Bones. Shells. Reefs. Teeth. Biominerology. The wonderful UCLA geochemist Rob Ulrich answers a giant pile of questions such as: How do crystalline structures materialize out of thin air and water? How do squishy animals make such hard shells? What’s the difference between a shell and an exoskeleton? What’s the noise you hear when you listen to a seashell? What’s up with ocean acidification? How do you keep a fiddle leaf tree alive? How do you meet new friends without battling LA traffic? Start by becoming virtual BFFs with this -ologist, who is shella cool...  Also MAY 18th, 5pm Pacific. WARD'S DOING A VIRTUAL LIVE SHOW. Tickets available here: https://onlocationlive.com/category/ologies  Rob’s website: https://www.robertnulrich.com Rollow Rob at https://twitter.com/robertnulrich & instagram.com/biomineralogist Queer & Trans in STEM: https://twitter.com/QueersInSTEM. A donation went to: https://www.ioes.ucla.edu/diversity/  Sponsors of Ologies: alieward.com/ologies-sponsors More links and info at alieward.com/ologies/biomineralogy Transcripts & bleeped episodes at: alieward.com/ologies-extras Become a patron of Ologies for as little as a buck a month: www.Patreon.com/ologies OlogiesMerch.com has hats, shirts, pins, totes and now… MASKS. Hi. Yes.  Follow twitter.com/ologies or instagram.com/ologies Follow twitter.com/AlieWard or instagram.com/AlieWard Sound editing by Jarrett Sleeper of MindJam Media & Steven Ray Morris Theme song by Nick Thorburn Transcripts by Emily White of https://www.thewordary.com/  Support the show: http://Patreon.com/ologies See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.