New research center to focus on subsurface resource models

 

Colorado School of Mines and Virginia Tech have been awarded funding from the National Science Foundation to set up a new research center focusing on advanced subsurface earth resource modeling.

 

Mines is the lead institute in the new Center for Advanced Subsurface Earth Resource Models (CASERM), which will bring together more than 20 faculty members from the two schools’ geology, geophysics, applied math and statistics, mining and computer science departments to develop high-impact solutions to help mining companies minimize drilling and increase the chances of exploration success.

 

Each institution will receive $750,000 through NSF’s Industry/University Cooperative Research Centers (I/UCRC) program, which represents the National Science Foundation’s primary mechanism to support industry-driven, pre-competitive applied research. The grant will pay for costs related to managing the center during its first five years of operation and will augment support the center receives for research projects from industry and agency sponsors.  

 

“Colorado School of Mines and Virginia Tech bring together more than 250 years of experience in earth resource research and service to the global exploration and mining industry,” said Ric Wendlandt, professor of geology and geological engineering at Mines and director of the new center. “It is our vision for the Center for Advanced Subsurface Earth Resource Models to transform the way geoscience data is used to locate subsurface earth resources.”

 

Research at the center will focus on four core areas:

“This research center is directed toward research challenges in the development of 3D subsurface models. We will advance geoscience knowledge, analytical capabilities, geostatistical methods and computational algorithms to model and visualize the subsurface of our Earth,” said Thomas Monecke, associate professor of geology and geological engineering at Mines and site director of the new center. “These models integrate diverse geoscience data to inform decision making and minimize geological risk, beginning with locating and mining subsurface earth resources and continuing through mine closure and environmental remediation.”

 

The vision for the center has been developed over the past three years in close collaboration with a group of industry advisors. A planning meeting supported by NSF in September 2017 involved 38 exploration and mining companies and government agencies. 

 

The center’s first formal meeting with industry and agency members will be held Nov. 8 and 9 on the Mines campus. During this meeting, industry and agency sponsors will come together and decide on the research program for the coming year.

 

“The geosciences of the future are going to rely more and more heavily on creative interdisciplinary techniques,” said Stefanie Tompkins, vice president of research and technology transfer at Mines and a geologist by training. “It gives us a great edge and changes how we explore and characterize the underground. The stakes are high, and you need sophisticated interdisciplinary tools.”

 

At Mines, participating faculty come from several departments: Ric Wendlandt, Thomas Monecke, Wendy J. Harrison, M. Stephen Enders, Alexander Gysi, Katharina Pfaff and Rael Lipson from Geology and Geological Engineering; Yaoguo Li, Andrei Swidinsky and Whitney Trainor-Guitton from Geophysics; Luis Tenorio, Mahadevan Ganesh and Soutir Bandyopadhyay from Applied Math and Statistics; Elizabeth Holley from Mining Engineering; and Hua Wang from Computer Science. 

 

Emilie Rusch, Public Information Specialist, Communications and Marketing | 303-273-3361 | erusch@mines.edu
Ashley Spurgeon, Editor, Mines Magazine | 303-273-3959 | aspurgeon@mines.edu