D., University of California – Santa Barbara

Dissertation: Metamorphism and exhumation of mid-crustal gneiss domes in the Arctic Alaska Terrane

M.S./B.S., Stanford University (both degrees conferred June 1992)

Thesis: Structural Evolution and Thermochronology of the Kigluaik Mountains, Seward Peninsula, Alaska

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Lava’s All You Need: Preview to Interview with Dr. Andrew Calvert (GeoShort) Jun 03, 2021

Today we have a preview to our interview with Dr Andrew Calvert, Scientist in Charge of the California Volcano Observatory, also known as CalVO.
Dr. Calvart first fell in love with volcanoes as a young boy growing up in Idaho when Mount Saint Helens erupted. This was the first ash sample he ever collected, and he and Chris share this connection to volcanoes and their interest in geoscience.
In this GeoShort, Dr. Andrew Calvart walks us through a million years of geologic history of Mount Shasta in Northern California. He has collected samples from every lava flow coming from the volcano. A million years ago, Shasta didn't exist. About 700,000 years ago, Shasta began forming. But, similar to Saint Helens, it fell apart about 400,000 years ago. He also talks about how episodic Shasta is compared to many of the other Cascadia stratovolcanoes. It doesn't erupt as often as many of the others. Despite being very eposodic, it's not very explosive (usually). Dr. Calvart also explains how the magma beneath Shasta is not as viscous as other stratovolcanoes.

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The Day the Dinosaurs Died: Dr. Ian Miller, Director of the Denver Museum of Nature and Science May 27, 2021

Dr. Ian Miller is the Director of the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, now working with National Geographic as the Chief Science and Innovation Officer. Dr. Miller is a paleobotanist who has spent his career making amazing discoveries about the ancient Earth using fossils! In this interview Dr. Miller describes what the Earth looked and felt like in the minutes and days after a meteorite impact struck the planet, killing the dinosaurs and creating a global catastrophe! Dr. Miller and his research team have made incredible discoveries that help us understand how life began to recover from this disastrous event, as well as making inferences about the height of the Ancient Rocky Mountains!
If you are planning a trip in or around the Denver, Colorado area, you must listen to this episode to hear about the amazing geoscience story you are driving past! Here is an excerpt from Dr. Miller's profile, and we think you will agree that Dr. Miller is one of the best science communicators out there.
Raised on a llama ranch in rural Washington State, Ian Miller first discovered the lure of rocks and fossils while scavenging mine tailings for fool’s gold and pulling Miocene clams out of road cuts with his four younger brothers. As a geology major at The Colorado College, he discovered fossil plants, his research specialty, while working as an intern at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science. After a two-year stint as a field geologist in New Mexico, Ian attended Yale University, where he studied paleobotany and tectonics and received his PhD in 2007.

Miller spent 15 years at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science, most recently serving as the director of Earth and Space Sciences. During this time he studied fossil plants, paleoclimate, paleoecology, and tectonics, and he also co-led the Snowmastodon Project, which provided a new benchmark for understanding climate change in the American West.

Throughout his academic career, Miller has natural history experience on all seven continents and has been a lead scientist on major field expeditions in Madagascar and much of the western United States. He has published 30 peer-reviewed scientific articles and books on paleobiology and geology.

Beyond his work as a scientist, Miller has led museum initiatives aimed at deepening people’s connection with the natural world and unearthing major trends in new and existing audiences that will define the future of museums.

Miller is a previous board member of Snowmass Discovery, a peer-reviewer for multiple academic journals, and member of various scientific societies, including the American Association for the Advancement of Science, Geological Society of America, and International Council of Museums.

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Asteroids and Extinctions: Excerpt from Interview with Dr. Ian Miller (Geoshort) May 20, 2021

In this GeoShort, Dr. Ian Miller (Director of Earth and Space Sciences, Associate Curator of Paleobotany for the Denver Museum of Nature and Science) compares the end Cretaceous event that killed the Dinosaurs to other mass extinction events.
Jesse and Ian also have a brief discussion about massive lava eruptions that can cause mass extinctions such as the Deccan Traps.
Ian also provides an excellent explanation on how fossils form!

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Glacier National Park May 13, 2021

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Today we are talking about the geology of Glacier National Park! We cover three major things:

1- The Colors: The rocks in Glacier have stunning colors and you can see them almost anywhere in the park. The main colors are various shades of red, green, brown, and gray.

First off, focus on the reds: These rocks have a mineral called hematite (Fe2O3). Hematite forms when iron bearing minerals react with O2 to produce the iron oxide. This happens either on land or in shallow enough water so the minerals have access to free O2 from the atmosphere. In Glacier, we know this definitely happened in shallow water. How do we know this? These red rocks contain sedimentary structures such as ripple marks that only form in shallow water….. If rocks have as little as 3% hematite, it can stain the rocks bright red.
Green: These rocks formed in deeper water. In chemistry, we call this a reducing environment (as opposed to an oxidizing environment for the red rocks). Because there is less O2 present in the deeper water, the iron doesn’t combine with oxygen, and instead binds with silica to produce dark minerals like hornblende, biotite, and others. But, these minerals aren’t as stable as hematite and turn into a green mineral called chlorite with burial.

So why do the red and green rocks alternate as they are stacked up on top of each other?

2- The Mountains:

Most of the rocks we see in the park were sedimentary. A shallow sea was depositing sedimentary rocks for a very long time (over 18,000 feet). The sea was actually a result of early continental rifting and higher sea level.
Long after the deposition of the rocks we see, tectonics began to influence the area. Sedimentary rocks are laid down flat. The rocks in Glacier are not flat - they are folded and tilted. This tectonic event is the same event that formed the Rockies extending from Canada to Northern Mexico. An oceanic plate was subducting beneath the North American plate.

3- Glaciers:

Beginning 2 my ago and ending 20,000 yrs ago, glaciers grew and filled the valleys with immense systems of moving ice. These powerful, slow, relentless glaciers carved Glacier NP into the rugged beauty we see today. Although there are active glaciers still today Glacier NP is named for the features that formed during the Ice Age rather than being named after the remnants barely hanging on today. Glacier NP is a textbook for features like cirques, aretes, U-shaped valleys,

Lakes fill in these U-shaped valleys. On the map view they look like fingers! Very similar to Finger Lakes area in western NY State and formed similarly, glacially scoured valleys that now have lakes in them.

