GMPV
Geochemistry, Mineralogy, Petrology & Volcanology

#Volcano

I asked ChatGPT to write a blog about lava lakes: here’s what happened

March 8, 2023
The lava lake of Halemaʻumaʻu at Kilauea, Hawaii
The lava lake of Halemaʻumaʻu at Kilauea, Hawaiʻi (by Ivan Petrovich Vtorov - own work, CC BY-SA 3.0)

If you’ve not been living under a rock you’ve probably heard of ChatGPT, the AI text generator wowing the internet and striking fear into the heart of exam co-ordinators worldwide. I’ve been meaning to write a blog about lava lakes for a while now, ever since rewatching Werner Herzog and Clive Oppenheimer’s excellent documentary Into the Inferno. But with deadlines looming and lab work and admin c ...[Read More]

Volcanoes and Wines, Part 1

and August 5, 2021
Volcano and Wine pt1 frontpage
On the left picture of Bromo Mountain in East Java Indonesia, photo by ibrahim kusuma on Unsplash. On the right a view of Mt Vesuvius through a vineyard from the Pompeii ruins near Naples, Italy. Photo by Pieter Biesemans on Unsplash

Why talk about wine on the GMPV blog? Well, this geologist-favourite drink is not only good memories of the EGU General Assembly but also a topic that spans among all the GMPV categories. Indeed, wine composition, flavour, structure and quality are inevitably bound to the mineralogy and geochemistry of the soil, making it so common and appreciated since ancient times. And what gives us a nice comp ...[Read More]

Happy Birthday Mama Etna!

May 5, 2021
Happy Birthday Mama Etna!
Photo by Piermanuele Sberni on Unsplash

18 May 1971. This date may not mean anything to you at the moment, but it represents a very special day for the evolution of Mount Etna, leaving a deep mark in the recent eruptive activity of the volcano. Exactly 50 years ago, Mount Etna saw the birth of what, only a short time later, was to become the most active crater of the last decades: “The South-East Crater”, the fourth child of ...[Read More]