For a man who has spent years delving, drilling and even walking into volcanoes, geological sciences professor Tom Vogel has a startling secret.

Volcanoes frighten him.

"I tend to study volcanoes that I would like to be extinct because I'm scared of them," Vogel said with a laugh. "But sometimes you just have to go to an active volcano to get samples."

Vogel and geological sciences assistant Professor Lina Patino are part of a team of international researchers participating in the Unzen Scientific Drilling Project. The endeavor, with an estimated cost of $10 million, has scientists from all over the globe drilling into and researching rocks from Unzen Volcano in Japan to get a clearer picture of how volcanoes work.

The project is a joint undertaking of the Japan Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology and the International Continental Drilling Program. Partially funded by the National Science Foundation, research teams in Japan are drilling into Unzen's inner plumbing, or conduit, to gather rock samples. The recovered samples then are shipped to other researchers, such as Vogel and Patino, for analysis.

John Eichelberger, one of the principal investigators for the project and a colleague of Vogel, said he first became interested in drilling into Unzen after its period of restlessness in the early 1990s.

"My Japanese colleagues and I started talking about how interesting it would be to find out how it was erupting," he said.

Eichelberger, professor and chair of the Department of Geology & Geophysics at the University of Alaska Fairbanks, has been studying volcanoes for more than 25 years. He said he finds working with volcanoes to be "incredibly exciting" despite the dangers they might pose.

"In part, it's exploring the unknown," he said. "Every geology textbook has a cross-section of a volcano, but in fact it's all speculation, and we're finally going to find out what's really there."

Unzen was chosen for this particular project because of the dual nature of its eruptions. Most volcanoes erupt either quietly or violently, but Unzen has experienced both types of eruptions.

"Sometimes it erupts very dangerously and sometimes the lava just rolls down the side," Vogel said. "We're trying to find out why."

One reason why Patino and Vogel are participating in the Unzen project is because they have access to a special piece of equipment called a mass spectrometer. With it, the two researchers can analyze rocks for elements that are only present in small amounts.

"Crystals record the history of magma just like growth rings in trees record the climate history," Eichelberger said. "You can read the history of the magma by analyzing the films that grow there."

Robert Christiansen, former Scientist-in-Charge at Yellowstone Volcano Observatory, said volcanic-drilling efforts such as the Unzen Scientific Drilling Project do not happen often.

"Drilling is one of the best ways to get three-dimensional information about the Earth, but because it's so expensive, it's relatively rare for most research projects," he said.

Many people involved said the educational opportunities from the Unzen drilling are not limited to learning what makes volcanoes tick.

Leslie Almberg, a University of Alaska Fairbanks alumna, spent about seven weeks in Japan last summer to work on the drilling project. She said the most rewarding part of the project is working with people from all over the world.

"I really like the fact that it's a big international collaboration," she said. "It's important because we have a lot of international problems."

"Science is a good way to bring people together," she said.

Almberg said there's no official end in sight for the project, which is in its second year. Even after the drilling is finished, research on the rocks and drill site could continue for many years, she said.

But for the researchers, the project is worth the time.

"We'd like to look at the material and make some predictions so we can say something about how hazardous these volcanoes can be," Vogel said.

"This was just an opportunity we couldn't pass up."

Emily Bingham can be reached at binghame@msu.edu.