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Glacier Questions From Our Live Event (GeoShort) May 06, 2021

We recorded a live podcast episode with Mappy Hour!
We recorded a live episode on the Geoscience a really special place, Glacier National Park and Waterton National Park in Northwestern Montana and Southern Alberta. The geoscience of these parks is truly special and there are great stories everywhere.
A few of the things we mentioned in these questions are the book Geology along the Going-To-The-Sun Road and the Roadside Geology book series. Check them out for some great info!

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Discovering Ancient SuperQuakes: Why Large Earthquakes Occur and Where Apr 29, 2021

Exciting news! This Tuesday, May 4th, we will be doing a live podcast recording with Mappy Hour. Register below!
PlanetGeo Mappy Hour Live Recording - Glacier National Park

Today we talk Earthquakes!
The list of EQ dating back to antiquity is shocking. The amplitude and deaths caused are estimated, but a glimpse of this list is very sobering. Below is a list of some of the important and more recent.

Medieval Europe (italy, spain, portugal) were all very aware of the risks of Earthquakes and were starting to apply new engineering specifically for earthquake mitigation (anchor plates in buildings, exaggerated buttresses).
1700: The Cascadia subduction zone. Research by Brain Atwater has revealed when this EQ occurred. Estimated to be 8.7 - 9.2 moment magnitude. Atwater has discovered ghost forests of red cedars that were killed by being lowered and submerged in salt water as a result of a massive EQ. The tree rings date back to 1699 - the last growing season before the EQ. Records in Japan confirm a tsunami that caught them offguard.
December, 1811 to February 1812: 3 large EQ in New Madrid, MO 8.1,7.8 8.0. Caused by old stress from a failed rift zone.
1906: San Francisco EQ 7.9
1964: The Great Alaskan EQ. 9.2 the shaking lasted 4 min and 38 seconds. The Richter scale put these two as the same strength.
1976: China. 7.6 EQ that unlike the year before, no foreshocks or warnings. Estimated up to 750,000 people died.
2004: Sumatra 9.1 227,000 people died
2009: L’Aquila, italy, 5.8, 309 people died; Italian seismologist went on trial for incorrectly reassuring the population that no earthquake would occur. Earthquake was predicted by one researcher a month before, he was called alarmist. Then the earthquake occurred and 7 people (6 scientists and one official) were convicted of giving false or misleading statements that downplayed the risks. This result was criticized by most major scientific organizations and outlets. These verdicts were later overturned by the Italian Supreme Court 2014
2011: Japan 9.0 Almost 21,000 people died

It’s also appropriate to talk about the exponential scale. The richter scale is outdated and really measures the amplitude and distance the waves travelled. It’s not accurate in discerning major EQ. The moment magnitude scale measures the amount of movement along a fault and the force required to make that movement. It also measures all of the seismic waves produced by an EQ.

The scales vary logarithmically. In terms of the amount of ground shaking, a difference of 1 varies by an exponent of 10. But in terms of energy released, it varies by powers of 30 (We round to 30. It’s actually 31.6. That means that for each increase in .2, the energy released is doubled)
Why do Earthquakes occur?

1 - Think back to the plate tectonics episode. The moveme

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2.5 Billon Tyrannosaurus rex (GeoShort) Apr 22, 2021

This is an Earth Day special! Today we are talking about this really cool study that came out last week in the scientific journal Science (one of the top journals in all of ‘science’).

It is by Charles Marshall and others from Berkeley, and the title is “Absolute abundance and preservation rate of Tyrannosaurus rex”
https://science.sciencemag.org/content/372/6539/284

The authors also wrote this very cool Conversation (name of the publication) article where scientists and journalists co-write a summary of research.
https://theconversation.com/how-many-tyrannosaurus-rex-walked-the-earth-159041

Well the title pretty well describes what this paper is about, but let’s go through the arguments here, and hopefully we will get a chance to talk to one of the authors of this study at some point in the future!

So, here’s what ‘we’ as the field of science knew before this paper:

T. rex mated ~15 years old
Estimates of how long each dinosaur lived
T. rex walked the Earth for 1.2 to 3.6 million years
Rough estimate of metabolic rate, somewhere between mammals and komodo dragon

Armed with this information, Marshall et all performed this cool calculation. First they figured that each generation of T. rex took ~19 years (average time between consecutive lineages, humans are between 22 and 33)

They then needed population density to figure out how many dinosaurs there were at any one time. So they applied this relationship between body mass (size) and population density for modern animals (Damuth’s law). Square mile of grassland supports more rabbits than elephants…Damuth’s law is also dependent on metabolic rate, so apply that data.

They get an average of 1 T. rex every 42.4 square miles, or 109.9 square km. This is two individuals in Washington DC! Ottawa county is 583 square miles, ~13-14 T. rex.

This calculation can then go one stage further and estimates that ~20,000 individual T. rex were alive at any one time, and 2.5 BILLION T. rex ever existed on Earth! That’s amazing!

So, there may be some debate about the actual numbers involved here (and these have a massive uncertainty, between 130 million T rex and 42 billion, using conservative uncertainty stats), but for us it teaches us two important points:

There is a method to uncertainty calculation that is a good lesson here: These calculations are all pretty uncertain, how do we know how reliable these final numbers are?
Fossils, especially land fossils, are a very very rare thing!

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Ancient Nukes: 1.9 Billion-Year-Old Nuclear Reactors Apr 15, 2021

Did you know that nuclear fission reactions are natural? Uranium fission drives many types of nuclear power plants as well as nuclear weapons. However, these types of reactions occurred on Earth naturally, just billions of years ago. Today, we discuss the Oklo natural fission reactors in Gabon, Africa.
These natural reactors are not only amazingly cool, but they have a really interesting discovery story and they can teach us a lot about the overlap between nuclear physics and geoscience, how uranium deposits form, and what Earth's ancient atmosphere looked like!
These are important for several reasons:

Geology and nuclear physics have a very intimate relationship.
1. Basically all radiometric dating we use on Earth was developed on the back of research on Uranium nuclear physics and research into nuclear weapons/reactors.
Geoscience and national security are intimately related:
1. Nuclear forensics, or using isotope analyses to look for people enriching uranium, use the same techniques and instruments as geochronology
2. Many PhD geoscientists go to work in national security labs/jobs
These natural nuclear reactors help us explain Earth’s history and where Uranium deposits occur.

Another cool feature of these ancient nuclear reactors is that they may have looked much like geysers in Yellowstone National Park! They were moderated by natural groundwater, and they cycled on and off in ~30 minute cycles.
All told, these natural nuclear reactors are one of the single coolest geoscience factoid we know of!

