Equipment and Resources
Our research is carried out on modern marine depositional environments, on outcrop, and on core. Each of these settings requires different equipment for both field work and laboratory analysis. As such, we have a wide assortment of equipment and resources (outlined below).
Resources
The ARISE Sedimentology Lab analyses samples for industry and university researchers. We have a range of grain size processing methods, and can do x-ray imaging as well. Please see the price sheet for analysis costs, and contact Shahin Dashtgard for further inquiries.
Core and Outcrop Equipment and Resources
- Two dedicated core facilities that house over 100 subsurface cores from both the Western Canada Sedimentary Basin (Alberta and BC) and the Georgia Basin (Vancouver Island, BC). These cores are used in teaching undergraduate classes and for doing undergraduate research projects.
- Camera-mountable petrographic scope for examining and photographing microstructure in core and in drill cuttings.
- Camera-mountable microscope with a mechanical point counting stage for determining the petrology and diagenetic history of rocks in thin section.
- Other non-standard field gear includes: portable, gamma-ray scintillometer, DJI Mavic Pro Platinum drone, and DJI Mavic Pro 2 drone TruPulse 200X Laser Range Finder
Sediment Samplers
- Partial Wink Vibracore for collecting and preserving 2 inch diameter cores up to 15 m in length, and that can be acquired in sand and mud. The operating manual for the Wink Vibracore can be downloaded here.
- Nine stainless steel boxcores that are used to acquire shallow (30 cm deep) slices of in situ sediment that can be taken back to the lab for xraying or resin peeling.
- Petit Ponargrab sampler for collecting sea floor samples in water depths between 1 and 300 m.
- Other non-standard field gear includes: underwater cameras, salinity, oxygen, and pH meters, and drysuits and dive gear.
Laboratory Resources
- Malvern Mastersizer 2000, laser particle analyzer for rapid grain-size analysis of silt and sand (up to 1 mm). It is not the ideal machine for measuring grain size of clay.
- Micromeritics Sedigraph 5120, x-ray particle analyzer for accurate grain-size measurements of fine-grained sediment (silt and clay; upto 0.25 mm).The sample prepartion and operating procedure for the Sedigraph in the ARISE lab can be downloaded here.
- Two Ro-Tap automated sieving machines for measuring grain size in coarse-grained sediment (sand and gravel; upto 32 mm).
- Soyee SY-31-100P x-ray machine and Kodak Vita Computer Radiography developer for xray imaging soft sediments collected in boxcores and in vibracores.
- Scanning Electron Microscope for imaging individual grains.
- Rock crusher, disc mill, Wilfley Table, Franz Magentic Separator and heavy liquids for extracting and concentrating detrital zircons.
- De-ionized water machine and fume hood.
- Three rock saws for cutting core and other samples for teaching and research.
