Geoheritage

Geoheritage is an emerging field that examines the cultural, scientific, educational, and aesthetic significance of geodiversity. Geodiversity is defined as the natural range of geological (rocks, minerals, fossils), geomorphological (landforms, processes), hydrological, and soil features. It represents the "abiotic equivalent of biodiversity" and is commonly regarded as the abiotic foundation of ecosystems. The field of geoheritage research has grown and now examines how geodiversity structures people's lives in the past, today, and into the future. 

Published Research

Dr. Stance Hurst recently published a paper that explored the geodiversity of building stones used in constructing a rock wall house near Post, Texas. Paper Link

Graduate Student Research Projects

Glenn Fernandez-Cespedes, a HMS student, currently is investigating how landscape geodiversity impacted the construction and location of early historical settler dugouts across the Southern High Plains region of Texas. 

Markus Crawford, an Interdisciplinary Studies student, is using pXRF to examine the variety of different types of Edwards Formation chert placed in lithic caches across the Southern High Plains region of Texas.