geological society of america

(Geological Society of America) Geology articles cover the minute to the grand, from calcite-producing earthworms, skeletal metazoans and mineral discoveries, to Earth's highest coastal mountain range, a newly discovered extension of the Nile deep-sea fan and a Canadian impact crater and mark important events in time, from a 9-degree warming in Greenland only 14,700 years ago to Africa's Middle Stone Age.

GSA Today goes farther back in time to analyze the formation and closure of the Rheic Ocean.

(Geological Society of America) Geology topics include a new model for Grand Canyon erosion; opal formation on Mars; the beautiful and delicate preservation of soft tissues in the Burgess Shale of Canada; Ediacaran atmosphere, ocean, and fossil preservation, including that of an eight-armed ocean-dweller in both China and Australia; a new technique for seismic hazard studies; and arsenic contamination of drinking water.

GSA Today cautions researchers against using sheeted dikes in ophiolites to investigate mid-ocean ridge spreading processes.

(Geological Society of America) The latest issue of GSA Bulletin spans the globe, examining ancient soils in Big Bend National Park, Texas; loess soils in Nebraska, including the greatest known thickness of the Peoria Loess in the world; folding, faulting, and metamorphism as seen in detailed geologic mapping across Pakistan; tectonic fractures in Southeast Viti Levu, Fiji; subsidence in Mexico City; groundwater arsenic in Araihazar, Bangladesh; the formation of the Andes and earthquakes in the Seattle fault zone.

(Geological Society of America) Paleontologist Sankar Chatterjee of Texas Tech University, aeronautical engineer Rick Lind of the University of Florida, and their students Andy Gedeon and Brian Roberts have reached back in time 115 million years to one of the most successful flying creatures in Earth's history, the pterodactyl, to conjure a robotic spy plane with next-generation capabilities.

(Geological Society of America) The Apollo Moon missions all share a dirty secret. "The major issue the Apollo astronauts pointed out was dust," says Larry Taylor, director, Planetary Geosciences Institute, University of Tennessee.

Fine as flour and rough as sandpaper, Moon dust caused 'lunar hay fever,' problems with space suits, and dust storms in the crew cabin upon returning to space.

Taylor and other scientists will present their research on lunar dust on 9 October at the Joint Annual Meeting of GSA/SSSA-ASA-CSSA/GCAGS.

(Geological Society of America) GEOLOGY topics include the fossil conservation of organic tissues, including guts, gills, muscles, and eyes, as carbon; an habitable zone model for recovery after major extinction; the complex response of biodiversity to both climate and tectonics; the "celebrated weirdness of Ediacaran fossils" preserved in fine-grained carbonate sediments; and a powerful new way to concentrate gold.

GSA TODAY compares present microbially induced sediment structures to microbial communities preserved in Earth history some three billion years ago.

(Geological Society of America) Small white stalagmites lining caves in the Midwest may help scientists chronicle the history of the New Madrid Seismic Zone -- and even predict when the next big earthquake may strike, say researchers at the Illinois State Geological Survey and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Preliminary results of the study will be presented Sun., Oct. 5, at the 2008 Joint Meeting of GSA-SSSA/ASA/CSSA-GCAS in Houston, Texas.

(Geological Society of America) Geology topics reach deep into Earth and far into space -- from magma and plate tectonics to cosmic dust and asteroids -- and touch on the intricate details of our planet, including a 1,200-year record of corals and coral reef health and the wealth of climate change information found in both bat guano and Chinese loess.

The GSA Todayarticle studies the end-Permian mass extinction in the marine realm, examining long-term environmental stress and recovery.

(Geological Society of America) More than 10,000 international scientists, professionals, educators and students will gather at the George R.

Brown Convention Center in Houston Oct. 5-9, 2008, to discuss the latest research and trends in energy, water resources, climate change, agriculture, science education, earth sciences and related disciplines.

This first-ever joint annual meeting is a collaboration that showcases the sciences of the sponsoring organizations.

(Geological Society of America) The Geological Society of America is pleased to announce the newest addition to its collection of premier peer-reviewed, earth-science journals.

Lithosphere is scheduled to launch in early 2009, and will focus on the tectonic processes that affect Earth's crust and upper mantle.

Content will highlight research that addresses how the surface, crust, and mantle interact to shape the physical and chemical evolution of the lithosphere at all spatial and temporal scales.