Posing for the camera, from left to right: Paul Stoffa, Director, Institute for Geophysics; Clark Wilson, Chair, Department of Geological Sciences; Steve Monti, Executive Vice President and Provost; Pat Clubb, Vice President for Employee and Campus Services; John R. (Jay) Boisseau, Director, Texas Advanced Computing Center; and William Fisher, Dean, Jackson School of Geosciences.
On September 29 at Bureau headquarters, groundbreaking ceremonies were
held for the construction of a new 94,000-square-foot facility to house UT's Institute for Geophysics and
Texas Advanced Computing Center. The facility, which will adjoin Bureau headquarters on the J. J. Pickle
Research Campus, is expected to be completed in September 2006. Details and architect renderings are posted
on the Jackson School Website. 09/30/05
Because of a last-minute, hurricane-related cancellation, the Bureau's own
Hongliu Zeng stepped in as the Friday, September 30, seminar speaker.
Hongliu spoke on “Mapping Sandstone Distribution in High-Frequency
Sequences Using Seismic Sedimentology in Corpus Christi Bay, Texas.”
[Abstract]09/27/05
Romulo Briceno is a new Bureau Research Scientist Associate II hired to manage the database for the State of Texas Advanced Oil & Gas Recovery program. Romulo holds a B.S. degree in Chemical Engineering from the University Simon Bolivar in Venezuela (1999) and will conclude an M.S. degree in Energy and Mineral Resources at The University of Texas at Austin in December 2005. Romulo has been working at the
Bureau since 2002, first in the Geophysical Log Facility and most recently as a Graduate Research Assistant assigned to a variety of projects. 09/26/05
The Bureau welcomes Daniel Kurtzman, Postdoctoral Fellow, who recently received his Ph.D. in groundwater hydrology (2005) from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Daniel holds an M.S. degree in environmental sciences (1997) and a B.S. in atmospheric sciences (1994), both from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Daniel works with Bridget Scanlon. 09/26/05
Srivatsan Lakshminarasimhan is a new Postdoctoral Fellow at the Bureau. He holds B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. degrees in chemical engineering from Indian Institute of Technology (Madras), Indian Institute of Science, and The University of Texas at Austin, respectively. Srivatsan is a member of the Gulf Coast Carbon Center, where he is applying his skills in theoretical and numerical modeling and computational methods. 09/26/05
Click picture for larger more detailed view.
The hurricane activity in the Gulf of Mexico resulted in BEG's Coastal Geologist Jim Gibeaut appearing in local and national news. On September 21 Jim was interviewed by CNN's Anderson Cooper about the topography of Galveston and its
risk from hurricanes [link to video]. Also on September 21, Jim was interviewed live on the Fox 7 broadcast at 9:00 p.m. On September 15, Jim was quoted in a Dallas Star-Telegram article by Scott Streater titled “Environmental Impact on Texas Unknown”. 09/22/05
BEG Coastal Geologist Jim Gibeaut recently attended the Coastal Texas 2020 Technical Erosion Conference held September 14-16 in Houston. Jim presented “Patterns of Gulf of Mexico Shoreline Change in Texas” [presentation in PDF format] and co-led a coastal erosion field trip to some of the Coastal Erosion Planning and Response Act (CEPRA) projects in Brazoria and Galveston Counties. The conference, organized by
the Texas General Land Office, brought together scientists, engineers, and other stakeholders to discuss coastal erosion problems in Texas. 09/22/05
Bureau Senior Research Scientist Shirley Dutton delivered Friday's seminar lecture this week (September 23). Shirley's topic�Curation of Continental Scientific Cores and Samples at the Houston Research Center[Abstract]. The seminar was heldat 8:30 a.m. in the Bureau's Main Conference Room. 09/20/05
On September 14 and 15, at the International Association of Hydrogeologists (IAH) Conference on Water Resources and Environmental Problems in Karst in Belgrade and Kotor, Yugoslavia, student research assistant Adrien Lindley presented a poster of his Master's thesis work. Titled “Hydrologic Function of Small
Click picture to enlarge.
