Potter Intern Allison Faulkner gathers a water sample near a suspected salt seep in Brown County in July 2024. | Sara Clifford, IGWS

The IGWS is accepting applications until Saturday, March 29, for students interested in working as Potter Interns for six to 10 weeks this summer.

These paid internships, headquartered at the IGWS on the IU-Bloomington campus, expose students to earth science-related careers and skills, such as collecting core in the field, creating maps, analyzing samples in a lab, organizing data into usable formats, and digitizing historical records. IGWS staff members act as mentors. Since the program started in the summer of 2022, three former Potter Interns have now become full-time staff members.

A new addition to the program for summer 2025 is free housing on the IU campus in hopes of assisting applicants from outside the Monroe County area.

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Three new projects have been published to the Indiana Journal of Earth Sciences, Vol. 7, since January:

Map of Indiana Showing Earthquake Epicenters and Structural Features

This map, largely based on IGWS Miscellaneous Map 84 from 2012, shows the epicenters of all known earthquakes of magnitude 3.0 and larger in Indiana since 1812 at 1:500,000 scale--including 27 earthquakes that were not on the 2012 map. It also shows 53 earthquakes that either registered smaller than 3.0 or did not have a recorded magnitude. The locations of known faults and other structural features throughout the state are displayed as well. Co-authors are Victoria Leffel, Polly Sturgeon, and Kilauren Driscoll. View the map here.

Quaternary Geology of the Indiana Portions of the Chicago and the Northern Half of the Kankakee 30- x 60-minute Quadrangles

A multi-year effort has produced a map, pamphlet, and database that document and examine the landforms and near-surface sediments in northwestern Indiana associated with the northward retreat of the Lake Michigan Lobe of the Laurentide Ice Sheet between 21,000 and 12,500 years ago. The map provides geological data to inform land-use planning, water resource planning, and site-level geological and environmental investigations. Co-authors are Dr. Henry Loope and Dr. Jose Luis Antinao. This project was financially supported by the Great Lakes Geologic Mapping Coalition. View the map, pamphlet, and database here.

Indiana's Limestone Campus--a Guide to the Limestone Architecture of Indiana University Bloomington

The IU Bloomington campus is built largely of Indiana limestone, a world-class dimension (building) stone quarried locally in Monroe and Lawrence Counties. Known to geologists as the Salem Limestone, this unique material has been used extensively in building projects across the United States and has contributed to iconic works of American architecture. This StoryMap, a digital companion to an updated and expanded, printed IU limestone campus tour brochure that will be rereleased for tour participants this spring, shares the historical stories behind 40 buildings on the IU Bloomington campus, including architectural styles, architects, and use and name changes. Extensive photo galleries highlight intricate limestone carvings found around campus. Co-authors are Polly Sturgeon, Dr. Brian Keith, and Kristen Wilkins. View the StoryMap here.

The easiest way to see what's underground is the obvious way: drill a hole and inspect the core that comes out.

Geologists can't always do that, though. Each borehole costs thousands to tens of thousands of dollars depending on the depth, the type of extraction method used, and the type of material being drilled through.

Since 2016, IGWS researchers have deployed a complementary data-collection method at locations where other data points are scarce: horizontal-to-vertical-spectral-ratio (HVSR) seismic, or "passive seismic" surveying. It doesn't produce the same quality of data as drilling a hole, as there's nothing to see but sound waves on a screen. But when you don't have a spare $100,000 or so to spend on a mapping project, HVSR can reduce the guesswork.

Research Geologist Isaac Allred sets up a Tromino HVSR unit in a thawing field in January 2023. | Sara Clifford, IGWS

The IGWS has four Tromino HVSR units, each about the size of a brick. Two research teams have been using them over the winter because frozen ground has been found to yield some of the clearest data.

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Editor's note: This is the second installment in the "Piles to Archive" series. The first was about moving truckloads of records out of temporary storage.

When geologists depart the Survey, they leave behind many traces of their work--in publications, in field notebooks, in the results of field and lab tests, and even in notes-to-self around the margins of maps. All of that contributes to the IGWS's collective knowledge about the geology of Indiana.

Over the past 18 months, more than a dozen current IGWS geologists, data analysts, and data preservationists have been sifting through tens of thousands of those records, aiming to make all that knowledge freely accessible to anyone, for the first time. This work has been funded by the USGS's National Geological and Geophysical Data Preservation Program (NGGDPP).

Efforts are paying off. While taking their turn to evaluate records in offsite storage last summer, the geologists mapping part of the Bloomington quadrangle for a 2025 STATEMAP project sorted a stack of paper maps dating back to at least the 1960s which hadn't been available for research use. Those maps have since been scanned and digitized, and the geologic point data was used to inform the new Bloomington quad map in progress.

