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Books in Earth and planetary sciences

Elsevier's Earth and Planetary Sciences collection brings together pioneering research on the complexities of our planet and beyond. Covering topics from Earth's structural dynamics and ecosystems to planetary exploration, these titles support advancements in geoscience, environmental science, and space studies, offering essential insights for researchers, professionals, and students.

BooksJournals

  • Natural Phenomena

    • 1st Edition
    • Volume 14A
    • English
    Developments in Geotechnical Engineering, Vol. 14A: Rockslides and Avalanches, 1: Natural Phenomena focuses on attempts to provide a foundation for studies of mass movement phenomena in the Western Hemisphere. The selection first elaborates on Albert Heim's observations on landslides and relevance to modern interpretations, Frank rockslide in Alberta, Canada, and Lower Gros Ventre slide in Wyoming, U.S.A. Discussions focus on geologic environment, events triggered by rise and fall of slide lake level, description of slide mass and zone of detachment, stability analysis, travel distance of sturzstrom deposits, and geometry of the Elm sturzstrom deposits. The publication then takes a look at Madison Canyon rockslide in Montana, U.S.A., Little Tahoma Peak rockfalls and avalanches in Mount Rainier, Washington, U.S.A., Sherman Glacier rock avalanche in Alaska, U.S.A., and Nevados Huascaran avalanches in Peru. Topics include rockslide kinematics, associated seismic activity, meteorological and hydrological conditions, mode of emplacement of other Alaskan rock avalanches, and applicability of mechanical fluidization to other rock avalanches. The text examines the mechanics of glacier movement, dynamics of snow avalanches, failure of snow slopes, and role of gravity in plate tectonics. The selection is a valuables reference for researchers wanting to study further rockslides and avalanches.

  • Engineering Geology

    • 1st Edition
    • Q Zaruba
    • English
    Engineering Geology attempts to provide an understanding of relations between the geology of a building site and the engineering structure. It presents examples taken from real-life experience and practice to provide evidence for the significance of engineering geology in planning, design, construction, and maintenance of engineering structures. The book begins with an introduction of geological investigations, distinguishing between the reconnaissance investigation, the detailed investigation, and investigation during construction. It then explains the significance of geological maps and sections; the mechanical behavior of rocks; subsurface investigation for engineering construction; and geophysical methods. The remaining chapters discuss the physical and chemical weathering of rocks; slope movements; and geological investigations for buildings, roads and railways, tunnels, and hydraulic structures. This book is intended particularly for civil engineering students and students of engineering geology in the university faculties of natural sciences. It describes geological features so as to be comprehensible to Technical College students and to explain construction problems intelligibly for geology students. The book will also be of assistance to planners, civil engineers, and graduate engineering geologists.

  • Analytical Geochemistry

    • 1st Edition
    • Volume 5
    • L Brealey
    • English
    Analytical Geochemistry is the fifth book in the Methods in Geochemistry and Geophysics series. This book serves as an introductory manual, presenting techniques that are frequently required in the analysis of rocks and minerals. After a broad introduction to geochemistry, the book explores qualitative and quantitative chemical analysis. It then focuses on the chemical analysis of the minor elements, such as antimony, arsenic, barium, beryllium, bismuth, boron, bromine, cadmium, carbon, cerium, chlorine, chromium, cobalt, columbium and tantalum, copper, fluorine, gallium, germanium, gold, hydrogen, indium, iodine, iridium, lead, lithium, manganese, mercury, molybdenum, nickel, nitrogen, osmium, oxygen, palladium, platinum, rhenium, rhodium, rubidium and cesium, ruthenium, scandium, selenium and tellurium, silver, strontium, sulfur, thallium, thorium, tin, titanium, tungsten, uranium, vanadium, zinc, and zirconium and hafnium. The remaining chapters of the book illustrate different laboratory instruments, including emission spectrography, flame photometry, X-ray diffraction, fluorimetry, and chromatography. This book serves as a guide for geologists especially those who did not study chemistry as undergraduates.

