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GEOLOGY & GEOPHYSICS NEWS Yale University I Department of Geology and Geophysics Fall 2011 New Faculty in Geology & Geophysics

The arrival of new young faculty, married postdocs and graduate students has brought the sounds of juvenile voices to the halls of Geology and Geophysics. Here is a gathering of the parents and their children who attended the recent Chair’s annual Fall Reception.

Chairman’s Letter involved in the modernization of the Department in the David Bercovici ([email protected]) mid 1960s that ushered in the fields of geophysics and atmosphere, ocean and climate dynamics that we see Dear Friends and Family of blooming today. Karl’s retirement marks the end of Yale Geology & Geophysics, an era. However he has started a new phase of his life I’m happy to once again as a Research Scientist and continues with his many report on recent activities in projects including editing the monolithic Treatise on our Department. Geochemistry. Although no new faculty This last June the Department underwent the joined our department this last University’s required quinquennial External Review, year, we continue to explore which actually last happened 15 years ago. This new frontiers, including involved a major self-study report about the status geobiology, crustal geology, and future of the department carried out by the surface processes, energy Department faculty, which then provided the launching David Bercovici science and exoplanetology, point for the External Review. The Review Committee

in preparation for possible hiring in the near future. continued on page 2 Even so, the overall size of the Department has grown dramatically in numbers of students and postdoctoral Inside this Issue scholars, to the point that we have now used up almost every available square foot of space in Kline G&G Postdoc News ...... 2 Geology Lab. Faculty Research ...... 3 July 1, 2011 witnessed the retirement of Karl Field Studies and Field Trips ...... 7 Turekian from his Professorship. Karl taught at Yale Visiting Faculty ...... 11 since 1956 and was—as many of you know so well— Recent Awards and Honors: Faculty ...... 12 one of the pillars on which today’s Department was Recent Awards and Honors: Students ...... 13 built. Karl has been a superstar of geochemistry for Student News ...... 15 decades, and in many ways is one of the fathers Recent Awards and Honors: Alumni ...... 17 of modern isotope geochemistry. He was deeply Alumni News ...... 20 Geology & Geophysics News Fall 2011

Letter continued from page 1 in general continues to fund and facilitate research in was comprised of Steven renewable energy, carbon sequestration, adaptation Sparks (Chair) from University in developing countries, climate change science and of Bristol, Margaret Leinen impacts, building efficiency, shale gas research and former Director of the NSF much more. The YCEI also had a review by its External Geosciences Division and Advisory Committee, which includes several G&G now CEO and Founder of the alumnae, David Lawrence from Shell Corporation, Joe Climate Response Fund, Peter Greenberg from Alta Resources, and Dan Schrag from Olson from Johns Hopkins, Harvard University. George Philander from Finally, I should note that this will be my last Princeton, Brian Wernicke letter as Chair, since I will be stepping down at the from Cal Tech and John Flynn end of the 2011–2012 year. The next Chair is not A recent photo of Karl from the American Museum. yet designated but this decision will be made next Turekian, Sterling Professor The committee met with Spring. Looking back on the last nearly 6 years, I’m Emeritus. faculty, staff, students and very happy and proud of all that the Department has postdocs for two days and reported their findings accomplished, both in its growth and in the role it has to the Provost. The report was released to the played in the University at large. It was an honor and a faculty and was very favorable and generous to the pleasure to serve the Department during this time. Department and made various recommendations Once again, thank you for your support and interest about future directions and initiatives that we are in the Department. I hope this newsletter finds you already acting on. well, and I wish you all the best for the coming year. One such initiative involved our on-going investigation of future areas of geoscience, which the department had been doing through exploratory G&G Postdoc News symposia (starting Spring 2010 and going through Yahya Al-Khatatabeh (yalkhatatbeh@simons-rock. Spring 2011), in preparation for considering where edu) who was working with Kanani Lee, is now a we should be going in the next ten to twenty years. Postdoc in the Department of Physics at Bard College May 2010 saw our first symposium on Frontiers in at Simon’s Rock in Great Barrington, Massachusetts. Paleontology and Geobiology, and in Fall 2010 there Richard Krause ([email protected]) who was a symposia on Frontiers in Crustal Geoscience. was working with Derek Briggs, is now a Research The final symposium, in May 2011, was on Earth Assistant in the Department of Paleontology at the Surface System Interactions, concerning exchanges Institute of Geosciences in the University of Mainz, of volatiles like water and carbon between the Germany. Chris Brierley ([email protected]) who atmosphere, ocean and solid Earth. Information about was working with Alexey Fedorov, is now a Lecturer past and future symposia can be found at www. (faculty rank of Assistant Professor) at the University geology.yale.edu/seminars. College of London. Gabe Bever ([email protected]) The Department continues its deep involvement in who was working with Jacques Gauthier is now an the Yale Climate & Energy Institute (YCEI). The YCEI Assistant Professor in the Department of Anatomy worked toward the establishment of the new Energy at the New York College of Osteopathic Medicine. Sciences Institute on the West Campus, which was Yue Jian Wang ([email protected]) who was recently given a gift of $25M by Thomas Steyer and working with Kanani Lee, is now an Assistant Professor Kathryn Taylor to help launch the new science and in the Physics Departemnt at Oakland University in technology institute (see the Yale Daily Bulletin Story: Rochester Michigan. Peter Van Roy (peter.vanroy@ http://dailybulletin.yale.edu/article.aspx?id=8865). ugent.be) who was working with Derek Briggs, This institute will focus on both renewable energies is now a Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of like solar fuels, as well as transitional technologies Ghent in Belgium. Marc LaFlamme (LaflammeM@ (like carbon sequestration and shale gas), so there si.edu) who was working with Derek Briggs is a is a very big role for the Department to play in Smithsonian Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department this new venture. The YCEI is also spear-heading of Paleobiology at the Smithsonian Institution in the development of a new Energy Curriculum and Washington, DC. Certificate program, in which the Department is again playing a critical role in offering classes on resources and sustainability, fossil fuels and energy transitions, and natural renewable energies. The YCEI

