Department of Geological Sciences and Geological Engineering Graduate Theses
Recent Submissions
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Automated Mineralogical Analysis of <250 µm Heavy Minerals in Till: Method Development and Case Study
Exploration under glacial sediment cover is a necessary part of modern mineral exploration in Canada. Traditional indicator methods use visual examination to identify mineral grains in the 250 to 2000 µm fraction of till ... -
Surficial exploration methods for detecting low sulfide high precious metal and Ni-Cu-PGE mineralization in glaciated terrain
The increasing difficulty of finding near-surface mineral deposits in glaciated terrain requires modification of conventional exploration techniques (drift prospecting) that can assist in exploring for deposits buried under ... -
CHEMICAL AND MINERALOGICAL CHARACTERIZATION OF AIRBORNE PARTICULATE MATTER ORIGINATING FROM MINING AND INDUSTRIAL OPERATIONS
Activities performed at mining and other industrial operations are capable of producing significant quantities of particulate matter that, if not properly contained, can be harmful to workers, and can enter surrounding ... -
Improving Rock Pillar Stability Guidelines Through Detailed Numerical Investigation
Pillar stability guidelines, for underground construction in rock, have been presented by various authors in the past, based on a combination of empirical (mostly visual) observations from mining applications and simple ... -
Quantification and Clustering of Microcrack Tensor Invariants
In the field of rock mechanics, the behaviour of hard rock materials such as granite are known to depend strongly on the nature of discontinuities present in the material. Even so-called intact rock samples, collected ... -
THE INFLUENCE OF SEDIMENT CONCENTRATION AND INTERSTITIAL FLUID DENSITY ON THE LOFTING POINT OF EXPERIMENTAL HYPERPYCNAL CURRENTS
Density Currents are gravity driven currents that propagate downslope when gravity pulls a dense fluid underneath a lighter fluid. Turbidity currents are an important type of density current that occur when this density ... -
Chromite Exploration and Deformation Monitoring Through PSInSAR
This thesis consists of two independent studies, i) the exploration for chromite in the Quesnel terrain, British Columbia, using terrestrial geophysics, and ii) urban deformation monitoring in the Dallas Forth Worth Metroplex ... -
Mechanisms of wollastonite weathering and applications to CO2 storage
The mechanisms of wollastonite dissolution and its potential applications in Enhanced Rock Weathering (ERW) initiatives that sequester atmospheric CO2 were investigated in two sets of experiments. Mixed flow reactor ... -
Evaluation of Magnetite as an Indicator Mineral for Porphyry Cu Exploration: A Case Study Using Bedrock and Stream Sediments at the Casino Porphyry Cu-Au-Mo Deposit, Yukon, Canada
The chemical composition of magnetite recovered from six local streams around the Casino high-grade porphyry Cu-Au-Mo deposit, west-central Yukon, is compared with igneous and magmatic-hydrothermal magnetite recovered from ... -
An Assessment of Rockfall Triggers and Seasonal Weather Trends Through An Examination of Railway Slope Management Procedures
Rockfalls are one of the many geohazards that impact railways across Canada with the potential to cause operational delays, damage to infrastructure and the environment, and injury or loss of life. To minimize the risk ... -
Epicontinental ironstone accumulation during the end-Ordovician glaciation and extinction events
The Upper Ordovician Neda Formation, Midwest, USA, is composed of hematitic dolostone and ironstone that rest conformably on crinoid and bryozoan wackestone to packstone of the underlying Maquoketa Formation. Deposition ... -
Optimization of UAV-borne Aeromagnetic Surveying in Mineral Exploration
The main objective of this research is to conduct a detailed analysis of the design, integration, and application of unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) aeromagnetic surveys for improved target characterization in mineral ... -
Hyperspectral Imaging Simulator and Applications for Unmanned Aerial Vehicles
Mineral exploration utilizing hyperspectral imaging sensors aboard low-altitude airborne platforms is still a relatively new and developing research topic. The main reason is the difficulty of finding the optimal combination ... -
Applications of Remote Sensing for Characterizing Debris Transfer Processes
The transfer of debris by geomorphic processes in mountainous terrain can pose a hazard to the safe operation of linear infrastructure. These geohazards have the potential to cause billions of dollars of economic losses ... -
Object Detection and Pattern of Life Analysis from Remotely Piloted Aircraft System Acquired Full Motion Video
Remotely piloted aircraft systems (RPAS) have introduced a new ability to quickly deploy low-cost, fully or partially autonomous aerial sensor platforms which has created new intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance ... -
Paleoecology of microbial-rich Late Frasnian carbonate slope buildups, Western Canadian Sedimentary Basin
The late Frasnian Nisku Formation in subsurface Western Canada hosts the last known episode of carbonate buildup in the Cynthia-Winterburn basin below the Frasnian-Famennian boundary. The Zeta Lake Member is composed of ... -
Ediacaran Fronds from South Australia and Newfoundland
The Ediacara biota (575-539 Ma) represents a seminal event in the evolution of life, the first abundant appearance of large, architecturally complex, soft-bodied organisms after three billion years of mostly microbial ... -
Application of Termitaria Geochemistry to Iron Oxide Copper Gold Exploration in the Kitumba District, Central Zambia
Identification and delineation of deeply buried mineral deposits has gained importance with the continuous increase in demand for commodities, specifically regarding Iron Oxide Copper Gold (IOCG) deposits, because of the ... -
Digital Rockfall Databases: Developing Best Practices for Semi-Automatic Extraction of Rockfall from LiDAR
In the digital age, the ability to collect and store information of phenomena in our world has become ever more useful, considering the vast improvements of predictive models and simulations. Geohazards are no different; ... -
Bulk and triple oxygen isotope geochemistry of marine ferromanganese crusts, nodules, and deposits
Ferromanganese (Fe-Mn) crusts, nodules, and deposits are chemical precipitates that are ubiquitous in the global ocean and contain valuable metals and metalloids. The chemical and mineralogical composition of Fe-Mn ...
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