The Capital of Dust
By Gerilyn SoreghanAbout the Book
In THE CAPITAL OF DUST, distinguished geoscientist Gerilyn Soreghan explores the astonishing role that windblown mineral dust—loess—has played in shaping human history and the history of Earth’s climate. As Soreghan shows, dust is an abundant resource that circulates all around us and our planet, its tiny motes holding a powerful store of potential energy. Dust has quietly spawned, built, and buried human civilizations. It acts as an agent of change, a record-keeper of Earth’s past, and a fertile source of clues about what might yet be coming. Soreghan chronicles how dust formed the soils that birthed agriculture, provided the raw material for shelters made of bricks and adobe, and revealed the vicissitudes of the Ice Ages. Weaving together stories and insights from geology, archaeology, and paleoclimatology, THE CAPITAL OF DUST uncovers the hidden forces that shaped our world while offering a new appreciation of the riches all around us.
About the Author
Gerilyn (Lynn) Soreghan is the Edward L. McCollough Chair and David L. Boren Professor of Geosciences at the University of Oklahoma, specializing in sedimentary geology, paleoclimatology, and loess. She has authored over 100 papers in the peer-reviewed scientific literature during a three-decade academic career in geoscience research. A fellow of the Geological Society of America (GSA), she is a recipient of the GSA’s Sloss Award for lifetime achievement in sedimentary geology. She has blogged on environmental topics for the general public and appeared on the 2023 BBC/PBS NOVA Ancient Earth documentary. She lives in Norman, Oklahoma.