Geology Bites

This episode features an interview with MIT professor Tom Herring about high-precision geodesy technology and its applications in studying Earth's surface movements, including earthquake deformation and plate tectonics.

This episode features an interview with geologist Esther Sumner, who discusses the formation, impact, and study of turbidity currents, powerful underwater sediment flows that shape the ocean floor and can disrupt infrastructure.

Geologist Vic Baker explains what megafloods are, defining them as massive flooding events with discharges of at least a million cubic meters per second and immense energies that significantly impact landscapes, with dam failures being a primary trigger.

This episode explores how geological events like the rise of the Andes and marine incursions over 23 million years have shaped the Amazon basin's extraordinary biodiversity.

This episode features an interview with scientist Anat Shahar discussing the key factors that make rocky planets habitable, focusing on water acquisition and planetary formation.

Geologist Keith Klepeis discusses how plutons form in tectonic environments like subduction zones, using examples from New Zealand and the Andes.

This episode features paleontologist Richard Fortey discussing the concept of deep time in Earth's history, focusing on how fossils like trilobites helped establish geological timelines.

This episode features Joe McGregor discussing his team's new geological map of Greenland, which reveals previously unknown subglacial provinces and valleys using advanced survey data.

This episode features Lindy Elkins-Tanton discussing the origin of Earth's water, exploring theories about how water arrived on Earth despite the challenges posed by the solar system's snow line and planetary formation processes.

This episode explores golden spikes, which are specific points in Earth's rock record that mark the boundaries of geological time stages, with philosopher and historian of science Joeri Witteveen.

This episode explores golden spikes, which are specific points in Earth's rock record that mark the boundaries of geological time stages, with philosopher and historian of science Joeri Witteveen.

Bob White discusses his research using dense seismometer arrays in Iceland to track magma movement through the crust and mantle, combining seismic data with geochemical analysis.

This episode features geologist Richard Ernst discussing the definition, causes, and impacts of large igneous provinces, which are massive accumulations of igneous rocks formed by huge volumes of magma erupting onto Earth's surface.

This episode explores how water amplifies volcanic eruptions through external contact with magma and internal presence, featuring expert Michael Manga explaining phreatomagmatic processes.

Geophysicist Rufus Catchings discusses methods for locating California's faults, including seismology and geomorphology, to improve earthquake hazard assessment.

This episode features geologist Roberta Rudnick discussing the continental crustal composition paradox, which explores why the composition of Earth's continental crust doesn't match that of magmas generated from mantle melting.

This episode features an interview with geologist Folarin Kolawole discussing the mechanisms and global examples of continental rifting, focusing on his research in regions like East Africa and Death Valley.

This episode features an interview with Professor Claire Corkhill about geological radioactive waste disposal, focusing on nuclear processes, long-term storage challenges, and safety research.

This episode features planetary scientist Mahesh Anand discussing how NASA's planned 2025 human return to the Moon will advance lunar geology research and resource utilization.

This episode explores how silicate rock weathering acts as Earth's geological thermostat to regulate atmospheric temperature over billions of years, featuring insights from geoscientist Susan Brantley.

This episode features Clark Johnson discussing the origins of banded iron formations, ancient iron-rich rocks from the protozoic era, and exploring theories beyond oxygenation, including microbial activity.

This episode features an interview with Michael Hudec, a research professor at the University of Texas at Austin, discussing salt tectonics, which explores how solid salt formations influence the structure and evolution of surrounding rocks in geological contexts.

This episode features Adam Simon discussing the geological sources and formation of critical metals like lithium, copper, nickel, cobalt, and manganese used in lithium-ion batteries for renewable energy and electric vehicles.

This episode features an interview with geologist Martin van Cranendonk discussing stromatolites as evidence for the earliest life on Earth around 3.5 billion years ago, focusing on his research in Western Australia's Pilbara Craton.

This episode features Hal Levison discussing the Lucy mission to Jupiter's Trojan asteroids and how studying them can help answer questions about the early solar system and planetary migration.

This episode explores the geological formation of the Alps, focusing on the role of the southern margin of Europe during the Eocene epoch and featuring expert insights from Professor Rob Butler.

This episode explores the Franciscan Complex, a unique land-exposed accretionary prism in California, through the research of geologist John Wakabayashi on subduction processes and plate tectonics.

This episode explores how biases and gaps in the sedimentary record affect geological interpretations, featuring Bruce Levell's research on depositional mechanisms and re-examining accepted theories.

This episode explores how ancient archaeocyath sponges, not modern corals, built the first reefs during the Cambrian period, potentially influencing the Cambrian explosion of life.

This episode features an interview with exoplanet expert Sarah Seager discussing how scientists study the geology of planets orbiting other stars using methods like the transit technique.

