Jeffrey Warber / Earth & Environmental Sciences / Faculty Mentor: Nathan Brown
Sand is the second most exploited natural resource in the world after fresh water and is being called “the new gold,” as illegal mining groups known as the “sand mafia” fight to collect this valuable resource. Sand is used to build many objects such as glass, roads and concrete and as demands continue to grow, it is said we could run out of sand by 2050. It is difficult to track these extraction activities since there is lack of oversight, due to sand being easily accessible compared to other resources such as oil or coal.
The basic conception of luminescence provenance analysis starts with various source areas that have different sediment proportions. This sediment is amalgamated by transport processes downstream. Based on the decay curves of each region, we can see how much sediment from each region is being sourced into a river.
After analyzing the luminescence signals from sand samples, a comparison can be made to see if the sand samples collected from specific locations have unique luminescence properties that are characteristic of their origins. This technique could determine whether sand of unknown origin was illegally sourced based on measured luminescence signals.
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