GE231 Structural Geology

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Course description

A basic course in structural geology should: (1) enable you to evaluate a suite of geologic structures to draw conclusions about their formation and their significance to the geologic history of an area, (2) enable you to apply basic structural-analysis techniques to solve problems in a variety of geoscience disciplines, and (3) help you develop the three-dimensional thinking skills needed to evaluate subsurface geology using data collected at the Earth's surface. In addition to these three primary goals, this course also aims to improve your graphical and written communication skills.

Instructor

Walter A. Sullivan (Bill)
Office: Mudd 206
Office hours: Open-door policy
Office phone: 859-5803
E-mail: wasulliv@colby.edu

Syllabus [PDF]

Read it. Live it.

Structural geology resources on the web

Nestor Cardozo's website: Great freeware including OSXStereonet

Steve Reynold's website: Contains tons of cool 3-D animations

Rick Allmendinger's website: Cool structural geology animations and great freeware

Haakon Fosson's online learning tools: Don't miss this!

Leeds University structural geology teaching page: Good slide shows of geologic structures

GeoMapApp: Super-cool mapping freeware

Google Earth: A very powerful geology tool

USGS geologic map symbols [PDF]: Complete list of official symbols for geologic structures

Lecture materials

Folder containing animation files [Folder]

Introduction [PPT]

Surfaces and Lines [PPT]

Geologic Maps and geologic contacts [PPT]

Field Notes [PPT] and the handout [PDF]

Foliations and Lineations [PPT]

Folds, Descriptive [PPT]--Supplemental

Fold Mechanics [PPT]

Pi analysis of folds [PPT]

Intro to scientific writing [PPT]

Intro to stress, joints and veins [PPT]

Faults introduction [PPT]

Dip-Slip Faults [PPT]

Strike-Slip Faults [PPT]

Mohr-Coulomb Failure [PPT] and Shear Stress Spread Sheet [XLSX]

Anderson's Theory of Faulting [PPT]

Strain [PPT]

Deformation Mechanisms and Rheology [PPT]

Shear zones [PPT]

Homework assignments

Geologic maps homework [PDF]

Mohr circle homework [PDF] and centimeter-rule graph paper [PDF]

Lab and field trip materials

Plate tectonic evolution of New England handout [PDF]

Supplementary data for Pemaquid Point trip [PDF]

Supplementary data for Waterville Formation trips [DOC] [PDF]