By John C. Menzies and Eugene J. LynchApril 4, 2025 On a clear, dark night, far from city lights, the Milky Way Galaxy stretches across the sky like a luminous river of stars, gas, and dust. This glowing band, a partial view of our galaxy’s spiral structure, is a breathtaking »
I have a Acer Predator Helios 300 PH315-52-74PR and recently purchased an MSI PRO MP161 E2 external monitor. The monitor would not power up with mini-HDMI and reported no HDMI data when connected via USB-C. This is not uncommon but there is a simple solution. The key takeaway is that »
The Resolution Copper mine, a joint venture between Rio Tinto (55%) and BHP (45%), targets one of the world’s largest untapped copper deposits near Superior, Arizona. As it advances, the project promises significant economic and strategic benefits but faces a complex landscape of community support and opposition, with its fate »
A contribution by Michelle Grantcharova (Grant Geoscience) and John C Menzies. Michelle has been working on minerals exploration in the Iberian Pyrite Belt on advanced projects and is developing a considerable depth of knowledge of this important VHMS province. Incidentally, Michelle is my daughter-geologist. This is a work in progress »
A Bold First Step Here is a series of edited prompts that will guide you through your mental clutter, explore your darkest fears, delineate your current working habits, your current framework of accountability and define your most important goals. Then you will generate a Bold Action Plan consistent with your »
The Vuggy Silica/Quartz textural atlas has been updated. Vuggy silica textures are formed by the dissolution of phenocrysts and clasts by hot and strongly acidic fluids that are generated during the cooling and crystallization of near surface intrusive bodies. Vuggy silica is often mineralized but is also a strong indicator »
A new study by Tina Lüdecke and colleagues provides a critical analysis of the dietary habits of Australopithecus at Sterkfontein Cave, challenging long-held assumptions about the role of meat consumption in hominin evolution. The research is based on a novel approach that utilizes nitrogen and carbon isotope analysis of tooth »
An interesting paper in Science by Daniele Bertacca and colleagues discusses a new model for the early universe that challenges the traditional inflationary paradigm, which relies on a hypothetical “inflaton” field. Instead, this model proposes that gravitational waves, arising from quantum fluctuations within an expanding universe, are responsible for creating »
The Roman Empire, a civilization whose power and influence once spanned the known world, ultimately succumbed to a variety of pressures, but a major factor in its decline was the combination of unchecked deficit spending and the unsustainable growth of its government. The Roman state, compelled to finance a vast »
January 4th, 2025: This post investigates the cause of crustal-scale electrical conductivity anomalies observed in magnetotelluric (MT) imaging of mineral provinces, specifically in the Olympic Dam region of Australia and the Southeast Missouri Iron Province (SMIP) in the United States and is derived from and a review of Graphite as »
1st January 2025: This is a reflection on pivotal events in human history 100 years ago – 1924. This was a pivotal year in many ways, but much remains the same in human affairs, particulalry the chaos of politics. The most significant event in science in 1924 was the proof »
28th December 2024, John C. Menzies: This post is a review of a paper on the impact of mantle oxidation and transport of gold rich fluids from the mantle to the near surface. Overall, this study demonstrates that mantle oxidation by S–bearing aqueous fluids is a key trigger mechanism for »
25th December 2024: The menu for Christmas Day. On schedule and as expected, a fine time was had by all. »
Mantle flow in subduction systems and its effects on surface tectonics and magmatism, Valentina Magni, Ágnes Király, Colton Lynner, Pilar Avila & James Gi, Nature Reviews, Earth and Environmental, 2024 doi.org/10.1038/s43017-024-00612-3 This review article examines the complex interplay between subduction dynamics, mantle flow, and their resulting expressions on Earth’s surface. »
In early writing, words were not separated by spaces, a format known as scriptura continua. Scribes wrote without breaks between words, reflecting the way language was originally spoken. Just as we don’t pause between every word when we speak, early writers didn’t think to insert spaces between words when writing. »
This is a review of an interesting extended abstract presented at the AEGC Conference held in Brisbane in 2023. Geometry of the margins of the North Australian Craton and correlations with upper crustal structures Authors: Fatemeh Amirpoorsaeed, Peter Betts, Anindita Samsu, Robin Armit, Alexander Cruden. Craton margins: Craton margins are »