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faculty research

Mineral and Rock Physics Laboratory

Shun Ichiro-Karato (the lithosphere) and sea-water—a When melting occurs in the upper project on this process (chemical mantle, magma rises upward to Yale’s Mineral and Rock Physics reactions of CO2-rich fluids with form a volcano. However, when Laboratory was established rocks) is underway in collaboration melting occurs under deep Earth when Shun Karato joined the with faculty colleague Zhengrong conditions, magma may sink rather faculty in August, 2001. The lab Wang (zhengrong.wang@yale. than rise upward. This is due to is designed to conduct studies edu) and undergraduate student the high compressibility and iron- on the properties of materials in Catherine Padhi ’14 (catherine. rich compositions of the melts. order to understand the structure [email protected]). Metamorphosed We have conducted systematic and dynamics of Earth and other oceanic crust together with the experimental studies on the melt planets (Figure 1). underlying cold lithospheric density and composition, and also Earth is a dynamic planet in mantle, returns to the mantle at developed a new theory of silicate which solid melts. In this materials slowly theory, we employ move both the concept that horizontally and the compression vertically. These of silicate melts processes occur occurs mostly not only at the through a change surface but also in in the geometrical the deep interior. arrangement Evidence for of nearly rigid active motion “molecules”. We deep inside Earth have proposed a and resultant universal equation chemical of state for silicate reactions has melts by which been obtained we can calculate through the density of any geophysical and Fig. 1: The members of the Yale Mineral and Rock Physics. First row from left: Lowell Miyagi, silicate melts if geochemical George Amulele, Shun Karato, Jun Yi, Zhenting Jiang, the second row from left: Robert the composition is Farla, Tolulope Olugboji, Zhengyu (Andy) Cai, far back from left: Duojun Wang, Kazuhiko studies. In the Otsuka, Catherine Padhi. given. This work is Mineral and Rock the core of a PhD Physics Lab, we investigate a range subduction zones. These materials study of former graduate student, of physical and chemical properties sometimes sink to the bottom of Zhicheng Jing, G ’10 (zjing@ of materials that control the the mantle (~2900 km deep), but uchicao.edu), now a post-doc at processes in order to interpret the sometimes they stay in the middle the University of Chicago. The motions. We use both experimental of the mantle. During these slow studies are now being extended to and theoretical approaches. motions in the Earth’s interior, the lower mantle. Rock sometimes fractures and sinking slabs go through various Similar to the ocean floor, cause earthquakes, but sometimes regions with different physical where hot rocks meet sea-water, it flows and causes tectonic plates and chemical properties, and rocks meet hot molten iron at to move. Hot materials move often undergo chemical reactions, the core-mantle boundary and upward and partially melt near including melting. The composition intense chemical reaction may the surface—oceanic crust is the of shallow-mantle melts is different occur. Graduate student Kazuhiko product. Hot oceanic crust is in from melts formed in the deep Otsuka (kazuhiko.otsuka@yale. contact with sea-water and intense mantle. Melts formed in the shallow edo), is investigating the nature of chemical reactions occurs at mid- mantle are silica-rich (basalt chemical reactions between rocks ocean ridges that modify the or granite) but melts formed in and molten metals (including Fe). composition of the surface rocks the deep mantle are silica poor. He has discovered that the degree

