Structural Geology at New Mexico Tech

Table of Contents

• Introduction
• Faculty and Adjuncts
• Research
  • Recent Graduate Students
• WWW Structural Resources
• Photos
• comments/suggestions/questions
• Field Trips

Introduction

New Mexico Tech has a large and diverse group of people involved in structural research, located in the Department of Earth and Environmental Science, the Department of Petroleum and Natural Gas Engineering, and the New Mexico Bureau of Mines and Mineral Resources. Interests of this group range from structures developed in metamorphic tectonites to faulting of unconsolidated sediments. Studies are conducted from detailed field work at all scales, modeling, and timing of deformation (fission track analysis and Ar/Ar geochronology). A recent thrust of members of this group has been to look at relationships between faulting and fluid flow in unconsolidated sediments.

New Mexico is, geologically speaking, a very diverse state, and many structural studies are possible within 1-2 hours of New Mexico Tech. Facilities for structural research include: a Starkey X-ray texture camera for complete crystallographic preferred orientations, a structural lab with image analysis facilities for the texture camera, petrographic microscopes, and U-stage, a state of the art automated lab for Ar/Ar geochronology, and a lab for fission track analysis . We recently got a Cameca SX100 Microprobe. Information about specific research interests in structural geology can be found on the appropriate faculty home pages.

We usually have 2 or 3 structurally related seminars per semester in our departmental seminar series. The structure group also meets weekly; in these meetings we discuss such things as our current research, any particular problems we are having in our research (a collective brain-storming session, interesting papers we have read recently, etc.

The Structurions

Geology/Geochemistry Program

• Gary Axen -- Associate Professor
• Bruce Harrison -- Associate Professor
• Shari Kelley -- Adjunct Professor
• Peter Mozley -- Associate Professor

Hydrology Program

• John Wilson -- Professor 

New Mexico Bureau of Geology and Mineral Resources

• Charles E. Chapin - Emeritus Director
• William Haneberg -- Engineering Geologist
• Paul W. Bauer -- Field Geologist
• Steven M. Cather -- Field Geologist
• Matthew T. Heizler -- Geochronologist
• Marshall Reiter -- Geophysicist

Areas of Research Interest

• Proterozoic geology of New Mexico
• Active tectonics
• tectonic geomorphology
• Laramide tectonics
• faults and fluid flow
• development of psuedotachylyte
• time-space evolution of plutons
• Geomechanics/theoretical studies
• Experimental deformation
• geochronology
  • 40Ar/39Ar geochronology
  • Fission track dating

Penrose Conference

A Penrose Conference "Faults and Subsurface Fluid Flow: Fundamentals and Applications to Hydrogeology and Petroleum Geology" was organised by members of the Structural Group. This meeting was held in New Mexico during September, 1997.

WWW Structural Resources

The Structural Geology Page by Smith College's Department of Geology)

Structural Geology and Metamorphic Petrology on the WWW

Structure and Tectonics Division of the Geological Society of America

Photos

• A large faulted fold along Arroyo del Tajo, east of Socorro, NM. Students are involved in a field trip for the introductory Structural geology class.
• cleavage refraction in Proterozoic metasediments, Monzano Mountains, NM.
• Preferential cementation of the Sand Hill fault by calcite. Because the sediments outside of the fault zone are unconsolidated, the cemented fault forms a wall. See faults and fluid flow for more details.
• Large cordierite porphyroblasts in the Picuris Mountains, south of Taos. Note the layering preserved in the porphyroblast.
• View of the Great Unconformity, Manzano Mountains, central NM.
• Unconformity between brecciated Proterozoic granite and Pennslyvanian sediments. This outcrop on the Santa Fe ski basin road shows evidence for pre-Pennslyvanian brittle deformation.
• L-tectonites developed in the Proterozoic rocks of the Joyita Hills.

Field Trips

• A field trip through Laramide and Rift-related structures across the Rio Grande from Socorro.

EES Departmental Links

Updated: 19 Jun 2006