Qualitative relationships of late Cenozoic cinder cones, southern Rio Grande rift, utilizing cone morphology and landsat thematic imagery: A preliminary assessment
— Jerry M. Hoffer, Brian S. Penn, Oscar A. Quezada, and Monica Morales

The Potrillo and Palomas basalt fields, located in southern New Mexico and northern Chihuahua, respectively, contain abundant cinder cones and basaltic lava flows. Radiometric dates indicate the volcanic activity in the Potrillo field is much younger (20-916 ka) than in the Palomas field (2960-5170 ka). Measurements of cinder cone morphology, including maximum slope angle and radius/height ratios, correlate well with individual ages from both of the fields. The maximum slope angles of the Potrillo cones average 19° versus 6° for the older Palomas cones; radius/height values show a similar relationship, 5.1 for the former, and 9.8 for the latter. In addition, Landsat thematic mapper images of the cinder cones in the Potrillo and Palomas fields increase in apparent reflectance in visible through short wavelength infrared with increasing age. The older Palomas cones display higher reflectance values than the younger Potrillo cones. The spectral reflectance in the visible and infrared wavelengths is due to the alteration of magnetite and/or ilmenite in the basaltic cinder to hematite and goethite.