(intense music)
- Welcome to today's program.
I am Angelo Lampousis
from the department of Earth
and Atmospheric Sciences
at the City College of New York.
Interviewing today my
colleague, same department,
Assistant Professor Steven Kidder.
Professor Kidder, Steve,
welcome to the program.
- Thanks.
Nice to be here.
- So I was reviewing before coming in,
your entry at the annual report
of the Division of Science,
recording your various achievements.
It was a concise entry but very telling
of your experiences so far.
Obviously your doctorate
from the University of California,
Institute of Technology in 2012.
And you received your Masters
from the Arizona, University.
And there's some interesting
post-doctoral experience
that I would love to discuss
but why don't you share
with us, if you would,
what made your title is
structural geologist, if I'm correct?
- Right, yeah.
- So would you share
with us, what made you,
I don't know if it was
a life changing moment
or if it was a slow process,
that kind of made you get there.
- Well I, as an undergraduate
at the University of
Minnesota, I didn't really know
what my major would be.
And my father was
an electrical engineer so I
figured I would be an engineer
because I was okay at math.
(both laugh)
And then I took
an introductory geology
course after a couple years
and I realized this is good stuff.
I could get a degree
and go on camping trips
and that's going to
count towards my degree.
So I thought that was pretty great
and also I noticed that
geologists were doing a lot
of traveling and I thought
that would be interesting
to sort of go to these interesting
places around the world
as part of my career, so I switched over
after I think about my third year.
And structural geology,
just sort of seemed
like one of the things I
was most interested in.
It's a topic that's pretty
accessible to a lot of undergrads
seem to gravitate towards
structural geology
because it deals with
folded rocks and faults
and there's lots of field
trips and hands-on stuff.
- So these expeditions
that you envisioned,
how soon were they realized
after your decision?
- Oh, even the first
course had field trips,
a Saturday field trip.
- I see.
- And then a lot of the other
courses as well would have
maybe a weekend trip or summer field camp
where we went to Montana or
Colorado for a few weeks.
- So the great outdoors?
- Yeah.
- I don't know, maybe you
can comment a little bit
on what is the distinction between geology
and other sciences especially as it comes
to doing laboratory time and exercise.
Because I know physics and chemistry
can be very successful in the lab.
- Yeah.
- But how much can you do in the lab
as opposed to outdoors
to make progress in this?
- Geosciences covers the whole realm.
So there's entirely
field-based geologists,
and there's entirely
lab-based people as well.
I mean there's a
sub-branch as a geologist:
geochemistry, geophysics, and
those can be very theoretical.
Or in the case of
geochemistry, very analytical
where you're entirely
doing laboratory work:
measuring isotope ratios
and that kind of thing.
Personally, I do a lot
of microstructural work
so I spend a lot of time using
a scanning electron microscope
or the optical microscope
looking at little what we
call thin sections of rock.
So basically shavings of rock
that are thin enough that
they are transparent.
And finding out as much as you can
about the history of the rocks from that.
- So you bring the samples in the lab
from some place outdoors so I assume that,
through your research, and
you already alluded to that
you had to actually go there
and collect them yourself, right?
- Sometimes, sometimes go
there and collect them.
Other times that work's been done.
I had a post-doc in New Zealand
and they've been
collecting all the samples
from their students over the years.
So there was this library
of samples in the basement.
And so I collected a few but
I took advantage of that.
You know it would've taken 20 years
to collect all the samples that I used.
- I see.
So I wonder if there is
any specific industries
that perhaps you envy for their access
or resources to good samples.
Would you have anything on
top of the list like that?
- Well for the work that
I'm doing, it's not...
So if you're kind of in sedimentary
or more shallow structural
work than seismic,
oil companies have great data,
three dimensional data
sets that are phenomenal.
I kind of focus on things
that are a little bit deeper.
Sort of 10, 20 miles down.
- Mhmm.
- So there's not really
any way to get down there.
(both laugh)
It's too far down for the mining
or petroleum industries
to be interested in it.
- I would like us to
return a little bit later,
in terms of the industries
and applications
of this science, however I also want
to ask you about the scale.
We already cover
different scales, I think.
