Landforms and landscapes vary enormously across the Earth, from high mountains to endless plains. At a smaller scale, Nature often surprises us by creating shapes which look improbable. Many physical landscapes are so immensely beautiful that they have received the highest possible recognition—they hold the status of World Heritage properties. Apart from often being immensely scenic, landscapes tell stories which not uncommonly can be traced back in time for tens of million years and include unique events.

Investment decisions are critical part of a company’s success, and capital budgeting is a central topic of financial management. However, in contrast to other strategic decisions in business, decisions on capital projects are decentralized, from corporate to divisions, divisions to operations, from operations to departments. Engineers at various levels within the organization who make a capital proposal are contributing to the strategic success of the organization. This book will assist engineers to contribute strategically to the organization, so that they can contribute to the success of their company and can make a success of their careers.<...>

This book contains chapters presented at the International workshop ‘Minerals as Advanced Materials I’ that was held in the hotel of the Russian Academy of Sciences on the Imandra lake, Kola peninsula, one of the most beautiful places of the Russian North, during 8–12 July, 2007. The idea of the workshop originated from the necessity of interactions between mineralogy and material science, including all aspects of both these disciplines. Many important materials that dominate modern technological development were known to mineralogists for hundreds years, though their properties were not fully recognized. Mineralogy, on the other hand, needs new impacts for the further development in the line of modern scientific achievements, including novel insights provided by development of bio- and nanotechnologies as well as by the understanding of a deep role that information plays in the formation of natural structures and definition of natural processes. <...>

Basin analysis is a comprehensive approach to decipher the geological evolution of a basin by constructing the stratigraphic framework and facies relationships, by mapping and understanding the geological structures in light of their historical development, and by examining the physical and chemical properties of rocks and their sedimentological and petroleum attributes. The purpose of the analysis is to identify potential source rocks and reservoir rocks, and to evaluate the maturation, generation, migration, and entrapment of hydrocarbons in a sedimentary basin. <...>

Vesuvianite-group minerals (VGM) are widespread and occur in different geological formations including regional metamorphic rocks, skarns, rodingites, etc. Specific crystal-chemical features of these minerals reflect conditions of their crystallization. As a rule, high-temperature VGM have high-symmetry structures (space group P4/ nnc), whereas low-temperature samples are characterized by the symmetry P4/n or P4nc (Allen and Burnham 1992).

While ancient man must have had some intuitive knowledge of geology, as evidenced by the feats of mining and civil engineering performed in the distant past, the present science of geology owes much of its origin to the civil engineers working in the eighteenth century. These engineers, while constructing the major engineering works associated with the industrial revolution, had the opportunity to view and explore excavations in rocks and soils. Some, intrigued by what they saw, began to speculate on the origin and nature of rocks, and the relationships between similar rocks found in different places. Their ideas and theories, based on the practical application of their subject, formed the groundwork for the development of geology as a science. Engineers such as Lewis Evans (1700–1756) in America, William Smith (1769–1839) in England, Pierre Cordier (1777–1862) in France and many others were the ‘fathers’ of Geology. <...>

In previous years, the genesis of uniquely large mineral deposits became one of the most urgent geological problems because of the key role played by giant deposits: accounting for <5 % of the currently developed mineral deposits, these deposits satisfy 85 % the world’s consumption of mineral resources. The development of these deposits should provide a basis for the stable progression of our civilization (Rundkvist and Kravchenko 1996 ). Another important aspect in the analysis of super-large mineral deposits is their genesis because these deposits are, in fact, giant geochemical anomalies in the Earth’s crust (e.g., the PGE concentrations in the Noril’sk ores are six to seven orders of magnitude higher than those in the clarkes) <...>

This volume is a collection of lectures presented during the 2009 International School on High-pressure Crystallography, which took place at the Ettore Majorana Center for Scientific Culture, between June 4 and 14, 2009, in the very picturesque Sicilian town of Erice. The 2009 school was the 41st course of the “International School of Crystallography” organized at the Majorana Center and was directed by Elena Boldyreva (Novosibirsk University) and Przemyslaw Dera (University of Chicago). Unmatched support and excellent on-site organization was provided by the expert team consisting of Prof. Paola Spadon (Uniersity of Padova), Prof. Lodovico Riva di San Severino (University of Bologna), Elena Papinutto and Prof. John Irvin (University of California, San Franciso), aided by great team of young local organizers (“orange scarfs”). <...>

Spectroscopy is the study of the interaction of electromagnetic radiation with the matter. There are three aspects of the spectroscopic measurement: irradiation of a sample with electromagnetic radiation; measurement of the absorption, spontaneous emission and scattering (Rayleigh elastic scattering, Raman inelastic scattering) from the sample; and analysis and interpretation of these measurements. The main subject of our book is spontaneous luminescence of natural minerals. We have used the term luminescence, which is the general term of the phenomenon. Luminescence may be subdivided to the fast fluorescence with spin-allowed transition and slow phosphorescence with spin-forbidden transition. Afterglow may be added, which is related to emission after trapping of an electron elsewhere. <...>

When using infrared spectroscopy for the study of minerals, researchers often face a number of specific difficulties. This may be due to various factors, including lack of available substance, small sizes of monomineral grains and aggregates, the presence of structural impurities and mechanical inclusions, instability of some minerals, scattering effects, atmospheric disturbance, background noice, anomalous dispersion, interference, etc. One can distinguish three kinds of sources of errors and artifacts in IR spectroscopy of minerals, which are connected with experimental procedures, data proceeding and data interpretation <...>