The Origin Of Pseudotachylite And Its Parent Rock

Canada and especially Ontario have very interesting and much filled geologic pasts. Ontario has many types of rocks and minerals that have formed and are still forming due to the geology. Ontario has sedimentary rocks; igneous rock, and metamorphic rock as well as minerals such as gold, silver, quartz, and many more. In this paper, we will begin by talking about ten rocks that were collected right here in Windsor Ontario. The rocks were examined from the outside which tended to be weathered and the inside which were fresh.

Rock Canyon is an excellent site for geologic research and has been investigated by geologists from around Utah and neighboring states. With outstanding extrusions of quartzite, tillite and limestone, it’s a favored destination for hikers, rock climbers and scientists. The quartzite is considered the most unique feature of Rock Canyon as it’s one of the few clear and distinct examples of the sedimentary processes involved with a shallow marine setting. The tillite beneath the quartzite draws attention to the ancient glaciers to the past. In conjunction with the active Wasatch Fault found at its doorstep, Rock Canyon is an important place in Utah for geologists.

As a tectonic plate slides into the mantle, the heat releases fluids trapped in the plate. Seawater and carbon dioxide, rise into the upper plate and can partially melt the overlying crust, forming magma. And magma most likely means volcanoes are around.

Next, we can see that the rock displays a subtle porphyritic texture with plagioclase comprising the phenocrysts. The overall texture of the surrounding groundmass is granoblastic equigranular. Under thin section we also see a weakly defined foliation evidenced in the preferential alignment of actinolite grains and to a lesser extent chlorite grains. Undulose extinction is also observed in quartz indicating the rock was subject to deformation. The normalized quartz, alkali-feldspar, and plagioclase (QAP) values of this rock indicate that it is classified as a grano-diorite according to the IUGS QAPF classification system which is consistent with the hand sample interpretation.

This newly exposed rock already had small cracks - weathering and erosion took full advantage of these. Water would creep in and the freeze - thus expanding. This expansion would create more cracks. Wind and water eroded by carrying away particles from cracks like these, as well as from the surface of the rock and any other nooks. Not only did water wash particles away - it also softened the rock which made erosion easier.

Some rock’s in the Earth’s interior that are solid, are so hot that, if the pressure on these were released, or they are convected into a lower pressure zone, they could begin to melt

Many millions of years ago the Sierra Nevada was filled with ocean water until sediments began collecting and formed mountain ranges. Over a large period of time, the mountains began to wear out and became immersed in the ocean once again. Many different particles and materials began to make layers and created the first mountain system. After the Jurassic era, “…new strata were folded and crumpled and invaded by molten granite from below” (Beatty, 1943). A large

They are called transversal when pressure builds and the rock breaks the energy of the break

The research below is about erosion. The purpose of this research is to perform an experiment involving erosion. Erosion happens when earth is worn away, often because of ice, wind, or water. The way erosion happens is “fluid flow” and that is when water, air, and ice flow from point A to point B because of gravity. Weathering is also similar to erosion, but instead of wearing away earth, it is wearing away rock. Weathering is so strong, no rock is hard enough to protect itself from weathering. The process of erosion moves rock and earth from one place to another. Normally when erosion is in the form of ice that ice is a glacier.

and relationships of a working model. If a testable hypothesis is confirmed by a large

Lane County Historical Society 28, no.1 (Spring 1983): 16-28. “Igneous Rocks.” Living With Volcanic Past. http://vulcan.wr.usgs.gov/LivingWith/ VolcanicPast/Notes/igneous_rocks.html (accessed May 23, 2012). International Correspondence Schools.

During my own excursion to this geological phenomenon, I marvelled at the sheer vastness and unorthodox beauty of the formation, which I was severally reminded by the park’s agreeable staff is not classified as a mountain. If not a mountain, though, what is Enchanted Rock? As I was fairly young at the time of my visit and did not raise questions concerning Enchanted Rock’s identity, I only recently uncovered the nature of the dome, when conducting research for this essay.

~ Glaciers are formed when snow builds up for several years from snowfall that exceeds snow melt. Over time, as new snow compresses the existing snow, the weight causes the snow underneath to turn to ice. The hardening effect is similar to what happens when you pack a snowball in your hand. The pressure from additional layers of snow builds for up to thousands of years. Glaciers can grow and shrink as a result of changes in the amount of snowfall or changes in the amount of melting because of

Boulder has a complex geologic history. The lithology of each formation in Boulder will be discussed along with the interpreted depositional environment explaining what we see in the present day.

The author of this article is Beth Geiger, who is a geologist and a freelance writer. She has a background in Earth science, and has worked on many articles concerning outdoor adventures, such a 7 year stint as an editor to Canoe & Kayak magazine. The article is a summary of a publication from Geological Society Publications’, and written by Maximillian van Wyk de Vries. He is an undergraduate geology student at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland.