Tim Middleton is GfGD’s Advocacy Development Officer, working to ensure GfGD’s voice is heard in relevant discussions, and helping geoscience students to understand the important role of effective advocacy work. Today, the 22nd March, is World Water Day. This is a day when the general public are encouraged to show their support for water-related issues and when countries announce speci ...[Read More]
Green Tea and Velociraptors
Fly, my pretties, fly!
The origin of bird flight is one of the greatest stories evolution has ever told us in the history of life on this planet. To imagine how organisms that once ran around on the ground have descendants that soar through the skies is truly phenomenal, and represents a truly great leap in increasing the awesomeness of these animals. The secret of how it came about though is hidden away in the fossil r ...[Read More]
GeoSphere
Geology Photo of the Week #26
The photo of the week is another great example of Pleistocene giantism in mammals. In the photo you see a recent (very) leg bone from a kangaroo held next to the fossilized leg bone of a Pleistocene kangaroo, known as Procoptodon. HUGE DIFFERENCE! The bone from the ancient kangaroo is at least 10-15cm longer and much, much thicker. Procoptodon, stood around 2m tall and weighed in at a massive 230 ...[Read More]
Geology for Global Development
In the News (March 2013)
A look at some of the issues that have caught my eye in the news recently Deep sea mining: Speculation surrounding the possibility of mining metal rich seafloor nodules has been going on for decades. These nodules grow slowly, so they adsorb high concentrations of metals from seawater, including the increasingly valuable rare earth metals. This resource has not been widely exploited before now bec ...[Read More]
Green Tea and Velociraptors
Your track or mine?
How do you tell between different dinosaurs, when you don’t have any dinosaurs? Trace fossils, like footprints, are ghosts of dinosaurs past, remnants of life entombed within the rocks. Palaeontologists and ichnologists (scientists who study trace fossils, not fish) often used to get confused by the question of matching a dinosaur track to its maker. Dinosaur tracks are known from multiple localit ...[Read More]
Geology for Global Development
Guest Blog: Water in Ghana (1) – Introduction
This year, GfGD’s University Group based at Imperial College London will be supporting Imperial Water Brigades, and their Water Brigades project in Ghana. A number of students from the Department for Earth Science and Engineering will be travelling to Ghana in September 2013 to help construct a rainwater harvesting system – and work with local communities who will be using the tank. Ov ...[Read More]
GeoSphere
Guest Post: Solar Storms and the Earth’s Protective Shield – Laura Roberts Artal
I am a PhD student at the University of Liverpool Geomagnetism Laboratory. My current research project is the palaeomagentic study of 3.5-3.2 billion year old rocks from South Africa. The aim of my research is to improve our understanding of the long term evolution of the Earth and the surface conditions under which the first forms of life originated through using palaeomagnetic records. The rock ...[Read More]
Geology for Global Development
Friday Photo (71): Geologists in the Field – Dorset
Students in Dorset, taking a close look at some vertical bedding. Send us your favourite photos of geologists at work in the field! Credit: Joel Gill (c) Geology for Global Development 2013
Geology for Global Development
Guest Blog: Women and Aid
Nikita Kaushal is a postgraduate student in the Earth Sciences Department at the University of Oxford. Here she shares some of the key ideas about the role of women in development discussed during the 2013 OxFID conference. Should Aid and development start with women? Gender inequality cuts across all races and communities. In development circles, women are touted as the magic cure because ...[Read More]
GeoSphere
Geology Photo of the Week #25
The photo for this week is something a bit different. It is a piece from my personal collection that was self collected. Ok, full disclosure, my dad actually found it, but I was over on another rock pile in the quarry and finding jack at the time…so it is self collected….I did help extract it after he found it. I should also mention that they were repaired and enhanced by a professiona ...[Read More]