An acclaimed international collection of earth science articles and book reviews on palaeontology, geology, minerals and more
Jon Trevelyan (UK) The road over Honister Pass does not feel like a place for industry. It climbs abruptly into the high fells, threading between steep slopes and exposed rock faces, with little sense of the gentler, pastoral Lake District often presented in guidebooks. Yet, set into this harsh landscape … Read More
Modern Britain lies far from active plate boundaries. It has no active volcanoes and experiences only minor earthquakes, and is often described as tectonically quiet. Yet its landscape is anything but passive. Hills and lowlands, coastlines and drainage patterns all reflect a deep structural inheritance established during earlier phases of continental collision, collapse and rifting.
By the end of the Carboniferous, Britain had already passed through more than one major phase of mountain building, each followed by long periods of erosion and structural collapse. The Caledonian mountains were long eroded, and the Variscan belt of southern Britain was entering its final stages of decay. Yet tectonic influence did not fade away. Instead, the dominant regime changed. Britain was no longer being compressed – it was being stretched.
At first glance, Geology: an illustrated history appears to be another entry in the now familiar genre of large-format, image-rich popular science books. In practice, however, David Bainbridge has produced something rather more distinctive: a visually driven history of geology in which images – maps, diagrams and artefacts – take a leading role, with the text providing interpretation and context.
Britain is often described as geologically quiet. There are no active volcanoes, no subduction zones, and only modest earthquakes. Yet, for its size, few countries display such a concentration of geological variety. Mountain uplands, volcanic terrains, deeply folded rocks, and ancient metamorphic cores all occur within a relatively small area. The explanation for this diversity lies not in Britain’s present tectonic setting, but in a long and complex tectonic history that assembled the country piece by piece from fragments that originated far apart.
Paul Binns’ Explaining the Earth: An Introduction to the Earth and its Systems is an attractive and highly accessible introduction to the planet and its major systems. Beautifully illustrated throughout with full-colour photographs and clear explanatory diagrams, it offers a brisk survey of the familiar territory of introductory Earth science – rocks and minerals, plate tectonics, oceans and atmosphere, the Earth’s interior, mountains, deserts and so on, and the processes that shape them.
The Oldest Rocks on Earth is composed in a consciously popular-science style, making it an enjoyable read, as well as an informative one for readers interested in how geologists reconstruct the earliest history of our planet. This approach allows Simon Lamb to interweave the science with his own research history, particularly his PhD work and later field studies in Swaziland (now renamed Eswatini), where he investigated some of the oldest rocks on Earth.
At first glance, What Did Dinosaurs Think About? looks like a slightly mischievous title attached to a familiar subject. Dinosaurs, after all, have been thought about endlessly; whether they themselves did much thinking is another matter. Ronan Le Loeuff’s book makes no claim to settle that question definitively, but it does something arguably more interesting – it asks what sort of sensory world dinosaurs inhabited, and how that might have shaped their behaviour.
This is the second of three articles on the Carnian Pluvial Event (CPE). The first covered the climate engine of the CPE. This article turns to the marine record, tracing how the CPE destabilised reefs and reorganised shallow-marine ecosystems.
Planetary geology occupies an awkward but fascinating position between disciplines. It draws its physical framework from physics and astronomy, its observational tools from remote sensing and space missions, and its interpretative instincts from terrestrial geology. Planetary Geology: An Introduction by Dominic Fortes and Claudio Vita-Finzi has, since its first appearance, sought to bring these strands together into a coherent teaching text.
This is the first of three articles on the Carnian Pluvial Event (CPE), often referred to as an ‘event’, although increasingly recognised as a prolonged episode, as I will discuss) of the Triassic that seems to have grown in importance and interest, and only become more widely known in relatively recent times. In this article, I will introduce the topic, concentrating on what might be called the “climate engine” driving what was happening.
Mike Leeder’s Geology and the Pioneers of Earth Science is an ambitious and absorbing exploration of the intellectual and personal stories behind the transformation of geology in the twentieth century. Published in September 2024, the book positions itself as an account of how the discipline shifted from a largely descriptive, field-based science into the more synthetic, quantitative and planet-wide framework we now call “earth science”.
