Research Partnerships

MDS is collaborating with two scientific partners to understand hydrate in natural and planetary settings. The central goal of this work is to improve our understanding of how hydrate forms, how to explore for hydrate, and how to understand the role of hydrate in climate and planetary evolution.

MDS is currently working with the Gas Hydrate Program of United States Geological Survey, Woods Hole, MA Branch to improve the growth of hydrate in sediment samples so that the electrical and acoustic alterations introduced by different amounts of hydrate can be characterized for purposes of resource evaluation. The accelerated growth of hydrate in the sediments will help natural gas hydrate growth models to provide a near-perfect analog of a naturally occurring hydrate deposit.

MDS has entered into a subcontract with the Lunar and Planetary Institute to investigate methods to remotely detect hydrate on space bourn objects including comments, Mars, and Titan. NASA is the primary sponsor of this work.