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Grand Canyon Hiking Recommendations (GeoShort) Apr 08, 2021

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Are you planning a trip to the Grand Canyon soon? Are you interested in seeing some cool geoscience features? Join us today as we discuss a few great hikes to check out while visiting the Grand Canyon National Park in Arizona, USA.
We discuss hiking trails such as the South Kaibab Trail down to the aptly-named Ooh Ahh Point (so beautiful!), and end up at Skeleton Point for a full view of the Canyon in all its glory! Alternatively, you could take the Bright Angel trail, a somewhat nicer hike because of all the restrooms and water stations every 1.5 miles, stop at the amazingly lush Indian Garden, and eventually make your way out to the Plateau Point for a dramatic view directly down to the Colorado River.
The South Rim of the Grand Canyon has an amazing amount of views and hiking that are easily accessible to everyone, even if you don't want to hike very far. For instance, you could start by visiting the small cairns that contain actual samples of the 1.7 billion-year-old Vishnu Schist, or by walking the Trail of Time, where for every large step you take down into the Canyon is equal to going back in time One Million Years in the rock record!
As always, don't feed the wildlife, and downhill hikers always yields to uphill hikers , and everyone yields to mule trains!
If you want to hear an overview of the geology of the Grand Canyon, check out our previous episode covering the full history with detailed descriptions of the major geoscience features of the park. The Grand Canyon has over 1.9 billion years of geology on display, and it is all very visible in a stunning landscape!

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The New Climate War: Dr. Michael Mann, Distinguished Professor and Author Apr 01, 2021

There is a new climate war afoot. And, there is a book about it! Professor Michael Mann, Distinguished Professor at The Pennsylvania State University, has a long history of studying and discussion climate change. His new book, titled The New Climate War, is out now!
In this episode we interview Mike about his journey in academia, what the new climate war is all about, and what he sees as the best path towards solutions. We discuss how last climate war has ended, what we all can do to fix the problem, and how Dr. Mann sees the future working out.
Send us your questions, thoughts, or suggestions!
Dr. Michael E. Mann received his undergraduate degrees in Physics and Applied Math from the University of California at Berkeley, an M.S. degree in Physics from Yale University, and a Ph.D. in Geology & Geophysics from Yale University.

Dr. Mann was a Lead Author on the Observed Climate Variability and Change chapter of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Third Scientific Assessment Report in 2001 and was organizing committee chair for the National Academy of Sciences Frontiers of Science in 2003. He has received a number of honors and awards including NOAA's outstanding publication award in 2002 and selection by Scientific American as one of the fifty leading visionaries in science and technology in 2002. He contributed, with other IPCC authors, to the award of the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize. He was awarded the Hans Oeschger Medal of the European Geosciences Union in 2012 and was awarded the National Conservation Achievement Award for science by the National Wildlife Federation in 2013. He made Bloomberg News' list of fifty most influential people in 2013. In 2014, he was named Highly Cited Researcher by the Institute for Scientific Information (ISI) and received the Friend of the Planet Award from the National Center for Science Education. He received the Stephen H. Schneider Award for Outstanding Climate Science Communication from Climate One in 2017, the Award for Public Engagement with Science from the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2018 and the Climate Communication Prize from the American Geophysical Union in 2018. In 2019 he received the Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement and in 2020 he received the World Sustainability Award of the MDPI Sustainability Foundation. He was elected to the U.S. National Academy of Sciences in 2020. He is a Fellow of the American Geophysical Union, the American Meteorological Society, the Geological Society of America, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry. He is also a co-founder of the award-winning science website RealClimate.org.

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The Feeling of Discovery with Prof. Michael Mann (GeoShort) Mar 25, 2021

Welcome to the preview to our full interview with Professor Michael Mann, prestigious climate scientist and author of the new book, The New Climate War.
Professor Mann is a Distinguished Professor at Penn State University, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, and has won many science and science communication awards.
In this GeoShort we discuss the feeling of discovery that Dr. Mann felt when publishing the 1999 scientific article that documented the "hockey stick" graph of CO2 increase in the atmosphere. Below is a short description of Dr. Mann's award-winning career, and join us next week for the full interview with Dr. Mann covering his new book, The New Climate War!
Dr. Michael E. Mann received his undergraduate degrees in Physics and Applied Math from the University of California at Berkeley, an M.S. degree in Physics from Yale University, and a Ph.D. in Geology & Geophysics from Yale University.

Dr. Mann was a Lead Author on the Observed Climate Variability and Change chapter of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Third Scientific Assessment Report in 2001 and was organizing committee chair for the National Academy of Sciences Frontiers of Science in 2003. He has received a number of honors and awards including NOAA's outstanding publication award in 2002 and selection by Scientific American as one of the fifty leading visionaries in science and technology in 2002. He contributed, with other IPCC authors, to the award of the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize. He was awarded the Hans Oeschger Medal of the European Geosciences Union in 2012 and was awarded the National Conservation Achievement Award for science by the National Wildlife Federation in 2013. He made Bloomberg News' list of fifty most influential people in 2013. In 2014, he was named Highly Cited Researcher by the Institute for Scientific Information (ISI) and received the Friend of the Planet Award from the National Center for Science Education. He received the Stephen H. Schneider Award for Outstanding Climate Science Communication from Climate One in 2017, the Award for Public Engagement with Science from the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2018 and the Climate Communication Prize from the American Geophysical Union in 2018. In 2019 he received the Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement and in 2020 he received the World Sustainability Award of the MDPI Sustainability Foundation. He was elected to the U.S. National Academy of Sciences in 2020. He is a Fellow of the American Geophysical Union, the American Meteorological Society, the Geological Society of America, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry. He is also a co-founder of the award-winning science website RealClimate.org.

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The Grand Canyon National Park Mar 18, 2021

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“Crying: acceptable at funerals and the Grand Canyon” - Ron Swanson
Today, we talk about the Grand Canyon. The scenery and geology combine to create one of the Natural Wonders of the World. If you are planning a trip, or would like to learn more about this spectacular location, listen to this episode!
It’s hard to show the principles of stratigraphy better than what’s on display in the Grand Canyon. Each layer gives clues to the environment of deposition and what the Earth was like at the time the sediment was laid down. It’s one of the best example of the geological Laws of Superposition and Original Horizontality on the planet. Other relative dating principles, that are also amazing textbook examples, include the principles of lateral continuity and cross cutting relations.
In this episode you will learn about the three main groups of rock formations on display in the Canyon. Really the only way to talk about them is from oldest to youngest - start at the beginning and work to last page in the book. The three formations are:

1- The Metamorphic Basement Rocks (up to 1.7 BILLION years old!)

