Green River oil shale contains minerals, kerogen, and bitumen and yields a significant amount of oil upon heating. Kerogen is the insoluble organic remains found in sedimentary materials. It is a precursor to crude oil and is one of the most abundant forms of carbonaceous materials on earth. The richest oil shale deposits in the world are found in the Green River Formation located in the states of Utah, Wyoming and Colorado in the United States with the potential to be a major national resource. Current extraction methods involve heating the shale to high temperatures in order to decompose and evaporate the shale oil. This method is very inefficient due to tremendous energy requirements and is environmentally unfriendly. Thus, the extraction of kerogen is commercially not viable in the United States at this time. My research at North Dakota State University has been focused on understanding how the kerogen is "locked" in the surrounding mineral matrix. The research involves experimental and modeling studies aimed at evaluating the molecular interactions in the oil shale. The focus of my study has been on the in situ chemical composition, mechanical properties, and the physical location of kerogen in Green River oil shale. Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR) studies have been conducted using the photoacoustic step-scan method to investigate the molecular nature of light and dark colored areas of the oil shale core. This technique provided the means for in situ investigation of kerogenmineral interactions. Results show that light colored oil shale has a high kerogen content with spectra similar to that of isolated kerogen while dark colored oil shale has more mineral components. Kerogen band shifts occurred indicating interactions on the molecular scale between kerogen and the surrounding minerals. Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) studies were performed in order to obtain information on the size and layout of pores, minerals, and kerogen in the shale. Energy Dispersive Spectroscopy (EDS) performed ort light and dark colored samples indicate that the light colored oil shale contains more kerogen associated with the minerals quartz, clay, and potassium-feldspar. Dark oil shale samples contained kerogen, clay, dolomite, calcite, pyrite, and analcite. SEM images perpendicular to the bedding plane of cross-sectional polished oil shale samples showed orientated layers and elongation consistent with compression over time. The absence of large kerogen regions in SEM images and nanoindentation results suggest that Green River kerogen is on the scale of tens of nanometers and is in close proximity to oil shale minerals. The mechanical properties of kerogen and oil shale minerals were found using nanoindentation techniques. Green River kerogen was found to have an elastic modulus of 9 GPa and hardness of 1 GPa.