10 June 2012

Magma cum laude


A scientist is determined to get some totally fresh molten lava from the lake in Nyiragongo volcano, "which has some of the fastest-moving lava flows ever recorded."

Via BoingBoing.

5 comments:

  1. It took me a while to figure out the title, then I was LOLing.

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    1. I actually didn't consider it an LOL title. Chuckleworthy, at best.

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    2. youre right, you arent funny. geeze take the compliment.

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  2. Does anyone know why it is worth the risk to get fresh magma instead of say a rock from the same magma that is a couple days old at the bottom of the crater?

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    1. There are relevant comments at the BoingBoing source -

      "There are a variety of reasons. You do sometimes want gases (as you surmised). Also, after it erupts it can get mixed in with other debris and the like easily from around, so you don't have as a good an idea what the initial composition was. Also, composition when still hot is connected to what sort of flow you get where details may be lost after cooling, and getting a better understanding of that could help predict the types of eruptions better and the give a better idea for what size evacuation zones are needed."

      and

      "Grabbing lava from as close to the vent as possible and then quenching it in a bucket of water turns the lava to glass which keeps the composition almost identical to that being erupted.

      If they left the lava to cool naturally its composition would change since the different minerals in the lava crystallise at different temperatures, some of the high temperature minerals don't travel far from the vent so a sample taken further away would be misleading..."

      More at BoingBoing

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