Posters virtual: Fri, 8 May, 14:00–18:00 | vPoster spot 5
The capabilities and widespread availability of generative AI are potentially changing ways of working and studying. However, there are a lot of pitfalls and ethical questions to complicate use. Postgraduate taught (PGT) students typically study at the University of Glasgow for 12 months. They come from a wide range of institutions, where rigorous academic citation of information may not have been previously covered. Students have also been falling into the trap of AI hallucinations and losing academic integrity as they don’t realise generative AI can’t be relied upon. With this in mind a workshop was designed and run in Autumn 2025 to discuss finding reliable sources of information, how to manage/store information you find during research (including citation information), how to cite information correctly, and why this is important. The workshop included an explanation of Generative AI and student discussions on generative AI use and ethics. This work will discuss the workshop and reflect on what went well and what could be further improved. We need students to have a solid understanding of what generative AI can and can’t do, and the ethical background to decide if and when to use it, during their studies and in their future careers.
How to cite: Petrie, E.: Integrating Generative AI into good academic practice: a workshop for PGT students on sourcing, managing and citing information and Generative AI, EGU General Assembly 2026, Vienna, Austria, 3–8 May 2026, EGU26-13848, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu26-13848, 2026.
Macaronesia (Azores, Madeira–Selvagens, Canary Islands, and Cape Verde) constitutes a natural laboratory for studying the interaction between intraplate volcanism, regional seismicity, and coastal hazards. This paper presents an integrated approach to assessing and communicating volcanic, seismic, and tsunami risks in the Canary Islands and their Macaronesian context, combining: (i) multiparametric monitoring data (IGN, INVOLCAN, CIVISA/IPMA), (ii) geophysical synthesis of the mantle structure beneath Macaronesia, and (iii) active learning experiences with university students. Case studies include the Tajogaite–Cumbre Vieja eruption (La Palma, 2021), with pre-eruptive seismic swarms, Strombolian emissions, and lava flows that affected infrastructure and necessitated evacuations; and the seismicity associated with volcanic systems and faults in the Canary Islands and Azores. The danger of tsunamis from volcanic landslides (prehistoric megatsunamis) and the UNESCO IOC NEAM early warning framework (with IPMA, INGV, CENALT, KOERI, NOA, PTWC, among others) are also discussed. Preliminary results show that integrating monitoring networks, propagation models, and educational activities based on real data improves risk understanding and community preparedness.
Goals
- To characterize the main geological hazards in the Canary Islands and Macaronesia (active volcanism, regional seismicity, and tsunami generation/propagation), integrating historical and instrumental data.
- Analyze the Tajogaite case (La Palma, 2021) as a recent example of risk management and civil response, highlighting lessons for monitoring and reconstruction.
- Exploring tsunami scenarios associated with volcanic flank collapses and early warning mechanisms in the NEAM region (capacities and limitations).
- Develop a program of academic activities with UNED students.
Methodology
- Data sources: IGN seismic catalogs (1585–2022), IPMA/CIVISA in the Azores, volcanic monitoring bulletins (IGN/INVOLCAN), and recent literature (Frontiers, MDPI).
- Analysis: review of eruptive chronologies and swarms (La Palma 2021), mapping of hypocenters and magnitudes, synthesis of mantle structure (tomography/seismicity), and evaluation of tsunami scenarios due to landslides.
- Alert framework: NEAMTWS (IOC ‑UNESCO), functions of NTWCs (IPMA, INGV, CENALT, KOERI, NOA) role of the PTWC/ITIC in interoperability.
Activities
- Seismic data practice (IGN/IPMA): download the catalog for the Canary Islands/Azores; filter by period, magnitude, and depth; visualization and heat map of hypocenters; discussion of active patterns (pre/post ‑eruptions).
- Analysis of the Tajogaite case (2021): timeline of previous seismicity, eruptive evolution, impacts on infrastructure and population; use of bulletins and technical articles (Frontiers/MDPI/IGN).
- Tsunami workshop: review of megatsunami deposits in the Canary Islands and basic wave attenuation modeling; coastal exposure maps; connection with Tsunami Ready (IOC).
- Macaronesian Geodynamics Seminar: Critical Reading of the Plume vs. Tectonics Debate; Implications for Risk; Relationship with Biodiversity and Human Occupation on Islands (Socio-environmental Context).
Results
- Technical skills: handling seismic catalogs and volcanic reports (IGN/INVOLCAN/IPMA/CIVISA), signal reading, and construction of hazard and exposure maps.
- Integrated risk understanding: connection between tsunami monitoring, geodynamics and warning in the NEAM system, with criteria for interpreting warnings and model limitations.
- Lessons from 2021 on La Palma: recognition of pre-eruptive indicators, evacuation logistics and reconstruction (slow cooling of lava flows, gases, geotechnical heterogeneity).