2- The Precambrian Grand Canyon Supergroup - all sedimentary rocks with a billion years of missing time.

3- Paleozoic Strata - a continuous record of Earth for ~300 million years.

The bottom line is that the rocks are old, and the canyon is young. We end this podcast with a discussion of the very young volcanic rocks around the Grand Canyon like Sunset Crater, and we also discuss some scientific ideas about how the Canyon formed, a process that started about five million years ago.

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A Recent Triple-Threat - Earthquakes Shake New Zealand (GeoShort) Mar 11, 2021

In this GeoShort we discuss last week's triple header of large earthquakes off the coast of New Zealand. There were three major earthquakes that occurred all within a few hours of one another.
The first, a magnitude 7.3 quake, was likely unrelated to the other two, but the second one, a 7.4, was a precursor to the last one! The last quake as a giant 8.1, a full 11 times larger than the 7.4 that occurred nearby.
These earthquakes set off tsunami warnings all around the Pacific ocean from New Zealand to Chile, and everywhere in between. Tsunami warnings even sounded in Canada. Luckily, no major tsunamis occurred.
These earthquakes were generated in a plate tectonic subduction zone, where the Pacific plate is diving beneath the Australian plate to the West. The Pacific plate gets stuck though and then pressure builds up until it break!
Check out our previous episode on Plate Tectonics (Ep. 2) and stay tuned for a longer episode on these megathrust earthquakes coming out in a few weeks!

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The Rise of Geoscience Education: Interview with Professor Steve Mattox Mar 04, 2021

Join us in a wide-ranging discussion with Professor Steve Mattox!
Dr. Mattox is a professor at Grand Valley State University, where he has taught for many years. Dr. Mattox had a very diverse career before going the faculty at Grand Valley, and we discuss his career path, how he became interested in the Geosciences, and what he thinks of the future of geoscience.
Dr. Mattox has led several very interesting research projects surrounding geoscience and society. These include quantifying the number of news articles that relate to the geosciences, studying the tools that teachers used, and developing what is effectively an Advanced Placement Geology course for high schools in Michigan.
Teaching is very familiar for Dr. Mattox and he has won numerous awards for his teaching acumen. Most notable among them are the Michigan Distinguished Professor of the Year Award in 2020 and the Michigan Outstanding Earth Science Teacher Award in 2012.
See below for a summary of Dr. Mattox's experience and a link to his personal website!
TEACHING EXPERIENCE

Associate Professor, Department of Geology, GVSU, 2003 to present.
Assistant Professor, GVSU, 1998 to 2003.
Lecturer, 2001, University of the Philippines College Baguio, Baguio City, Luzon, Philippines.
Post-doctoral Research Volcanologist, University of North Dakota, 1995-1996.
Lecturer, University of Hawaii at Hilo, 1991-1996.
Visiting Lecturer, School of the Art Institute, Chicago, Illinois, 1991.

WORK EXPERIENCE

Exploration Geologist (east Java, Indonesia), Golden Valley Mines NL, West Perth, WA, 1997.
Exploration Geologist (Kimberley), Precious Metals of Australia, West Perth, WA., 1996-1997.
Consulting Geologist, Belt Collins & Associates, Honolulu, HI, 1993.
Geologic Investigation Contractor, Utah Geological Survey, 1989-1990.
Geologic Mapping Contractor, Utah Geological Survey, 1984-1989.

AWARDS, HONORS, AND GRANTS

GVSU Alumni Association Outstanding Educator Award, 2009.
Michigan Science Teachers Association, College Teacher of the Year, 2008.
Pew Teaching Excellence Award for the Science and Mathematics Division, 2002.
National Science Foundation, co-PI, Volcanology for Earth Science Teachers, 1994-1996, $315,000.
National Park Foundation, to write "A Teacher's Guide to the Geology of Hawaii Volcanoes National Park", 1993-1994, $21,000.

TEACHING AND RESEARCH INTERESTS

Collaborating with undergraduate students in writing/presenting innovative teaching materials.
Establishing a state-wide "AP" geology exam in Michigan.
Completing "Geology Underfoot in Michigan" for Mountain Press.
Learning paleomagnetism as a research method.

https://www.gvsu.edu/geology/mattox-steve-r-29.htm

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Gold in The Outback, Stories with Professor Steve Mattox (GeoShort) Feb 25, 2021

In this GeoShort, we take a snippet from our discussion with Dr. Steve Mattox from GVSU. He has an interesting career path that started out in the economic geology sector working for a mining company looking for base metals (copper, zinc, gold, silver). This took him to some interesting places such as Australia and rural Indonesia. Steve talks about the interesting skill set that geologists have to make sense of an area. For example, Steve talks about finding gold in a sand and gravel deposit ( a placer), and following the deposits up the watershed to find the source rock, and higher concentrations, of gold.
Tune in next week to hear the full interview with Dr. Mattox!

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Rocks get better with age: HOW and WHY we date them Feb 18, 2021

In this episode we discuss the many ways in which we determine the ages of rocks. This is a really common and important question that many people have. Here, we cover some of the basics. Basically, the methods used to date rocks range from simple intuition that anyone can do if you just spend some time looking at outcrops, to really advanced techniques involving laser and plasma instruments!
We introduce this topic by describing the differences between relative dating, where we put events in order, and absolute dating where we assign numerical ages to specific events. As you might tell from the discussion, the techniques geoscientists use vary widely! We highlight a few of the key principles established by the OG geologists like Charles Lyell, such as the principle of original horizontality, or the law of cross cutting relations. We also discuss the most memorable places that we have seen where these principles are clearly shown!
We then move into discussing how radiometric dating works, and how radioactive decay is very important to our understanding of the age of events on Earth. We highlight specifically the techniques that Jesse uses in the lab he is building at Penn State to date individual parts of tiny mineral grains that are the size of a human hair! Amazingly, these tiny mineral grains can record events billions of years apart from one another! The techniques we use to get actual ages out of these minerals include blasting them with a laser and injecting that material into a plasma so that we can measure the uranium and lead compositions of the mineral. All fancy stuff that doesn't require a white lab coat!

