Rocks, water and ocean life: traces and records!

Fluid inclusions are ubiquitous in both naturally occurring minerals and in laboratory-grown crystals. Inclusions are generally small but their chemical composition and physical properties can be used to estimate the temperatures, pressures, and physicochemical nature of the fluid at the time of trapping. To the geologist, inclusions provide a unique fossil record of the various fluids responsible for the formation and evolution of rocks and minerals throughout the history of the Earth.

Thanks to traces of DNA that all living things release in their environment, a drop of sea water can tell us what creatures live in the ocean without catching or even seeing them.

They bloom, they vanish, yet their trace remains. We followed the spectral trail of phytoplankton across Atlantic skies, where they birth clouds and nudge Earth’s thermostat.