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faculty research

of chemical reaction between the the properties of lower mantle University in Korea), we have molten core and the rocks at the minerals, then by a combination discovered that such a relation is base of the mantle may be far with geophysical measurements, sensitive to water content as well more extensive than previously we will be able to probe the whole as stress and temperature. Our thought. mantle of the Earth to obtain key studies have provided a guideline Properties of materials change clues to its overall properties. for interpreting these observations. drastically under the extreme Deformation often changes the One of the special aspects pressureYou are and warmly temperature invited to a specialstructure weekend of a rock. in Such New changes Haven for ofalumni the lab ofis that the we conduct conditionsgraduate of andexperimental planetaryundergraduate interiors. programsstudies using newly For example, under designed equipment, the deep Earth new methods of conditions, many investigation, and minerals become development of new good hosts for theories. One of the water. In fact, if all new devices is a the mantle materials so-called rotational contained water to Drickamer apparatus their limits, there (RDA) (Figure 2). This would be more than apparatus, designed 10 oceans of water in the lab, allows us in the Earth’s mantle. to study the plastic We are investigating flow properties of how water is held rocks under deep in minerals and Earth conditions,

how water changes Fig. 2: The operation of RDA (rotational and extends the properties of Drickamer apparatus) at the National the maximum minerals. We have Synchrotron Light Source at Brookhaven pressure of National Lab. From left: George Amulele, found that water Kazuhiko Otsuka, Robert Farla, Lowell Miyagi. operation by more enhances plastic flow than a factor of of minerals by as much as 10,000 can be detected 10 over previous times, and also enhances the by high-resolution studies. To date, electrical conductivity of minerals. seismological studies we have operated Comparing our own data with (faculty colleagues this apparatus the results of geophysical remote Jeffrey Park (jeffrey. to pressure of sensing, we have found that water [email protected]) ~23 GPa and a is distributed heterogeneously and Maureen Long temperature of in the Earth’s mantle, being (maureen.long@yale. ~2200 K under enriched in the mid-mantle region edu) carry out these the synchrotron (transition zone) where it promotes sorts of studies). If the facility at partial melting. Minerals under the relation between the deformation Brookhaven National Lab (in the lower mantle conditions behave pattern of a rock and the flow Long Island, NY). These are record- rather differently than those in the geometry is known, then such breaking quantitative studies of shallow parts. Kazuhiko Otsuka is observations will tell us the flow plastic deformation. The studies investigating the properties of the pattern in the Earth’s interior. have been conducted with several lower mantle mineral (Mg,Fe)O. Based on hundreds of experiments post-docs and graduate students He has developed a new model for conducted in the lab, starting including Zhicheng Jing, Kazuhiko the physical properties of (Mg,Fe) with the work of former graduate Otsuka, Zhixue Du, Liam Slivka. O, and is inferring the physical student, Haemyeong Jung (hjung@ and chemical conditions of the snu.ac.kr) (now an Associate lower mantle. Once we understand Professor at the Seoul National

