At Benfontein, near Kimberley, South Africa, three sills of kimberlite intrude Dwyka shales and overlying Karroo dolerite. Each sill results from numerous injections of kimberlite that have consolidated to give the sill a layered appearance. Many layers - show magmatic sedimentation features and cumulus textures, and, although some show in situ differentiation, other layers result from pre-injection differ­entiations The transporting, intercumulus liquid was carbonate-rich and some layers have differentiated to form a carbonate rock composed of the intercumulus calcite; this, on trace element and isotopic data, shows strong affinities with carbonatite. In one of the sills 'one calcite layer has migrated diapirically into overlying layers in.the sill. These sedimentation features, combined with thermal metamorphism of country-rock shales and the presence of quench calcite and apatite, are interpreted as evidence that the kimberlite was injected as a highly mobile fluid, comprising megacrysts of olivine, garnet, pyroxene, mica and picroilmenite in a hot carbonatitic liquid from which olivine, magnetic spinel, perov-skite, apatite, calcite, dolomite, ankerite and quartz crystallised. The evidence that the transportation medium was a warm carbon­atitic liquid is directly opposed to earlier hypotheses proposing that kimberlite is intruded as a cold or plastic paste, and also supports proposals of a genetic link between kimberlite and carbonatite.

In 1848, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., was beginning to shift from being primarily a literary publisher to being a scientific, technical, and engineering publisher. This shift was the first of many Wiley has made over the years as it has constantly adapted to meet the unique needs of each new generation.
This was also the year Wiley published one of its most enduring and notable titles: James D. Dana’s Manual of Mineralogy, including Observations on Mines, Rocks, Reduction of Ores, and the Application of the Science to the Arts. Over the years, it too has continually adapted to meet the changing needs of all who use it. Now in its twenty-third edition, the Manual of Mineral Science remains the standard for teaching introductory mineralogy/mineral science. <...>

Mineralogy is an integral part of the undergraduate education of geologists and it may also be part of a curriculum in materials science. One or several courses in mineralogy are generally required in a geology or earth science undergraduate program. These courses are meant as prerequisites to upper-level courses in petrology, geochemistry, economic geology, or mineralogy itself.

The review chapters in this volume were the basis for a two day short course on Medical Mineralogy and Geochemistry held at the United States Geological Survey in Menlo Park, California, U.S.A. (December 9-10, 2006) prior to the American Geophysical Union Meeting in San Francisco, California. This meeting and volume were sponsored by the Mineralogical Society of America, Geochemical Society, and the United States Department of Energy <...>