Bishop Museum Geology Section

Aloha and welcome to the Geology division of the Bishop Museum! Because of it's volcanic and tectonic setting, Hawai`i is an ideal place for geologists to study hot-spot volcanism, mid-ocean ridges, mantle-plume processes, and other geological and volcanological events.

Here at the Bishop Museum the Geology group has the facilities for petrographic analysis and sample preparation, as well as the capabilities for chemical analysis of geological specimens. We also have strong research ties with SOEST (School of Ocean & Earth Science & Technology) at the University of Hawai`i.

Current Projects

• An oceanographic research expedition to the southeast Indian Ocean to study the formation of the Indian Ocean Basin as India, Australia, and Antarctica separated starting 150 million years ago. The 53-day research cruise in February-April, 1996, collected seafloor rock samples from 98 sites along 1600 km of the Southeast Indian Ridge a ifting that occurs along the licollected multi-narrow beam swath sonar data used to construct bathymetric maps of the region. Click here to see the results summary from the expedition.

• A geochemical study to investigate the structure of the Hawaiian hotspot by studying lavas erupted at Kilauea over much of it's history. We will look at three very deep cores (1500-2000 meters long) that represent 100,000-200,000 years of eruptions at Kilauea. This will tell us how the compositions of lavas changed over most of Kilauea's life and from this we will learn about the hot spot's size and structure deep in the Earth's mantle.

• A collaborative study with scientists from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and SOEST (University of Hawai‘i ) to investigate the structure and composition of the submarine extension of the East Rift Zone of Kilauea, known as the Puna Ridge. We will be conducting a sea-going expedition to the Puna Ridge in September-October, 1998 and collecting high resolution sonar data, photographs, magnetic field and gravity readings, and rock samples from the seafloor in this are. The purpose is to learn how rifting occurs and to compare it to both the on-land portions of the rift zone and to the rifting that occurs along the globe-encircling mid-ocean ridge system.

If you have any questions, technical or non-technical, about Hawaiian geology, earthquakes, or volcanoes, please feel free to call Dr. Kevin Johnson M-F, 9am.-5pm. (HST) at (808) 848-4124.

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BISHOP MUSEUM
The State Museum of Natural and Cultural History
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