Most of the magnetic fabric work conducted by U.S. workers and in U.S. laboratories over the past quadrennium has concentrated on the effect of rock and sediment deformation on magnetic fabric. The ultimate goal of these studies remains the quantification, and hence the quick, non-destructive measurement, of rock strain with magnetic anisotropy intensity. U.S. workers found that it is very important to consider the effect of multiple mineralogic sources of magnetic fabric both from paramagnetic and ferromagnetic material. To understand the relative contribution of these sources detailed rock magnetic, rock fabric (SEM, X ray pole figure goniometry), experimental deformation and numerical modeling may be required. Using these approaches, there has been success in developing ``local strain gauges'' for specific rock types which can be used to extend more traditional strain measures from non-magnetic rock fabrics. More work has been done in the past quadrennium in using magnetic fabric measurements to recognize and correct for deformation effects on NRM, particularly in studies of burial compaction.
Igneous flow studies concentrated mostly on identifying source areas for large ash fall tuffs. Distributional anisotropy, rather than orientation anisotropy, has been suggested as a new way of envisioning the microscopic mechanism for the magnetic fabric that arises from igneous flow.
Finally, in terms of strategically important studies the potential for magnetic fabric research is particularly great in environmental and paleoenvironmental studies of marine and lacustrine environmental systems.
Acknowledgments. The comments of Dr. A. Goldstein, one anonymous reviewer, and the editors helped improve the clarity of the text. NSF grant EAR-9315778 provided partial support for this work.