The release of the interactive ibook 'Moon Rocks: an introduction to the geology of the moon' reminded us that there are some fascinating moon rocks. This one is called a breccia, it was once a mixed soil full of small rock fragments ejected from local impact craters . It finally became a rock when shock melted by a large impact. View Rock of the Month slide | View Rock of the Month page
This week saw the release of a free interactive iBook on the Apple Book Store, titled "Moon Rocks: an introduction to the Geology of the Moon". The Open University already has over 420 free eBooks and now has some very popular iTunes U courses all available free on the itunesU site. This new iBook is the first Open University ebook to... read on
On Saturday 3rd March 2012, the fourth annual Nature's Treasures event organised by the Mineralogical Society of Great Britain, the Russell Society, Rockwatch and the Gemmological Association of Great Britain was held at Oxford University Museum.
The Virtual Microscope team was invited to put on a display and for this year we decided on a... read on
On January 16th 2012 Professor Brian Cox recommended that viewers should take a look at our Virtual Microscope images of Moon rocks and meteorites. They did this in their thousands and doubled our normal hit rate. More here: http://www.open.ac.uk/earth-research/tindle/AGT/AGT_Home_2010/Virtual_Mi...
[view_node] read on
We've just received the news of success in a bid for funding for a new series of virtual microscope samples and open educational resources. The aim of the project is to create a United Kingdom Virtual Microscope (UKVM) for Earth science as a freely accessible on-line open educational resource, accessible from desktop PC, laptop or tablet. We aim... read on
The Virtual Microscope was developed for undergraduate teaching of petrology and geoscience at the Open University in the United Kingdom, allowing students to explore rock hand specimens and thin sections in a browser window. Click on the Collections tab to see terrestrial, extraterrestrial and rare rock collections.
