Our neighbouring planet Venus is gaining popularity in the terrestrial planetary sciences, especially since the selection of three new Venus missions by NASA and ESA in 2021. Now, for the first time ever, scientists have directly observed surface changes that indicate active volcanism on Venus. This discovery was made with data from NASA’s 30-year-old Magellan …[Read More]
We are still in a lockdown and we can still use some entertainment for when we stare at the same four walls for hours on end or go on our daily walk. Fear not, dear reader, I have got just the thing for you in these troubling times: the new podcast Geology Bites hosted by …[Read More]
You know what has been missing from this blog so far? Book reviews! This week, Maeve Murphy Quinlan, PhD student at the University of Leeds, United Kingdom studying meteorites, comes to our rescue and discusses the science fiction genre with a review and recommendation of the novella To be Taught, if Fortunate. I know what’s …[Read More]
Who doesn’t love baking? Seriously, baked goods are the best: with or without gluten, with or without chocolate. But you know what makes every bake out there even better? A geological theme. You heard it here first! This week, Ruth Amey, postdoctoral researcher and programme manager of the Earth Observation Center for Doctoral Training at …[Read More]
The last few weeks have been filled with devastating news – harrowing stories about the police killing black people. Racial inequalities and discrimination go far beyond current events. In science in general, and in the geosciences in particular, little progress has been made regarding diversity over the past few decades. This is both the result …[Read More]
We are all studying geodynamics, but what does that really mean? Do we limit ourselves to the mantle? The lithosphere? The equations we solve? In this Wit & Wisdom post, Colin Hardy, PhD student in fluid dynamics at the University of Leeds, United Kingdom, makes his case for an often forgotten boundary condition of mantle …[Read More]
All blobs are equal, but some blobs are more interesting than other blobs. In this new Wit & Wisdom post, Jamie Ward, PhD student in seismology at the University of Leeds, United Kingdom, explores this age-old saying and discusses whether or not LLSVPs are the most important blobs in our lives. Also, there is a …[Read More]
Doing science is not a walk in the park. In fact, it might be closer to dancing on a volcano. Dan Bower, CSH and Ambizione Fellow at the University of Bern, Switzerland, takes full advantage of the creative freedom of a blog post to reiterate that scientific progress is not a straight-forward endeavour. We all …[Read More]
After years of trying to get a PhD, publishing papers, networking with professors, and trying to land that one, elusive, permanent job in science, it can be quite easy to forget that you actually do have career options outside of academia. To get a little taste of this, Nico Schliffke, PhD student in geodynamics at …[Read More]
The Geodynamics 101 series serves to showcase the diversity of research topics and methods in the geodynamics community in an understandable manner. We welcome all researchers – PhD students to professors – to introduce their area of expertise in a lighthearted, entertaining manner and touch upon some of the outstanding questions and problems related to …[Read More]
