ScotBlogs

So many things happened in the department in April that I got totally behind. In fact, April was so busy that I’ve only barely caught up here at the end of May. But, some great things happened so I want … Continue reading →

This is one of the most beautiful fossils in Wooster’s teaching collections. It is a polished section of petrified wood. It has vibrant colors and exquisite detail, as you’re about to see. Unfortunately any label that accompanied this specimen disappeared … Continue reading →

The above rock was collected on our Sedimentology & Stratigraphy class field trip last month. It is an average piece of weathered Brassfield Formation (Early Silurian, Llandovery) from Oakes Quarry Park near Fairborn, Ohio (N 39.81472°, W 83.99471°). It is … Continue reading →

I was privileged today to visit Brown’s Lake Bog, a Nature Conservancy preserve, with Greg Wiles, Nick Wiesenberg, and Kim Carter (Chemistry ’16). Greg and Nick have been here many times with students and colleagues, including some epic sessions of … Continue reading →

Well, folks, this is it: my final blog post. I didn’t exactly keep up with this blog as much as I intended to this year…or at all…which is pretty par for the course, honestly. But I still thought I would … Continue reading →

The fossil above was found by Luke Kosowatz (’17) on our Sedimentology & Stratigraphy class field trip last month. We were measuring and sampling the Brassfield Formation (Early Silurian, Llandovery) near Fairborn, Ohio, and Luke pulled this beauty out of … Continue reading →

On Thursday evening, April 23, the Alumni Board convened its spring meeting with an informal reception, welcome, and brief review of the schedule. Following dinner, Mary Neagoy ’83, chair of the Presidential Search Committee and Tom Courtice, search consultant from … Continue reading →

Last week, SpaceX conducted a successful pad abort test of its innovative Crew Dragon spacecraft. The hypergolic (= ignite on contact) MMH + NTO Super Draco engines accelerated Dragon from 0 to 100 mph in 1.2 seconds — that’s faster than … Continue reading →

This week’s fossil is again in honor of Annette Hilton (’17), now retired as my Sophomore Research Assistant this year. She has been assessing with great skill a large and diverse collection of scleractinian corals from the Matmor Formation in … Continue reading →

As a kid, I poured over diagrams in Popular Science magazine describing possible Grand Tours of the outer solar system (Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto) made possible by a rare alignment of the planets. Unfortunately, budget cuts reduced the Grand … Continue reading →