Elizabeth Devon (UK) ‘I know it’s Monday when a new Earth leaning idea appears’ – quote from a supporter in India. The Earth learning idea was set up for the International Year of Planet Earth with the intention of reaching as many children throughout the world as possible, particularly those … Read More
In recent years, geology has evolved from being primarily concerned with rocks, minerals and the Earth’s physical structure, to integrating fields, such as climatology, meteorology, biology and more. This interdisciplinary approach has become essential for understanding complex Earth systems and this book is part of that trend – a discussion of Earth’s climate and the evolution of life, in the context of geology.
Jack Wilkin (UK) Climate sceptics often argue that, because the climate has changed in the past, contemporary global warming must therefore also be natural. However, in this context, paleoclimatologists study the causes and effects of climate change throughout geological time to better understand human-induced (anthropogenic) warming. And it is this … Read More
Dr Trevor Watts Barrow Hill (Fig. 1) is a little gem. It is virtually unknown, very accessible and in the middle of a large town – Dudley, in the West Midlands of England. Nowadays, it is almost swallowed up in the western suburbs of Birmingham (Fig. 2). A brief summary … Read More
Rosalind Jones On the Hebridean island of Mull, on a day just before 1850, when potato famine and clearances brought misery to the Highlands and Islands, a man (perhaps collecting shellfish to stave off starvation) ventured down into a wind-swept gully on the Ross of Mull. Known as Slochd an … Read More
Dr G Trevor Watts In the fisrt part of this article (KratataAn excursion to Krakatau (Part 1)), I started to describe the geology of this famous volcano and also my visit to it. I now continue and you find me on fresh scoria and sulphurous steaming rock, standing on the … Read More
Dr G Trevor Watts (UK) Some researchers credit a major eruption of Krakatau (or Krakatoa, if you prefer) in the middle of the sixth century with the triggering the Dark Ages (Figs. 1 and 2). Whether or not this is true, the volcano was certainly responsible for about 36,000 deaths … Read More
Dr G Trevor Watts (UK) Cerro Negro (The Black Hill) is a stark, lively little volcano. Little known outside Nicaragua, it is easily accessible from the city of Léon and well worth the effort of the hike of about a thousand feet up. Location Cerro Negro is about 30km east-north-east … Read More
This book has something of an aspirational, rather than practical, feel to it. However, there is no doubt – in my mind anyway – that it is the best book on the geology of the Himalaya I have read. It is written with a nice light touch, with some humour. And it covers far more than just geology – where appropriate, it includes history, especially about the exploration of the subcontinent, and Asian culture.
Recently, I have finished the Great Silurian Controversy, a magnificent book about the nineteenth century arguments over the age of the lower Palaeozoic greywackes/sediments of Devon, and the creation of the concept of the Devonian. And reading The Lewisian: Britain’s oldest rocks by Graham Park, perhaps it occurs to me that this should perhaps be called, The Great Lewisian Controversy. It shares the same historical and scientific intentions, and the same grand sweep of scientific history from the early twentieth century, namely, the exploration over decades of the geology of the Lewisian of northwest Scotland.
Ian Francis and Bruce Yardley (UK) The violent eruption that occurred near the Pacific island of Tonga in January 2022 reminded the world of the ferocious power of volcanoes. The most destructive eruptions can bury huge areas in layers of ash and lava, generate tsunamis, and even alter the Earth’s … Read More
Khursheed Dinshaw (India) The first time I saw a mud volcano at close range was in Rotorua in New Zealand. I was fascinated – the raw energy of the erupting mud massively appealed to me. Once back home, I read up on mud volcanoes and learnt that, out of the … Read More
Deborah Painter Let’s see, when I say “Arizona hot spots”, what might come to mind for many people are the restaurants, nightclubs and sports events in Phoenix (the US state’s largest city), the Grand Canyon of the Colorado River, attracting visitors from around the world, Tombstone (the infamous “town too … Read More