IGWS Research Scientist Robin Rupp and Volunteer Affiliates Henry Gray and Russell Boulding discuss decades-old IGWS seismic data created by setting off dynamite charges at the surface. Paper copies of the data were recovered during data preservation efforts funded by an NGGDPP grant. | Nick Angelos, IGWS

In addition, a large paper cache of around 12,000 seismic data points--collected statewide from the use of dynamite decades ago--was recovered and compared against existing digital records. The paper copies corrected some known deficiencies in the digital versions, increasing confidence in the data and making it useful again to help determine accurate depths to bedrock.

"Old" data is still useful science, and may become more valuable as time goes on, said Nick Angelos, a GIS analyst who's been working to make this recovered data usable today.

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• Dr. Howard Swyers began work as the IGWS assistant director for business on Jan. 2. He is responsible for monitoring financial accounts and reporting, assisting in grant budgeting, and managing the IGWS Business Division staff and functions. Swyers has served the Indiana University community for more than 25 years with more than 20 years in financial management. Among the units he has worked for are the Jacobs School of Music, the College of Arts & Sciences, and most recently the Kelley School of Business. He became a fiscal officer in 2008. In moving to the IGWS, he is looking forward to deepening his knowledge of grant-funded operations and geological science. He holds a bachelor's degree in music education from the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse, and master's and doctorate degrees in music from the Jacobs School of Music.

• A 2004 paper about the Great Lakes co-authored by State Geologist Dr. Todd Thompson was cited in a new study of coastal deposits of Mars. "That publication is really out of this world," Thompson quipped.

• Thompson signed letters and certificates for 12 new Licensed Professional Geologists (LPGs) on Jan. 23. (See photo at right.)

• Research Scientist Dr. Maria Mastalerz is a co-author of three recent papers in the International Journal of Coal Geology: "Elastic Anisotropy and Deformation Characteristics of Pennsylvania Anthracite under True Triaxial Stress," "Organic Matter Content and Its Role in Shale Porosity Development with Maturity: Insights from Baltic Basin Silurian Shales," and "Anomalies in Vicker's Microhardness of Subbituminous and High Volatile Bituminous Coals."

• Mastalerz co-wrote an article for the commemorative book celebrating the 75th meeting of the International Committee for Coal and Organic Petrology (ICCP). It was about the history of the ICCP's Reinhardt Thiessen Medal and the Organic Petrology Award, both of which Mastalerz has won.

• Dr. Jose Luis Antinao co-authored a paper published in the Journal of South American Earth Sciences, "Flow-type Controls on Tributary Alluvial Formation along the Andes." The paper was derived from work performed under two grants from the National Science Foundation in collaboration with Chilean and European scientists.

• Research Scientist Victoria Leffel, GIS Analyst Nick Angelos, and Editor Sara Clifford sat for an interview with the Indiana Daily Student newspaper about landslide research and fieldwork on Jan. 24. The IDS story can be read here. Leffel was interviewed by FOX 59 television in January about her landslide work, and Clifford published a story about landslide research in IU Today on Jan. 13. Leffel also presented landslide information to the Indiana Association of Professional Soil Classifiers on Feb. 24.

• On March 6 and 7, Research Scientists Kilauren Driscoll, Leffel, and Education and Outreach Coordinator Polly Sturgeon participated in the Central U.S. Earthquake Consortium state geologists meeting and National Earthquake Hazard Model Map workshop. They presented their new epicenter map and response plan progress.

• Research Scientists Leffel, Dr. Henry Loope, and Ashley Douds, along with frequent IGWS collaborator Dr. Ben Dattilo, will present at the Indiana Academy of Science meeting March 22 in Indianapolis. Leffel will speak about using LiDAR to identify natural landslides in the Hoosier National Forest. Douds' topic is "Benefits of incorporating lithologic strip geochemical analysis into a subsurface investigation." Loope will share significant findings regarding the chronology of the Wisconsin and Illinois Episode glaciations in central Indiana.

• Research Scientists Loope and Don Tripp will help guide the Professional Geologists of Indiana (PGI) field trip April 5 at McCormick's Creek State Park.

• Research Scientist Tracy Branam will speak to Indiana Department of Natural Resources staff and others about passive treatment of acid-mine drainage on April 16 in Jasonville.

• IGWS staff have formed a new committee to extend outreach to geoscience college students. Thompson promoted careers at state geological surveys for the Mirksy Day of Geoscience at IU Indianapolis on Feb. 28, while Tripp and Research Scientist Garrett Marietta will attend the Crossroads Conference at IU Bloomington in April. If you know a student who would like to learn more about state geological survey careers, email proot@iu.edu.

• The Indiana Master Naturalist course is returning to the IGWS Learning Lab for its fourth year. New this year are three weekend field trips to explore tree biology at the IU Teaching and Research Preserve, native birds at Lake Monroe, and water quality with the Hoosier Riverwatch program. Email proot@iu.edu to be placed on a waitlist for next year's program.

The Indiana Geological and Water Survey is a research institute, but it's also a public service institute. Education and service to the state are central parts of our mission, accomplished through the collection of geologic specimens and data and the dissemination of scientific information. Here's a snapshot of how we carried out that mission over the past year: