Expeditions 2010-2011

Expedition 330 Louisville Seamount Trail

December 2010-February 2011

In December 2010, an international team of scientists set sail on the scientific drilling vessel JOIDES Resolution for an eight-week IODP expedition to the Louisville Seamount chain. The expedition set out to examine: (1) the possible motion of the Louisville hotspot and its geodynamical implications; and (2) the eruptive cycle and geochemical evolution of the seamount trail. Two scientists from the University of Leicester sailed on Expedition 330, Dr Rebecca Williams (Petrologist) and Dr Louise Anderson (Logging Staff Scientist). Over the course of 8 weeks the expedition drilled 1114 m of sediment and igneous basement across eight holes at six sites located on five different seamounts. In total 806 metres of core was recovered, corresponding to 72% recovery. Two holes were logged during the Expedition, U1374A and U1376A. U1374A was logged with the Triple-combo (Density - Neutron Porosity – Resistivity & Gamma Ray sondes), Formation MicroScanner-Sonic string, Goettingen Borehole Magnetometer (GBM) and Ultrasonic Borehole Imager (UBI). U1376A was logged with all the previously listed tools excluding the UBI. Excellent downhole data were acquired including borehole imagery, which will aid in the calculation of the number of massive igneous units drilled and fill in gaps where no core was recovered.

EPC Logging Staff Scientist: Louise Anderson

See IODP Expedition 330 for further details.

Expedition 325 Great Barrier Reef Environmental Changes

The GBREC expedition is designed to establish the course and effects of the last glaciation in reef settings that developed in tectonically inactive areas located far from glaciated regions. Expedition 325 proposes to core at several osshore sites along transects on the Great Barrier Reef. Key objectives are  to reconstruct the deglaciation curve for the period 20Kyrs-10Kyrs before present in order to establish the minimum sea level during the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) and to assess the validity, timing and validity of meltwater pulses which are thought to have disturbed the general thermohaline oceanic circulation and hence global climate. The expedition also aims to establish the sea-surface temperature variation which accompanied the transgression. These data will enable the impact of sea-level rise on reef growth, geometry and biological makeup to be assessed. The patterns of short term palaeoclimatic changes are thought to punctuate the transitional period between present-day climatic conditions following the LGM.

EPC Petrophysicists: Louise Anderson and Sally Morgan

See IODP Expedition 325 for further details.

Expeditions 2009

Expedition 313 New Jersey Shelf

Unraveling global sea level changes from the effects of subsidence and sediment supply requires a fundamental understanding of passive margin sedimentation.  Sea level fluctuations have a fundamental, worldwide control on the stratigraphic record, as do tectonics and changes in sediment supply.  The challenge is to isolate the imprint of each of these effects.

The New Jersey continental shelf, particularly the inner to middle shelf where this expedition drilled, is well suited for estimating late Oligocene-Miocene eustatic amplitudes, a period of known glacioeustatic changes, as sediments in this setting are stratigraphically more complete, record the full range of water depth variations, and provide the facies needed to estimate amplitudes.

EPC Petrophysicists: Jenny Inwood, Johanna Lofi, Sally Morgan, Annick Fehr, Frank Bosch

See IODP Expedition 313 for further details.

Expedition 321 Pacific Equatorial Age Transect/Juan de Fuca

May 5—July 5, 2009

Expedition 321 is grouped into the same science program as 320, and will continue the drilling, coring and logging program. The two expeditions will use data they gather and combine it will seismic reflection studies of regional sedimentation so that equatorial Pacific sediment history can be reconstructed with high confidence, and improve upon earlier reconnaissance work.

See Equatorial Pacific / Juan de Fuca

 EPC Logging Scientist: Louise Anderson  

Expedition 320 Pacific Equatorial Age Transect

March 5—May 5, 2009

This expedition will employ the JOIDES Resolution's unique capabilities and recover seafloor sediments to study ocean circulation and productivity.