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The Viral Cookie Monster Agate and How Agates Form (GeoShort) Feb 11, 2021

Have you seen the viral "cookie monster agate"? If not, check it out via the link below (or our instagram: @planetgeocast)!
Both Chris and Jesse have had this viral agate image shared with them, and today we discuss how agates are formed, and how the represent a really cool and important geologic process; fluid flow!
Agate is a form of microcrystalline silica (like quartz) that often forms from super-saturated fluid. These fluids flow through many parts of the Earth's crust, including through small gaps or cavities in volcanic or sedimentary rocks. The super saturated fluids will deposit agate (or calcite or other minerals) within cavities and they are deposited in concentric rings that grew much like tree rings grow! The different rings can have slightly different colors due to small impurities in the minerals that are being deposited.
However, beware! Agate is a porous material so synthetic dyes can be easily applied to natural agates, turning them to very showing, but artificial, colors. In fact, most pink or bright blue agates are actually dyed.
Listen to our GeoShort to learn about the Cookie Monster Agate!
https://www.sciencealert.com/this-geode-like-rock-bears-an-uncanny-resemblance-to-sesame-street-s-cookie-monster
- rockhounds
- rock collecting
- geology in the field
- agates and geodes

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How We Know What's Inside of the Earth (and Other Listener Questions)! Feb 04, 2021

In this episode, we answer a series of really excellent listener questions.
Mrs. White, a high school teacher, assigned our plate tectonics episode to one of her A.P. classes and they came back with some great questions. Here they are:
1- how far have we drilled into the Earth and is there any hope of reading the mantle? We have drilled about 12 km which is a tiny amount. This took about 20 years to accomplish and the high temperatures inhibited drilling deeper.
2- what instruments to we use to determine the thickness and structure of the core and mantle since we don't have any direct samples? We study seismic waves traveling through the interior of the Earth.
3- what happens to the asthenosphere as a result of loss of magma during volcanic eruptions? In answering this question, we discuss the misconceptions of what a magma chamber actually looks like. It's a very complicated question that requires a complicated answer.
Join us as we discuss the answers to these questions (we have drilled >12km deep into the Earth, which isn't very far!), discuss how the relate to recent scientific discoveries (what is a magma chamber anyways???), and talk about how we image the interior of the Earth using seismic waves!
Listener questions are always welcomed at PlanetGeo and they usually drive us to think about things more deeply, and sometimes end up with long answers!

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Identifying Rocks Can Be Hard! (GeoShort) Jan 28, 2021

In this GeoShort we tell a few stories that highlight how identifying rocks can be sort of difficult, even for those of us with Geology degrees! Chris likes to call limestone the "Katy Perry" of rocks and Jesse got a question about pumice wrong, one of the easiest rocks to identify on the planet! So, if you are an amateur rock collector and don't always know what the rocks you find are called, never fear! It can be hard.
If you want to know more about limestone, listen to Episode 5: Hard Water and What Makes the Ocean Salty!

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Astronomy and Geoscience: Interview with Astrophysicist Dr. Jackie Faherty Jan 21, 2021

Today we interview Dr. Jackie Faherty of the American Museum of Natural History in New York City! Our conversation runs wild (and a bit longer than normal!) where we cover everything from Jackie's favorite rock, the overlap between geoscience and astronomy, to the BackYard World Citizen Science project that Dr. Faherty launched several years ago.
Dr. Faherty is an observational astronomer, meaning that she uses telescopes to study our universe, and she specializes in studying brown dwarfs, which she describes as misfits! Brown dwarfs are somewhere between a planet and a star, and they provide important information about how solar systems ultimately form! Jackie also tells the incredible story of the Apollo 11 Lunar Landing with Neil Armstrong piloting the Lunar Lander safely down to the moon's surface, and she tells us that her favorite rock is in fact a sample from Apollo 17!
Jackie and Chris also have a great discussion of astronomy education and how best to convey the inherent interest in astronomy to students. Check it out to learn more!

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Jupiter, Space Time, And a Preview to Our Interview with Dr. Jackie Faherty (GeoShort) Jan 14, 2021

In this GeoShort, we give you a short preview to our full interview Dr. Jackie Faherty (coming out next week Thursday). Dr. Faherty is an astronomer who now works at the American Museum of Natural History in New York. Dr. Faherty is a prominent astronomer who has published and presented over 100 papers and has a really unique perspective on the Geosciences! We were absolutely honored that she agreed to talk about astronomy, geoscience, and generally interesting topics on PlanetGeo! In this GeoShort, she discusses Jupiter and why she calls it the "bouncer" of our solar system. She believes that if another planet in some other solar system will be found to harbor life, a Jupiter like planet must also exist in that solar system.
Jackie also gives us a glimpse into space time and why it's so difficult for humans to comprehend. This GeoShort is informative and entertaining - Just a short glimpse into the full episode next week.

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Dammed if We Do, Dammed if We Don't! Jan 07, 2021

In this episode we cover....you guessed it, dams! Dams are incredible manmade features that can not only dominate the landscape but also dominate the river system and fundamentally change how the rivers operate.
We discuss everything from the amount of dams in the United States to major dam failures in the recent past, and highlight some of the basics of how dams fundamentally affect streams when they are installed.
Here are some highlights of the statistics we cover!

There are roughly 91,000 Dams in the US
They Impound over 600,000 miles of river or 17% of rivers
The average age is 59 years
The number of high-hazard potential dams is over 15,000 and increasing
It is estimated that over 70 billion dollars is needed to properly upgrade these dams. For perspective, 425 billion dollars are spent each year on Road Infrastructure. About 75% of that comes from state and local governments. 25% comes from Federal.
Dam regulation is largely up to each state and each person is responsible for about 200 dams.
All too many are suffering from a neglected investment in infrastructure.
Dams are this interesting intersection between geology, engineering, government oversight, and humanity.
So why do we build them? So many reasons: hydroelectric, irrigation, flood mitigation, recreation, municipal water

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How is water in the ground measured? (GeoShort) Dec 31, 2020

In this GeoShort, we briefly discuss how people measure groundwater, from the fairly rudimentary (stick a measuring tape down a well) to the highly sophisticated (satellites and conductivity!).
We highlight the GRACE satellites that have been used for decades to monitor and predict groundwater levels around the world.
And we also briefly discuss work by future Penn State Professor Dr. Chloe Gustafson, who uses electromagnetism to measure groundwater underneath the Atlantic Ocean (see her publications here: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=hFaSe94AAAAJ&hl=en).
In summary, groundwater is awesome and measuring it can be both simple and very difficult!

