May Luncheon & Annual Meeting

Please RSVP by 3:00pm on Friday, May 22, 2026.

Reservations made after the deadline will incur an additional fee of $10.

LOCATION: In-Person luncheon meeting will be held at the Bush Convention Center. Virtual meeting on Zoom. 

TOPIC:

A decade of research and technology. Building integrated datasets and setting standards for stratigraphic frameworks in mudstones - Daniel Minisini, Geologist, ExxonMobil, and Chief Editor of the AAPG Bulletin

ABSTRACT:

Goal

A decade of data acquisition, analysis, and interpretation of specific "black shales" demonstrates the value of integrated high-resolution studies in mudstone analysis, useful for resource exploration, refinement of greenhouse climate conditions and carbon cycle dynamics.

Material and methods

Data from outcrops and cores were analyzed on scales ranging from pore throats to basin. The rocks from coeval environments of deposition were investigated integrating sedimentology, mineralogy, geochemistry and palaeoecology, using age models in different physiographic sectors based on biostratigraphy, astrochronology, stable isotopes, and zircon U-Pb geochronology.

Results

The precise chronostratigraphic and compositional framework generated demonstrates that multiple processes responsible for transport, deposition, and preservation of organic-rich mudstones acted contemporaneously in different parts of the basin. The analyses allowed determine well-defined temporal stages recorded over ~10 Myr in an area spanning ~100,000 km². 

Conclusions

The outcrop–core–log correlations, extensive and integrated dataset, high-precision and well-calibrated constraints set a standard for studies where high-frequency timelines (10s kyr) show relationships among coeval facies of organic-rich mudstones. The generated age models have become global benchmarks and have been used in hundreds of published studies to calibrate a full suite of regional and globally recognized age-diagnostic events. Petrophysics, Geomechanics and Seismic interpretations lean on these high-resolution frameworks.

BIO:

Pioneered subsurface interpretation in unconventional resources by integrating scales (from micron to kilometers), methods (experiments, modeling, modern analogs, outcrops, seismic), and disciplines. Helped discover and develop the first economical unconventional play outside North America. Popularized the Geological Sciences in websites, podcasts, and video interviews in international forums. Authored 70 peer-reviewed papers. Geologist at ExxonMobil, Shell, Eni, Rice University, National Research Council of Italy. Chief Editor of the scientific journal AAPG BULLETIN.