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The link between volcanism and the formation of copper ore could lead to discovery of new copper deposits. Copper has been in use for 6,000 years and it shows no signs of slowing down. The average home has about a hundred pounds of it and we are going to have more people and homes, not fewer. Volcanoes may be the answer. A research team led by Professor Jon Blundy of University of Bristol's School of Earth Sciences, studied giant porphyry copper deposits of the variety that host 75 percent of the world's copper reserves. Copper forms in association with volcanoes...

Sorry for being gone awhile, but I came back with a superb shot of geysers in New Zealand: Rare triple eruption of Kereru, Prince of Wales Feathers and Pohutu Geysers, Te Puia, Rotorua. Click for full size!

Since I probably won't be able to post next week (thought I might try to sneak one in Sunday) I'm putting up some colorful images. Hope you like. Another place I'm unlikely ever to visit: Akpatok Island, Ungava Bay, Canada: From space: Akpatok Island lies in Ungava Bay in northern Quebec, Canada. Accessible only by air, Akpatok Island rises out of the water as sheer cliffs that soar 500 to 800 feet (150 to 243 m) above the sea surface. The island is an important sanctuary for cliff-nesting seabirds. Numerous ice floes around the island attract walrus and whales, making...

Implications of Polonium Radiohalos in Nested Plutons of the Tuolumne Intrusive Suite, Yosemite, California by Dr. Andrew Snelling and Dallel Gates April 8, 2009 Abstract The formation of granite plutons has conventionally been thought to be a slow process requiring millions of years from generation to cooling. Even though new mechanisms for rapid emplacement of plutons have now been proposed, radioisotope dating still dominates and dictates long timescales for pluton formation. However, a new challenge to those long timescales has arisen from radiohalos. Polonium radiohalos found in biotite flakes of granites in Yosemite National Park place severe time constraints on...

As commonly happens, I found this image looking for something else. If you go here, you can see a bigger version (FR won't let me crosslink directly to Wikipedia). The really interesting article (with accompanying high-resolution video links) is here or at the source link: Action, Camera... LightsNew deep-sea “light post” illuminates the ocean's perpetual night (WHOI/Oceanus) Note that the "Christmas Tree" is from the Lost City vent field in the Atlantic (Mid-ocean Ridge). The source link is to the Wikipedia article about "Lost City". The video is from a vent field on the Juan de Fuca Ridge off...

Think of it as the Mars Rover but at the bottom of the ocean, remotely exploring our own planet's most alien landscape for scientists back at mission control. "This is how the science is going to be done," said Deborah Kelley, a University of Washington oceanographer. In 2000, Kelley led an expedition using a manned submersible to explore the deep Atlantic Ocean. Her team stumbled upon something never seen before. The researchers discovered a startlingly massive collection of limestone towers located miles away from the tectonic "spreading" cracks in the seafloor that typically produce such structures. Some of these hydrothermal...

(CBS) For years, CBS News Correspondent Sandra Hughes reports, scientists have tried to understand the dynamic nature of Yellowstone National Park. "It's beautiful up here, everybody should see this at one time or another," says one appreciative observer. Scientist Lisa Morgan may have unlocked one piece in the puzzle, deep below the park's biggest lake. "It is kind of the last unmapped frontier in Yellowstone National Park," says Morgan. What she found looks more like the surface of the moon. Using sonar she's identified a massive bulging dome the size of seven football fields. The only other underwater dome in...