Geology

What Can Lake Vostok Tell Us About Europa?

What Can Lake Vostok Tell Us About Europa?

Does the prospect of life in subglacial Lake Vostok really point to the same on the icy satellite Europa? The answer may surprise you.

 
Geological Outings Around the Bay: Napa Glass Mountain

Geological Outings Around the Bay: Napa Glass Mountain

A Napa Valley roadcut was once a strategic resource center for the local inhabitants. Today it still draws visitors seeking out that resource: obsidian.

 
Geological Outings Around the Bay: Mount Vaca and the Monticello Dam

Geological Outings Around the Bay: Mount Vaca and the Monticello Dam

Visit two great landmarks of the northeastern Bay Area—one highly visible, the other well hidden—featuring the same body of rock.

 
Treasure from the Sky

Treasure from the Sky

The recently authenticated fall of meteorites from Mars excites fever dreams as well as scientific fervor.

 
Confounding Concretions

Confounding Concretions

Not crystals, not meteorites and not fossils, concretions puzzle people who find them. Geologists find them only slightly less puzzling than the general public.

 
A Most Earthly Mineral on Mars

A Most Earthly Mineral on Mars

The planet Mars tantalizes with its resemblance to parts of Earth. Now space geologists with their trusty field assistant, the rover Opportunity, have found gypsum veins there like those in our own countryside.

 
Got Science on the Brain? Come Blog with QUEST

Got Science on the Brain? Come Blog with QUEST

Got science on the brain? Come blog with us. KQED’s QUEST is looking to add new voices to our blog, which already offers commentary from our producers, reporters, and several writers from science organizations in our region. pply by February 1st.

 
Sand: Hold a Mountain in Your Hand

Sand: Hold a Mountain in Your Hand

Sand . . . we play in it, we stroll on it, we make castles out of it, but what do we really know about it? The size, shape and location of a grain a sand can tell us a lot about it's origin, makeup and history.

 
The Bay Area Geological Holiday Quiz

The Bay Area Geological Holiday Quiz

Twenty questions, four days to answer them, and one giveaway hint — that's what this geological quiz is about.

 
Top KQED QUEST Stories of 2011

Top KQED QUEST Stories of 2011

From hackerspaces to banana slugs, flying telescopes to cheese – it's been a quite a diverse year of storytelling here at QUEST. Here's a round-up of the top 10 video and audio stories and blog posts that you've enjoyed from the past year.

 
Getting Started on Earthquake Preparedness

Getting Started on Earthquake Preparedness

Preparing your home is a part of the Bay Area's response to future earthquakes that is just as essential as the Bay Bridge upgrade, but you can manage it yourself with some free help.

 
AGU: Twenty Thousand Geeks by the Sea

AGU: Twenty Thousand Geeks by the Sea

Geoscientists mark the holiday season every year by swarming to San Francisco to eat, drink and talk science.

 
Bay Area Tides

Bay Area Tides

The daily tides are the Bay's way of breathing, from its windpipe at the Golden Gate to its lungs, the wetlands from the Delta to the coast.

 
Geological Outings Around the Bay: Natural Bridges

Geological Outings Around the Bay: Natural Bridges

There's more to see at Natural Bridges State Beach than the temporary natural bridge. It's a monument to the cultural as well as the geological past.

 
Fossil Collecting in the Bay Area

Fossil Collecting in the Bay Area

Many parts of the Bay Area have fossils. Can we collect them? Some situations are clear; others not so much. Perhaps it could be easier.

 
Geological Outings Around the Bay: Fitzgerald Marine Preserve

Geological Outings Around the Bay: Fitzgerald Marine Preserve

The area around Pillar Point is famous for surfing and tidepooling, but its fault-related landforms are significant geological resources too.

 
Hetch Hetchy Aqueduct: Big Fixes for Big Quakes

Hetch Hetchy Aqueduct: Big Fixes for Big Quakes

The San Francisco Public Utilities Commission is hard at work on a $4.6 billion, decade-long construction project to overhaul the Hetch Hetchy water system, which delivers water from the Hetch Hetchy reservoir in Yosemite National Park and five local reservoirs to 2.5 million residents in the Bay Area.

 
Geological Outings Around the Bay: Fremont Peak

Geological Outings Around the Bay: Fremont Peak

Fremont Peak oversees a large region of the Coast Ranges between Monterey and Hollister. When you pay it a visit, be sure to look around your feet too.

 
Affinity for Stone: The Public Art of Ruth Asawa

Affinity for Stone: The Public Art of Ruth Asawa

Stone is more than the plaything of geologists. Each of us sees it in special ways. Take a look at stone in two masterworks by San Francisco artist Ruth Asawa.

 
What's in a Clay? Finding the right minerals for Salt Glaze Pottery

What's in a Clay? Finding the right minerals for Salt Glaze Pottery

Check out this Google map that shows clay minerals found around the U.S. and world that are commonly used in pottery.