- Impact on resilience: improving community preparedness and a culture of prevention in island environments by connecting science, education, and citizens through replicable activities.
Bibliography
- IGN: Seismic Catalogue of the Canary Islands 1341–2022 (maps and relocations 1975–2000).
- IPMA/CIVISA: seismic networks and maps for Azores/Madeira.
- Geodynamic Macaronesia: Frontiers 2023 (mantle and plume review/alternatives).
How to cite: Delgado García, A.: Study of volcanic, seismic and tsunami risks in the Canary Islands and Macaronesia: integration of monitoring, models and university education for resilience., EGU General Assembly 2026, Vienna, Austria, 3–8 May 2026, EGU26-2161, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu26-2161, 2026.
Underground mining supplies essential metals that are indispensable for the energy transition and digital technologies. In this context, mountain landscapes around the globe are profoundly transformed, not only at the surface, but also underground on a large scale. Hidden subsurface landscapes develop progressively below the earth surface. A better understanding of the interconnections between subterranean metal extraction, landscape change, energy use and metal consumption is essential for future visions of sustainable resource management. In the current study, the Harz Mountains in Northern Germany serves as a case study to analyze the development of historical mining landscapes in a spatio-temporal and interdisciplinary context including especially geological, geomorphological, hydrological and cultural aspects. The natural landforms has been transformed significantly by ore extraction forming a new hybrid mining landsape.
The project on mining landscapes is carried out at the UNESCO-World heritage site Samson Mine in St. Andreasberg, which was one of the deepest mines in the 19th century and shows an almost 400-year mining history of silver. The research results are communicated to a wider public in the museum. In this regard the study is embedded in geographical environmental education (GEE), in which global learning and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) form central components. Historical mining serves as a learning platform to reflect on current challenges of global metal extraction and energy use.
Historical perspectives reveal how mining landscapes have been shaped over centuries, how the rate of extraction increased with technical and social innovations or stagnated due to various crises, and they may show, most important, the cultural drivers of ore extraction. In this regard a geocultural concept for science communication has been developed for the Samson Mining Museum integrating digital forms of geovizualisations such as Structure-from-Motion (SfM), GIS-Applications and Augmented Reality (AR). They have the potential to make the underground visible and at the same time to show landscape changes over longer time periods. The fundamental starting element of the educational concept is the staff-guided mine tour through the original historical mine as an authentic and emotional experience. The didactic progression consists of the real-life experience in the mine, followed by locating, capturing, understanding, contextualizing, and reflecting mine-related topics in a local to global context through hybrid digital media in the museum to enhance geographical core competences, and finally transferring the acquired knowledge and interconnections to the real landscape – from Analog via Digital to Real-World explorations (ADR-Concept). The project is supported by fundings schemes on cultural heritage in Lower Saxony by the Ministry of Science and Culture of Lower Saxony (zukunft.niederdsachsen.de).
How to cite: Iturrizaga, L.: Geocultural Education and Digital Geovisualizations of Mountain Mining Landscapes: From Analog via Digital to Real-World explorations – a conceptional approach, EGU General Assembly 2026, Vienna, Austria, 3–8 May 2026, EGU26-16962, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu26-16962, 2026.
In the field of science, there is a need for a more comprehensive assessment of the potential geopolitical impacts of the transition to renewable energy. The combination of risk-prone situations such as depleting mineral resources, increasing environmental problems, rising geopolitical risks, and regional and global conflict potentials with the energy transition’s intense demand for critical minerals has made uninterrupted access to critical minerals a highly sensitive issue for the countries’ national security. The importance of these minerals, which are also heavily used in sophisticated weapon systems and ammunition, is increasing day by day. Recent events such as trade disputes between countries, resource nationalism, the COVID-19 pandemic, the Russia-Ukraine War, US President Trump’s demand to “annex” Greenland and Canada for critical minerals deposits, the US-Ukraine Minerals Deal that ensures the control of US on the critical minerals deposits of Ukraine, and the US-China trade war depending on REE’s and critical minerals have made the risk of disruption to the global economy and security even more apparent. This situation has placed critical minerals in a sensitive position in the global political economy, necessitating a reassessment of the mutual economic and political relations between the major global economies of the 21st century and resource-rich developing countries. In this process, developed countries need to enter into a new economic structure with resource-rich countries in order to maintain their prosperity and national security. The ideological divisions of the Cold War era are giving way to new alliances based on economic and technological superiority. On the other hand, due to the vital importance of critical minerals, especially for leading economic and military powers such as the US, EU, China, Russia, Japan, and India, any disruptions these countries may experience in the access of critical minerals or mutual interventions between parties in resource-rich countries carry the risk of large-scale conflict worldwide.
