{"id":620,"date":"2015-01-26T15:04:27","date_gmt":"2015-01-26T15:04:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs-staging.imperial.ac.uk\/studentblogs\/victoria14\/?p=130"},"modified":"2015-01-26T15:04:27","modified_gmt":"2015-01-26T15:04:27","slug":"a-break-from-london-with-science-part-2-a-stony-reception","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs-staging.imperial.ac.uk\/student-blogs\/2015\/01\/26\/a-break-from-london-with-science-part-2-a-stony-reception\/","title":{"rendered":"A break from London (with science!) part 2 \u2013 a stony reception"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dorset is the location of some fine geological sites, known as the Jurassic Coast<\/a>, and designated as a World Heritage Site so we spent a day there with Richard Twitchett, a geologist from the Natural History Museum. The evening before Richard gave an overview of some geological concepts and an introduction to the geology of the area.<\/p>\n

\"Richard<\/a>
Richard explains stratigraphy (rock layers)with the help of beer mats<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

The rocks of this area are the sedimentary type, which are formed by accumulation of\u00a0material compacted and cemented together over millions of years.\u00a0These type of rocks may contain fossils of plants and animals that died and became trapped and preserved between the layers. The exposed rocks of the Dorset coast are\u00a0Jurassic (200-145 million years old) and Cretaceous (145-65 million years old) in age. The rocks of Cretaceous age would have originally lain on top of the older Jurassic ones but earth movements have titled them\u00a0so they become younger as you move east along the coast – like a walk through time. This entertaining video tells the story better than I.<\/p>\n