October 2015 ESE Newsletter

Geophysics Field Day in Hyde Park

The start of a new academic year: ESE welcomes new undergraduate students, Geophysics in Hyde park and more

Contents

Publications
Conferences, Lectures and Seminars
Impact and Media
Awards
Outreach
Fieldwork
PhD Vivas
Announcements

Publications

Abbott, S.S., John, C.M., and Fraser, A.J., (2015). Detailed 3-D depositional architecture of Late Jurassic carbonate-anhydrite cycles (Brightling Mine, Weald Basin, UK). Marine and Petroleum Geology. DOI: 10.1016/j.marpetgeo.2015.10.012.

Allen, P.A., Armitage, J.J., Whittaker, A.C., Michael, N.A., Roda-Boluda, D.C. & D’Arcy, M. (2015) Fragmentation model of the grain size mix of sediment supplied to basins. Journal of Geology, 123, 405-427, DOI:10.1086/683113. 

Duffy O.B., Bell R.E., Jackson CA-L, Gawthorpe RL, Whipp PS, 2015, Fault growth and interactions in a multiphase rift fault network: Horda Platform, Norwegian North Sea, Journal of Structural Geology, Vol: 80, Pages: 99-119

Ochoa Gonzalez R. and Weiss D. Zinc Isotope Variability in Three Coal-fired Power Plants: A Predictive Model for Determining Isotopic Fractionation During Combustion. Environ. Sci. Technol. 20 (2015) 12560-7. http://pubsdc3.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs.est.5b02402 

Le Blond, J.S. (2015). Intellectual property: Safeguard the ideas of junior scientists, Nature Correspondence, DOI: 10.1038/526195b

Jones, R.R., Pearce, M.A., Jacquemyn, C., Watson, F.E. (2015) Robust best-fit planes from geospatial data. Geosphere (in press)

Maidment, S. C. R., Brassey, C., Barrett, P.M. (2015) The postcranial skeleton of an exceptionally complete individual of the plated dinosaur Stegosaurus stenops (Dinosauria: Thyreophora) from the Upper Jurassic Morrison Formation of Wymoing, USA. PLoS One 10(10): e0138352.

Manzoor, S., Simperler, A., Korre A., (2015) A theoretical study of the reaction kinetics of amines released into the atmosphere from CO2 capture. International Journal of Greenhouse Gas Control. DOI:10.1016/j.ijggc.2015.05.012.

Prelat A., Pankhania S., Jackson CA-L, Hodgson DM (2015). Slope gradient and lithology as controls on the initiation of submarine slope gullies; insights from the North Carnarvon Basin, Offshore NW Australia. Sedimentary Geology, Vol: 329, Pages: 12-17

Salimzadeh, S., Khalili, N. (2015). Three-dimensional numerical model for double-porosity media with two miscible fluids including geomechanical response. International Journal of Geomechanics. doi: 10.1061/(ASCE)GM.1943-5622.0000494

Stevenson C.J., Jackson CA-L, Hodgson D.M., Hubbard S.M., Eggenhuisen J.T. (2015). Deep-Water Sediment Bypass. Journal of Sedimentary Research, Vol: 85, Pages: 1058-1081

Villamizar, C.A., Hampson, G.J., Flood, Y.S., Fitch, P.J.R. (2015). Object-based modelling of avulsion-generated sandbody distributions and connectivity in a fluvial reservoir analogue of low to moderate net-to-gross ratio. Petroleum Geoscience, v. 21, p. 249-270. DOI: 10.1144/petgeo2015-004 

Conferences, Lectures and Seminars

Julie Prytulak was invited to kick off the Departmental Seminar Series at the University of Bonn, Germany on October 22nd.  She spoke on the topic of “What can stable vanadium isotopes do for you?”  Julie gave the same invited seminar a week later at the Open University, UK.

Christian Jacobs gave an invited talk entitled "Research Data Management for Computational Science"  at the University of Sheffield's Open Data Science Initiative event.

Chris Jackson gave an invited talk at the Geologists’ Association monthly meeting at Burlington House, Piccadilly. His talk was entitled ‘The Rock that Wouldn’t Stay Still’ and focused on the origins and significance of evaporite deposits. 

Philip Mannion and PhD student Jonathan Tennant attended the annual meeting of the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology (14–17^th Oct), this year held in Dallas, Texas. Aside from staring at the 6^th floor window of the Book Depository from where JFK was shot, Phil gave a talk on a new dinosaur from France (‘The earliest known titanosauriform sauropod dinosaur and the evolution of Brachiosauridae’) and Jon presented a poster entitled ‘Environmental drivers of crocodyliform diversity and extinction through the Jurassic/Cretaceous boundary’. 

On 27 October, Robert Zimmerman gave an invited talk entitled "The role of the intermediate principal stress in petroleum geomechanics", at the monthly meeting of the Society of Petroleum Engineers London Chapter.

