SDAG monthly meeting
February 18 |
Location:
Sufi Mediterranean Cuisine
5915 Balboa Ave
San Diego, CA 92111
Directions:
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6:00pm -
Social hour
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SDAG Monthly Meeting
6:00pm - Social Hour
7:00pm - Dinner
8:00pm - Program
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7:00pm
Dinner
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Menu: Mediterranean Buffet with Vegetarian options
if pre-registered by the deadline, $5 extra if you did not make a reservation.
Click the SDAG member checkbox on the reservation form if you are a member.
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Cost: $ 55.00 Member; Non-Member $ 65.00; Student $ 25.00
Reservations:
Make/Pay your reservation online by clicking the button below
by 6:00pm Wednesday, February 11
RESERVATIONS CANNOT BE ACCEPTED AFTER by 6pm Wednesday, February 11
(Please note beginning January 2024 all meeting reservations will require on-line pre-payment due to venue costs,
venue contracts, and loss of money due to no shows.)
IF YOU DO NOT PRE-PAY YOUR FOOD RESERVATION, WE CANNOT GUARANTEE YOU A MEAL.
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8:00pm - Program
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" From Precambrian Iron Formation to Terraforming Mars —the JIMES Expedition to Santoria "
Speaker: Eleanora (Norrie) Robbins, PhD (USGS-retired; SDSU-retired)
Working on living iron bacteria and the proto-minerals that they
precipitate, I got curious about Precambrian Iron Formation.
One variety called Banded Iron Formation is alternating layers
of hematite, magnetite, and silica (chert). Stan Tyler (Univ.
Wisconsin) taught his students that he thought iron bacteria
precipitated Iron Formation. His student Gene LaBerge (Univ.
Wisconsin) thought the silica was precipitated by silica algae.
Thinking like a paleoecologist, I asked the whereabouts of a
purported modern analog for Iron Formation. Gerhard Amstuz
(Univ. Heidelberg) said: Santorini!. So I needed to get to
Santorini and collect samples in the famous iron embayments
and hot springs of the little volcanoes in the ancient caldera.
The literature showed that researchers go there in the summer.
Realizing that biological communities usually change as
weather conditions change across a year, I wanted samples
monthly for a year which could help to interpret banding.
To solve this ended up involving: Santorini high school students,
their science teacher, a National Geographic photographer, the
head of the Santorini Boatman’s Union, my entire family, an
aerospace physiologist who wanted to be Greece’s first
astronaut, a Greek Supreme Court Judge, the chief engineer of
the cable car company, a NASA microbiologist, the Santorini Air
Force, an algologist at the Univ. Guam, my colleagues at the
USGS (a geologist, two geochemists, and a mineralogist), as
well as astronauts from America, Japan, and Russia.
The students collected fresh flocculate samples monthly near
the hot springs in two iron embayments and mailed them to my
lab in Reston, VA. They also immersed microscope slides in the
water for epilithic bacteria and algae to attach over the span of
each month. I discovered that the iron bacteria and siliceous
algae indeed switched abundances as the seasons unfolded.
The cyanobacteria and tube-dwelling diatoms provided useful
models for secreting oxygen to help our coauthor Chrysoula
Kourtidou Papadeli think about terraforming Mars. The iron
bacteria precipitated two-line ferrihydrite which dehydrated
into goethite in the bottom muds, discovered our coauthor
Gordon Nord. The cold winter Bora winds emptied out one of
the iron embayments leaving a carpet of pumice.
Our observations triggered coauthors physicist Arthur Iberall
(dad) and volcanic geochemist Moto Sato to develop a model
for life’s origin on Earth in iron-rich hot spring water bubbling up
through pumice, thus an inverted but natural fractionating
column, and precipitating formaldehyde. Volcanic
formaldehyde could form membranes around bubbles and
entrain iron. Entrained iron could switch between reduced and
oxidized, thereby acting as little onboard engines. As for the
plastic accumulating in the Palea Kameni embayment that one
student discovered in the summer, the Bora winds in winter
emptied it out into the Aegean Sea thereby wiping out any
possibility of annual deposition in the most famous iron
embayment where tourists frolic and geologists attempt to
core
Dr. Eleanora (Norrie) Robbins is a geologist who started her
geology career with the Tanganyika Geological Survey as a
Peace Corps Volunteer in Dodoma. She then worked for the
US Geological Survey as an economic geologist and
palynologist (fossil pollen grains) for 34 years in Washington,
DC, Denver, CO, and Reston, VA. Retired from the Federal
Government, she became adjunct faculty at SDSU, a 15-year-
long activity that involved mostly mentoring students while
she did her own research on geomicrobiology.
