The Rock Cycle is Earth's great recycling process where igneous, metamorphic, and sedimentary rocks can all be derived from and form one another. Analogous to recycling a Coke can, where an old can ...

Researchers have discovered microdiamonds in the Nishisonogi metamorphic rock formation in Nagasaki Prefecture, Japan. Microdiamonds in metamorphic rocks are important minerals because they form in ...

The discovery of tiny diamonds embedded in rock samples from northeastern Australia indicates that the geological past Australia’s eastern coast is more complex than previously thought. Metamorphic ...

Some rocks are very common on earth. Large portions of the continents consist for example of granite and basalt covers almost all of the oceanic crust. Other rocks are formed only when very specific ...

Collectors of all ages have always been interested in rocks and the minerals that make them up. They come in countless shapes, sizes and colors. There are three main types of rocks: sedimentary, ...

The oldest blueschists—metamorphic rocks formed during subduction—are of Neoproterozoic age 1, and 0.7–0.8 billion years old. Yet, subduction of oceanic crust to mantle depths is thought to have ...

As a youngster growing up in New York, Graham Baird always was interested in science and the natural world, and in college he was fascinated with how igneous and metamorphic rocks formed. As an ...

Researchers have produced a new estimate for the origin of Earth's plate tectonics—the movement of large chunks of the planet's outer layer, or crust. Although there is broad consensus that plate ...