Publications

We present a detailed example of how a subbasin develops adjacent to a transfer zone in the Rio Grande rift. The Embudo transfer zone in the Rio Grande rift is considered one of the classic examples and has been used as the inspiration for several theoretical models. Despite this attention, the history of its development into a major rift structure is poorly known along its northern...

The Midcontinent Rift System (MRS) is a Late Mesoproterozoic (∼1.1 Ga) sequence of volcanic and sedimentary rocks exposed in the Lake Superior Region of North America. The MRS continues to be the focus of much research due to its economic mineral deposits as well as its archive of Precambrian life and tectonic processes. In order to constrain the post-depositional thermal history of the...

Adsorption using activated alumina is a simple method for removing fluoride from drinking water, but to be cost effective the adsorption capacity must be high and effective long-term. The intent of this study was to assess changes in its adsorption capacity under varied conditions. This was determined by evaluating the physico-chemical properties, surface charge, and fluoride (F−)...

The growth and decay of ocean-island volcanoes are intrinsically linked to vertical movements. While the causes for subsidence are better understood, uplift mechanisms remain enigmatic. Santa Maria Island in the Azores Archipelago is an ocean-island volcano resting on top of young lithosphere, barely 480 km away from the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. Like most other Azorean islands, Santa Maria...

We report the first study of the Re-Os systematics of cobaltite (CoAsS) using disseminated grains and massive sulfides from samples of two breccia-type and two stratabound deposits in the Co-Cu-Au Idaho cobalt belt (ICB), Lemhi subbasin to the Belt-Purcell Basin, Idaho, USA. Using a 185Re + 190Os spike solution, magnetic and non-magnetic fractions of cobaltite mineral separates give...

The potential immediate effects of a hypothetical shock to Russia’s supply of selected mineral commodities on the world market and on individual countries were determined and monetized (in 2014 U.S. dollars). The mineral commodities considered were aluminum (refined primary), nickel (refined primary), palladium (refined) and platinum (refined), potash, and titanium (mill products), and...

In The Size of the Risk, Leisl Carr Childers chronicles the changing ways in which public lands of the Great Basin have been managed from the latter half of the nineteenth century through the late 1970s. The main focus is the State of Nevada, which constitutes the core of the Great Basin. Rather than proceeding chronologically, the book is organized by the uses to which lands were put...

An analytical method for the in situ measurement of “common” Pb isotope ratios in silicate glasses and minerals using a 193-nm excimer laser ablation (LA) system with a double-focusing single-collector (SC)-ICPMS is presented and evaluated as a possible alternative to multiple-collector (MC)-ICPMS. This LA-SC-ICPMS technique employs fast-scanning ion deflectors to sequentially place a...

Deep, episodic slow slip on the Cascadia subduction megathrust of western North America is accompanied by low-frequency tremor in a zone of high fluid pressure between 30 and 40 km depth. Tremor density (tremor epicenters per square kilometer) varies along strike, and lower tremor density statistically correlates with upper plate faults that accommodate northward motion and rotation of...

A probabilistic mineral resource assessment of metal resources in undiscovered porphyry copper deposits of the Ural Mountains in Russia and Kazakhstan was done using a quantitative form of mineral resource assessment. Permissive tracts were delineated on the basis of mapped and inferred subsurface distributions of igneous rocks assigned to tectonic zones that include magmatic arcs where...

We have assembled a library of spectra measured with laboratory, field, and airborne spectrometers. The instruments used cover wavelengths from the ultraviolet to the far infrared (0.2 to 200 microns [μm]). Laboratory samples of specific minerals, plants, chemical compounds, and manmade materials were measured. In many cases, samples were purified, so that unique spectral features of a...

The mission of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) National Minerals Information Center (NMIC) is to collect, analyze and disseminate information on the domestic and international supply of and demand for minerals and mineral materials essential to the U.S. economy and national security. Understanding mineral exploration activities and trends assists government policy makers, minerals...