Large Igneous Provinces

'This book is truly an excellent comprehensive treatise of LIPs, mantle dynamics, and their undisputed control [of] multiple aspects of intraplate tectono-thermal events. The layout, figures [and] presentations are all of high quality ... This book is highly recommended to academics, researchers, and geoscientists in the mining and exploration industry.' Ore Geology Reviews

'In Large Igneous Provinces, Ernst sets out to review all aspects of this vast topic and has done an excellent job ... this is a masterly treatise on an important topic, written by an acknowledged expert in the field. It is comprehensive, packed with information, and yet is easy to read and thoroughly accessible. Each chapter ends with a very useful summary of our current state of knowledge. The book will be enormously useful to anyone with an interest in any aspect of LIPs, and will provide an essential starting point for future LIP studies. It is destined to become the standard work on the subject for a very long time to come.' Godfrey Fitton, Lithos

'... the book would make a great reference for a graduate seminar in LIPs and could be used for other courses, including climate change and tectonics. Anyone with an interest in LIPs will want to have this book.' Elements

Richard E. Ernst is Scientist-in-Residence in the Department of Earth Science at Carleton University, Ontario, Canada. After receiving his Ph.D. in 1989, he spent fourteen years conducting contracted research in Canada and many global regions, particularly Siberia, mainly for the Geological Survey of Canada. In 2003 Dr Ernst started his consulting firm Ernst Geosciences and also became co-leader of the Large Igneous Provinces (LIPs) Commission of IAVCEI (International Association of Volcanology and Chemistry of the Earth's Interior). He has worked extensively to further research in the field: in 2009, he co-launched a consortium of industry sponsors funding use of the LIP's record for research into reconstruction of supercontinents back into deep-time. Dr Ernst is the author or co-author of more than 100 refereed publications, focussed on all aspects of the terrestrial LIP record and including planetary analogues.

Preface; 1. Introduction, definition, and general characteristics; 2. Essential criteria: distinguishing LIP from non-LIP events; 3. Continental flood basalts and volcanic rifted margins; 4. Oceanic LIPs: oceanic plateaus and ocean basin flood basalts and their remnants through time; 5. Plumbing system of LIPs; 6. Archean LIPs; 7. Planetary LIPs; 8. Silicic (felsic) LIPs; 9. Links with carbonatites, kimberlites, and lamprophyres/lamproites; 10. Geochemistry of LIPs; 11. LIPs and topographic changes; 12. LIPs and rifting; 13. LIPs and links with contractional structures; 14. LIPs and environmental catastrophes; 15. Assessing the origin of LIPs; 16. LIPs and implications for mineral, hydrocarbon and water resources; References; Index.