Protectionist, control-oriented, import-substitutionist, and divisive policies are those that most countries have implemented or have been forced to contend with regarding “critical minerals.” This situation, which has led to a resurgence of resource nationalism worldwide, also signals the beginning of a new “mercantilist” era from a global perspective. These policies, reflect the fundamental characteristics of neo-mercantilism, have formed the main axis of many countries’ “critical minerals” strategies, especially since 2016. Moreover, the United States, one of the most important advocates of economic liberalism, is leading this new era globally. The US’s national interests are driving the country to pursue neomercantilist strategies regarding critical minerals. These strategies leave other countries with no choice but to either align with the policies they contain or respond to the US with similar counter-policies. In today’s climate of international insecurity, the implementation of neo-mercantilist policies on critical minerals is becoming a necessity rather than a choice for countries. Developments in the coming period will determine whether critical minerals will be a vital aid for the clean energy transition or a bottleneck for world politics and economics due to access risks. Geologists and policymakers will need to work together on this issue.
How to cite: Tuna, İ. K.: The United States' critical minerals security policies in the context of neomercantilism and their impact on global geological studies, EGU General Assembly 2026, Vienna, Austria, 3–8 May 2026, EGU26-7904, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu26-7904, 2026.
Geoethics provides a critical framework for understanding and guiding responsible human–Earth interactions, particularly within UNESCO Global Geoparks (UGGps), which function as living laboratories for geoconservation, geoeducation, and sustainable regional development. Despite growing recognition of geoethics within the geosciences, validated and standardized tools for assessing geoethical awareness—and for understanding how societal engagement with geoheritage varies across socioecological contexts—remain limited. This study addresses this gap by integrating the development, validation, and application of a Geoethical Awareness Scale (GAS) with a comprehensive mapping of residents’ geoethical perceptions and engagement profiles across nine Hellenic UGGps (Lesvos Island, Psiloritis, Chelmos–Vouraikos, Vikos–Aoos, Sitia, Grevena–Kozani, Kefalonia–Ithaca, Lavreotiki, and Meteora–Pyli).
Using an online questionnaire administered to 798 residents, we developed and psychometrically validated a 32-item GAS structured across 16 thematic axes. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses identified six robust dimensions of geoethical awareness: (1) geological heritage conservation and sustainable georesource use, (2) community engagement and collaborative governance, (3) sustainability through geoenvironmental education, (4) environmental challenges and risk adaptation, (5) sustainable geotourism, and (6) climate awareness and ecosystem resilience. These factors explained 60.12% of the total variance, with reliability indices ranging from acceptable to excellent. Structural equation modeling confirmed the internal validity and generalizability of the scale, establishing GAS as a reliable tool for assessing geoethical awareness in designated, protected, and managed socioecological systems.
Beyond scale validation, spatial and comparative analyses revealed generally high levels of geoethical awareness across Hellenic UGGps, alongside significant regional variability linked to local context, management visibility, and outreach practices. Sitia UGGp consistently exhibited the highest awareness levels, whereas Psiloritis and Lavreotiki UGGps showed lower scores in dimensions related to community engagement and sustainable geotourism, highlighting opportunities for targeted governance and educational interventions. Demographic and experiential factors—particularly age, education level, urban origin, prior visits to UGGps, and membership in environmental organizations—significantly influenced geoethical perceptions, underscoring the importance of experiential learning and direct engagement.
Cluster analysis further identified four distinct resident profiles: (1) highly engaged environmental stewards, (2) supportive but selective advocates, (3) moderately indifferent participants, and (4) disengaged or critical respondents. While nearly 70% of participants demonstrated strong or moderate alignment with geoethical principles and values, the remaining groups highlight the need for tailored education, participatory governance, and inclusive outreach strategies.
Overall, this integrated assessment demonstrates how validated measurement, spatial differentiation, and social profiling of geoethical awareness can inform adaptive governance and geoeducation strategies within UGGps. The findings support a transition from anthropocentric toward geocentric perspectives, positioning geoethical awareness as a key socioecological indicator for sustainability, resilience, and Earth-system stewardship in the Anthropocene.
How to cite: Koupatsiaris, A. A. and Drinia, H.: Measuring Geoethical Awareness and Engagement Profiles in UNESCO Global Geoparks: A Validated Scale and Evidence from Greece, EGU General Assembly 2026, Vienna, Austria, 3–8 May 2026, EGU26-1853, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu26-1853, 2026.
The evolution of life on Earth has been bracketed by two momentous events. The first was enabling: the rise in atmospheric oxygen from photosynthetic cyanobacteria during the early Proterozoic. The second was disrupting: the alteration of all subsystems comprising the Earth System by Homo sapiens beginning in the Late Pleistocene and intensifying through the Holocene. Using this lens, the Anthropocene that has morphed this century from a term to a concept to a keyword to a zeitgeist is a profound, albeit in many ways inadvertent, outcome of the transformed pure-to-applied geology profession. It instructively highlights the natural to unnatural transition of Earth history with the human-modified upper part of the lithosphere as the archaeosphere which straddles the Geological and Archaeological Timescales. In Earth System terms, it informs a new ethos to challenge the estrangement from nature by most non-indigenous peoples and the blinkered approach to climate change deliberations by most policymakers.