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faculty research

Modeling and observations of aerosol-cloud-climate interactions

Trude Storelvmo aerosol- and cloud- physics in GCMs, We all know that fossil underlaid by recent fuel burning, currently findings from laboratory supplying more than and theoretical studies 80% of the world’s and field measurements. energy, emits greenhouse In an attempt to gases (GHGs) that act tackle this problem to increase Earth’s from a slightly different greenhouse effect and angle, I’ve recently heat the planet. The joined forces with P.C.B. effect of aerosols, tiny Phillips, a professor particles that are co- in Yale’s Department emitted with the GHGs is of Economics, in an less well known. Aerosols effort to disentangle reflect solar radiation the greenhouse and back to space, either aerosol effects in by direct scattering of observations and in solar radiation or by the IPCC GCM output brightening clouds, and archive. Our approach thereby cool the planet. is to apply methods This cooling effect is that are well established

masking part of the Fig. 1: The complexity of atmospheric aerosols: A mixture of aerosol in the econometrics greenhouse warming, pollution is shown at the top: the picture to the left shows urban aerosol community, but novel but the magnitude of pollution and the picture to the right shows aerosol pollution from the India in the climate research and Bangladesn. Examples of the main natural and anthropogenic aerosol the masking is largely sources are, from the top left corner and counterclockwise: The volcanic community, to climate unconstrained. According eruption of Grimsvotn, 21 May 2011, emitting primary volcanic ash and SO2 data sets. We recently to the last report from resulting in sulhate aerosols. Sea spray, illustrating sea salt aerosols. Desert storm in Iraq, 26 April 2005 showing mineral dust aerosols. Savannah received a Yale Climate the Intergovernmental biomass burning, illustrating both anthropogenic and natural fires as sources and Energy Institute Panel for Climate of aerosols. Coal power plants, illustrating industrial and fossil fuel aerosol (YCEI) seed grant to sources. Ship in a Norwegian fjord resulting in aerosols containing carbon, Change (IPCC) it could sulhates, and nitrates. Cooking, representing a large domestic source of pursue this research, amount to anything carbonaceous aerosols. A truck, representing the transport sector. The core and the preliminary from a negligible cooling of the figure shows examples of aerosol structures illustrated by an electron microscope image of black carbon attached to sulhate particles. Credit for results look intriguing. to one comparable microscope picture: Peter Buseck, Arizona State University. Space- and ground- in magnitude to the based remote sensing amplification of the greenhouse effect. The fact that is crucial in constraining and validating aerosol effects an unknown proportion of the greenhouse warming on climate, and I am increasingly using satellite data has thus far been compensated for by aerosol in my research. An example is the data set obtained cooling complicates projections of future climate. The by the Cloud and Aerosol Lidar (Light Detection and uncertainty associated with the aerosol effect reflects Ranging) with Orthogonal Polarization (CALIOP) how challenging it is to represent aerosol emissions onboard NASAs CALIPSO satellite. CALIOP is the (Fig. 1), their atmospheric lifetimes and their impacts first polarization Lidar in space, and provides valuable on clouds and radiation in global climate models information on the thermodynamic phase of clouds. (GCMs). CALIOP has, since it was launched in April 2006, My research to date has focused on how the revealed an intimate relationship between certain representation of aerosol-cloud-climate interactions aerosol types and the occurrence of ice in clouds. This can be improved in GCMs, with the hope that by has implications for both aerosol effects on climate improving the parameterizations in the models we and cloud-mediated climate feedbacks. I am currently can be more confident about their projections of leading an international GCM intercomparison future climate. The aim is to refine the treatment of project using CALIOP data to validate the GCM’s

