A geological survey of about 120 medieval churches in south Cambridgeshire reveals a dominant theme of local fieldstone rubble walls with dressings of local Cretaceous Clunch and imported Jurassic Barnack limestone; the richer the church the greater the volume of costly Barnack. The Cretaceous Ely Sandstone forms rubble walls only near the city. Victorian renovations […]

The evolution of trees and forests through the Devonian Period fundamentally changed the Earth's land biosphere, as well as impacting physical environments and geomorphology by stabilizing sediments and interacting with flowing air and water. In this talk I will describe a recently discovered forest landscape within the Middle Devonian (Eifelian) Hangman Sandstone Formation of Somerset […]

Dr Steve Boreham (BSc PhD) worked for the University of Cambridge for more than 30 years and has a special interest in Southern England, East Anglia, Fenland and the Cambridge District. He is a key member of the CGS Geosites team and in this talk he will describe the geodiversity of the county and its […]

Dominic Davey gave a talk on Septarian Nodules Penny Coggill gave a talk on International Commission on Geo-Heritage Sites Peter Fletcher gave a talk on Carbonatites in Assynt

The presentation summarises the Crossrail project before explaining the main construction methods for the tunnels and stations. The Cretaceous to Holocene geology encountered along the route is presented including both the impact the geology has on the engineering and how recent in- frastructure investigations have developed our knowledge of the geology of London. The discussion […]

Comets and Meteors can be an impressive sight in the night sky, but the study of them has told us a huge amount about the origins of the Solar System and the Planets including Earth. Paul will show where these space rocks and dirty snowballs come from and the story that they reveal including the […]

The glacial history of our region has a complexity that is yet to be fully unrav- elled, but significant discoveries have been made in recent years that throw light on the glacial, periglacial and interglacial periods that have transformed our landscape. Phil is a Quaternary geologist, and this talk will describe how the dramatic changes […]

Isostasy explains why there are raised beaches and fossil cliffs, why mountains like icebergs have roots, the shape of rift valleys, the height of Everest, and many other aspects of the landscape. Mike's talk will have lots of demonstrations to help us visualise how all this happens

We are probably aware of the contribution of large scale Lidar surveys to understanding the landscape around us, by organisations using aircraft or drone borne commercial Lidar and 3d mapping systems, but you may not be aware that this technology is to hand for smaller scale modelling in your iPhone Pro (and some other) mobile […]

In 1878, some Belgian coal miners discovered the first nearly complete dinosaur skeletons ever found: a group of 30 Iguanodons. This talk will show how far the real appearance of these animals differed from previous reconstructions based on only a handful of bones and teeth, and how research has given us some detailed insights into […]

Everything around us, apart from hydrogen and helium, was made inside stars. The Earth and Sun contain elements made in generations of stars that were born and died before the birth of our Sun and planets. The story of the birth and death of stars is also the story of the battle of matter against […]