MINERALOGY

Catalog description

To apply mineralogical principles to environmental issues that deal with materials; to use mineralogical principles not only to identify environmental concerns, but also to work toward finding solutions to those problems; to develop a knowledge base for some recognizable environmentally important mineral groups, e.g., asbestos, zeolites, clays; to write coherent descriptions of materials and discussions of issues. The ultimate goal for students is to develop the ability to: analyze an environmental materials issue, determine what is known and what still needs to be investigated, apply mineralogical principles to the appropriate unanswered questions, and write up and present the results in a way that their audience will understand.