Nevada Field Trip

Nevada field trip May 4-10, 2022

Nevada field trip, May 4-10, 2022 Led by Dan Sturmer, fifteen members of the Department – four undergraduate majors, four graduate students, three alumni, one of our staff, and three faculty -- went on a field trip to northern Nevada in early May. The trip was multi-disciplinary, multi-faceted, very educational, and a ton of fun. The geology of the Basin and Range in northern Nevada is tremendously varied and complex, illustrated by the stops organized by Dan (and described in the 185-page guidebook he assembled). Highlights included the Sierra Nevada frontal fault, the geomorphology of Lake Tahoe, Cretaceous plutonic rocks of the Sierra Nevada batholith at Donner Summit, Pliocene plant fossils and diatomite, Miocene tufa mounds, recent fault scarps, gigantic sand dunes, and petroglyphs, rocks of a Miocene lacustrine fan-delta system, 35 ka basalt lava flows (with olivine and pyroxene megacrysts), the latest Miocene to Pleistocene Lunar Crater volcanic field, upper Ordovician organic-rich black

shales, Carboniferous conglomerates, strongly deformed Cambrian phyllites, and thanks to Melissa McMullen (B.S., 2009), a tour of the Barrick Cortez Carlin-type disseminated gold mine (the main pit and the principle processing plant). And one of the principal highlights surrounding us every day: the vivid and beautiful Basin and Range landscape. For all his hard work and generosity, a very special thanks to Dan! We hope to run the trip again…in 2025!

Photo Captions: Group photo at Donner Summit: Seated, left to right: Wayne Goodman, Mike Lewan, Marty Goodman, Adam Bernhardt Standing, left to right: Andrew Michel, Jake Janszen, PJ Schomaeker, Cole Farnam, Sam Little, Nathan McCarthy, Vince Nowaczewski, Dan Sturmer, Krista Smilek, Dylan Ward (photo by C. Dietsch)