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faculty research

MODELING continued from page 5

Trude (right), postdoc Muge Komurcu, and student Rick Russotto Trude and Muge Komurcu, looking at GCM output. on the roof of KGL where the new lidar instrument will be making measurements. performance. In Spring 2011, with the purchase of Postdoc Muge Komurcu ([email protected]) a Lidar designed to measure aerosol- and cloud- recently came to Yale after completing her PhD at properties, Yale got its own instrument with the same Penn State on modeling of Arctic mixed-phase clouds. capabilities as CALIOP. With the Yale Aerosol and She will continue to do similar work and specifically, Cloud Lidar, remote sensing of aerosols and clouds she will seek to improve the representation of ice over Yale Campus and New Haven are now possible. clouds in GCMs, in particular when it comes to the We made measurements with the new instrument treatment of ice crystal shapes, which we know is from the roof of the KGL building for a few weeks this currently oversimplified in GCMs. spring, and it was thereafter shipped to Martinique to In addition to the above activity, I am currently complement the host of ground-based and airborne directing much of my Junior Faculty Leave to atmospheric measurements made during the DOMEX investigations of the viability of several so-called (short for The DOMinica EXperiment: Orographic geoengineering schemes. Such schemes seek to Precipitation in the Tropics) field campaign led by my artificially strengthen the current aerosol cooling colleague Ron Smith ([email protected]) in April effects on climate in the event that global warming and May of 2011. Unfortunately, the Lidar had problems accelerates and develops into a substantial threat with the torrential tropical rain showers and proved to our environment and civilization. Geoengineering not to be completely watertight. The instrument’s laser is a particularly hot topic in my field, and a recent was damaged by the water, and the lidar system is YCEI sponsored geoengineering workshop revealed currently in France, where it was manufactured, to be that scholars within fields as diverse as Policy, repaired. Rick Russotto ’12 ([email protected]) Law, History, Economy and Engineering have also had planned to use data from the Yale Aerosol and started to pay attention to this topic. The question Cloud Lidar for his senior research project, so we were of whether to geoengineer, or even perform research forced to come up with a Plan B for his work. Luckily, on geoengineering, is a controversial one. However, I the DOMEX data set has provided a beautiful example strongly believe it is our responsibility as scientist to of how aerosol and cloud microphysics is intimately ensure that the geoengineering schemes that have coupled to large-scale atmospheric dynamics, and been put forth are based on solid and sound science. how the microphysics and dynamics act together to Only then can policymakers and society as a whole determine whether a given cloud will form rain or not. make well-informed and responsible decisions, should Rick is currently analyzing aerosol and cloud data from we ever be faced with dangerous climate change. the DOMEX field campaign, and will follow up with numerical modeling of aerosol-cloud interactions. He will present his preliminary results at this year’s AGU Fall Meeting.

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FIELD STUDIES AND FIELD TRIPS

Participants on the South Africa/Namibia departmental field trip visit the Witwatersrand (Afrikaans for “white water ridge”) near Johannesburg.

The Von Damm Fellowships were endowed G&G Fieldtrip To South Africa, by the late Karen Von Damm ’77, to support Summer 2011 undergraduate field research and field trips. Bulldogs in Southern Africa Von Damm Fellowship recipients for In July and August, a group of 25 G&G students and calendar year 2011: faculty visited geological highlights of South Africa and Namibia. Led by faculty members David Evans Alexandra Andrews ’11, “Thermal evolution of and Jay Ague, and with extensive planning assistance the Kaapvaal craton, South Africa: The effect of from Evans’s long-time colleague and Professor diffusion on the geotherm” (advisor: Zhengrong Emeritus Nic Beukes (Univ. Johannesburg), the group Wang). Chelsea Willett ’11, “Timescales of glacial journeyed through 3.5 billion years of Earth history limits to mountain topography in the Patagonian as dramatically illustrated by the rich stratigraphic Andes” (advisor: Mark Brandon). Joe O’Rourke record in that region. Participants with interests ’12 and the Yale Drop Team, “The influence of in planetary science and geophysics marveled at gravitational variations on solidification of fluids Earth’s largest impact structure (Vredefort) and one and the formation of mushy layers” (advisor: John of the best understood Archean cratons (Kaapvaal), Wettlaufer). Tony Fragoso ’13, “Slumping and including direct sampling of the mantle lithosphere entrainment in gravity currents” (advisor: John by diamond-bearing kimberlite pipes (e.g., the Big Wettlaufer). Cody McCoy ’13, “Dental microwear in Hole in Kimberley). In terms of structural geology mammalian woodpeckers and comparison with a and petrology, the group traversed ancient mountain fossil notoungulate” (advisor: Jacques Gauthier). belts (e.g., Cape Fold Belt around Capetown) and world-famous igneous intrusions (e.g., Bushveld Igneous Complex). Concerning paleoclimatology, the

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FIELD STUDIES AND FIELD TRIPS

African ecology in Kruger National Park, including a memorable episode involving one of the rental vans becoming mechanically disabled just as three lions approached and circled about. Fortunately, this was one of the few moments when things didn’t go quite as planned! Days spent under the African winter sunshine ended with campfires and “braai,” South African-style barbecues, under the stars. In all, after 8000 km of driving and three weeks of camaraderie, participants returned with a unique and firsthand experience with some of the world›s most important rock outcrops for elucidating Earth history.