But you talk the samples,
the thin sections
you are using and analyzing in the lab.
And then you extrapolate
or arrive to some
conclusions that go how deep?
- Well the work I've
personally been involved with
is probably the best example of that,
is some experimental
deformation that I did.
So I did some lab work
where we took samples
that were about a centimeter in size
and we heated them up in a special machine
to about 1,000 degrees under high pressure
and squashed them so they
were quartzite samples.
And it took, generally, a couple of days.
And those types of experiments
are used to predict
how strong the crust is.
So the hundreds of kilometers scale.
We can measure the rates
of movement of the crust
from GPS measurements oftentimes.
So we have some idea of that,
but to get at what's
happening at the deeper parts
where it's not just blocks
sliding past each other
on faults but actually
the kind of slow oozing
of the rocks over time.
Getting at that, those experiments
are one of the best ways to
approximate that information.
- I understand, of
course that's in relation
to our limitations in
digging down there, right?
I mean I don't know what's the deepest,
I've heard stories of the
mine and the deepest mine,
and the deepest distributed facts of...
- Yeah the deepest hole, I think,
is something like 10
kilometers or 10 miles or so.
- And then this is some kind of a well.
- That's a drill, yeah.
- A drill, I see.
- Yeah they drilled.
- And the mine, if I recall correctly,
is some place in South
Africa or something.
So there are limitations
that, in your discipline,
you are trying to overcome by simulating,
if that's the right word.
- Exactly, yeah.
- Simulating these conditions in the lab
using the appropriate samples.
Very well.
So if you would elaborate a
little bit on New Zealand,
is that the furthest
you've been from home?
- Yeah.
- Doing this?
Okay.
And this was on a fellowship
from the National Science Foundation?
- That's right.
Yeah, so as a doctoral student,
you see the end of your time approaching
and you have to figure out,
okay what am I gonna do?
- Sounds pretty ominous.
(both laughing)
- Yeah I gotta apply for some jobs,
or one of the most common
things is the post-doc.
And yeah, so I wrote a
proposal for a project
in New Zealand to work
with some people there
and do a very specific
thing and it was funded.
So I spent a year and a half there.
- I assume that anything
that has to do with anything
from the National Science Foundation
is extremely competitive these days.
So it's a big achievement
of yours to do it?
- It was an honor, yeah,
I think that the odds
were sort of on the 30 or 40% were funded.
- Oh okay.
- So not as bad as I had thought.
- Yeah that sounds higher than I think,
but yeah the proposals
for funding they go for.
And so if we come back a
little bit to the industries,
I know that students who are
coming in, as undergrads,
it's a typical question,
maybe the first question:
"I love doing this, what
type of job I can find
"after I'm done with this?"
What would you have to
offer to them in this case?
- There's a variety of things.
And generally students find
employment in the oil industry,
there's a lot of environmental
consulting works,
you can become a state
geologist, there's academic jobs.
And I think a fair number of students
go in different directions:
teaching, at different levels.
Something I read once about
geologists, in particular,
was in World War II I believe
that they were really sought after
because they were used to
dealing with, in the war effort,
they were used to dealing
with messy information, like messy data.
So I mentioned how there's
geophysics and geochemistry.
And as a geologist you're using
a really wide range of tools
and information that you have to
sort of synthesize, that kind of thing.
You can be pretty flexible
after your degree, I think.
- I want to ask you, Steve,
about your experience
interacting with students here
at City College of New York.
I don't know how you
feel about the bedrock
that we're located on.
For you, you would know
probably more than the
rest of the occupants
in the science building
combined about that,
but we're situated here in Manhattan
and we have qualified students:
undergrads and graduates.
You are the graduate advisor
for the Department of Earth
and Atmospheric Science.
So what has been your
experience with projects
and working with students so far?
- A lot of the undergrads are interested
in research projects.
I've worked with a few,
and my other colleagues have as well.
Typically, I'm working with
one or two at any given time.
I also have a masters and PhD student now
who are both working on
projects related to New Zealand.
So I got a grant funded to
do some work in New Zealand.
So one of my students is
actually spending the semester
at Brown University doing those
rock squeezing experiments
that I mentioned.
- Rock squeezing?
