Jon Trevelyan (UK) This is the fourth of my series of short articles on fossils of the Ediacaran Period. And among the most intriguing organisms of the late Ediacaran Period is Ernietta, a sack-shaped, partly infaunal creature that lived around 548-541 million years ago in the shallow seas of what is now Namibia.

Jon Trevelyan (UK) At first glance, What Did Dinosaurs Think About? looks like a slightly mischievous title attached to a familiar subject. Dinosaurs, after all, have been thought about endlessly; whether they themselves did much thinking is another matter. Ronan Le Loeuff’s book makes no claim to settle that question definitively, but it does something arguably more interesting - it asks what sort of…

Stephen K Donovan (UK) If asked what is my favourite fossil collecting site, I would have to say the Farquhar’s Beach oyster bed on the south-central coast of Jamaica. I taught at the University of the West Indies for over 12 years and this locality was an easy drive. In my retirement I doubt if I will ever see it again – too far away and too expensive a trip – but it has a special place in my heart.

Jon Trevelyan (UK) This is the second of three articles on the Carnian Pluvial Event (CPE). The first covered the climate engine of the CPE. This article turns to the marine record, tracing how the CPE destabilised reefs and reorganised shallow-marine ecosystems. When the Triassic seas lost their balance In the early Late Triassic, the warm epicontinental seas along the western Tethys margin were home to thriving carbonate platforms.

Jon Trevelyan (UK) Planetary geology occupies an awkward but fascinating position between disciplines. It draws its physical framework from physics and astronomy, its observational tools from remote sensing and space missions, and its interpretative instincts from terrestrial geology. Planetary Geology: An Introduction by Dominic Fortes and Claudio Vita-Finzi has, since its first appearance, sought to bring these strands together into a coherent teaching text.

Michael Mackiewicz (USA) Fluorite has long captivated mineral collectors with its range of colours, sharp cubic crystals, and its magical glow under ultraviolet light. Once sought after for its beauty, it is now a mineral that is essential to modern industry and clean-energy supply chains. Fluorite, also called fluorspar, is now considered a critical mineral by the US Geological Survey, the European Union and China, and a strategic mineral by the UK.

Jon Trevelyan (UK) This is the third of my series of short articles on fossils of the Ediacaran Period. Dickinsonia is one of the most recognisable and debated organisms of the Ediacaran Period, living between 558 and 550 million years ago on shallow seafloors long before the rise of animals with hard parts.

Jon Trevelyan (UK) The Naturmuseum Südtirol is housed in an historic building in the old town of Bolzano and was opened in 1997 in its current form. Its major theme consists of the geology of South Tyrol, that is, the region’s rocks, minerals (Fig. 1) landscapes, tectonics, its natural habitats (Figs. 2 and 3), forests, alpine zones, valleys, and so on.

Jon Trevelyan (UK) This is the first of three articles on the Carnian Pluvial Event (CPE), often referred to as an ‘event’, although increasingly recognised as a prolonged episode, as I will discuss) of the Triassic that seems to have grown in importance and interest, and only become more widely known in relatively recent times. In this article, I will introduce the topic, concentrating on what might be called the “climate engine” driving what was happening.

Jon Trevelyan (UK) I found the pebble almost by accident, while staying with friends near Eccleshall in Staffordshire. We had taken their two dogs (the much missed Holly and Chutney) out for an afternoon walk - the kind of slow, stop-start loop where the dogs dictate the pace and the conversation meanders as much as the footpath. Along a muddy stretch of track, something smooth and rounded caught my eye: a faintly banded, reddish stone lying half-buried among the usual Midlands gravel and mud (Fig.

Jon Trevelyan (UK) This is the second of my series of short articles on fossils of the Ediacaran Period. Charniodiscus is one of the most characteristic frondose organisms of the Ediacaran Period, living around 560-555 million years ago in the quiet, low-energy seafloors that preceded the Cambrian explosion. With its elegant, leaf-like body anchored to the substrate by a sturdy holdfast, …

Jon Trevelyan (UK) The Classic Geology in Europe series has, over many years, established a distinctive and reliable identity: authoritative regional syntheses written by specialists, designed for geologists who want to understand landscapes through field observation rather than armchair generalities. The Southern Pennines sits comfortably within that tradition and, in several respects, exemplifies the mature strengths of the series. The Southern Pennines—includingmuch of the Peak District National Park - are not an obviously dramatic geological province.

Michael C Mackiewicz (USA) Minerals have shaped human societies since ancient times, but the idea of ‘critical minerals’ is fairly recent. As explored in earlier articles in this series, the Top Ten critical minerals, lithium, cobalt, nickel, graphite, manganese, the rare‑earth elements, tungsten, vanadium, bismuth and antimony are central to advanced technologies, the global economy and national security. These minerals are essential for renewable energy, high‑tech manufacturing and strategic infrastructure, and they also play a major role in global politics and the economy.

Jon Trevelyan (UK) This is the first of my series of short articles on fossils of the Ediacaran Period. Charnia is one of the most iconic fossils of the Ediacaran Period, known for its elegant frond-like form and its place among the earliest large, complex organisms in Earth’s history. First discovered in Charnwood Forest, Leicestershire, it was the first Precambrian fossil ever recognised, overturning the long-held belief that complex life began only in the Cambrian.

Kurt Lahmers (USA) A closer look at a dinosaur bone found in the Garden Park area of Cañon City, Colorado (USA) shows some interesting details on the end of the bone. The holes in the dinosaur bone shownin Fig. 1 used to be tube-like structures called Haversian canals. These are branching channels, where the blood vessels and nerve fibres are carried through the bone.

Jon Trevelyan (UK) This is the third and last of my series of short articles on fossils of the Pre-Cambrian. The stromatolites of the Tumbiana Formation, Western Australia, form one of the most remarkable biological records of the Late Archean, dating to around 2.72 billion years ago. These exquisitely preserved domes, columns and branching structures suggest thriving microbial communities living in shallow lakes long before animals, plants or even complex eukaryotes emerged.

Michael Mackiewicz (USA) Gallium is one of those odd minerals that somehow gets people’s attention. Unlike cobalt, lithium or the majority of other critical minerals, you do not find gallium in rich ore bodies that can be mined directly. Instead, it shows up in trace amounts inside common minerals like bauxite and sphalerite. It often substitutes for aluminium or zinc atoms because they are similar in size, which means gallium is recovered as a by-product when aluminium and zinc ores are processed and not mined on their own.

Jon Trevelyan (UK) This is the second of my series of short articles on fossils of the Pre-Cambrian. The Strelley Pool stromatolites, preserved in the ~3.45-billion-year-old Strelley Pool Formation of Western Australia, rank among the oldest widely accepted macroscopic evidence of life. Formed on shallow marine carbonate platforms during the early Archean, these laminated domes offer a rare glimpse into Earth’s earliest ecosystems, when microbial life had only recently emerged.

Paul Lyle begins GeoHibernica with a slightly mischievous acknowledgement: the book exists only because the author of GeoBritannica was unable to take on its Irish counterpart himself. It is a revealing admission, and one that immediately invites comparison between the two works. That comparison is instructive, although not always in the ways one might expect.