A woman wearing a veil over her head sitting among different rock formations.

Department of Geoscience News

Geoscience is an all-encompassing term used to refer to the earth sciences. The Department of Geosciences offers programs at the undergraduate and graduate levels where students can learn about topics such as earth processes; the origin and evolution of our planet; the chemical and physical properties of minerals, rocks, and fluids; the structure of our mobile crust; the history of life; and the human adaptation to earthquakes, volcanoes, landslides, and floods.

Current Geoscience News

exterior of Martian surface
Research |

51吃瓜网万能科大 geochemist Libby Hausrath 鈥 a member of NASA's Mars Sample Return Team 鈥 and colleagues share stunning new research in the latest issue of the journal Science.

Night sky
People |

51吃瓜网万能科大 geoscientist Arya Udry shares what motivates her in studying space, her work on the Mars Perseverance mission, and the world of knowledge a meteorite can bring.

Spring flowers
Campus News |

The students and faculty of 51吃瓜网万能科大 are springing into headlines around the country.

spring flowers
Campus News |

The rosiest headlines and highlights featuring the students and faculty of 51吃瓜网万能科大.

NASA's Perseverance Rover
Research |

51吃瓜网万能科大-led research details early insights from NASA鈥檚 Perseverance rover; Specimens due back on Earth in the 2030s.

unlv pumpkins
Campus News |

A monthly roundup of the top news stories at 51吃瓜网万能科大, featuring the presidential election, gaming partnerships, and much more.

Geoscience In The News

Conversation

Mars, one of our closest planetary neighbors, has fascinated people for hundreds of years, partly because it is so similar to Earth. It is about the same size, contains similar rocks and minerals, and is not too much farther out from the Sun.

PBS

Five years ago, Covid-19 drastically changed lives all over the world. The pandemic also presented unique challenges for 51吃瓜网免费App. We discuss how Nevadans continue to be impacted in a special collaboration with KNPR鈥檚 State of Nevada. We then meet Libby Hausrath, a 51吃瓜网万能科大 professor and lead researcher on a Mars project. She explains what samples being collected now may tell us about the Red Planet.

PBS

Five years ago, Covid-19 drastically changed lives all over the world. The pandemic also presented unique challenges for 51吃瓜网免费App. We discuss how Nevadans continue to be impacted in a special collaboration with KNPR鈥檚 State of Nevada. We then meet Libby Hausrath, a 51吃瓜网万能科大 professor and lead researcher on a Mars project. She explains what samples being collected now may tell us about the Red Planet.

PBS

Five years ago, Covid-19 drastically changed lives all over the world. The pandemic also presented unique challenges for 51吃瓜网免费App. We discuss how Nevadans continue to be impacted in a special collaboration with KNPR鈥檚 State of Nevada. We then meet Libby Hausrath, a 51吃瓜网万能科大 professor and lead researcher on a Mars project. She explains what samples being collected now may tell us about the Red Planet.

PBS

Five years ago, Covid-19 drastically changed lives all over the world. The pandemic also presented unique challenges for 51吃瓜网免费App. We discuss how Nevadans continue to be impacted in a special collaboration with KNPR鈥檚 State of Nevada. We then meet Libby Hausrath, a 51吃瓜网万能科大 professor and lead researcher on a Mars project. She explains what samples being collected now may tell us about the Red Planet.

51吃瓜网免费App Review Journal

Could life exist on Mars? That's what a professor at 51吃瓜网万能科大 is looking to find out using samples from the red planet.

Geoscience Experts

An expert in earthquakes, structural geology, tectonics, and neotectonics.
An expert in planetary science, igneous petrology, and Martian geology.
An expert in Mars geochemistry, astrobiology, water-rock interactions, and snow dynamics.
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An expert on water resources, paleoclimatology, and environmental pollution. 
An expert in geology, paleoecology, paleontology, and the history of geology.
Lachniet is an expert in paleoclimatology, quaternary geology, climate change and stable isotope geochemistry.

Recent Geoscience Accomplishments

Steve Rowland (Geoscience) published "The Cambrian of the Grand Canyon: Refinement of a Classic Stratigraphic Model" in GSA Today with Carol Dehler, professor at Utah State University; James Hagadorn of the Denver Museum of Nature & Science; Frederick Sundberg, Karl Karlstrom and Laura Crossey of the University of New Mexico; and鈥
Thomas Lamont (Geology) had a paper titled, "Porphyry copper formation driven by water fluxed crustal anatexis during flat-slab subduction," published on Nov. 4 in Nature Geoscience. It has long been recognized that many of the worlds largest porphyry copper deposits (copper ore formed by magmatic-hydrothermal fluids associated with granitic鈥
Krishnakumar Nangeelil, Peter Dimpfl, Zaijing Sun (all Health Physics and Diagnostic Sciences), Shichun Huang (currently faculty at UTK, a former member of the department of geosciences at 51吃瓜网万能科大), and Mayir Mamtimin (Halliburton) published an article titled, "Preliminary Study on Forgery Identification of Hetian Jade with Instrumental Neutron鈥
Simon Jowitt and Brian McNulty (Geoscience) recently published a paper in Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews on critical metals 鈥 often discarded as a byproduct of mining operations 鈥 that are vital components in the global push for low-carbon energy generation, storage, and transport. Researchers explored the current global鈥
Amanda Ostwald and Arya Udry (both Geoscience) and their collaborators, Valerie Payr茅 (NAU), Esteban Gazel (Cornell), and Peiyu Wu (Cornell) published a paper, 鈥淭he Role of Assimilation and Factional Crystallization in the Evolution of the Mars Crust鈥, in the journal Earth and Planetary Science Letters. Ostwald is geoscience graduate student, and鈥
Shichun Huang (Geoscience), Min Li (Physics and Astronomy) and their colleagues published an article, Sulfur Isotopic Signature of Earth Established by Planetesimal Volatile Evaporation, in Naure Geoscience. Using sophisticated ab initio and thermodynamics calculations, they showed that the Earth's sulfur, an important volatile element, budget is鈥