Geo 407 Lecture 01 - Introduction, Light

Announcements:
textbook – hugely expensive!
I’ll leave my copy of the text in the lab room. Do not remove it, except to Xerox/scan
pages.

Reading: p. 3-7, 16-24

next: p. 7-15

Goals
Learn goals of course
Learn organization of course
Take photos
Schedule extra hour
Learn about light and particles, waves, and rays
Learn basics of microscope

About me
History
Research interests
Teaching experience:
Third time teaching this class, but once before doing optical.

Demo (why optical mineralogy)

Sed rock - what is the diagenetic history?
 Met rock - what was the maximum temperature this rock experienced?
Ig rock - was the magma chamber that these plagioclase crystals grew in strongly
convecting or not?

Demo (what will you learn)

Calcite - double refraction
Iolite - pleochroism
Quartz wedge & polars - interference
How do polarized sunglasses work?

Goals of course
Learn to identify minerals in thin section - lab stuff
Learn how the interaction of light and crystals produces features we observe in thin
section - lecture stuff
Learn about mineralogic and petrologic features observed in thin section - both lab
& lecture
It will be easy to get buried in the minutia of optical mineralogy at times, but
remember that everything is in the service of petrology.

Syllabus
Everything is subject to change, especially given that this is only the third time I've
taught this class.
Web site
All info is posted online.
Can check scores / grades interactively
Grading
Mainly based on tests & labs - few homeworks
Quizzes probably every class - provides attendance/promptness score as well
Some will be dropped
Attendance
Really important
Better late than never
Lecture and labs
Probably mingled, although I'll try to have labs on Wednesdays
Early in Quarter - focus is on lectures
need to get basic info across
Later - focus on labs
email
I must be able to contact you via email!
See syllabus for how.
I will send out a small quiz over email this weekend.
Feedback
Very important - responsibility to future students
Think of the best teachers you've ever had. Most started out much worse and got better by
students telling them what worked and what didn't
This is my first time teaching this course
I appreciate comments in person, via email, and via the anonymous comments form
on the website
Questions
Ask lots!
Small class - lots of discussion
Project
 Choose suite of rocks
Analyze petrographically
Make website
Evaluate each other
Get grades on project from me, each other and get reviewer grade from me.

Organization
Everybody get somebody’s phone number or email.

Light
Nature
Particle / wave
In this course, we will be mostly concerned with the wave aspects
Transverse (like a phone cord) or longitudinal (like sound) wave?
Demo: Light with polars. Put in line, source, polar EW, polar EW, eyeball
If light is a longitudinal wave, then there should be no directionality other than along the
wave travel direction
If light is transverse, then there may be cases in which the direction matters
Some surface waves in earthquakes only vibrate vertically
Show that rotating upper polar changes total intensity of transmission - proves light is a
transverse wave
Polarization
Light has a vibration direction (diagram)
In fact, there are two: the electric component vibrates 90° from the magnetic component.

In this course, we will ignore the magnetic component

 Normal light is really lots of rays of light, each vibrating in a random orientation -
"unpolarized"
By passing light through a special sheet (made up of organic polymers oriented in a single
direction), we remove all components vibrating in directions other than the orientation
of the sheet - "polarized"
Wave features
velocity, v
wavelength, 
frequency, 
 = v/
Interference
diagram constructive and destructive interference
Speed
3e8 m/s - in vacuum only!
In other substances (air, water, glass, minerals), light travels slower
We can measure speeds in these substances, and come up with a value representing
the amount by which light is slowed in various substances, n = vvacuum/vmedium
n is larger for "slower" substances
n can never be less than 1.0
maximum n ever found? Bose-Einstein condensate
Hwk for Friday - Look this up and find or calculate n for this substance
n is called the "index of refraction" - we will find out why in the next lecture

Scope
Your scope is basically a light source, a polarizing sheet ("nicol" or "polar"), the rock
sample, and another polarizing sheet, with some magnifying lenses tossed in along the
way.
It is the polarization aspects that primarily distinguish a petrographic microscope from
other microscopes.
Read lab and work on it for remainder of time
use your text as a reference
ask questions, if the text isn't clear

How to center objectives

Why it matters
more at high power.
don’t want what you’re viewing to leave field of view as you rotate the stage
1. Be sure the objective turret is in the right place and for older scopes) the head is
fully engaged.
2. Pick feature at center of FOV
3. Rotate stage 180° and watch where feature goes.
4. Adjust objective until feature moves halfway back to center
5. Repeat 2-5.

Hand out scope cabinet keys

Go over lab