Happ #FieldworkFriday from the Alvord Desert playa in far southeastern Oregon! Hot work on the Alvord Hot Springs discharge plume during the day, followed by hanging out on the playa at sunset! ⚒️🧪

A little World Cup planetary science... If the Earth were the size of a soccer ball, 🌎 = ⚽ then the Moon would be the size of a tennis ball: 🌔 = 🎾 The Earth-Moon distance, 🌎 to 🌔, would be about 30 soccer balls: ⚽⚽⚽⚽⚽⚽⚽⚽⚽⚽⚽⚽⚽⚽⚽⚽⚽⚽⚽⚽⚽⚽⚽⚽⚽⚽⚽⚽⚽⚽ or a little less than the width of the goal 🥅

Love exploring climate change in the geological record? Want to teach about climate change with fabulous undergraduates? Yearning to advance your paleoclimate research in a supportive, scholarship-forward environment? Then come work with us at Colgate University! ⚒️🧪❄️🧪🌊🧪 apply.interfolio.com/188708

Road salt? In my drinking water? If you live in central NY, the answer might be yes, and a lot of it. Read all about @colgate.edu Earth & Environmental Geosciences student Morgan Cecil's findings here bit.ly/hamiltonsali... - fresh out in Case Studies in the Environment. ⚒️🧪💧🧪❄️🧪

Happy #FieldworkFriday! Exploring lava tubes from above and below at Tabernacle Hill volcano outside of Fillmore, UT. 🥾🌋⚒️🧪

You know, we don't see the "before" part of this scene, but I think Stickman was probably provoking the rocks on the North Kaibab trail before they turned on him ⚒️🧪

Today was a particularly effective day to teach about aeolian processes at Coral Pink Sand Dunes

An interesting (& maybe not quite right) read from Ezra Klein about AI and knowledge work. I agree with him that good media literacy would treat breathless news reports about AI's power and pending replacement of work as ad copy for AI companies. www.nytimes.com/2026/05/03/o...

Opinion | Why the A.I. Job Apocalypse (Probably) Won’t Happen

nytimes.com

For all who are also deep in review of undergraduate student theses, I salute you. My students actually do get to practice Haiku Voice when we submit LPSC abstracts. The rest of the time, I push for Active Voice.

Sarah Whorley, Ph.D. 🦬⚔️@dralgaegirl.bsky.social · 3mo ago

Stolen from FB....

Happy Earth Day! I'm giving a talk on campus, the gist of which is that geoscientists don’t just care about the Earth for the Earth’s sake—we care about it because it’s our home and people who matter to us live on it. ⚒️🧪 h/t NASA’s Suomi NPP satellite for this stunner.

Experiencing a little #moonjoy outside of the Ho Science Center @colgate.edu. A late evening on campus helping students put the finishing touches on their senior thesis presentations.

Kind of weird to have an LPSC2027 save the date with no location. Is it in Texas again? Will abstracts that suggest broadening participation in planetary science is a good thing be discouraged again? If the answer to both is yes, I think my response might be, "When is DPS again?"

New Commission on Fine Arts renderings just dropped for the National Participation Trophy, er, #DCarch. Blank on left has a nice big frieze you can write whatever you like on. I recommend Times New Roman (the boringest font) and the Photoshop bevel effect. #monuments #DC #Architecture

Happy little mud cracks from the Alvord Desert playa at the end of a cracked-up week. #drones

Spring is coming, change is coming. Audio on for peepers! 🐸

It feels like the subtext of recent reporting on long TSA lines is that it’s the Dem’s fault for holding firm on unmasking ICE agents and requiring judicial warrants for searches before agreeing to fund DHS. That reporting slant is just gross.

I have a joke about winter conditions in Antarctica, but it's kind of dark.

Jim Elser@drlimnology.bsky.social · 5mo ago

I have a limnology joke about large lakes but it’s too deep. Way over your head.

For my money, I think they'll find both more jokes and more receptive audiences when they head to AGU. #Geoscientists are a funny bunch and are usually a pretty receptive audience. A great talk is like an IgNobel prize winner: "first [it] makes you laugh, then [it] makes you think.”

