Who needs to go into the field any more?

I've been spending the last few days studying a high-resolution dataset (2-foot contours, LiDAR-derived) for one of my field areas. I took the contour line data and extracted a three-dimensional surface:



Well, of course we go into the field because we have to test hypotheses derived from remotely sensed data. What are the relationships between the various terraces visible in the picture? Are there materials buried that can be dated either with radiocarbon or optically-stimulated luminescence?

Ultimately, what are the lithofacies (textures, composition, structures that distinguish the deposits) that characterize the sediments within this valley? What are the architectural and temporal relationships between these different lithofacies?

And of course, how can I make a "fly-over" movie of this model without my computer crashing?

Crazy Weather

So we had snow falling from the sky again today. This has been what feels like an unusually cold spring here in Wisconsin. Looking at the graph from the weather underground, it looks like last month (March) was at or just below the average¹ for our neck of the woods - but much cooler than usual just a bit further north and west



Note also that there were warmer than average temperatures for much of the southwest. I find it interesting how much warmer Siberia was at this time (while on the opposite side of the hemisphere, the temperature anomalies were split - both higher and lower than average. Yesterday's strong storm outbreak was impressive, frightening, and a result of these contrasts in warm and cold temperatures. Storms get much of their strength from the contrast between warm and cold air (moisture, temp, pressure, etc). The stronger the contrast, the stronger the storms. I'm not surprised that we have powerful April storms given the big differences in North American temps in March. I am surprised at how quickly and how devastating they were. I'll be very curious to see what the temperature anomalies for April and May are like.

¹"Average" in this case is defined as the net total data from 1901-2000. Some "averages" use a 30-year moving window to calculate average temperatures and such.

Thurs-Demo: The one with hot cocoa

My department chair had been noticing that the noise her mug made when stirring hot cocoa changed as the mug heated up. So we shot some video and I present the following for today's demo:

Sound Changes in a Ceramic Mug from Matt Kuchta on Vimeo.

It's fitting, given that we had snow falling from the sky this morning.

Thurs-Demo: The one with mud

Today's demo - some more fun things to do with the fine sand that we dug out of the ground on campus. I mentioned this dilatency behavior earlier in a post about footprints in the sand.

Here's the video:

Dilatency and Liquefaction of a fine sand from Matt Kuchta on Vimeo.

We don't need no stinkin' sieves

I've been setting up for Thursday's demo. I thought I'd show you how I often separate sand and gravel so that I have enough fine sand for some of my other projects.

Gravel Separation from Matt Kuchta on Vimeo.

Some fun with mud

We collected an exciting type of sand from the outdoor classroom on campus. It's a fine sand and silt that displays an interesting behavior when the rate of strain is fast (like being squeezed, or hit quickly) compared to a slow rate of strain (or if it's shaken).

Dilatency Preview from Matt Kuchta on Vimeo.

Clearly, this is screaming for a demo - so perhaps I'll have time to do something with it this week.