The story of the Earth in 25 rocks
Subtitle: tales of important geological puzzles and the people who solved them
By: Donald R. Prothero
Published: 2018
Language: eng
Number of pages: 354
ISBN-13: 9780231182607
Subjects: Earth sciences; Popular works; Geologists; Geology
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.
Table of contents: title: Volcanic tuff : Vulcan's wrath : the eruption of Vesuvius; title: Native copper : the iceman and the island of copper; title: Cassiterite : the "isles of tin" and the bronze age; title: Angular unconformity : "no vestige of a beginning" : the immensity of geologic time; title: Igneous dikes : the "Earth's great heat engine" : the origin of magmas; title: Coal : the rock that burns fires the industrial revolution; title: Jurassic park : the map that changed the world : William Smith and the rocks of Britain; title: Radioactive uranium : the atomic clock : Arthur Holmes and the age of the Earth; title: Chondritic meteorites : messengers from space : the origin of the solar system; title: Iron-nickel meteorites : the cores of other planets; title: Moon rocks : green cheese or anorthosite : the origin of the moon; title: The first sediments : early oceans and life? evidence in a grain of sand; title: Stromatolites : microbial condos : cyanobacteria and the oldest life; title: Banded iron formation : mountains of iron : the Earth's early atmosphere; title: Turbidites : archean sediments and submarine landslides; title: Diamictites : tropical glaciers and the snowball Earth; title: Exotic terranes : paradox in rocks : wandering fossils and traveling landmasses; title: Jigsaw-puzzle bedrock : Alfred Wegener and continental drift; title: Chalk : the cretaceous seaway and greenhouse planet; title: The iridium layer : the death of the dinosaurs; title: Lodestones : how paleomagic launched plate tectonics; title: Blueschists : the puzzle of subduction zones; title: Transform faults : earthquake! the San Andreas Fault; title: Messinian evaporites : the mediterranean was a desert; title: Glacial erraticts : a poet, a politician, a professor, and a janitor, and the discovery of the ice ages.