Quarrying data for gems of knowledge

Predicting where Australia’s next mineral boom will come from is serious business. Data collected using satellite sensing, airborne surveys, seismic crews and prospecting teams is immense and is piling up rapidly. But what use is all this data?

'This is a vast electronic resource and we need new methods to mine it for useful information,' said Professor Dietmar Müller of the University of Sydney.

Professor Müller and his team are developing electronic tools to access and compile the data so that the changes over geological time in the Earth’s crust can be tracked and simulated. Known as the Virtual Geological Observatory, it is claimed to be one of the new-generation tools Australia will need for future mineral exploration.

Müller is a keynote speaker at the Theo Murphy High Flyers Think Tank starting at the Australian Academy of Science in Canberra.

The High Flyers Think Tank 2010, Searching the Deep Earth: The Future of Australian Resource Discovery and Utilisation, is gathering of about 60 bright early- and mid-career research scientists from a range of disciplines relating to exploration and mining.

They will be discussing questions such as: How are we going to find the next giant deposits to mine? What new technologies will we need to exploit them in a low-carbon future?

For further information and program, visit: www.science.org.au/events/thinktank2010/index.html.