ERTH450/GEOL 550 - Cave and Karst Systems

Instructor: Penny Boston, Associate Professor of Cave and Karst Science
Teaching Assistant: Laura Rosales Lagarde, Email: lagarde at nmt.edu

Catalog Description: A system-based study of caves and karstic terrains over time including formation mechanisms (speleogenesis), hydrology, geochemistry, mineralogy, and geomicrobiology. Emphasis on caves as interactive microcosms cross-cutting many disciplines. GEOL 450 and 550 lectures shared, but 550 is graded separately and additional graduate-level work is required. Prerequisites: CHEM 121 & 122 and either ERTH 101 or BIOL 111.

Lecture 1 - Introduction (3.7 MB PDF)
Lecture 2 - Hydrology (68.5 MB PPT - Select Save, not Open); same lecture without movies or animations (5MB PDF)
Lecture 3 - Importance of Karst (12 MB PDF)
Lecture 4 - Eogenetic Karst (17 MB PDF)
Lecture 5 - Epigenic Karst (9.5 MB PDF)
Lecture 6 - Hypogenic Karst (10.4 MB PDF)
Lecture 7 - Eogenetic Article 1 (2 MB PDF)
Lecture 8 - Demo reports 1 and 2 (1MB PDF)
Lecture 9 - Chemistry (0.8 MB PDF)
Lecture 10 - Villa Luz Cave (1 MB PDF)
Lecture 11 - Lavatubes (9 MB PDF)
Lecture 12 - Lavatubes 2 (3.5 MB PDF)
Lecture 13 - Silica & Quartzite (5 MB PDF)
Lecture 14 - Speleothems (14.8 MB PDF)
Lecture 15 - Speleothems, tafoni, sandstone (10.7 MB PDF)
Lecture 16 - Suffosional, ice, ET caves (7.5 MB PDF)
Lecture 17 - Alpine and Arctic Karst (3.2 MB PDF)
Lecture 18 - Biomineralization (12.2 MB PDF)
Lecture 19 - Cave Ecosystems (14.6 MB PDF)
Lecture 20 - Paleo Archaeo Art (12.3 MB PDF)
Lecture 21 - Dating (14.5 MB PDF)
Lecture 22 - Geophysical Methods (7.2 MB)

ERTH 450L, Cave and Karst Lab

Survey of techniques applicable to various aspects of speleology speleology and karst studies. Project-based lab, developed for each student in consultation with instructor. Meets with GEOL 550L but is graded separately. Corequisite: ERTH 450

CK Lab - Vertical Techniques (259 kB)