Intern - University of Oslo

During my time at the University of Oslo, I conducted a project with a geologist working on the paleomagnetism of the Devonian period. I studied rocks from Woodfjorden, Svalbard that were from the Old Red Sandstone Sequence, which is of early Devonian age. The samples were collected as hand samples in the summer of 2023. I drilled cores from the hand samples and made powdered samples. Using the powdered samples I measured magnetic susceptibility using the AGICO MFK1-FA Kappabridge, using the same machine, I measured the anisotropy of magnetic susceptibility. The cores were subjected to stepwise thermal demagnetization, at each step I measured the natural remanent magnetization in a Superconducting Rock Magnetometer. Additionally, I used a small rock chip from each sample to measure induced and remanent magnetization in a J_meter Coercivity Spectrometer. After all my measurements were done I wrote a report analyzing my results and comparing my magnetic results to previous magnetic fields to hypothesize the origin of the different magnetic signals in each of the samples. 

My time at the University of Oslo has taught me a lot about different measurements taken in paleomagnetism and how they can all be used to piece together a puzzle that in the end tells the history of the magnetic signals in the rocks.