EarthRef.org Events & Conferences


EarthRef.org Events & Conferences Below all events organized or co-sponsored by EarthRef.org are listed.

2017 MagIC Workshop, SIO, La Jolla, 24-27 Jan, 2017

The The 2017 MagIC Workshop will be held in La Jolla, CA from 24-27 January, 2017. There will be two days of talks on the Earth's magnetic field from the beginning to the present. A MagIC Database Upload Workshop will be held on the third day and a Pmagpy hack day on the forth. Registration opens October, 2016.

workshop home page | MagIC home page

First MagIC Workshop, SIO, La Jolla, 24-26 March 2002

The First MagIC Workshop will be held in La Jolla, USA from 24-26 March, 2002. The goal of this workshop is for the community to design a generic and global database comprising modern paleo, rock and geomagnetic data. Note that the Abstract Volume for this workshop is now available.

program and abstract volume | read more

MagIC Science & Database Workshop, SIO, La Jolla, 12-14 May, 2014

The MagIC Science & Database Workshop will be held in La Jolla, CA from 11-13 September, 2014. There will be a Special Hands-on MagIC Data Upload Workshop and scientific keynotes on biogeomagnetism, magnetic stratigraphy, and magnetic properties under high pressure.

registration | workshop home page | MagIC home page

MagIC Science & Database Workshop, SIO, La Jolla, 19-21 September, 2011

The MagIC Science & Database Workshop will be held in La Jolla, CA from 19-21 September, 2011. There will be a Special Hands-on MagIC Data Upload Workshop and scientific keynotes on biogeomagnetism, magnetic stratigraphy, and magnetic properties under high pressure.

registration | workshop home page | MagIC home page

Rio Grande Rise NBP1808 Expedition (October - November 2018)

This expedition's main goal is to carry out 40Ar/39Ar dating and collect geochemical data on the lava flows that formed the Rio Grande Rise (RGR) structure roughly between 80 and 40 million years ago. We will use this data to refine plate motion models of the South American and African tectonic plates, while improving our understanding of conjugate intra-plate volcanic systems that form over long geological periods on two separating plates. In this case, the sister volcanic system of the Rio Grande Rise is the Walvis Ridge hotspot trail on the African plate. Previous research has been conducted on Walvis Ridge, and it is now the RGR's turn! We are collecting this data by mapping and dredging the 40 seamounts, rift zone valleys, and steep escarpments in the Rio Grande Rise, from 28S and 39W to 39S and 20W.

GOLF 0-5-6 (2016): Exploring the Earth's Magnetic Field Intensity on the Southernmost Continent

Earth's magnetic field is decreasing rapidly, leading some to propose that it will undergo collapse followed by a return to its usual strength but in the opposite direction, a phenomenon known as a "polarity reversal" which last happened approximately 800,000 years ago. Such a collapse would have a potentially devastating effect on the ability of the magnetic field to shield us from cosmic ray bombardment. We will study how Earth's magnetic field intensity changed during the last 5 million years and hope to determine whether the current decrease in field intensity is a common occurrence that does not necessarily indicate an upcoming reversal or whether it is indeed a rare behavior that will likely lead into the reversal of the magnetic field.

GOLF 4-3-9 (2012): Exploring the Rock Bottom of the Food Chain in McMurdo

Volcanoes host a deep dark biosphere that may contain a substantial fraction of the biomass on Earth, but we know very little about it. How does microbial life adjust to darkness, making organic compounds without light or energy from existing organic components? How does the temperature or the availability of oxygen control microbial function in these settings? G-439 uses the extreme environments of volcanoes in the McMurdo area as a model system to shed light on these questions. G-439 will work below the sea-ice, in frozen lakes in the Dry Valleys and fumarolic ice caves on the ice-covered 14,000 feet tall Mt. Erebus volcano, the southernmost active volcano on Planet Earth. Follow this website, read about the G-439 project, and find out about their work, encounters and adventures at the bottom of the globe.

Walvis Ridge MV1203 Expedition (February-March 2012)

Expedition MV1203 aims to dredge 40 seamounts along the southwest portion of the Walvis Ridge seamount trail. The Walvis Ridge begins on the African continent and extends to near the mid-Atlantic Ridge. The southwest half of the Walvis Ridge appears to bifurcate into two distinct physical and geochemical trends, the Tristan (northern) and Gough (southern) tracks. The data we collect will assist in improving absolute plate motion models for the African continent, and knowledge of the geochemical evolution of plumes and the regional tectonic setting of the surrounding area. Visit the Expedition Website ...

IODP Expedition 330 to the Louisville Seamount Trail

IODP Expedition 330 to the Louisville Seamount Trail will drill four underwater volcanoes off the NE coast of New Zealand. One hypothesis states that these volcanoes formed above a narrow plume of hot mantle rising from a position deep in the Earth's mantle. For decades scientists assumed these mantle plumes remain anchored there for tens of millions years, but there is mounting evidence that mantle plumes wander in a large-scale mantle wind. This expedition aims to establish how much mantle plumes may have moved over the last 80 million years and whether the Louisville hotspot moved coherently with the Hawaii hotspot. Follow the expedition online ...

