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Cave Cartography
Caves or caverns are natural voids under the Earth's surface. Caves often form by the weathering of rock and often extend deep underground. Exogene caves are smaller openings that extend a relatively short distance underground (such as rock shelters). Caves which extend further underground than the opening is wide are called endogene caves. Speleology is the science of exploration and study of all aspects of caves and the cave environment. Visiting or exploring caves for recreation may be called ''caving'', ''potholing'', or ''spelunking''. Formation types The formation and development of caves is known as ''speleogenesis''; it can occur over the course of millions of years. Caves can range widely in size, and are formed by various geological processes. These may involve a combination of chemical processes, erosion by water, tectonic forces, microorganisms, pressure, and atmospheric influences. Isotopic dating techniques can be applied to cave sediments, to determine the time ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lechuguilla Cave Pearlsian Gulf
''Agave lechuguilla'' (common name in Chihuahua: ''lechuguilla'', meaning "small lettuce") is an ''Agave'' species endemism, found only in the Chihuahuan Desert. The plant flowers once in its life and then dies. Description The plant reproduces most often through underground offshoots, creating large colonies. It also can flower at any time after the plant has reached three to 21 years of age, producing a leafless stalk that can reach in height. The flower clusters are located at the top and are funnel-shaped in purples, reds, and yellows. The plant dies after flowering in May–July. The leaves are long, tough, and rigid, with very sharp, hard points that can easily penetrate clothing and even leather, giving the colloquial name "shin-daggers". Taxonomy Charles Wright (botanist), Charles Wright first collected the plant in 1849 and it was described by John Torrey in 1859. Distribution and habitat It is an indicator species in the Chihuahuan Desert, the only place it is ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Salt Cave
A salt cave is a cave formed within rock salt by the dissolution of this very soluble rock by water. As with other soluble rocks, a distinctive set of landscape features can arise from the solutional process; in this case it is known as salt karst or 'halite karst'. The three key areas of salt karst are those in Iran, Israel and Spain, together with an example in Romania. Malcham cave in Israel is the longest salt cave in the world with a measured length of over 10km. It is located at Mount Sodom. There are significant salt caves on Qeshm Island in Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) and also known as Persia, is a country in West Asia. It borders Iraq to the west, Turkey, Azerbaijan, and Armenia to the northwest, the Caspian Sea to the north, Turkmenistan to the nort ... including Tri Nahacu Cave and Namakdan Cave. This cave was listed in October 2022 by the International Union of Geological Sciences in their 'First 100 IUGS Geological Heritage S ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Soda Straw
A soda straw (or simply straw) is a speleothem in the form of a hollow mineral cylinder (geometry), cylindrical tube. They are also known as tubular stalactites. Soda straws grow in places where water leaches slowly through cracks in rock, such as on the roofs of caves. Soda straws in caves rarely grow more than a few millimetres per year and may average one tenth of a millimetre per year.Hill, C A, and Forti, P, (1997). "Speleothem Growth Rates", Cave Minerals of the World, (2nd edition). [Huntsville, Alabama: National Speleological Society Inc.] pp 285 - 287 A soda straw can turn into a stalactite if the hole at the bottom is blocked, or if the water begins flowing on the outside surface of the hollow tube. Soda straws can also form outside the cave environment on exposed concrete surfaces as a type of calthemite, growing significantly faster than those formed on rock. Formation These tubes form when calcium carbonate or calcium sulfate dissolved in the water comes out of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Helictite
A helictite is a speleothem (cave-formed mineral) found in a Solution cave, limestone cave that changes its axis from the vertical at one or more stages during its growth. Helictites have a curving or angular form that looks as if they were grown in zero gravity. They are most likely the result of Capillary action, capillary forces acting on tiny water droplets, a force often strong enough at this scale to defy gravity. Helictites are, perhaps, the most delicate of cave formations. They are usually made of needle-form calcite and aragonite. Helictite forms have been described in several types: ribbon helictites, saws, rods, butterflies, "hands", curly-fries, and "clumps of worms". They typically have symmetry (biology)#Radial symmetry, radial symmetry. They can be easily crushed or broken by the slightest touch. Because of this, helictites are rarely seen within arm's reach in Tourism, tourist caves. Timpanogos Cave National Monument in Utah has one of the largest collections o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Stalagmite
A stalagmite (, ; ; ) is a type of rock formation that rises from the floor of a cave due to the accumulation of material deposited on the floor from ceiling drippings. Stalagmites are typically composed of calcium carbonate, but may consist of lava, mud, peat, pitch, sand, sinter, and amberat (crystallized urine of pack rats). The corresponding formation hanging down from the ceiling of a cave is a stalactite. Formation and type Limestone stalagmites The most common stalagmites are speleothems, which usually form in limestone caves. Stalagmite formation occurs only under certain pH conditions within the cavern. They form through deposition of calcium carbonate and other minerals, which is precipitated from mineralized water solutions. Limestone is the chief form of calcium carbonate rock, which is dissolved by water that contains carbon dioxide, forming a calcium bicarbonate solution in caverns. The partial pressure of carbon dioxide in the water must be great ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Stalactite
