Geochemistry, Mineralogy, Petrology & Volcanology

May GeoRoundUp: the best of the Earth sciences from around the web

Laura Roberts-Artal June 7, 2017

French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius - President of the COP21 climate change conference - bangs down the gavel on December 12, 2015, after representatives of 196 countries approved a sweeping environmental agreement during a multinational meeting at LeBourget Airport in Paris, France. Credit: U.S. Department of State from United States [Public domain], distributed by Wikimedia Commons

Drawing inspiration from popular stories on our social media channels, as well as unique and quirky research news, this monthly column aims to bring you the best of the Earth and planetary sciences from around the web. Major Story In the last couple of weeks of May, the news world was abuzz with the possibility of Donald Trump withdrawing from the Paris Agreement. Though the announcement actually ...[Read More]

Imaggeo on Mondays: A lava layer cake

Laura Roberts-Artal May 29, 2017

A lava layer cake flowing . Credit: Timothée Duguet (distributed via imaggeo.egu.eu)

Brekkuselslækur, a small river, carves its way across Iceland’s ancient volcanic landscape. At Hengifoss, Iceland’s third-highest waterfall, it tumbles fiercely down thick, dark layers of lavas erupted from volcanoes some 18 to 2.58 million years ago, during a period of geological time known as the Tertiary. Eruptions are rarely continuous; during hiatuses in the extrusion of lavas, ash is able to ...[Read More]

Extraordinary iridescent clouds inspire Munch’s ‘The Scream’

Hazel Gibson April 26, 2017

Are the lurid colours and tremulous lines of Munch's 'The Scream', caused by strange and rarer nacreous clouds? L: Edvard Munch’s ‘The Scream’ 1893. R: Mother-of-pearl or nacreous clouds. Credit: Svein Fikke.

Edvard Munch’s series of paintings and sketches ‘The Scream’ are some of the most famous works by a Norwegian artist, instantly recognisable and reproduced the world over. But what was the inspiration behind this striking piece of art? The lurid colours and tremulous lines have long been thought to represent Munch’s unstable state of mind; a moment of terror caught in shocking technicolour. At the ...[Read More]

Imaggeo on Mondays: In the belly of the beast

Alexandra Kushnir April 17, 2017

Conducting research inside a volcanic crater is a pretty amazing scientific opportunity, but calling that crater home for a week might just be a volcanologist’s dream come true, as Alexandra postdoctoral researcher at the Institut de Physique du Globe de Strasbourg, describes in this week’s Imaggeo on Mondays. This picture was taken from inside the crater of Mount St Helens, a stratovolcano ...[Read More]