GOLF 4-3-9 (2010): Exploring the Rock Bottom of the Food Chain at McMurdo

Five scientists from Oregon, Maine and California (and their team mascot "da Microbe") are traveling to Antarctica to study the "Rock Bottom" of the food chain in the extreme environments of McMurdo Sound. GOLF-439 scientists will be based at McMurdo station of the US Antarctic Program (USAP) on Ross Island from where they will embark on trips to remote locations and field camps in the Antarctic Dry Valleys, at Cape Evans, on Mount Erebus and in the Royal Society Range. Targets of their investigations will include moorings below the ice of Lake Fryxell (Taylor Valley), experiments below the sea-ice using SCUBA diving, hydrothermal vents and ice caves in the glaciers of Mt. Erebus, as well as seasonal creeks running through volcanic terrain that are fed by glacial melting in the short Antarctic summer.

GOLF 4-3-9 (2008): Exploring the Rock Bottom of the Food Chain at McMurdo

Two Scientists from Scripps Institution of Oceanography (La Jolla, California) and the School of Marine Sciences at the University of Maine (Orono, Maine) are traveling to Antarctica to study how microbes interact with rocks in the harsh environments of Antarctica. The project G-439 (spelled "golf-4-3-9") of the US Antarctic Program will begin on 27 October 2008 with a flight from Christchurch/New Zealand to McMurdo, Antarctica and it may last until Mid-December 2008. On this page, you will find regular updates of the 2008 expedition, exciting information about life in Antarctica, and reports on their adventures (and their work).

Hawaiian Volcano Field Trip, University of California, September 2010

Instructors Hubert Staudigel and Geoffrey Cook (SIO) are leading an Introductory course in Volcanology in September 2010, at Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, Hawaii. Participants will learn the fundamental aspects of physical and chemical volcanology in a course with a major field study component. Field work may involve hiking as much as 15 miles per day and gathering data in the form of GPS track data, digital photographs, and other notes. A Class Web Page is available where you can find information on how to register, a syllabus and other pertinent information.

FeMO2009 Jason II Dive Cruise, Loihi Seamount, October 2009

FeMO2008 Jason II Dive Cruise, Loihi Seamount, September 2008

FeMO2007 Jason II Dive Cruise, Loihi Seamount, October 2007

GOLF182 Antarctica Expedition, November 2006 to January 2007

Hawaiian Volcano Field Trip, University of California, September 2005

Instructors Peter Schiffman (UCD) , Hubert Staudigel (SIO) and Robert Zierenberg (UCD) conducted an Introductory course in Volcanology in September 2005, at Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, Hawaii. Participants learned the fundamental aspects of physical and chemical volcanology. This course has a major field study component and subjects which are introduced in lectures are reinforced and expanded upon through exercises in the field. Field work may involve hiking as much as 15 miles per day, and gathering data in the form of GPS track data, digital photographs, and other notes. A Class Web Page was developed to record the data and reports provided by students as well as to explore ways to present volcanology field data. Be certain to visit the Picture Galleries with special footage of the active lava flows.

ALIA Expedition to the Samoan Islands and Vailulu'u, April 2005

Scientists from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and Scripps Institution of Oceanography are teaming up on the Hawaiian research vessel the Kilo Moana to study the Samoan hotspot. They will leave Pago Pago on 4 April 2005 with an ambitious plan to study previously uncharted underwater volcanoes along the Samoan seamount chain that are scattered over almost 600 nautical miles, from is most recent and quite active Vailulu¿u submarine volcano in the east, to Combe Island in the west. The data and rocks collected during the ALIA Expedition will be used to explore the validity of the hotspot model, which predicts that ocean island and seamount chains are formed on moving lithospheric plates by stationary hotspots in the Earth¿s mantle. You can follow the findings of this cruise on our ERESE website, where we will post photo galleries, interviews, reports, video clips and preliminary data during the course of this expedition.

ALIA expedition home page | ERESE home page

Hawaiian Volcano Field Trip, University of California, September 2004

Instructors Peter Schiffman (UCD), Hubert Staudigel (SIO) and Robert Zierenberg (UCD) conducted an Introductory course in Volcanology in September 2004, at Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, Hawaii. Participants learned the fundamental aspects of physical and chemical volcanology. This course has a major field study component and subjects which are introduced in lectures are reinforced and expanded upon through exercises in the field. Field work may involve hiking as much as 15 miles per day, and gathering data in the form of GPS track data, digital photographs, and other notes. A Class Web Page was developed to record the data and reports provided by students as well as to explore ways to present volcanology field data.