The Best Preserved Trilobites 

The New Scientist magazine has THIS ARTICLE which is based on the discovery of some remarkably well preserved Cambrian trilobites in Morocco. The original article can be found HERE. Full access is behind a pay wall but you can download a PDF, from the same page, which contains a huge amount of detail, including maps, illustrations and references.

The trilobites were preserved through rapid ash burial in a pyroclastic flow entering a shallow marine environment.

This fossil shows the digestive system (blue), the hypostome (green), the labrum (red) and selected appendages

Arnaud Mazurier/University of Poitiers

The finest details of its exterior and interior have been preserved. The illustration below gives you some idea of the level of detail.

 Tour de France Geology

Some of you may be aware that the Tour de France starts today - Saturday 29th June. One of the joys of following it is looking at the scenery, especially the views from the hovering helicopters. And often the geology is intriguing. A correspondent brought THIS WEBSITE to my attention. This will be giving a geological perspective to each stage.

Just to be contrary, this year the Tour starts in Florence, Italy and the web site talks about the tectonics of the Appenines. THE ARTICLE for today is written by someone who knows what she is talking about and she gives references for further reading. 

Each day of the Tour has a different geological topic and a different author. I hope they will all be so informative.

Tectonic units of the Northern Apennines with indicated buried faults (Figure from Conti et al., 2020). The course of stage 1 in yellow.

 Is Geological Research Becoming Less Interesting?

Over the last while I have been floundering to find things to put in the blog. There has still been a lot of local geological happenings which I am always pleased to highlight, but there has been a dearth of other stuff.

I thought this was just me not looking hard enough but then I came across THIS ARTICLE from a man who has been the source of many of the articles I have published. And he says the same! Why this should be so, neither he or I can think of a good reason. Let us hope it is just a passing phase.

I hope he (and I) find some interesting articles soon. If you came across something notable, let me know and it will appear here.

 Madygen - a Possible Future Excursion?

I came across THIS ARTICLE in New Scientist because I was seeing many photos of colourful rock strata, most of which looked as if they had been "improved" greatly - see the two examples below - they are photos of the same place!

Eventually I found the following photo which seems relatively untouched by Photoshop.

The accompanying article was equally interesting. It concerns the attempt to get the Madygen area declared a Geopark. Madygen is in Kyrgyzstan and was once part of the USSR.

Geologically the area has a lot going for it - rocks, fossils, a fascinating geological history. It is everything else which is going to make things difficult. If you thought the North West Highlands was remote, this part of Kyrgyzstan is (almost) out of this world. 

To be recognised by UNESCO, a Geopark must have tourist infrastructure, including trails, information signage and places to stay nearby. The Batgen Region of Kyrgyzstan, where Madygen is, is the poorest of the country and almost everything is not there!

And to make things worse, most of the geological knowledge of the area is held in the Russian Academy of Sciences in Moscow.

I hope that the area becomes a Geopark but I suspect it will be a few years before I will be advertising excursions to the area.

 Down to Earth Extra June 2024

The June 2024 edition of Down to Earth Extra has been published. You can download it HERE or you can read it below.