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How is Obsidian Formed? (GeoShort) Dec 23, 2020

Have you ever heard of obsidian? Mostly likely you have; it is the rock that was commonly used by early humans to make arrowheads and other weapons. Obsidian is a very beautiful rock types, but it's formation is often misunderstood. In this GeoShort, we briefly highlight how obsidian is formed and discuss how unique it is. Obsidian is actually a glass, meaning it has no crystals in it! In fact, obsidian is naturally very unstable at Earth's surface so it breaks down quickly. This means that obsidian is usually a very young rock; no ancient obsidian occurs on Earth!
Obsidian has been used for thousands of years by humans. However, obsidian formation is usually misunderstood by people! In this GeoShort we discuss how obsidian forms, which has more to do with the composition of the magma than the cooling rate. The felsic (silica-rich) magma type that obsidian forms from is very thick and sticky. This means that it cannot flow very quickly (a term called viscosity, or the resistance to flow) which also inhibits elements from diffusing within the molten rock. The lack of diffusion means that crystals cannot form quickly, and the magma cools before mineral grains can form. This creates a glass! Obsidian is often used in lapidary work as well as it polishes well and often occurs in beautiful colors!
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The Voices of Volcanoes: Interview with Volcanologist - Dr. Diana Roman Dec 17, 2020

In this episode we had the great pleasure of interviewing Dr. Diana Roman, a volcanologist at the Carnegie Institution for Science in Washington DC! Diana is not only a spectacular and prolific researcher, but she is an excellent communicator of all things volcanoes!
In this interview we talk to Dr. Roman about a wide range of topics including her career trajectory and former life as an economist and venture capitalist! Now, Dr. Roman is a leading researcher into volcano seismicity, or the earthquakes associated with volcanoes and volcanic eruptions. Diana draws an analogy to volcanoes and famous vocalists, in that the pitch of a volcano's earthquakes changes through time!
We also discuss Dr. Roman's path to geoscience, what her career path looked like, and what it is like being a high-profile woman in the sciences! She also discusses the future of volcano research, and how the field can go from pattern recognition to a deeper understanding of the processes of volcanism on Earth.
Give this interview a listen; we think you'll learn something interesting! As always, if you enjoyed this episode we simply ask that you share it with someone who you think will get something from it too!

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Why don't beaches erode quickly? Plus an interesting beer question (GeoShort) Dec 10, 2020

In this episode, we answer a listener question! Thanks to Tom for the excellent question which is, Why Don't Beaches Erode Quickly? Basically our answers are the same, that beaches do erode quickly both in storms and in every day wave action. But, we answer them in two different parts.
Tom also wondered what was our favorite beer to drink while looking at the Grand Tetons. Another excellent question! Chris enjoys a hazy IPA from the Snake River Brewing Company (Earned It) or any beer from Grand Teton Brewing Company and Jesse would choose a nice cold Narragansett after a long day of hiking (though Chris judges him for it).
Thanks for the questions Tom and keep them coming!
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Where is Earth's Water? Examples from the Great Lakes Dec 03, 2020

In this episode, Jesse and Chris talk about water. That's right - water. Where is the worlds water? We begin by lumping all of the worlds water into 6 geological basins: oceans, glaciers, groundwater, lakes, atmosphere, and rivers. We then assign relative percentages to each reservoir and then demonstrate how much water each would hold if all of the worlds water were scaled down to 5 gallons (19 Liters).
What comes to light is that less than 1% of all the worlds water is useable for human consumption - less than a half of a cup on a 5 gallon scale! That "1/2 cup of water" is enough to keep 9 billion people alive, but it is not evenly distributed over the planet.
We use the Great Lakes in the Mid-West United States to illustrate the "haves and have nots". The Great Lakes contain 21% of all the standing fresh surface water on Earth. Despite having this incredible amount of water, the Great Lakes Basin is already dealing with water issues. Our groundwater is being depleted and our standing water is being diverted.
We use the Chicago River diversion to illustrate some of the issues and concerns about moving Great Lakes water out of the Basin. We also use Waukesha, Wisconsin as an example of an area that has a poor groundwater source but has been granted access to Great Lakes water to avert their needs.
Although we talk a lot about the Great Lakes region in this episode, the issues here are an analogy for the entire planet. World population might reach 9 billion in 20 years. Fresh water is finite and we need to be aware of the issues we will face - and are already facing while we still have time!

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Bonus Story from Harlan Kredit: Yellowstone Park Ranger Nov 25, 2020

Welcome to PlanetGeo - a short episode. Today, we have a bonus story from our interview with longtime Yellowstone Park ranger - Harlan Kredit. We were asking him about some of his most memorable experiences during his 48 year tenure. Late one night, Harlan got a call about a baby that was lost at Lewis Lake in the Southern part of the park. He talks about the grueling task of working a gird search in rough terrain. Buried in this story, is a powerful life lesson as he made a crucial decision that resulted in rescuing the baby. This is worth the listen.
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Interview with a Yellowstone Park Ranger - Harlan Kredit - 48 years and counting Nov 19, 2020

In this episode, we interview a real gem - Yellowstone Park Ranger Harlan Kredit. At 81 years old, Harlan has taught high school biology and earth science for 58 years and worked as an interpretive ranger for 48 years in Yellowstone. Don't be fooled by his age; Harlan hasn't lost a step; Chris' high school students have a hard time keeping up with him on hikes! Arguably, Harlan has more of an intimate knowledge of Yellowstone than anyone other human - past or present. He is also the best teacher we've had the privilege to watch and he has won almost every teaching award possible, including the prestigious Presidential Award for Excellency in Mathematics and Science Teaching. Harlan as has his own Wikipedia page; not something many people can say!
Today, Harlan talks about a wide range of topics regarding Yellowstone National Park, including funny stories and problems facing the park in the future.
Throughout the interview, our discussion spans many different topics such as:
- Reintroduction of the wolves - Harlan participated in releasing one of the packs.
- Yellowstone usage and the problems the park faces.
- Why he chose to stay at one park for so long.
- The threat that invasive species pose to Yellowstone.
- The impact Covid-19 has had on Yellowtstone.
- The fascinating impact of social media in the park.
- Climate change and forest fires.
- The intersection between geoscience and biology.
- In the opinion of Harlan, the most interesting geoscience feature in the park.
- Interesting stories someone who has worked for 48 years in the park might tell.
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Listener Question - Can Human Noise Damage the Earth? (GeoShort) Nov 12, 2020