Rajendra Gupta from the University of Ottawa published a paper in the Astrophysical Journal based on a modified Lambda CDM + TL model which suggests an age of the universe since the Big Bang of 26.7 Gyr as compared with the consensus view of 13.8 Gyr. Given that zircon age »
“Subsurface Microbial Colonization at Mineral-Filled Veins in 2-Billion-Year-Old Mafic Rock from the Bushveld Igneous Complex, South Africa,” focuses on the examination of microbial life in ancient igneous rocks from the Bushveld Igneous Complex in South Africa. The study investigates the possibility of long-term microbial survival in stable subsurface environments over »
Emily J. Judd, Jessica E. Tierney, Daniel J. Lunt, Isabel P. Montañez, Brian T. Huber, Scott L. Wing, Paul J. Valdes, Science. DOI: 10.1126/science.adk3705 An interesting approach to palaeo-temperature modelling – produced by assimilating observational data during the last 485 million years with climate model predictions. This paper introduces a »
Authors Pearl Connelly & Lynley Wallis Purchase: Mitakoodi Traditional Medicinal Plant Uses of the Cloncurry Region can be purchased on-line Most photos are the copyright of Pearly Connelly & Lynley Wallis The country around Cloncurry comprises the traditional lands of the Mitakoodi People. In this book, Mitakoodi Elder Pearl Connelly teams »
This post does NOT contains images of deceased Australian Aboriginals – some Australian Aboriginal people find seeing the images and or hearing names of the deceased disturbing as it may disturb that person’s spirit. Australian Aboriginals were hunter gatherers surviving on “Bush Tucker” and photographs of traditional tribal groups in »
WARNING: This post contains images of deceased Australian Aboriginals – some Australian Aboriginal people find seeing the images and or hearing names of the deceased disturbing as it may disturb that person’s spirit. Australian Aboriginals were hunter gatherers surviving on “Bush Tucker” and photographs of traditional tribal groups in the »
This article from the Brisbane Courier of Saturday, December 22nd, 1923, puts our modern world of global and near earth communications in perspective – this was a mere 100 years ago. TELEPHONIC CHAIN. LINKING UP. FOUR STATES CONNECTED. SYDNEY, December 21. There Is now a complete chain of telephone lines »
Brisbane Courier (Qld. : 1864 – 1933), Saturday 1 December 1923, page 19 By A. MESTON. Few people have any knowledge of the vast amount of works, reports, and papers that have been written on the anthropology, ethnology, and geological history of the aboriginals of Australia and Tasmania. Many of »
Ben Andrew, Senior Geologist at Mt Isa Mines submitted a captivating PhD thesis (Andrews, B.S., 2020) in 2020 on alteration at Mt Isa and its implications for fluid flow of the hydrothermal fluid that formed the world class Cu and Pb-Zn-Ag orebodies. Here we summarize some of his δ18O results. »
Moreira, H., Storey, C., Bruand, E. et al. Sub-arc mantle fugacity shifted by sediment recycling across the Great Oxidation Event. Nat. Geosci. 16, 922–927 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41561-023-01258-4 Substantial accumulation of free oxygen in the atmosphere occurred between ~2.45 and 2.20 billion years ago , with permanent atmospheric oxygenation commencing between 2.3 and 2.2 Ga. This »
Queensland’s Early DaysBY C. Duncan LaidleyBrisbane Courier (Qld. : 1864 – 1933), Saturday 27 October 1923, page 19 I find it most interesting to read the Brisbane Courier from 100 years ago on a Saturday morning. It brings into stark relief the modern world, that which remains much the same »
The Curtis Nugget, the largest in Queensland, was discovered in Gympie, Queensland in 1868 by Curtis and Brigg on a lease close to the initial claim of the discoverer of the Gympie Goldfield, James Nash. The claim where the Curtis nugget was found had been pegged earlier by George Curtis »
This post is a summary of the excellent recent paper on the above topic in Economic Geology: Jeffrey W. Hedenquist, Antonio Arribas; Exploration Implications of Multiple Formation Environments of Advanced Argillic Minerals. Economic Geology 2022;; 117 (3): 609–643. https://doi.org/10.5382/econgeo.4880 Introduction Hydrothermal ore deposits are associated with alteration minerals, and one such alteration type »
I find it most interesting to read the Brisbane Courier from 100 years ago on a Saturday morning. It brings into stark relief the modern world, that which remains much the same and that which has evolved beyond belief in such a short period of time. Here is a transcription »
