The science of gemmology is concerned with the study of the technical aspects of gemstones and gem materials and the use of these aspects for identification purposes. For well over 2000 years, philosophers and scientists have been captivated by the beauty and the enigma of gems, and down the years have left records of their observations on these ornamental products of nature. One of the first gemstone books in English was written by Thomas Nichols as long ago as 1652*, but it was only in the last half of the nineteenth century that the science of gemmology began to emerge as a specialized offshoot of an already well-established branch of science, mineralogy. <...>

Out of season, the bar of the Cobweb Inn at Boscastle is everything a pub should be. There is a low, heavily-beamed ceiling hung with antique bottles, and a plain floor which is a jigsaw of flagstones. Photographs of the local women’s darts team hang on the wall, alongside framed, faded newspaper cuttings which record in print the several virtues of the inn.

A renaissance in the 1980s concerning geochemistry of sulfur in fossil fuels makes an update of the subject timely. Papers developed from the 1989 ACS Symposium in Dallas provide a cross-section of recent research and progress in our understanding of the abundance and nature of organically bound sulfur in fossil fuels. This chapter furnishes an overview of our understanding of sulfur introduction into the geologic systems and biogenic materials that produce petroleum and natural gas. Many of the geochemical considerations also apply to coal and lignite deposits. A brief historical account leads to a summary of the most recent advances, an appraisal of current understanding, and some remaining challenges and opportunities for further research <...>

This volume of the Geology of the Philippines, Second Edition comes at an opportune time when the Philippines has become once more  a beehive of activities by geologists owing to the efforts of government to promote the revitalization of the mining industry. This edition is a timely reference material that gives the reader an overview of the geology of the Philippines, as well as the stratigraphic make-up of local areas.

Questions of morphological study addressing living and fossil organisms are briefly discussed. The importance of ontogenetic patterns and processes in evolutionary biology are viewed on the background of three special problems of cephalopod morphology: the reproductive system of octopods, the lower beaks of coleoids and ammonites, and the arm crown of the coleoids. <...>

Campanian M1 Sandstone is one of the major prospective sandstone units in the Tarapoa field in Oriente Basin, Ecuador. The M1 Sandstone is always markedly sharp based, averages 25 m in thickness, shows upward increasing marine bioturbation and generally fines upward from coarse to very fine grained sandstone. In cores, the sandstones at base are amalgamated coarse to fine grained with prominent cross stratification (dm thick), sometimes clearly bi-directional and contains mud drapes.

Bereits drei Jahre nach ihrem Erscheinen war die 6. Auflage des „Matthes“ vergriffen und der Verlag drängte auf die Vorbereitung einer Neuauflage. Das bot die Gelegenheit, den Inhalt des Lehrbuchs gründlich zu überarbeiten und an den modernen Wissensstand anzupassen. Die bewährte Gliederung in die Hauptteile „Spezielle Mineralogie“, „Petrologie und Lagerstättenkunde“ sowie „Stoffbestand und Bau von Erde und Mond“ blieb dabei erhalten. Allerdings schien es angezeigt, einige sehr umfangreiche Kapitel aufzuteilen, so dass das Buch jetzt aus 30 Kapiteln besteht. Die „Mineralogie“ wurde an vielen Stellen inhaltlich erweitert; zahlreiche neue Abbildungen kamen hinzu; dem stehen Streichungen veralteter Passagen und Straffungen des Textes gegenüber. <...>

Geologically, the Carpathian Range is the continuation of the Eastern Alps towards the East forming an arching bow-shaped mountain chain of 1,500 km in length that extends through several countries, (i.e. the Czech Republic. Slovakia, Poland. Hungary, Ukraine, and Romania). From a mineralogical viewpoint, the Carpathians, with its more than 1,000 mineral species, is an extremely interesting area. Its geological formations vary in ages and compositions. The structural evolution is highly complicated. It has also been a traditional mining area since prehistoric times. More than fifty valid mineral species were first described from this region (karpatite. koktaite, libethenite, native tellurium, pilsenite, rozenite. rhodochrosite.  etc.). Some very rare species, originally discovered in other parts of the world, also occur here (cymrite, hetaerolite. nambulite, segnitite, capgaronnite, etc.). <...>