This is a book about the why and how of doing experiments on rocks,
minerals, magmas, and fluids. It could have as logically been subtitled
"Experimental petrology" as "Experimental geochemistry," but we chose
geochemistry to emphasize the broad and overlapping nature of current
experimental work. We have tried to aim the book at a general readership
which we hope will include advanced undergraduate students, graduate
students, and anyone else interested in learning something about
experimental petrology. Although we hope there will be something of
interest for the practicing experimentalist, our aim is at the
non-experimentalist interested in learning why experiments are useful,
what kind of experiments can be done, and what some of the major
problems and limitations are and how they can best be avoided. The
result of a journey through this book should be an ability to evaluate
published experimental work critically and a knowledge of the kinds of
problems an experimentalist might be able to help solve. Some details of
experimental technique are included in the Appendix for those readers
who want to "get their hands dirty. " Indeed, one of our main incentives
for writing this book was to try to encourage more petrologists and
geochemists to become experimentalists. In our pedagogical approach we
have chosen to discuss a small number of case histories as illustrations
of principles and techniques. We have tried to select studies we regard
as well executed.