  • Supergene and Surficial Ore Deposits

    Textures and Fabrics
    • 1st Edition
    • Volume 3
    • Bozzano G Luisa
    • English
    Supergene and Surficial Ore Deposits; Textures and Fabrics is a collection of papers that deals with economic geological deposits, particularly as endogenic type, or as an integral part of their geological environment. One paper explores the possibility that the evolution of ores of sedimentary affiliation or of sedimentary rocks and their chemistry during geologic history can be a product of the evolution of the outer spheres of the earth combined with a cycling phenomena that proceeds in a spiral way. Another paper discusses the role of climate on a large range of depositional environments through mobilization, both by chemical and physical events, of metal-ions. Mobilization can also occur by controlled deposition and enrichment of the "mobilized" ions in a certain sedimentary environment. Various depositions occur in different climates, for example, bauxites, requiring higher precipitation levels, form in humid zones. One paper points that ore-mineral accumulations controlled by descending supergene solutions play a significant role in ore-mineral depositions. The collection is beneficial to geologists, industrial chemists, researchers, technical designers, and engineers whose works are related with ore deposits and mining.

  • Granite Landforms

    • 1st Edition
    • C.R. Twidale
    • English
    Granite Landforms provides a systematic, coherent, and comprehensive account and analysis of granite landforms. It examines granite forms and their genesis; the morphology of granite exposures; the nature of the materials from which granitic rocks have evolved; and the weathering processes near the Earth’s surface. It also describes major landforms and assemblages, as well as the minor features that have evolved on the major hosts. Organized into four parts encompassing 12 chapters, this book begins with an overview of granite, including their characteristics, occurrences, and composition. It then discusses the factors that influence the weathering of granitic rocks and considers boulders and inselbergs, the all-slopes topography in granite, granite plains and rock basins, granite forms associated with steep slopes, and scarp foot depressions. The reader is also introduced to the piedmont angle, grooves or flutings, caves and tafoni, split rocks, cracked blocks and plates, and the role of climate in the development of landforms on granitic outcrops. Geologists, geomorphologists, geology students, and anyone interested in geology will find this book extremely useful.

  • Au, U, Fe, Mn, Hg, Sb, W, and P Deposits

    • 1st Edition
    • Volume 7
    • Bozzano G Luisa
    • English
    Handbook of Strata-Bound and Stratiform Ore Deposits, Volume 7: Au, U, Fe, Mn, Hg, Sb, W, and P Deposits focuses on the characteristics, properties, origins, and structures of Au, U, Fe, Mn, Hg, Sb, W, and P deposits. The selection first elaborates on gold in the Proterozoic sediments of South Africa, nature of the Witwatersrand gold-uranium deposits, and origin of Western-States type uranium mineralization. Discussions focus on tectonic conditions, sedimentation, mineralization and alteration, architecture of the Witwatersrand Basin, source of wealth in the Witwatersrand Basin, gold mineralization in South Africa, and ground-rules for gold prospecting. The text then ponders on origin of the Precambrian banded iron-formations, aspects of the sedimentary petrology of cherty iron-formation, and genetic problems and environmental features of volcanosedimentary iron-ore deposits of the Lahn-Dill Type. Concerns cover geological setting, crystallization structures, origin of cherty iron-formations, similarities and differences between banded and oolitic iron-formations, regional geologic distribution, and general diagnostic statement. The manuscript examines sedimentary phosphate deposits, ancient manganese deposits, and freshwater ferromanganese deposits. The selection is a dependable reference for researchers wanting to explore Au, U, Fe, Mn, Hg, Sb, W, and P deposits.

  • Computational Methods in Subsurface Flow

    • 3rd Edition
    • Peter S. Huyakorn
    • English
    Computational Methods in Subsurface Flow explores the application of all of the commonly encountered computational methods to subsurface problems. Among the problems considered in this book are groundwater flow and contaminant transport; moisture movement in variably saturated soils; land subsidence and similar flow and deformation processes in soil and rock mechanics; and oil and geothermal reservoir engineering. This book is organized into 10 chapters and begins with an introduction to partial differential and various solution approaches used in subsurface flow. The discussion then shifts to the fundamental theory of the finite element method, with emphasis on the Galerkin finite element method and how it can be used to solve a wide range of subsurface problems. The subjects treated range from simple problems of saturated groundwater flow to more complex ones of moisture movement and multiphase flow in petroleum reservoirs. The chapters that follow focus on fluid flow and mechanical deformation of conventional and fractured porous media; point and subdomain collocation techniques and the boundary element technique; and the applications of finite difference techniques to single- and multiphase flow and solute transport. The final chapter is devoted to other alternative numerical methods that are based on combinations of the standard finite difference approach and classical mathematics. This book is intended for senior undergraduate and graduate students in geoscience and engineering, as well as for professional groundwater hydrologists, engineers, and research scientists who want to solve or model subsurface problems using numerical techniques.