Knock knock, no one’s there. Study finds scientists’ jokes mostly fall flat

Survey examines how often academics attempt jokes during conference talks — and how these attempts at comedy land.

nature.com

Hot new paper with cool results—using apparent thermal inertia to study permafrost and landforms in Antarctica’s McMurdo Dry Valleys. Come for the bedrock mapping, stay for the discovery of a possible new paleo-lake basin and channel spillway! ⚒️🧪❄️ doi.org/10.1080/1523...

Central NY folks, DST got you down? Then mark your calendars to spring forward into science with the inaugural Science Pub at Lower Lake Brewery - April 2 at 7 pm. I'll be talking about road salt contamination of local water supplies & ecosystems. Come for a beverage, stay for science discussion! 🍺🧪

It seems like many of the industries that produce the most life support (farming, mining, caregiving) are also some of the most labor intensive and lowest margin. There's RoI if you automate a chip-fab or a iPhone plant. But is there the capital or the technology to automate real arduous labor?

A World Where All Is Free? That’s Elon Musk’s Theory of ‘Sustainable Abundance.’

nytimes.com

I guess they fired the graphics team at the Washington Post, too. That first icon is freestyle snowboard, right? Then cross country-skiing while angry, and Star Trek transporter accident.

Cold deserts are dominated by physical weathering, not chemical weathering, you say? Check out new work in @geosociety.bsky.social Bulletin showing evidence for aluminosilicate weathering in Antarctic #wetlands & #groundwater. doi.org/10.1130/B386... ⚒️🧪❄️🧪💧🧪 Starring @colgate.edu student scientists!

It looks like ~1,000 accepted abstracts for #LPSC2026, down from >2,000 in 2023 (typical range seems to be ~2,000 ± 300 or so). www.hou.usra.edu/meetings/lps...

LPSC 2026 - Lunar and Planetary Science Conference

We’re excited to announce that the 57th Lunar and Planetary Science Conference (LPSC) will take place March 16–20, 2026, at The Woodlands Waterway Marriott Hotel and Convention Center in The Woodlands...

hou.usra.edu

I think my new definition for "mid-career" for #academics is the year that the cat you adopted in grad school and/or the dog you adopted as a postdoc reach the end of their days. This may be the real reason associate profs are so famously glum. It has been a rough few months for household mammals.

Go giant, slow-moving rocket, go!

Alexandra Witze@alexwitze.bsky.social · 7mo ago

If you wanna watch a really big rocket roll very slowly out to the launch pad in Florida, live, go here now m.youtube.com/watch?v=nrVn... It’s the Artemis II mission, aiming to launch in the coming weeks to send humans to the Moon for the first time in over half a century 🧪

The many faces of Crystal Geyser in Green River, UT. Spending some time with it this afternoon was a treat after a day in the Jurassic. ⚒️🧪

I generally think I have a pretty cool job as a geoscientist, explorer, and teacher, but I also think I will never be as cool (at least not in the eyes of my 12 year old kid) as whoever ends up with these gigs.

Elisa Granato@prokaryota.bsky.social · 7mo ago

JOB ALERT! 📢 For the scientists who love science communication: we’re hiring at @kurzgesagt.org !🌍 Come join our team, the vibes are impeccable. ✍️ Scriptwriter (Remote) kurzgesagt.org/careers/scri... 🔍 Fact-Checker & Researcher (Munich/Berlin/Remote) kurzgesagt.org/careers/seni...

One of my students just submitted their LPSC abstract - # 1439 on deadline morning. Looks like it could be a very sparsely attended meeting. Anyone want to hang out not in TX and have censorship-free conversations about space & planetary science? We could ski & talk Mars here in central NY 🚀🪐🧪

a man wearing glasses stands in front of a blackboard with the words bueller written on it

ALT: a man wearing glasses stands in front of a blackboard with the words bueller written on it

media.tenor.com

Higher education #academicsky faculty folks, how does your institution handle faculty governance-related voting? In-person balloting? Do you get an email with a voting link? Sherds in a pot? Your elected faculty representative votes for you?

a kermit the frog is holding a sign that says vote .

ALT: a kermit the frog is holding a sign that says vote .

media.tenor.com