Power Outage = Computer Harm?

[rfakhrai]

Re: Power Outage = Computer Harm?

Well it's not about data storage and power outages obviously! Rather, something that might bore you guys to tears:

Synextensional Kinematics of the Eastern Lake Mead Fault System

[GreyGeek]

Re: Power Outage = Computer Harm?

Ah, geology!

Sounds interesting... have a link?

(I taught Earth Sciences for 18 years, on both HS and college)

[rfakhrai]

Re: Power Outage = Computer Harm?

Good to meet a fellow Earth geek! The thesis itself is in pretty rough shape; I'm just now only starting field work. But any information you read about tertiary extension of the basin and range in western North America is pretty much the parent topic for my work.

Thanks for the interest

[GreyGeek]

Re: Power Outage = Computer Harm?

Wow, that's a pretty extensive territory and topic. Are you going to create your own finite model of continental extension within the lithosphere? Research like that could lead to new models predicting the locations of Gold, Copper and Rare Earths, resources we are running short of.

Half of that Range and Basin is in Mexico. Do you plan to do any personal research there during these dangerous times?

Color me green...

The times I spent working on my Masters (Biochem) were some of the most enjoyable I ever had. Doing research is an absolute blast!! IF I could have afforded it I would have remained a professional student. 8)

As it was, I was working my way through college and could only take 12 hours a semester, until I got a research grant from the Welch Foundation that allowed me to work on my Masters. That usually meant only one lab course a semester, so I filled my 12 hours with classes from all the sciences, and after 7 years in college, plus over 60 hours post graduate, I had major hours in Chem, Physics, Math, Bio and Earth sciences. I enjoyed Chem and Biochem the most, but while teaching math at my first teaching job at a college in central Nebraska I realized that I enjoyed Physics and Math even more, and over the years have spent more time refreshing and expanding my knowledge in those two areas more than any of the others. Another incentive to leave Chem was that of the 14 classmates that earned their Masters in Biochem at the same time I did, I am, to the best of my knowledge, the only one still alive. All of the others have died of cancer. I found out, in the early 90's, that most of the chemicals that we used to do our research with were determined later to be carcinogens. Of those 14, I am the only one who did not continue on in biochemical research, but went into teaching instead, and never continued using those chemicals.

[rfakhrai]

Re: Power Outage = Computer Harm?

That is certainly a very intriguing story about your life as a chemist. I'm sure those chemicals are still being used for research purposes; has the safety protocol kept pace for workers?

Some day, I would love to know all there is to know about the B&R but, for my thesis, I'm focusing on a 5 sq-km area of the central B&R just north of Lake Mead in southeastern Nevada. Most of this work is, indeed, funded by the NSF because its importance to the energy industry is unparalleled. The area is an enormous basin (just one of many in the B&R, of course) that has upwards of 30,000km of sediment fill! In addition, after much of that sediment was deposited, the Sevier Fold and Thrust Belt came through and severely messed up the area leaving behind many interesting faulted structures and extraordinarily active fault systems.

The Lake Mead fault system, a strike-slip fault system (like the San Andreas) where my work centers, has seen nearly 80km of displacement! So understanding these complex fault systems and structures will be critical to performing an overall basin reconstruction which could inform (as you called it) future energy and mineral exploration.

But I could talk forever on this topic. After I'm through with this thesis -- as much as I love being a student -- it's definitely time for me to take a break and do some work for which I actually get paid

It's always great to talk with another scientist, albeit one with much more esteem than I. Maybe eventually the public will hold science as a whole in more esteem. But that's a topic for another thread.