- Yeah, that's what we call it.
That's the technical term.
And my other student is working on some,
starting a project, my master student,
on some xenoliths.
So xenoliths are chunks of rock
that have been carried up
in a volcano in New Zealand.
And they're actually chunks of the mantle.
So they're at least 20 or 30 miles down.
And they're green, they
look totally different
than the rocks we normally
see at the surface.
And so she's trying to figure out
what the stress levels are there
and how fast the rocks are moving,
and try to understand better
what's going on below the crust
in terms of deformation.
- The green would be olivine in this case?
- Yeah, the mineral, olivine.
And there's some pyroxene
in there as well.
And you mentioned so the
City College is sitting
on the Manhattan Schist,
which as you guessed,
is great rock.
It's got peridot, it's got
garnet, coarse grains of micas
so there's some muscovite and biotite
that flake off and are nice to look at.
It's been very highly deformed
as a structural geologist.
It's a pretty great rock.
You can see, if you look carefully,
you can see where a
layer will come like this
and then be folded and come back again.
So they've been extensively squashed,
to use that term again.
So it's a lot of fun,
so I take my undergrad structure class.
We'll go out and look at those
rocks for a few different
Friday afternoon labs.
And they'll learn to use their...
We need to take
measurements with a compass
so we go out there and learn
how to use their compass
and then we look at those rocks.
- And the traditional compass
is still the better way
of doing this?
Because I have seen these applications
on iPhones and I'm not entirely convinced
that they're accurate,
I have tried them out.
But I was not successful, so far.
- Different strokes for
different folks, I think.
I like the traditional
compass is tried and true,
it's not going to run out of batteries.
It's got a little mirror in it,
so you can kind of see your
reflection, if you want.
You can check your teeth after lunch.
- Your makeup.
(both laugh)
- Yeah, it's a really great instrument.
So we train the students to use that
and they're welcome to bring their phones
and try that as well.
It seems like the apps
that you just download,
they're not super reliable
so you may have to do
some kind of calibration
or something before you would want to
collect a lot of data with your phone.
Definitely, my colleagues are doing that.
I'm on a Listserv where I
hear a lot of discussion
about training a field camp with the iPads
and that kind of thing.
So it's happening.
- I see.
Speaking of the difference
between traditional approaches
and modern approaches, in equipment
in this case in technology.
I was wondering what's the current trend
in your perspective in
terms of professional growth
in this field for, say
entry-level students,
who are graduating with enough
structural geology background.
What would be the
industries that employ them?
- Well the obvious one
is the oil industry.
Where you find oil is controlled
by structures, basically.
So you find the rocks
are layered like this,
the oil tends to rise up into that.
So structural geologist, if
the industry is going well,
if the gas prices are high,
then there's always jobs
for geologists there.
But there's actually
a lot of other directions or
other employment opportunities:
there's a lot of
consulting jobs out there,
our students often have GIS background
and there's a lot of government jobs
and other consulting jobs where there's
a lot of GIS work to do,
and environmental consulting jobs as well.
So the geologists tend to be
trained in a wide variety of fields
so you'll take a geophysics class,
and you'll take a geochemistry class,
and an aquatic chemistry class.
So you have a really broad
background coming out
of an earth science program.
So we are actually the
Earth Science Department.
Used to be the Geology Department.
So I think that that background
is actually pretty...
Our students find jobs,
some end up teaching
at different levels:
college level, high school.
- Sounds great.
Sounds promising.
And I have to disclose a
little bit of bias here
because I work for the same department
and this way I'm biased in
favor of what you're saying,
I could not agree more.
But, there it is, the disclosure.
So we have been talking
to Professor Steven Kidder
of the Department of Earth
and Atmospheric Sciences.
Professor Kidder's an
assistant professor here
at City College of New York.
I would like to thank our host institution
which is City College of New York
and specifically, for this interview,
the radio station WHCR 90.3
FM, The Voice of Harlem
and the general director
and general manager, Angela Harden,
as well as Christopher Fiore,
who is responsible for
video taping all of this.
My name is Angelo Lampousis,
Professor Kidders, Steve,
thank you so much for being here.
- It's a pleasure.
(soft electronic music)