Robert Zimmerman lectured at the EC-sponsored "Advanced Course on CO2 Sequestration in Deep Geological Formations", held at Montpellier, France, from 19-21 October. The course, which included a field trip to the Maguelone CO2 injection test site, was attended by over 40 participants, including ESE PDRA Saeed Salimzadeh.

Impact and Media

ESE has ranked 1st place in The Times and The Sunday Times Good University Guide 2016 for Geology. With a total score of 100%, we are now ranked as the top university department in the UK for Earth Science. The quality of our teaching scored 99.9%. A big congratulations to all for being a part of this great achievement.

Dick Selley has been filmed for one TV and one promotional film on the impact of geology & climate change on UK viticulture. He has given talks on Wealden petroleum exploration and the hydrogeology of the North Downs to the Mole Valley Conservative Association and the Effingham Local History Group respectively.

"The Geological Society organised #askageologist for Earth Science week (October 11th-16th). 3 of the 5 geoscientists were from the RSM; Jon Tennant (@protohedgehog), Chris Jackson (@seis_matters) and Lizzie Day (@lizzieday). They answered questions on a range of geo-topics, including evolution, hydrocarbons and whether the moon could be made of cheese. You can catch up on the conversations here. 

Awards

Several members of staff have been awarded fellowship of the Higher Education Academy. Lorraine Craig has been awarded Senior Fellowship, and Ian Bastow and Mitch D’Arcy have been awarded fellowship. All staff with teaching responsibilities can apply for Fellowship, and PhD students with experience as a GTA can apply for Associate Fellowship. The Education Development Unit offers support for applicants throughout the year.

Undergraduate student Harry Fisher has won Second Place in the 2015 Neftex Earth Model Award, for his project entitled ‘Chlorite chemistry as a vectoring tool in mineral exploration: application to the propylitic alteration zone of the Lagalochan porphyry Cu-Au-Mo prospect, Argyll, Scotland’. He will collect a £1000 prize at the Geological Society Founders Day Dinner in November, and the award also includes a matching £1000 prize for the department. Harry’s supervisors were Robin Armstrong, Clara Wilkinson and Jamie Wilkinson.

Christian Jacobs was awarded the early career Imperial College High Performance Computing Prize for his 2015 paper "An improved quantitative measure of the tendency for volcanic ash plumes to form in water: implications for the deposition of marine ash beds", which demonstrated a high level of scientific impact in the fields of numerical volcanology and sedimentation through the use of high-performance computing facilities. The award was presented by Professor James Stirling and Professor Peter Haynes at the Imperial College HPC Summer School.

Outreach

Lizzie Day gave a talk to the Physics society of Henrietta Barnet School at the end of September.

PhD student Amelia Davies wrote an article "Diving on a Permian Reef" for Rockwatch, a magazine by the Geologists' assiociation aimed at 7-16 year olds.

Mike Streule gave a lecture on the Tectonics of the Alps to the London branch of the Open University Geological Society.

Fieldwork

The Geophysics Society organised a Geophysics Field Day in Hyde Park on Wednesday 21^st October. Undergraduate Emma Pearce arranged for the society to borrow some geophysical equipment from specialist company Geomatrix. Supported by fellow undergraduates Katie Bell, Sophie Butcher and Catherine Spurin, the team did a fantastic job setting up the equipment and demonstrating its use to an enthusiastic group of 1^st and 2^nd year students. They were supported by Ian Bastow, Lizzie Day, Rob Lowther and PhD student Alex Perrin. Despite a bit of rain the day was enjoyable for all and a big help for students studying applied geophysics. Congratulations to Emma and the team for organising this field day.

Along with research staff and PhD students from the University of Leeds, Chris Jackson undertook fieldwork in the Neuquén Basin, Argentina (6th-12th October). The fieldwork, which was part of the LOBE2 project based at the universities of Leeds and Manchester, focused on the sedimentology and stratigraphy of Lower Jurassic, early post-rift deep-water deposits. Apart from the rocks, the active Chilean volcanoes, visible just across the border, were very invigorating…

New 1^st year undergraduates were welcomed to the department with their first field trip to Leicestershire. They were by Mark Sutton, Mark Sephton, Matt Genge, Alex Whittaker, Philippa Mason, Julie Prytulak, Emma Passmore,  Lizze day, Amy Gilligan, Mike Streule, Lorraine Craig, Rob Lowther and Alexander Norori McCormac. PhD students Chris Dean and Jay Shah also helped out. 

PhD Vivas

James Lewis passed his viva, examined by Monica Grady and Tina van de Flierdt, on the 22nd October with very minor corrections. James' project was supervised by Mark Sephton and Matt Genge.

Announcements

Jennifer Le Blond has taken up a Visiting Scholar position at UMass and Harvard. Jennifer will be based at UMass in Lowell, working with Profs David Wegman and Susan Woskie furthering her research into chronic kidney disease until the end of March 2016.