GeoLog

imaggeo on mondays

Imaggeo On Monday: The Heart of a Stone

Imaggeo On Monday: The Heart of a Stone

Heart-shaped glomerocryst (aggregate of phenocrysts) made of plagioclase and pyroxene in a cordierite-bearing dacitic lava from Lipari (Eolie Islands). I study the crustal xenoliths of these lavas to understand the processes accompanying high-temperature metamorphism and crustal melting. But I came across this spectacular glomerocryst and couldn’t help but take a picture! Polarized light pho ...[Read More]

Imaggeo On Monday: Salt marsh in El Rocío (Huelva, SW Spain)

Imaggeo On Monday: Salt marsh in El Rocío (Huelva, SW Spain)

The coast line of Huelva is furrowed by wetlands and sprinkled with salt flats. These areas are a sanctuary for wildlife and are visited by migrating birds travelling between Europe and Africa. In these wetlands grow the salt cedar, the Phoenician juniper, the mastic tree, the Montpellier cistus, the rockrose, the kermes oak, rosemary, cordgrass, reeds and bulrushes. The picture shows part of the ...[Read More]

Imaggeo On Monday: Intriguing artwork by heat-loving microbes

Imaggeo On Monday: Intriguing artwork by heat-loving microbes

The geothermal area Sol de Mañana is part of the Altiplano–Puna volcanic complex shared between Bolivia and Chile. The area is characterized by volcanic activity and the sulphur springs host mud lakes and steam pools. The different colours stem from thermophilic, hyperthermophilic and acidophilic bacteria that colonize areas of varying temperatures.   Description by Julia Miloczki, after the ...[Read More]

Imaggeo On Monday: Križna jama

Imaggeo On Monday: Križna jama

The Križna jama Cave on the east side of the periodic Cerknica Lake in Slovenia is an underground karstic cave primarily famous as a rich site of bones of the extinct cave bear, Ursus speleus. The eight kilometer long cave is full of stalagmites and stalactites (sometimes called drip-stone decorations) and also boasts 50 underground lakes separated by sinter barriers through which crystal clear wa ...[Read More]