Q&A: Ask Dr. Adam Kent your questions about Mt. Hood!

We’ve had a lot of success with the Q&A series here on Eruptions, so why not keep it up. Earlier in the summer, I briefly mentioned an article that was picked on about the generation of magma and eruption mechanisms at Mt. Hood in Oregon. It just so happened that I am somewhat entangled in the study – first off, the first author of this study that appeared in Nature Geosciencesis friend and colleague of mine from my Ph.D. alma mater (Oregon State University), Dr. Adam Kent. Beyond that, one of the coauthors on the paper was a student in the volcanology class (Christina Darr) for which I was a TA and another coauthor was my postdoctoral advisor (Kari Cooper). Combine that with the fact that I was part of the field crew that collected some of the samples around Hood (I have real uses, see?), it only seemed natural that Adam should do an Q&A here on Eruptions.

(right) Dr. Adam Kent, telling his graduate students which way to run if there is a tsunami.

To give you some background on Dr. Kent, he is a native of Australia who has been on the faculty in the Geosciences Department at Oregon State University since 2002. His research expertise is in the study of melt inclusions in crystals – tiny blebs of melt (a.k.a. magma) that get trapped inside of crystals as they are forming in the magma – which can be analyzed to understand the conditions in which the crystal formed. He has worked all over the world, on volcanoes in the Marianas, Cascades, Japan (and more) and is one of world’s experts on laser ablation ICP-MS analysis of minerals – with a publication record to prove it.

So, here is your chance to ask him questions about his research and about his recent (and ongoing) study of Mt. Hood, his work on other volcanoes or anything else … send me your questions to eruptionsblog at gmail dot com by September 24 and I will forward on selected questions to Adam for answers!

And be sure to check out the previous Q&A for some great volcano information from the people who make it:

Dr. Jonathan Castro on the eruption of Chaiten

Dr. Boris Behncke on Etna and Italian volcanoes

Alan Boyle, science editor for MSNBC.com, on science in the media

Sally Kuhn Sennert on the Global Volcanism Program

Send me your questions!

Top left: Mt. Hood in Oregon