A stalactite (, ; , ) is a mineral formation that hangs from the ceiling of caves, hot springs, or man-made structures such as bridges and mines. Any material that is soluble and that can be deposited as a colloid, or is in suspension (chemistry), suspension, or is capable of being melting, melted, may form a stalactite. Stalactites may be composed of lava, minerals, mud, peat, pitch (resin), pitch, sand, Geyserite, sinter, and amberat (crystallized urine of pack rats). A stalactite is not necessarily a speleothem, though speleothems are the most common form of stalactite because of the abundance of limestone caves. The corresponding formation on the floor of the cave is known as a stalagmite. Formation and type Limestone stalactites The most common stalactites are speleothems, which occur in limestone caves. They form through Deposition (geology), deposition of calcium carbonate and other minerals, which is precipitated from mineralized water Solution (chemistry), solutio ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Flowstone
Flowstones are sheetlike deposits of calcite or other carbonate minerals, formed where water flows down the walls or along the floors of a cave. They are typically found in "solution caves", in limestone, where they are the most common speleothem. However, they may form in any type of cave where water enters that has picked up dissolved minerals. Flowstones are formed via the degassing of vadose percolation waters. Flowstone may also form on manmade structures as a result of calcium hydroxide being leached from concrete, lime or mortar. These secondary deposits created outside the cave environment, which mimic the shapes and forms of speleothems, are classified as "calthemites" and are associated with concrete degradation.Smith, G.K., (2016). “Calcite Straw Stalactites Growing From Concrete Structures”, Cave and Karst Science, Vol.43, No.1, P.4-10, (April 2016), British Cave Research Association, ISSN 1356-191X. Formation Flowing films of water that move along floors or do ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Precipitation (chemistry)
In an aqueous solution, precipitation is the "sedimentation of a solid material (a precipitate) from a liquid solution". The solid formed is called the precipitate. In case of an inorganic chemical reaction leading to precipitation, the chemical reagent causing the solid to form is called the precipitant. The clear liquid remaining above the precipitated or the centrifuged solid phase is also called the supernate or supernatant. The notion of precipitation can also be extended to other domains of chemistry (organic chemistry and biochemistry) and even be applied to the solid phases (e.g. metallurgy and alloys) when solid impurities segregation (materials science), segregate from a solid phase. Supersaturation The precipitation of a compound may occur when its concentration exceeds its solubility. This can be due to temperature changes, solvent evaporation, or by mixing solvents. Precipitation occurs more rapidly from a strongly supersaturated solution. The formation of a pr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Calcium Carbonate
Calcium carbonate is a chemical compound with the chemical formula . It is a common substance found in Rock (geology), rocks as the minerals calcite and aragonite, most notably in chalk and limestone, eggshells, gastropod shells, shellfish skeletons and pearls. Materials containing much calcium carbonate or resembling it are described as calcareous. Calcium carbonate is the active ingredient in agricultural lime and is produced when calcium ions in hard water react with carbonate ions to form limescale. It has medical use as a calcium supplement or as an antacid, but excessive consumption can be hazardous and cause hypercalcemia and digestive issues. Chemistry Calcium carbonate shares the typical properties of other carbonates. Notably, it: *reacts with acids, releasing carbonic acid which quickly disintegrates into carbon dioxide and water: : *releases carbon dioxide upon heating, called a thermal decomposition reaction, or calcination (to above 840 °C in the case of ), t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sinkhole
A sinkhole is a depression or hole in the ground caused by some form of collapse of the surface layer. The term is sometimes used to refer to doline, enclosed depressions that are also known as shakeholes, and to openings where surface water enters into underground passages known as ''ponor'', swallow hole or swallet. A ''cenote'' is a type of sinkhole that exposes groundwater underneath. ''Sink'', and ''stream sink'' are more general terms for sites that drain surface water, possibly by infiltration into sediment or crumbled rock. Most sinkholes are caused by Karst topography, karst processes – the chemical dissolution of carbonate rocks, collapse or suffosion processes. Sinkholes are usually circular and vary in size from tens to hundreds of Metre, meters both in diameter and depth, and vary in form from soil-lined bowls to bedrock-edged chasms. Sinkholes may form gradually or suddenly, and are found worldwide. Formation Natural processes Sinkholes may capture surf ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Organic Acid
An organic acid is an organic compound with acidic properties. The most common organic acids are the carboxylic acids, whose acidity is associated with their carboxyl group –COOH. Sulfonic acids, containing the group –SO2OH, are relatively stronger acids. Alcohols, with –OH, can act as acids but they are usually very weak. The relative stability of the conjugate base of the acid determines its acidity. Other groups can also confer acidity, usually weakly: the thiol group –SH, the enol group, and the phenol group. In biological systems, organic compounds containing these groups are generally referred to as organic acids. A few common examples include: * Lactic acid * Acetic acid * Formic acid * Citric acid * Oxalic acid * Uric acid * Malic acid * Tartaric acid * Butyric acid * Folic acid Characteristics In general, organic acids are weak acids and do not dissociate completely in water, whereas the strong mineral acids do. Lower molecular mass organ ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Carbonic Acid
Carbonic acid is a chemical compound with the chemical formula . The molecule rapidly converts to water and carbon dioxide in the presence of water. However, in the absence of water, it is quite stable at room temperature. The interconversion of carbon dioxide and carbonic acid is related to the breathing cycle of animals and the acidification of natural waters. In biochemistry and physiology, the name "carbonic acid" is sometimes applied to aqueous solutions of carbon dioxide. These chemical species play an important role in the bicarbonate buffer system, used to maintain acid–base homeostasis. Terminology in biochemical literature In chemistry, the term "carbonic acid" strictly refers to the chemical compound with the formula . Some biochemistry literature effaces the distinction between carbonic acid and carbon dioxide dissolved in extracellular fluid. In physiology, carbon dioxide excreted by the lungs may be called ''volatile acid'' or ''respiratory acid''. Anh ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
