Lite Geology — Back-issues

Experience a small taste of the New Mexico Bureau of Geology and Mineral Resource’s (NMBGMR) scientific research from the comfort of your home. In this edition of Lite Geology, we explore a few of our labs and meet the geoscientists who work in them. These scientists investigate the geology and hydrology of New Mexico. We start our tour with Kelsey McNamara and Virgil Lueth at the X-ray Diffraction Lab, where they will discuss the science behind x-ray diffraction, then we’ll go down the hall to visit Lynn Heizler and Nels Iverson at the Electron Microprobe Lab, where we’ll learn about the electron microprobe and do an activity that uses an electron microprobe image to help students determine the pore size in a sample. Our tour will then leave the building and drive up the hill to visit the Subsurface Library with scientists Luke Martin, Joseph Grigg, and New Mexico Tech (NMT) geoscience student Hailey Dietz, and they will explain the importance of warehousing drilling cores and rock samples. We’ll then circle back to the NMBGMR building and visit the Chemistry Lab, where Dustin Baca will discuss basic chemistry concepts and water sample analysis. We will then visit the Apatite Fission-Track Lab, where Jake Thacker and Shari Kelley will share information about their research. To complete our tour, we’ll walk down the hall to the Argon Lab to meet geoscientist Matt Heizler, NMBGMR Associate Director of Labs and Sr. Geochronologist, as part of our ongoing “Through the Hand Lens’’ interview series. We hope you enjoy this virtual tour of the NMBGMR. Bon appètit.