Sinkholes in the Uplands of the Edwards Aquifer Recharge Zone of Central and South Texas, U.S.A,” Adrien's poster presents results that he collected under the supervision of Bureau Research Scientist Susan Hovorka. The work was part of a field assessment study and was funded by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality. Adrien's thesis advisor is Jack Sharp, a professor at the UT Department of Geological Sciences. 09/18/05
Dr. Art Donovan, Senior Technical Advisor for BP, was the Friday seminar speaker this week (September 16). Please note that Dr. Donovan spoke in BEG's Main Conference room at 3:00 p.m. instead of the usual 8:30 a.m. Donuts were nonetheless available. 09/13/05
Sergey Fomel was in Pau, France, September 5–8 to participate in a research workshop titled “Multicomponent Seismic—Past, Present, and Future”, which was organized by the European Association of Geoscientists and Engineers and Society of Exploration Geophysicists. The workshop attracted 130 participants from industry and academe. The title of Sergey's presentation,
co-authored by Paul Sava, was “Wave-Equation Angle-Domain Imaging for Multicomponent Seismic Data.” 09/12/05
The Bureau welcomes Virginio Neumann as a new visiting scientist with the Fracture Research and Application Consortium. Virginio will work with Julia Gale until June 2006 on fracture systems in lacustrine carbonates in the Araripe Basin in NE Brazil and on Pennsylvanian fractured carbonates in New Mexico and West Texas. A member of the faculty at the University of Pernambuco in NE Brazil, Virginio obtained his Ph.D. from the University of Barcelona in 1999. His expertise is in the
sedimentology, palaeontology and stratigraphy of lacustrine carbonates. 09/12/05
Click on photo to enlarge. Northeast Holden Crater on Mars—10-m resolution DEM of the Eberswalde Delta. Reds are topographic highs, and darker colors are topographic lows. The delta relief is about 60�80 m. To assist in interpretation, this image was generated by hand contouring of color satellite images guided by low-resolution altimetry data and higher-resolution altimetry of Aharonson and Lewis (CalTech).
On September 9, Research Scientist Lesli Wood presented a talk on Martian deltas to members of the Austin Astronomical Society at their monthly meeting at UT. The topic of her presentation was “Deltas of Mars: Life in the Martian Marshes.” 09/12/05
This fall, the Fracture Research and Application Consortium (FRAC) is conducting Structural Diagenesis Master Classes at UT Austin. Topics include interaction of chemical and mechanical
processes in the development of fracture systems and regional subthrust fracture systems. FRAC members and UT students are invited to join. Please contact Steve Laubach for more information and to register. 09/12/05
The Coastal Studies Group recently completed a 2-week-long mission during which they acquired research-quality, airborne lidar data along the Texas coast. After the data are processed, they will yield highly detailed, accurate topographic models for ongoing studies in shoreline change, storm-surge flooding, geomorphology, and
Click photo to enlarge.
status and trends of geoenvironments. Areas covered include shorelines from the Brazos River to Sabine Pass and along South Padre Island; the San Luis Pass area, including the southwest end of Galveston Island and northeast end of Follets Island; and all of Mustang Island. BEG owns and operates an Optech lidar instrument as part of a program in airborne geophysics and remote sensing. A Cessna 206 aircraft owned and operated by the Texas Department of Transportation was used for the recent surveys. 09/02/05
The 55th Annual GCAGS/GCSSEPM Conference scheduled for New Orleans during September 25–27, 2005, has been cancelled due to Hurricane Katrina. Efforts continue toward publication of the 2005 GCAGS Transactions (Volume 55), at least in CD-ROM format, and possibly
in paper format in limited quantities, at a later date. Go to the GCAGS Website at www.gcags.org for updates. 09/02/05
