This 90-minute short course aims to introduce non-geologists to structural geological and petrological principles, which are used by geologists to understand system earth.

The data available to geologists is often minimal, incomplete and representative for only part of the geological history. Besides learning field techniques that are needed to take measurements and acquire data, geologists also need to develop a logical way of thinking to overcome these data gaps and arrive at an understanding of system earth. There is a difference between the reality observed in the field and the geological models that are used to tell the story.

In this course we briefly introduce the following subjects:
1) Geology rocks: Introduction to the principles of geology.
2) Collecting rocks: The how, what, and pitfalls of onshore and offshore geological data acquisition.
3) Failing rocks: From structural field data to (paleo-)stress analysis.
4) Dating rocks: Absolute and relative dating of rocks using microstructural, petrological and geochronological methods.
5) Shaping rocks: The morphology of landscapes as tectonic constraints
6) Crossover rocks: How geology benefits from geodynamic, seismological and geodetic research, and vice-versa.
7) Q&A!

Our aim is not to make you the next specialist in geology, but we would rather try and make you aware of the challenges a geologist faces when they go out into the field. In addition, currently used methodologies and their associated data quality are addressed to give other earth scientists a feel for the capabilities and limitations of geological research.

This course is given by Early Career Scientists and forms a quartet with the short courses on ‘Geodynamics 101’, ‘Seismology 101’, and ‘Geodesy 101’. For this reason, we will also explain what kind of information we expect from the fields of geodynamics, seismology and geodesy, and we hope to receive input on the kind of information you could use from our side.