Core sample - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Page 1 of 3

Core sample
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A core sample is a cylindrical section of a naturally

occurring medium consistent enough to hold a
layered structure. Most cores are obtained by drilling
into the medium, for example the earth, with a
hollow steel tube called a corer. The hole made for
the core sample is called a core hole. A variety of
corers exist to sample different media under
different conditions. More continue to be invented.
In the coring process the sample is pushed more or
less intact into the tube. Removed from the tube in
the laboratory, it is inspected and analyzed by
different techniques and equipment depending on
the type of data desired. Analysis is generally non- Core sample. The product of a Diamond rig
destructive of most of the sample.

Contents
■ 1 Methods
■ 2 Management of cores and data
■ 3 Layering
■ 4 Informational value of core samples
■ 5 See also
■ 6 External links

Methods
■ gravity coring, in which the core sampler is dropped into the sample
■ drilling
■ vibracoring, in which the sampler is vibrated to allow penetration into thixotropic media.

Management of cores and data

Coring is the method to retrieve cores samples from the ground. Coring is often utilised in ocean drilling
and surveying. Scientist often using coring to acquire core samples for study.

Drilling equipment is often used for coring. Rock core is often taken during mineral exploration
operations to help determine the rock type and amount of mineralisation present. A diamond
impregnated core bit is used which is rotated to cut an annulus of rock, producing a rock core which
extends through the bit into the core barrel. In a wireline system, the core barrel can be retrieved using a
wire cable that is run inside the drill rods. Thus, the drill rods do not have to be removed from the

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borehole each time a core run is complete. Diamond coring can be carried out to depth of 2000m using
conventional mineral exploration drilling equipment. Core can be recovered from deeper wells but the
operation becomes more expensive.

The technique of coring long predates attempts to drill into the Earth’s mantle by the Deep Sea Drilling
Program. The value to oceanic and other geologic history of obtaining cores over a wide area of sea
floors soon became apparent. Core sampling by many scientific and exploratory organizations expanded
rapidly. To date hundreds of thousands of core samples have been collected from floors of all the
planet’s oceans and many of its inland waters.

Access to many of these samples is facilitated by the Index to Marine & Lacustrine Geological Samples,

"A collaboration between twenty institutions and agencies that operate geological repositories."

The above agency keeps a record of the samples held in the repositories of its member organizations.
Data includes

"Lithography, texture, age, principal investigator, province, weathering/metamorphism, glass

remarks and descriptive comments"

Layering
Any natural medium at or under the Earth’s surface or other body that is consistent enough to maintain a
solid or semi-solid structure is layered. The layering comes from successive deposition or growth in time
of structural or compositional variants of the medium.

Most familiar to us are the layers of the Earth’s surface on which the geologic history of the surface is
based; for example, the Eocene, Oligocene, Miocene, etc. Each layer in this case contains distinctive
fossils generated by the evolution of species. Layers often are divided into sublayers.

Layering is more pervasive than the broad outline of the Geologic Time Scale leads us to believe. Any
change in environment causes a new layer to be deposited. A succession of plant species in a region, for
example, causes a succession of layers containing different pollen in ice and mud. Variation in rainfall
causes tree rings to be of different widths.

Informational value of core samples

Scientific coring began as a method of sampling the ocean floor. It soon expanded to lakes, ice, mud,
soil and wood. Cores on very old trees give information about their growth rings without destroying the
tree.

Cores indicate variations of climate, species and sedimentary composition during geologic history. The
dynamic phenomena of the Earth’s surface are for the most part cyclical in a number of ways, especially
temperature and rainfall.

There are many ways to date a core. Once dated, it gives valuable information about changes of climate
and terrain. For example, cores in the ocean floor, soil and ice have altered the view of the geologic
history of the Pleistocene entirely.

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See also
■ Ice core
■ Scientific drilling
■ Core drill

External links
■ Core Sample (http://www.marslife.com/coresample.htm)
■ Aquifer Core Samples (http://www.egr.msu.edu/schoolcraft/core.htm)
■ Core from Walden Pond (http://whyfiles.org/021climate/journey.html)
■ Ice Core Dating (http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/icecores.html)
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