Presently she is formally retired and searching for the next
exciting adventure.
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Upcoming SDAG meetings - 2026
February 18 - Norrie Robbins Speaking on "From Precambrian Iron Formation to Terraforming Mars - the JIMES Expedition to Santoria"
March 18 - Josh Goodwin with BPELSG speaking on "Understanding Geology Licensure in California: PG, CEG, CHg, and PGp; How to apply, serve as a reference, and avoid common violations."
April 15 - Student Research Presentations by Scholarship Recipients
May 20 - TBA
June 17 - Joint meeting with South Coast Geological Society
July 15 - TBA
August 19 - TBA
September 16 - TBA
October 21 - Wes Danskin, USGS retired speaking on "Geology and Water Resources of the San Deigo – Tijuana Area"
Novmber 18 - Joint meeting with AEG Inland Empire Section
December 16 - Annual Holiday Meeting at San Diego History Museum with Tom Deméré as speaker
Recordings of past meetings
Note: If the video or sound does not play, try using another web browser. Firefox and Chrome may work on some of the videos. MS Edge and Safari are most likely to work.
1/21/26 Ali Fattah on "Updates to the San Diego Municipal Code requirements for Geotechnical Reports - Outreach"
12/17/25 Traditional holiday meeting at the San Diego Natural History Museum - Tom Deméré on "150 years of Paleontology at the San Diego Natural History Museum"
11/19/25 Joint Meeting with AEG Inland Empire Section - Eldon Gath on "San Joaquin Hills, Santa Ana Mountains, Puente Hills, and the Whittier fault: The final(?) grand theory of Orange County's tectonic geomorphic evolution"
10/15/2025 Todd Wirths on "Eocene Paleontology at Tourmaline Surfing Park, La Jolla"
8/20/2025 Dr. Mario Caputo on "Newly Discovered Tetrapod Bones, Insect Trace Fossils, & Eolian Adhesion Structures- Upper Pennsylvanian Wescogame Formation, Supai Group, Grand Canyon, Arizona"
7/16/2025 Rachel Maxwell on a survey of the Mojave-Sonoran Desert Springs and their sources. "Is this spring connected to that Aquifer?"
6/18/2025 Development of the western Hollywood Basin and Cheviot Hills, and newly identified blind thrust in Santa Monica Bay - Dr. Miles Kenney
5/14/2025 Landslide Stabilization - Dr. Sebastian Lobo-Guerrero (Audio is very quiet first few minutes.)
4/16/2025 Constraining Natural and Anthropogenic Controls on Base of Freshwater and Underground Source of Drinking Water (USDW) In Central San Joaquin Valley - Emily Imperato
4/16/2025 Examination of Middle Cambrian hyoliths from the Manuels River Formation of Avalonian southeastern Newfoundland - Nicolas Oliver
2/19/2025 A New Seismotectonic Framework for Active Faults in Metropolitan San Diego - Karl Mueller
8/21/2024 Upper Cretaceous through lower Eocene strata in San Diego: Messages for the end-Cretaceous impact, extinctions, and paleoclimates - Dr. Pat Abbott
5/15/2024 Exploring Iceland's Geological Wonders: From a Regional Perspective to a Hiking Expedition - Don Barrie & William Buckley
3/19/2024 Mighty Bad Land: A Perilous Expedition to Antarctica Reveals Clues to an Eighth Continent - Bruce Luyendyk
Meetings are usually scheduled for the 3rd Wednesday evening of the month.
Meeting information on this website is normally updated the second week of the month.
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