In this GeoShort Episode we answer the listener question: Can human induced earthquakes damage Earth? The short answer is....no.
Human seismic noise is actually really really small, but everywhere. Much like static in the radio signal, it creates a little background buzz in many place.
In this episode, we talk about how small the human background seismicity is and also the misconception that earthquakes are rare events. Earthquakes are actually quite common; it's the big earthquakes that are rare. Small earthquakes are occurring all the time except that they just cannot be felt by humans. Our really sensitive instruments do pick up these vibrations though! Millions occur every year all over the planet but they don't have a major impact on our lives.
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Hiking Recommendations for the Tetons (GeoShort) Nov 10, 2020

In this GeoShort Chris gives recommendations for several hikes to do in the Grand Teton National Park! These recommendations range from short day hikes to see cool geoscience within the Park, to full-on weeklong backpacking trip suggestions if you need to get away from it all for awhile.
Backpacking: Teton Crest Trail. Unrivaled beauty along this well-defined trail. Four to six days depending on what you want to do.
Day Hikes: Amphitheater Lake. This well defined trail takes you up to a cirque and tarn. It's a large area at the destination which enables the hiker to get away from people if you want.
Black Tail Butte: Short day hike (maybe 4 miles) that offers great views of the Eastern slopes of the Tetons.
Best Geology Hike: I was only allowed one so I picked Paintbrush Canyon. It's amazing and if you're feeling adventurous, you can hike over the divide and down to Lake Solitude.
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The Greenhouse Effect Unpacked Nov 05, 2020

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Join us as we discuss the science behind the greenhouse effect and how it all works.
In this episode, we talk about the forgotten history of the greenhouse gases. The science behind greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide and water is 200 years old. What we began to understand two centuries ago came long before humans had any impact on the composition of our atmosphere and it certainly never occurred to Joseph Fourier and John Tyndall that humans could ever influence the greenhouse effect. The discussion then turns to what scientists know about the greenhouse effect and, more precisely, how it works. This natural phenomenon is a good thing as it makes our planet habitable by keeping it warm and preventing the oceans from freezing.
We then turn our attention to the chemistry of burning fossil fuels using coal, natural gas, and gasoline as examples. The main gases produced by burning fossil fuels are carbon dioxide and water. We use this knowledge to talk about the carbon cycle. By following Carbon atoms as they make their way through the atmosphere, geosphere, hydrosphere, and biosphere, we can clearly identify a Carbon cycle. Specifically, we discuss a long carbon cycle (can take 100,000's of years for this cycle) and a fast Carbon cycle (years or even seasons). Through this part of our discussion, we have only discussed what science has established as fact. The greenhouse effect, the gases involved, and the ways Earth regulates Carbon in cycles is a good thing for our planet. We can't help but point out that through continued Carbon emissions, humans will upset this balance. In fact, we have a nearby example in Venus as a case study of a runaway greenhouse effect.
We hope you enjoy this episode. We sure had fun making it. Cheers.
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Grand Teton National Park: A geological story Oct 22, 2020

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Check out this photo of Grand Teton National Park to visualize what we discuss in this Episode!
https://www.nps.gov/grte/planyourvisit/tetonfall.htm
Join us this episode as we take you through a tour of the geoscience history of Grand Teton National Park and discuss why the Grand Tetons are such an amazing place to explore geoscience questions.
Grand Teton National Park is a totally dynamic place, where there are two competing forces. First, tectonic uplift works to build the mountains up to high elevations while weathering and erosion works to knock these mountains back down to sea level. These competing forces make for a very active and restless mountain range.
We discuss the full range of the geologic history of the Grand Teton National Park, which spans from very ancient metamorphic gneisses that are 2.7 billion years old, to glacial features forming beautiful U-shaped valleys and cirques. In between there are many dramatic events, including a large mafic dike, very clearly exposed on the face of Mount Moran, that intruded 800 million years ago when North America began to split away from Australia and Asia.
The reason that the Grand Tetons are so spectacular is a massive normal fault, which is a location where rocks are actively being broken during seismic disasters. These seismic disasters have moved the Tetons up for the past 15 million years, while dropping the valley floor lower and lower. Jackson Hole will keep sinking with each future fault movement!
We also talk about some of the hikes in and around the Tetons that can gain you access to some of the features and events we discuss. Below is a list of some examples:
1- hike up Cascade Canyon and then the North Fork to Lake Solitude to visit a cirque, tarn, and some of the gneiss
2- hike up Cascade Canyon and then the South Fork to Schoolroom Glacier
3- hike up to Amphitheater Lake to a spectacular cirque, tarn, and horn
4- on the West side of the Tetons - in Idaho, hike into Alaska Basin to see the vast accumulation of sedimentary rocks
5- hike up Death Canyon where you can see the gneiss and the lighter colored halos around garnets and magnetite.
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Diamonds: Earth's Deepest Gem Oct 08, 2020

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In this episode we cover a range of topics centered around diamonds. Where do they come from? Why are they valued? How are they formed? Why do diamonds sparkle so much?
Diamonds are a huge industry, and an economically important resource for many countries. We cover the basics of diamond formation, what causes them to sparkle so much, and why they are scientifically so interesting!
It all comes down to density and hardness. Diamonds are formed deep within the Earth where carbon is put under great pressure. The extreme pressure required for diamond formation is what makes them so hard, which in turn makes them sparkle more than most gems. The extreme pressures are also difficult and expensive to replicate in the lab, so making diamonds synthetically is a pretty extreme task. However, there are ways around this, including putting graphite into a small room with a bomb and blowing it up! This is one method to make small micro diamonds for industrial uses like in polishing equipment or in saw blades.
Reach out if you have any comments, questions, or suggestions! We are @planetgeocast on Twitter and Instagram and planetgeocast@gmail.com; we love to hear your feedback and we have already had some awesome suggestions from listeners. Keep them coming!
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Hard Water and What Makes the Ocean Salty Sep 24, 2020

