Pilot whales, northern lights, breakfast every day overlooking the ocean — it sounds like a dream Scandinavian cruise, but not one you’ll find on any travel site. In 2021, geoscientist Sarah Lambart embarked on a scientific mission to explore the geologic history that shaped the continents as we see them today. That mission took her past the Arctic Circle aboard a research vessel equipped with a drill rig that pulled up sediment and rock cores from the deep ocean floor, giving Lambart and her colleagues an insight into volcanic activity on Earth 60 million years ago. Read the full story here!

Let’s take a journey into the depths of the Earth, down through the crust and mantle nearly to the core. We’ll use seismic waves to show the way, since they echo through the planet following an earthquake and reveal its internal structure like radar waves. Down near the core, there are zones where seismic waves slow to a crawl. New research from the University of Utah finds that these enigmatic and descriptively-named ultra-low velocity zones are surprisingly layered. Modeling suggests that it’s possible some of these zones are leftovers from the processes that shaped the early Earth—remnants of incomplete mixing like clumps of flour in the bottom of a bowl of batter. “Of all of the features we know about in the deep mantle, ultra-low velocity zones represent what are probably the most extreme,” says Michael S. Thorne, associate professor in the Department of Geology and Geophysics. “Indeed, these are some of the most extreme features found anywhere in the planet.”

Congratulations to professor emeritus of geology and geophysics Bob Smith! He has been chosen as the 2021 recipient of the Colorado Scientific Society’s Past Presidents’ Award for Best Paper of the Year, honoring his work studying the anatomy of Old Faithful and the Yellowstone volcanic system.