earth science

Michael Lesher

Michael Lesher is a earth science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Michael Lesher rather than just read about it. In short: Carl Michael Lesher (born 1951) is an American geologist. He is an authority on the geology and origin of nickel-copper-platinum group element deposits, especially those associated with komatiites and the Sudbury Impact Structure, their physical volcanology and localization, the geochemistry and petrology of associated rocks, and controls on their composition.

Key takeaways

Michael Lesher belongs to earth science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Michael Lesher to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Michael Lesher from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Carl Michael Lesher (born 1951) is an American geologist. He is an authority on the geology and origin of nickel-copper-platinum group element deposits, especially those associated with komatiites and the Sudbury Impact Structure, their physical volcanology and localization, the geochemistry and petrology of associated rocks, and controls on their composition.

Life, education, and career Lesher was born in Indianapolis, Indiana, United States, but has been living and working in Canada beginning in 1975 and continuously since 1997. He holds BSc and MA degrees in geology from Indiana University Bloomington, where he was a member of Phi Delta Theta fraternity, rode in the Little 500 bicycle race in 1971 and 1972, and was on the IU water polo team in 1972 and 1973. Between 1975 and 1979, he worked as an Exploration Geologist and Mineralogist for the Iron Ore Company of Canada, before obtaining a PhD degree in geology from the University of Western Australia. Between 1982 and 1984, he was a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the J. Tuzo Wilson Research Laboratories of the University of Toronto; and between 1984 and 1997, he was Professor of Economic Geology at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa. In 1997, he was appointed Professor of Economic Geology, NSERC Senior Industrial Research Chair in Mineral Exploration, and Founding Director of the Mineral Exploration Research Centre at Laurentian University in Sudbury, Ontario. In 2010-2011 he served as Director of Mining Initiatives, designing and founding the School of Mines (now Goodman School of Mines). He has been a Visiting Fellow in the Abteilung Geochemie at the Max Planck Institute für Chemie (1989 and 1991) and the Research School of Earth Sciences at the Australian National University (1990), an Honorary Professor at the Chengdu University of Technology (2000), and a visiting professor at Indiana University (2002-2003), and has given plenary, keynote, and invited lectures all over the world. In 2021 he was appointed Professor Emeritus at Laurentian University. Between 1998 and 2002, Lesher was Leader of the International Union of Geological Sciences- and UNESCO-sponsored International Geological Correlation Program (now International Geoscience Programme) Project 427, Ore-Forming Processes in Dynamic Magmatic Systems. Between 2012 and 2018 he was Principal Investigator and Project Director of the $13M pan-Canadian Integrated Multi-Parameter Footprints of Ore Systems project, sponsored by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada and the Canada Mining Innovation Council. He is currently a Co-Principal Investigator on the $100M Metal Earth program, sponsored by the Canada First Research Excellence Fund and the Northern Ontario Heritage Fund. Lesher's scientific publications have been cited over 12,000 times, and he has served on the editorial boards of Mineralogical Abstracts (1987-1988), The Canadian Mineralogist (1989-1991), Reviews in Economic Geology (1993-1998), and Mineralium Deposita (2010–2016). In addition to his research, he has consulted for mining companies in Australia, Canada, Finland, and the USA.

Honours and awards Lesher has been awarded the Duncan R. Derry Medal (2007) from the Mineral Deposits Division of the Geological Association of Canada, and co-awarded the Julian Boldy Award (2002) by the Geological Association of Canada, and the Wardell Armstrong Prize (2009) by the Institution of Mining and Metallurgy. He has served as a Society of Economic Geologists Thayer Lindsley Visiting Lecturer (1998-1999) and as a Canadian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy University Lecturer (1997-1998). He is an elected Fellow of the Society of Economic Geologists, the Geological Society of America, and the Geological Association of Canada.

… excerpt ends here. Continue reading the full article.

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Michael Lesher

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Michael Lesher claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In earth science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Michael Lesher before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Michael Lesher ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Michael Lesher

In research: Michael Lesher appears in earth science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Michael Lesher in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Michael Lesher is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1951 births, 20th-century American geologists, 20th-century Canadian scientists, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Michael Lesher outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Michael Lesher in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Michael Lesher means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Michael Lesher out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Michael Lesher in simple terms?

Why does Michael Lesher matter?

Because it connects several earth science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Michael Lesher?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Michael Lesher.