Giovanni De Giudici, Jonathan Lloyd and Caroline Peacock (contact: Jon.Lloyd@manchester.ac.uk)

Chemical reactions occurring at biogeochemical interfaces often control the mobility of bulk and trace elements and drive mineral precipitation. This is due to processes ranging from the molecular scale to the macro scale, that involve living tissues, organic molecules released to the environment, microbes, fluids and (bio)minerals. These are central to environmental sciences, and a growing number of multidisciplinary studies provide significant insight into how life is causative of environmental processes and can offer opportunities to develop environmental technologies. This session solicits contributions that explore the interactions between life and minerals from the molecular to the macro scale. Biogeochemical interfaces of relevance can include biofilms, the rhizosphere, biological tissues and fluids in a wide range of natural and engineered environments. Studies from the molecular scale to the field scale are encouraged. Focus will also include biomonitoring of pollutant transfer processes to the biosphere. (JL and CP stand for the Geomicrobiology and the Environmental Mineralogy Groups of MSGBI respectively).

The Keynote speaker, and MinSoc Hallimond Lecturer, will be Kevin Rosso (Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, Washington, USA)