PAUL W. WEIBLEN
Professor Emeritus
PhD, 1965, University of Minnesota
Office: 100H Pillsbury Hall
Phone: 612-625-3477
Fax: 612-625-3819
Email: pweib@...
Professor Weiblen
with the electric pulse disaggregator in Williams Laboratory.
Research Interests
Since my retirement in 1997, I have continued to pursue my
interests in the Precambrian geology of Minnesota, meteorites,
and outreach activities.
Current activities on the Precambrian geology of Minnesota
include studies of igneous petrogenesis in the Midcontinent
Rift and the ancient gneiss terrane of the Minnesota River Valley.
I have fabricated and maintain a facility for electric-pulse
disaggregation in Williams Laboratory at the University. This
facility uses a high voltage electric pulse disaggregation technique
to liberate minerals from a rock along grain boundaries. The
technique allows recovery of fine-grained minerals such as zircon
whose size would be reduced with conventional mechanical crushing
and grinding. The facility is currently being used by Assistant
Professor Christina Gallup at the University of Minnesota, Duluth
in her studies of Archean rocks in northeastern Minnesota. Several
Canadian geochemists are also using the facility to recover
zircon and to explore new ways to recover chondrules from meteorites.
For over 35 years I have had to inform numerous individuals
that samples they brought to the department for identification
were not meteorites but just interesting samples of iron formation,
basalt, or Archean greenstone. In July 2000, I received a sample
from Mr. Rick Wirth, Turtle Lake, Wisconsin. It had struck the
windshield of Mr. Wirthıs parked Geo Metro on the night of October
21, 1966. It turned out to be an 82 gram sample of a chondrite
which is now in the departmental collection.
Upon retirement I have offered an annual course in Minnesota
Geology for members of the Elder Learning Institute. The course
consists of field trips to some of Minnesotaıs ³best kept secrets².
During the coming year I will be conducting hands-on outreach
activities in three local schools.
Professor Weiblen (far left)
and Mr. Rick Wirth with the ìTurtle Lakeî meteorite. Saint
Paul Pioneer Press, July, 25, 2000.
