Did you know that Canada is home to the oldest rock ever discovered? It’s the 4.03-billion-year-old Acasta gneiss. For most of us, four billion years is an unimaginable length of time. So how do we know this rock is in fact almost as old as Earth itself? Simply Science visits a highly specialized Geological Survey of Canada lab in Ottawa to meet a team of time-travelling rock star experts who figure this all out.
There’s nothing quite like a Canadian winter. Majestic scenery, fun outdoor activities, and brutally cold days that cause your heating bill to skyrocket. Scientists and engineers at Natural Resources Canada believe a promising technology can help reduce your energy consumption, the heat pump. What are heat pumps? How do they work? Why is everyone talking about them? Are they right for you? Listen to find out.
Research scientist Vicki Tschirhart and “professional rock crusher” Sarah Mount explain how scientists are determining the composition of the Earth’s mantle. Remember kids, science if FUNdamental!
Growing up, Ranjana Sharma would read everything she could lay her hands on in her family’s small library. Little did she know that the inspiring words and images she found in those captivating books and magazines would eventually lead her to a fascinating career. Now Dr. Sharma, Chief Scientist at Natural Resources Canada (NRCan), she stands at the centre of “everything science” and still finds the energy to support women and youth in the STEM fields through culture change.
In Cape Bathurst, where Canada's mainland meets the Arctic Ocean, an entire coastline is burning. Aptly named the Smoking Hills, it's home to a really unique geological feature: a deposit of sedimentary rock that's been burning and smouldering continuously for thousands of years. On this episode, we'll be speaking with a research scientist who visited the hellish landscape to study it first-hand.
Kevin Brewer is a geophysical technologist responsible for building, designing and maintaining various pieces of equipment used in survey work. One of his designs, the microvibe, generates a frequency sweep that travels down into the ground and reflects back up. This microvibe allows the creation of detailed images of the ground very similar to an ultrasound.
