Alison Rust

Exercise bikes in a seminar room @VolcanoLMV! How many students would be more engaged if they could cycle along during lectures? @UoBEarthScience

"The most staggering, terrifying & beautiful imagery of nature ever recorded." @Variety. Join Volcanologist and next Head of School for @UoBEarthScience Professor @AlisonRust for a special intro to the extraordinary Fire of Love Wed 3 Aug 18:00. Tickets: wshd.to/fireoflove

@BristolGlass made us large Prince Rupert's drops by dripping molten glass into water. We then commissioned bubbly ones but the melt always formed fragments rather than quenching into a drop. Bubbles matter! Important for magma-water interactions given the ubiquity of bubbles.

This fun project took us to the workshop of Bristol Blue Glass @BristolGlass. Was fascinated to see that they make bubbly glass by adding a POTATO to the molten glass in the furnace!

Prince Rupert’s Drops are glass beads with unusual (and explosive!) material properties. We show that heterogeneous internal stresses control the size and shape distribution of fragments & discuss implications for magma fragmentation during hydrovolcanism pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pn…

You can go inside. I've been on the conseil scientifique since 2011 but today was struck by the view looking up. (Of course not a realistic volcanic vent shape and not what I was meant to be considering.)

It is remarkable how variable 20 years of lichen growth is on the volcanic rocks used to build this stylized volcano building at the heart of 'Vulcania', a volcano... theme park in central France.

I am sure I am biased but I somehow find these scars on the landscape from geothermal energy extraction attractive. It's been an interesting week at a summer school on geothermal and magmatic systems near Krafla, Iceland.

@Matt_J_Roche @UoBEarthScience If I had any more references letters to write for you I'd be adding that your MSci project seminar was the best presentation (at any level) I've seen in years. It was engaging, clear and informative. A great cap to 4 years of hard work and learning.

I was excited to finally present the results of my MSci project today, entitled “Iron redox cycling as viable metabolic pathways in Enceladus’ ocean”. And to top it off I even won a cuddly Triceratops! Not quite a plushy Geobacter though… Uni, completed it m8 ✅ 🎉🥂🪐

I'm reflecting on our constructive @UoBEarthScience in-person(!) away day. As incoming Head of School I have pages of notes of ideas. All the outgoing Head @rpancost next to me wrote is: HAPPY HOUR & CREAM TEA IS COMING BACK.

@rpancost @UoBEarthScience Not sure about cooler. But more magnetic.

Delayed 2020 graduation today! Thinking of field work at Laguna del Maule in Chile with graduating PhD student Claudio Contreras. Amazing scenery and geology. So thoughtful of Univ. of Chile undergrad Marcel Cortes to both take this photo and share it with me.

It is humbling to see the soil (with pottery) the Minoans lived on and think about the subsequent devastating events recorded in the volcanic deposits above. Turn around to see the beauty of the resulting caldera. It's been a joy to share Santorini with our eager MSci students.

I'm really glad we decided to run our Santorini field class in April this year. It is so much cooler and quieter than September when we usually go. This makes it much less draining for students and staff. Bonus: so many flowers!

@OlowoAyodele1 @UoBEarthScience There are various apps available . I'm using Physics Toolbox Magnetometer.

@AlisonRust @UoBEarthScience Wow, I love this. Please, how do I get to achieve this ?

Did you know smartphones have magnetometers? Had fun today looking at change of magnetic field near some lavas and (hidden) dykes.

@jonfr500 @UoBEarthScience There are various apps. I'm using Physics Toolbox Magnetometer.

It's great we can use public buses for transport on the field trip. But wow do I have a load of receipts for my expense claim.

Great to be back with students in the field learning about eruptions...and the challenge of engineering solutions to reduce risk to people on Red Beach. Ironically if managed to stop rocks falling and sliding onto the beach you'd soon lose the beach to sea erosion.

The new packing for field teaching: How many FFP2 masks can I fit in a hat hat?