The opening ceremony, which has been chaired by the vice-rector for Research of the UB, Dr. Jordi Alberch, has been also attended by Dr. Lluís Cabrera, dean of the Faculty; Dr. Bard Krokan, director of the Research Centre of the Norwegian company Statoil, and Dr. Josep Anton Muñoz, professor at the Department of Geodynamics and Geophysics and director of the Geomodels Research Institute (UB). At 11:00, the conference “Mountain building, from oceanic to continental subduction: insights from 30 years of analogue modelling”, has been given by Dr. Jacques Malavieille, from the Geosciences Montpellier laboratory of the Montpellier 2 University (France).
More support for research on earth sciences and for the business world
The new Geomodelsʼ Analogue Modelling Laboratory of the UB will be led by professor Josep Anton Muñoz, from the Department of Geodynamics and Geophysics, and professor Oriol Ferrer will be a technician. The new laboratory will be set at the Faculty of Geology and will be part of the Laboratory of Simulation of Geological Processes (SIMGEO), a joint centre fostered by the Faculty of Geology of the UB and the Institute of Earth Sciences Jaume Almera (ICTJA-CSIC). The Analogue Modelling Laboratory will support the business world and research on earth sciences, and it has been developed as part of a scientific project, co-funded by the European Regional Development Fund of the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation, the enterprise Statoil and the BKC.
The ICTJA has contributed to the project with the purchase of a scanner which captures variations in relief produced at the surface of the model as the deformation progresses. This new laboratory, which will occupy about 70 m
2 of the SIMGEO laboratoryʼs grounds, will allow broadening research on numerical models and on 3D structural models, one of the major research lines of the
Geomodels Research Institute and of the Geodynamics and Basin Analyses Group of the UB.
Analogue models
In order to understand geological structures and to predict the characteristics of rock properties involved, temporal evolution analysis is required. In nature, however, only the final stage of this temporal evolution can be observed; therefore, any method used to reproduce and simulate it is fundamental in order to make progress in the geological knowledge. In the business sector it is also important to facilitate research and management of natural resources.
Analogue models are tools that allow studying the evolution of the geological structures during their formation, as well as the factors that determine their characteristics. They are reproductions of the geological reality, which allow simulating several geological processes, studying progressive deformation of the structures and comparing the final stage of the experiments with real cases, and from here, inferring their properties and having predictive ability. In the models, several materials are used (sand, clay, glass microspheres, silicone polymers, etc.), which may reproduce at small scale the mechanical properties of real rock stratus. If scaled properly, the evolution of the modelled bodies is comparable to the evolution of their equivalents in nature. In all models, the timescale of natural geological systems is also scaled to model the duration of geological processes.
The new laboratory will have a modular modelling table, designed in collaboration with the team lead by Tomeu Ventayol, from the CIM-UPC Foundation, to simulate a wide variety of geological contexts: extension, compression, strike-slip, basement faulting, tectonic inversion, salt tectonics, gravitational gliding, etc. A total of eight engines, run by a digital controller, transmit the deformation to the mechanical arms. The number and configuration of the engines allow modelling any strain field. The rate and orientation of movement are monitored by a computer allowing them to be varied during the experiment. The modelling table also allows carrying out models at basin and crustal scale.
Detecting the changes in structural evolution that determine relief
Digital time-lapsed photographs of the upper surface of the model are taken and controlled by a computer as the deformation progresses. These photographs are complemented with a high-resolution white light scan, which captures point clouds and records changes in topography at millimetre scale. A second top light scan captures other images, which facilitate the calculations of different stages of the deformation process. Finally the model is cut in homogeneous and equidistant sections. General and detailed photographs are taken for each section. These pictures are then transferred and referenced into a 3D framework according to a Cartesian coordinate system, thanks to 3D structural modelling software, which will allow digitising the different structural and stratigraphic elements, knowing their coordinates and position within the model, and carrying out a 3D reconstruction of the original analogue model.
The new Geomodelsʼ Analogue Modelling Laboratory is a resource that will contribute to improve knowledge on geological systems and on the processes that determine the formation, location and quality of the geological resources and reservoirs which are important for civil society, together with geomechanical behaviour of the land and their effect on the territory.