  • Geostatistical Ore Reserve Estimation

    • 1st Edition
    • M. David
    • English
    Developments in Geomathematics, 2: Geostatistical Ore Reserve Estimation focuses on the methodologies, processes, and principles involved in geostatistical ore reserve estimation, including the use of variogram, sampling, theoretical models, and variances and covariances. The publication first takes a look at elementary statistical theory and applications; contribution of distributions to mineral reserves problems; and evaluation of methods used in ore reserve calculations. Concerns cover estimation problems during a mine life, origin and credentials of geostatistics, precision of a sampling campaign and prediction of the effect of further sampling, exercises on grade-tonnage curves, theoretical models of distributions, and computational remarks on variances and covariances. The text then examines variogram and the practice of variogram modeling. Discussions focus on solving problems in one dimension, linear combinations and average values, theoretical models of isotropic variograms, the variogram as a geological features descriptor, and the variogram as the fundamental function in error computations. The manuscript ponders on statistical problems in sample preparation, orebody modeling, grade-tonnage curves, ore-waste selection, and planning problems, the practice of kriging, and the effective computation of block variances. The text is a valuable source of data for researchers interested in geostatistical ore reserve estimation.

  • Biogeochemistry

    An Analysis of Global Change
    • 1st Edition
    • William H. Schlesinger
    • English
    Biogeochemistry: An Analysis of Global Change deals with changes in the biogeochemistry of the Earth's surface. The book covers the basics about the effect of life on the chemistry of the Earth, with emphasis on the microbial and chemical reactions that occur on land, in the sea, and in the atmosphere. Computer models are used to help understand elemental cycling and ecosystem function. This book is divided into two sections and comprised of 14 chapters. The discussion begins with an overview of the chemical processes controlling the environment in which we live. A simple model for the biogeochemistry of the Earth's surface is described. The chapters that follow examine models that astrophysicists suggest for the origin of chemical elements, as well as models for the formation of the solar system and the planets. The biogeochemical reactions in the atmosphere, lithosphere, and terrestrial biosphere are also described, along with rock weathering on land and the processes that drive the weathering reactions. The reader is introduced to biogeochemical cycling on land; biogeochemistry in freshwater wetlands and lakes, rivers and estuaries, and the sea; and the global water, carbon, sulfur, nitrogen, and phosphorus cycles. The book concludes with the argument that human population growth is the basis of every major environmental issue facing the world today. This book is intended as a textbook for college-level and graduate students who are interested in global change.

  • Geochemical Facies Analysis

    • 1st Edition
    • Volume 11
    • Warner Ernst
    • English
    Methods in Geochemistry and Geophysics 11: Geochemical Facies Analysis summarizes research regarding geochemical analysis of sedimentary facies. It demonstrates the extent to which geochemical criteria can be used to interpret sedimentary facies and considers the physicochemical criteria that affect the sediments deposited, including salinity, temperature, and redox potential. It also examines element or isotope variations in sedimentary rocks that are associated with variations in the depositional environment. Organized into seven chapters, this volume begins by defining the facies. It also presents the prerequisites of geochemical facies analysis. This includes the permanence of the composition of the oceans through long periods of the Earth's history, along with climatic, tectonic, and biological influences. The book then discusses methodological prerequisites for the determination of geochemical facies. It provides the results of geochemical facies analyses, including those for hydrofacies, lithofacies, and biofacies. In addition, it explains the non-chemical methods of facies analysis. The book concludes by looking at practical applications and future importance of geochemical facies analysis. This is an invaluable source book for students, geochemists, and geophysicists.

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