Geologist Evan Smith discusses his 2016 discovery that some of the largest, highest-quality diamonds actually form at extreme depths of 600-650 kilometers in the mantle, challenging previous assumptions about diamond formation.

Geologist Renée Tamblyn discusses the formation of Earth's continents, exploring whether they emerged suddenly or gradually and the role of water in this process.

This episode of Geology Bites, hosted by Oliver Strimpel, discusses the 2023 Turkey-Syria earthquakes, which killed over 50,000 people, and contrasts them with the 2011 Tohoku earthquake in Japan.

This episode explores the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake, where Patrick Fulton discusses his team's research into the fault zone using a temperature observatory to measure dynamic friction, revealing why the slip was so large and triggered a devastating tsunami.

This episode features Sujoy Mukhopadhyay discussing how noble gases in present-day basalts can probe Earth's early history, focusing on whether structures from the Hadean era survive in the mantle today.

Geologist Catherine Mottram discusses her research on alternative radiometric dating methods using minerals like calcite to date low-temperature geological processes that zircon cannot capture.

This episode explores how continental plates differ from oceanic plates in their deformation behavior, featuring geologist Alex Copley discussing the rigidity of plates and exceptions to it.

Geologist Isabel Montañez discusses how the Late Paleozoic Ice Age serves as an analog for understanding current human-driven climate change through sedimentary records and climate proxies.

This episode features an interview with geologist Jiří Žák about the Cadomian and Variscan orogenies that shaped Central Europe's geological history, placed within the context of supercontinent cycles.

Geologist Shanan Peters discusses his ambitious Macrostrat project, which compiles global stratigraphic data to quantitatively analyze the relationship between sedimentary rock records and Earth's evolutionary history.

Paul Smith, director of the Oxford University Museum of Natural History, discusses the Cambrian explosion, a period of rapid animal diversification documented by fossils like those in the Burgess Shale.

Ruth Siddall discusses urban geology, focusing on studying building stones in cities to understand their geological provenance and social history through walks and databases.

This episode features an interview with Claudio Faccenna, who discusses the dynamics and evolution of subduction zones, including their mechanisms and surface manifestations, based on his 30 years of research in the Mediterranean region.

This episode features Scott Bolton discussing Io, the most volcanically active body in the solar system, and what recent Juno mission flybys reveal about its intense volcanism and interaction with Jupiter.

This episode features geologist Kees van Staal discussing how the Appalachian Mountains formed as part of the Caledonian orogeny, connecting their origin to ancient supercontinents like Rodinia and Pangaea.

This episode features Mike Searle discussing the geological formation and characteristics of the Himalayan and other Central Asian mountain ranges, including insights from his 45 years of research.

This episode explores the latest developments in seismic imaging techniques, particularly using fiber optic cables, to create sharper three-dimensional pictures of Earth's mantle with Andreas Fichtner.

Geologist Damian Nance discusses how new research on mantle dynamics and subduction is revolutionizing our understanding of what drives the formation and breakup of supercontinents like Pangaea.

This episode features an interview with geologist Rob Strachan discussing the Caledonian Orogeny, a major mountain-building event that occurred over 100 million years and shaped regions across North America and Europe.

This episode features an interview with David Kohlstedt about his lab experiments simulating the Earth's mantle to understand the properties of the asthenosphere and its role in plate tectonics.

Oliver Strimpel interviews mineralogist Steve Jacobson about replicating extreme planetary conditions in the lab to understand Earth's interior and other rocky bodies.

Dan Rothman discusses his research on carbon cycle disruptions and mass extinctions in Earth's history.

One sandstone in South Africa's Barbiton Greenstone Belt preserved Hadean zircons that point to a lost terrain spanning about 4.15 to 3.31 billion years.

Geology Bites with Oliver Strimple and John Cottle focuses on petrochronology, the pairing of crystal dating with trace-element chemistry in zircon, monazite, titanite, rutile, and apatite.

Geology Bites with Oliver Strimple follows Martin Gibling, Emeritus Professor at Dalhousie University, through fluvial deposits that reach back to the Moody's Group of southern Africa at about 3.2 billion years.

Martin Gibling discusses the history of rivers in Europe and the Americas, including the impact of ice ages and humans.

Geologist Katie Stack discusses how geological maps of Mars are made using orbiter images and rover data, contrasting with field methods on Earth.

A geophysicist debates the mantle-plume hypothesis versus plate tectonics as explanations for volcanism.

An interview with planetary geoscientist David Rothery discussing the diverse shapes and types of volcanoes on Earth and across the solar system.

An interview with a geologist about asteroid sample return missions and what they reveal about the early solar system.

An interview with geologist Laurent Jolivet explaining why the Mediterranean region's plate tectonics is more complex than typical oceans like the Atlantic.