In contrast to the Anthropocene Event approach by a diverse group who considered all of humanity’s Earth-surface-altering impacts, the stratigraphically focused Anthropocene Working Group (AWG) proposed a post-Holocene epoch/series with a 1952 GSSP centered on the mid-20th-century Great Acceleration and peak of atomic bomb testing fallout. Starting its advocacy in 2015 in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, which was created at the urging of Albert Einstein and Manhattan Project researchers to reflect on the catastrophic weaponry used at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, was a questionable anomaly in Geological Timescale practice. Rejected in 2024 by the Subcommission on Quaternary Stratigraphy, International Commission on Stratigraphy and International Union of Geological Sciences, the AWG’s proposal also ignored several relevant breakthroughs in the human psyche. These included the Rockefeller Foundation–Lancet Commission on Planetary Health in 2015 and the UN’s Transforming our World agenda from 2015-2030.
Today, the sciences and humanities would be wise to integrate the prescient realizations of Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859) that nature would exist in the absence of humanity but that humanity cannot exist without nature and of James Lovelock (1919-2022) that there is no prescription for living with Gaia, only consequences. Arguably, today’s biggest dividend of Anthropocene thinking is that it provides a holistic foundation for urgent Earth System governance.
How to cite: Koster, E., Gibbard, P., and Gibling, M.: The Anthropocene as Earth’s natural to unnatural history transition, EGU General Assembly 2026, Vienna, Austria, 3–8 May 2026, EGU26-1432, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu26-1432, 2026.
Early-career researchers play a central role in advancing geoscience, yet their research trajectories are shaped not only by scientific challenges, but also by structural conditions that influence access, recognition, and sustainability. While equal-opportunity frameworks aim to ensure fairness through consistent treatment, they may still produce uneven outcomes when differences in experience, workloads, contribution, and risk exposure are not fully recognised. These conditions are particularly consequential for early-career researchers navigating mobility and temporary contracts. The uneven distribution of invisible academic labour further shapes who remains visible and who is able to sustain a research career.
Framing these dynamics as shared research challenges allows early-career researchers to learn from one another’s experiences, reduce impostor syndrome, and make visible the human side of scientific work. Equity is a shared responsibility: institutions and organisations can improve transparency around structural conditions, while research communities and scientific societies can reduce inequities by shaping participation, recognition, and visibility within existing constraints. This includes flexible participation models, transparent evaluation practices, and greater recognition of non-visible contributions that support more equitable and inclusive research environments. By treating equality and fairness as shared problem-solving spaces rather than individual burdens, this perspective aims to support more inclusive and sustainable pathways for early-career researchers in geoscience.
How to cite: Tang, A. C. I.: Beyond Equality: Early-Career Perspectives on Equity in Geoscience, EGU General Assembly 2026, Vienna, Austria, 3–8 May 2026, EGU26-16189, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu26-16189, 2026.
One of the most life-changing experiences for scientists is when real-world events challenge theoretical knowledge and standard models in the literature. When facing such circumstances, scientists, instead of feeling disappointment and discouragement, must seize the opportunity to expand their knowledge and adjust for flaws in their initial assumptions, as academic integrity is rooted in fundamental scientific values, such as honesty and fairness. Considering this, and after decades of post-graduate, PhD, and post-doctoral studies in the fields of Hydraulics, Hydrology, and Stochastics, we witnessed a series of unprecedentedly extreme events in academia involving the official regulations for tenured professorships in Greece. These regulations mandate the formation of an Academic Board for candidate evaluation by randomly drawing lots from a pool of professors whose scientific fields are relevant to the subject of the position. This is intended to avoid "pre-designed" boards (i.e., those formed by blocking certain experts —often highly qualified ones— from the draw and favouring others —often poorly qualified ones— who may have scientific and financial conflicts of interest regarding specific candidates), which can cause severe long-term degradation of the educational system. Unexpectedly, even after multiple repetitions and strong reassurance regarding the validity of the above procedure, the probability of the outcomes (specifically, the consistent drawing of a handful group of lots) reached the extreme order of millionths. In this presentation, we will discuss these experiences with extremes and whether the concepts of statistical significance and reliability indices in scientific literature and academic regulations should be revisited.
How to cite: Dimitriadis, P.: Extreme Academic Tales for Recorded Extreme Tails in Greece, EGU General Assembly 2026, Vienna, Austria, 3–8 May 2026, EGU26-21525, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu26-21525, 2026.