The Pacific Equatorial Age Transect expeditions (320 &321) aim to recover a continuous Cenozoic record (from 65.5 million years ago to the present) of the equatorial Pacific by drilling at the paleoposition of the Equator at successive crustal ages on the Pacific plate. This will also help scientists to understand how the Earth was able to maintain very warm climates, relative to the 20th century, even though solar radiation received at the earth’s surface remained nearly constant for the last 55 million years.

See Equatorial Pacific / Juan de Fuca

PhD Student Peter Fitch sailed as a Physical Properties Scientist 

Expedition 320T Seatrials

January 20 - March 5 2009

Expedition 320T started in January 2009 and tested all of the scientific and technical equipment on board the JOIDES Resolution following its time in dry dock. The expedition transited from Singapore via Guam to Honolulu, and revisited the Ontong-Java Plateau region (near ODP Site 807). One hole, U1330A, was specifically drilled for logging. Three adapted tool strings were run: a Trial Combination (HNGS,HLDS,GPIT,DIT-E), a Formation MicroScanner comination (HNGS, GPIT, FMS) and a Magnetic Susceptibility Sonde comination (HNGS, HLDS, GPIT, MSS).

EPC Logging Scientists: Jenny Inwood, Louise Anderson, Annick Fehr 

IODP Expeditions 2001-2005

Expedition 310 Tahiti Sea Level

Fall 2005

The IODP Tahiti Sea Level Expedition 310 in 2005 was initiated to investigate global sea level rise since the last glacial maximum, approximately 23,000 years ago, to learn more about the timing and course of past global sea level changes to better understand present and future sea level rise due to global greenhouse conditions.  Since the end of the last ice age, global sea level has risen by about 120 meters, primarily because of the melting of large inland ice sheets and thermal expansion of the global body of ocean waters attributable to rising temperatures.  Tahiti is well situated for these investigations because the island is located in a tectonically stable region. Consequently, changes in sea level here can be related solely to global effects.  Because the corals off Tahiti have strict ecological requirements and are extremely sensitive to environmental changes, both natural and human-induced, they are accurate, sensitive recorders of past sea level and climatic change.  For six weeks, aboard the DP HUNTER, the expedition science party worked on the most extensive geological research investigation ever undertaken in a coral reef area. 

See Tahiti Sea Level Expedition website for further details.

EPC Logging Scientists: Hendrick Braaksma, Jenny Inwood

 Publications

• Inwood, J., Brewer, T. S., Braaksma, H. and Pezard, P.  2008.  Integration of Core, Logging and Drilling Data in Modern Reefal Carbonates to Improve Core Location and Recovery Estimates (IODP Expedition 310).  Journal of the Geological Society of London 165, 585-596.

NanTroSEIZE

The Nankai Trough Seismogenic Zone Experiment (NanTroSEIZE), starting in 2007, is a complex ocean drilling project that will be conducted over several years with multiple expedition teams of scientists from all around the world. NanTroSEIZE attempts for the first time to drill, sample, and instrument the earthquake-causing, or seismogenic portion of Earth’s crust, where violent, large-scale earthquakes have occurred repeatedly throughout history.

The Nankai Trough is located beneath the ocean off the southwest coast of Japan. It is one of the most active earthquake zones on the planet. The plan for NanTroSEIZE includes drilling, below the ocean, very deep into the Earth to observe earthquake mechanisms, and this will help us to learn more about how and why earthquakes and tsunamis occur.

PhD student Joanne Tudge, part of the Geophysics and Borehole Research Group in the Department of Geology at Leicester, sailed as an LWD specialist on this NanTroSEIZE expedition to classify the rocks and understand the physical properties of the sediments in the subduction zone. 

See Nankai Trough Seismic Zone experiment for further details.

Superfast Spreading Rate Crust 3

See Expedition 312 for further details.

EPC Logging Scientist: Marc Reichow

Arctic Coring Expedition (ACEX)

See Expedition 302 for further details.

EPC Petrophysicist: Brice Rea

Oceanic Core Complex Formation, Atlantis Massif 2

See Expedition 305 for further details.