After finding more than 300 surface faults in Harris County, a University of Houston geologist now has information that could be vitally useful to the region’s builders and city planners.

The vast Tibetan Plateau--the world's highest and largest plateau, bordered by the world's highest mountains--has long challenged geologists trying to understand how and when the region rose to such spectacular heights.

Patterns of scalloped-edged cliffs or lobate scarps on Mercury’s surface are thrust faults that are consistent with the planet shrinking and cooling with time. However, compression occurred in the planet’s early history and Mariner 10 images revealed decades ago that lobate scarps are among the youngest’ features on Mercury.

A new global portrait taken from space details Earth’s land cover with a resolution never before obtained. ESA, in partnership with the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation, presented the preliminary version of the map to scientists last week at the 2nd GlobCover User Consultation workshop held in Rome, Italy.

A geologist from the University of Leicester has proposed an immense (1.5km) exhibition to illustrate the vastness of geological time and to give a vivid perspective of how quickly human activity is changing the climate.

Bennett et al. found that new geodetic data from the Dinarides mountains and Dalmatian islands in southern Croatia and Bosnia, indicate that the region is actively deforming.

Prof. Liu Dongsheng, a researcher with the Institute of Geology and Geophysics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, has been awarded the Alexander von Humboldt Medal in 2007 by the European Geosciences Union (EGU) for his exceptional contributions to earth and environmental sciences, particularly in advancing the understanding of paleoclimatic change using Chinese loess-paleosoil sequence.

A breakthrough in geological dating can be expected within the next few years, combining existing methods to yield higher accuracy over longer time scales closer to the earth’s origin. This will bring great benefits not just for earth sciences, but also for other fields that rely on accurate dating over geological time.

Not all areas of the Tibetan Plateau rose at the same time, according to researchers who are determining the past elevation of plateau locations by studying the remains of terrestrial plants that once grew there.

Researchers exploring a remote terrain in Arctic Canada have made discoveries that may rock the world of Canadian geology.

The 3,000-kilometer-long Transantarctic Mountains are a dominant feature of the Antarctic continent, yet up to now scientists have been unable to adequately explain how they formed.

A magnitude 6.8 earthquake has struck offshore Guatemala on June 13, 2007, at a depth of 64 kilometers and some 115 kilometers from the capital, the US Geological Survey said. See the Guatemala map about the news. Guatemala is a small country in Central America.