The crystallography and crystal chemistry of naturally occurring inorganic compounds (minerals). The identification, origin, distribution and use of minerals. Laboratory work includes the principles and methods of optical mineralogy, X-ray diffraction, back-scattered electron microscopy, and electron beam microanalysis. Three hours of lecture and three hours of lecture/discussion and directed laboratory.

Recommended requisite: GEOL 111, CHEM 151 or 155 or their equivalent. Fall semester. Professor Cheney.

This course focuses on the history of life as preserved in the sedimentary rock record.  Students will learn how paleontologists and geobiologists use skeletal fossils, molecular fossils, and geochemical signatures to ask and answer questions about the evolution of ancient life and Earth history.  Students will study the origination, radiation, and extinction of major groups of organisms in the context of global environmental change, with an emphasis on invertebrate and microbial life.

As the science that considers the origin and evolution of the earth, Geology provides students with an understanding of what is known about the earth and how we know it, how the earth “works” and why we think it behaves as it does. In particular this course focuses upon the earth as an evolving and dynamic system where change is driven by energy generated within the earth.

From the earliest civilizations, humankind has been a major agent of environmental change. However, from the dawn of the industrial age, when fossil fuels were first tapped as an energy resource, the rate of this change has increased exponentially. In this course, we will discover how and why human activity influences climate change by examining the recent geologic record of our climate and by exploring processes that affect the climate in modern natural systems.