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This week we tackle a big question: why is the ocean so salty? Spoiler alert: it's because of the hard water you may have running through your house!
In this episode we cover three major questions: 1) Why is the ocean salty? 2) Why do rivers keep flowing all the time? and 3) What is hard water? Guess what...they are all related!
Hard water is water that is "hard" to make a lather with. This is caused by dissolved ions in the groundwater. Those ions get there because groundwater interacts with rocks under... wait for it... the ground! This groundwater feeds rivers, which then flow into lakes and ultimately the oceans. The ocean water then evaporates, leaves behind the salty stuff from dissolved rocks, forms clouds and rain, and starts the whole process over again. Except, the salty ions are left behind in the ocean and accumulate over time.
Hard water is extremely important to pay attention to because it can severely damage industrial equipment as well as cost you thousands of dollars in home repairs if you don't get it taken care of it. Here is a link to a United States Geological Survey article that outlines hard water, where it is found, and what it can cause. Check out that picture of the clogged pipe!
https://www.usgs.gov/special-topic/water-science-school/science/hardness-water?qt-science_center_objects=0#qt-science_center_objects
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Covid19: it's not ALL bad Sep 10, 2020

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In this episode we discuss what happened to our planet during the lockdowns due to Covid in the Spring of 2020.
TL;DR The Earth quieted down and we produced less CO2
We highlight a few interesting articles that have been published recently and discuss the way that scientists measure Earth movement using seismometers! We can even detect touchdowns during football games with seismometers, and when everyone was forced to stay at home during lockdowns the Earth became much quieter. Also, air pollution was reduced and we talk about what that might mean going forward.
Here are links to the articles we mentioned. Specifically, this Nature commentary outlines the reduction in seismic noise curing Covid Lockdowns
Read this article on the reduction in seismic noise: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-00965-x
which has been updated in a more recent article since we recorded this episode!
https://science.sciencemag.org/content/early/2020/07/22/science.abd2438

Here are the two articles discussing CO2 reductions and air pollution decreases during the Covid lockdowns
Read this article on the CO2 emissions related to the lockdown
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41558-020-0797-x

And this short blurb on other pollutants
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/05/200511124444.htm

Thanks for listening and, as usual, please reach to us if you have any questions or suggestions, and leave us a rating/review if you enjoyed the show!
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Yellowstone National Park Aug 29, 2020

Learn all the basics of the amazing Geology of Yellowstone National Park, with visuals! Available now at - campGEO!
Available here: geo.campcourses.com

In this episode we get into one of our favorite places to study and teach the geosciences, Yellowstone National Park! Yellowstone was the United State's first National Park, and arguably the first park of its kind in the world, but there is so much more! We discuss some of the interesting biology and geology going on in Yellowstone National Park, including cutthroat trout, how elk affect beavers, and the super volcano that created the landforms we see today! Morale of the story, we love Yellowstone National Park, and if you haven't been there, check it out someday soon!
If you are intrigued about our discussion of the Snake River Plain and want to know more, please check out this excellent webpage created by Paul Link at Idaho State University.
Also, if you have the time, check out Craters of the Moon National Park next time you are in Idaho; it completes the story of Yellowstone's volcanic history!
All in all, Yellowstone National Park is one of the premier geologic features on the planet! Join the PlanetGeo discussion by contacting us at our website or reaching out via email!

Download the CampGeo app now at this link.
On the app you can get tons of free content, exclusive images, and access to our Geology of National Parks series.
You can also learn the basics of geology at the college level in our FREE CampGeo content series - get learning now!
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What is a Tectonic Plate? Aug 27, 2020

Learn all the basics of geology in our new conversational textbook - campGEO!
Available here: geo.campcourses.com
“Plate tectonics makes this planet awesome, flat out.”
In this episode we take a dive into the fundamental process that makes Earth unique, plate tectonics. We discuss what a tectonic plate is and what our planet would look like without plate tectonics, which would be pretty boring! Also, because of plate tectonics we are always moving relative to the center of the Earth. Listeners in North America are moving very slowly (think of the rate your fingernails grow) away from listeners in Europe and they are both moving away from those in Australia.
Check this link out for a map of the various tectonic plates on Earth at the moment!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plate_tectonics#/media/File:Plates_tect2_en.svg
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Instagram: @planetgeocast
Twitter: @planetgeocast
Facebook: @planetgeocast
Email: planetgeocast@gmail.com
Website: https://planetgeocast.buzzsprout.com/

Download the CampGeo app now at this link.
On the app you can get tons of free content, exclusive images, and access to our Geology of National Parks series.
You can also learn the basics of geology at the college level in our FREE CampGeo content series - get learning now!
Like, Subscribe, and leave us a Rating!
——————————————————
Instagram: @planetgeocast
Twitter: @planetgeocast
Facebook: @planetgeocast
Support us: https://planetgeocast.com/support-us
Email: planetgeocast@gmail.com
Website: https://planetgeocast.com/

Geoscience is Important. Period. Aug 22, 2020

Learn all the basics of geology in our new conversational textbook - campGEO!
Available here: geo.campcourses.com
Welcome to the first episode of PlanetGeo! Here we get introductions out of the way and discuss what excites us about the geosciences.
We are Chris Bolhuis, an award-winning High School Teacher in Hudsonville, Michigan. Over his 20-ish year career, Chris has taught Earth Science, Geology, and Astronomy, as well as field courses in the Geosciences. Chris won the National Earth Science Teacher of the Year award in 2014 and can usually be found sitting on his front porch admiring his substantial rock collection.
Jesse is a Geoscience Professor at Penn State University, and a former student of Chris’s. Jesse took 9th Grade Earth Science, 11th Grade Geology, and went on a several field courses taught by Chris while he was in high school, which led to his passion for the Geosciences. Since that time, Jesse obtained his PhD in Geochemistry from the University of Alberta, worked as a Postdoctoral Fellow at a research institute in Washington DC for several years, and recently started at Penn State as an Assistant Professor.
Join us as we explore the Geosciences together. In this podcast we will do everything from exploring the basics, highlighting societally relevant topics, digging into the economics of the geosciences, and interviewing prominent scientists and industry leaders. We aim to cover a lot, so keep up!
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Instagram: @planetgeocast
Twitter: @planetgeocast
Facebook: @planetgeocast
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCJ_A82nOMu0nIvZto6zMPqg
Email: planetgeocast@gmail.com
Website: https://planetgeocast.buzzsprout.com/

Download the CampGeo app now at this link.
On the app you can get tons of free content, exclusive images, and access to our Geology of National Parks series.
You can also learn the basics of geology at the college level in our FREE CampGeo content series - get learning now!
Like, Subscribe, and leave us a Rating!
——————————————————
Instagram: @planetgeocast
Twitter: @planetgeocast
Facebook: @planetgeocast
Support us: https://planetgeocast.com/support-us
Email: planetgeocast@gmail.com
Website: https://planetgeocast.com/

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