Field Work in Peru This past May and June, a group of G&G seismologists spent several weeks in Peru installing seismometers as part of the PULSE (PerU Lithosphere and Slab Experiment) project. This experiment, led by Maureen Long in collaboration with scientists at the University of North Carolina and the University of Arizona, is geared towards understanding the unique dynamics of the subducting Nazca slab beneath Peru. The subduction zone in this region has an unusual

Climbing the world’s highest sand dunes at Sossusvlei, Namibia. geometry; the slab subducts to a depth of about 100 km and then flattens for several hundred km group visited rocks containing Earth’s oldest well before resuming its descent into the mantle. Flat preserved sedimentary and volcanic environments slab subduction is a poorly understood process, and (Barberton Greenstone Belt), they saw pristine data gathered during the PULSE experiment will sedimentary sections spanning progressive provide constraints on mantle structure and dynamics atmospheric oxygenation through the Archean- beneath the Peruvian flat slab. Participants in the Paleoproterozoic boundary interval (Witwatersrand Spring 2011 PULSE field work included graduate and Transvaal Supergroups), and they witnessed students Caroline Eakin, Colton Lynner, and Erin direct evidence for “Snowball Earth” glacial deposits Wirth, and recent graduate Jenny Hanna (G ’11). and cap carbonates formed in low paleolatitudes (Makganyene and Numees/Namaskluft, respectively Paleoproterozoic and Neoproterozoic in age). The trip was also a paleontological showcase of the world›s oldest alleged fossil-bearing sediments (Barberton), soft-bodied Ediacara biota from the end of the Precambrian (Aar and Swartpunt farms in Namibia), the richest terrestrial sections through the Permian-Triassic mass extinction (Rubidge farm near Graaff-Reinet), and amazing cave deposits with fossil hominids (Cradle of Humankind near Johannesburg). Geomorphology ranged from rolling savannah of the high veld, to deep canyons (e.g., Fish and Orange Rivers) incised into the 1.5-km- From left to right, graduate students Erin Wirth, Colton Lynner, and high plateau; from snow-tipped mountains (near the Caroline Eakin, with Maureen Long; construct a site at a school in Cape of Good Hope), to some of the world’s highest El Carmen, Peru. sand dunes in one of the driest deserts (Sossusvlei, Namibia). The group spent a day appreciating

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FIELD STUDIES AND FIELD TRIPS

Field Work in the Arctic Sea Mary-Louise Timmermans wrote about her work in the Arctic in the Spring 2010 Newsletter. In the article she described the difficulties of getting long-term measurements from beneath the Arctic sea ice. She was back in the field for the summer season, July–August 2011. The photo shows Mary-Louise (left) kneeling on the ice as she deploys oceanographic sensors through a hole in the Arctic sea ice. The instruments return measurements of ocean properties via satellite, monitoring the ocean’s impact to sea ice throughout the year.

“Fossil Fuels and Energy Transitions” GG274A Field Trip The Fall Semester for 2011 saw the first offering of a new course G&G 274A Fossil Fuels & Energy Transitions taught by Michael Oristaglio and Brian Skinner. On October 11, 2011 the class visited a shale–gas drilling site operated by Carrizo Oil & Gas in Montrose, Pennsylvania. Far right is their host for the day, Jim Pritts, VP Business Development, for Carrizo. On the same day they also visited an active fracking operation in the Marcellus Shale on a site owned by the Williams Company.

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FIELD STUDIES AND FIELD TRIPS

“Dynamic Earth” GG111A Field Trip Autumn escapades. The G&G Department continues to gain a well deserved cross-campus reputation for student opportunities in the field, whether for research or for class instruction. October is a particularly opportune month for escaping New Haven to enjoy (usually) dry weather and glorious Fall colors of the Northeast. Among several undergraduate classes with weekend field trips (including the well established trips in Stratigraphy, and Structural Geology & Tectonics), the newly created laboratory course for introductory geology (“Dynamic Earth”) now also embarks on a weekend camping trip to Delaware Water Gap. There, students first absorb a synoptic overview of the Gap’s stratigraphy and structure from the overlook at Mt. Minsi, Pennsylvania (instructor David Evans at left), looking across the river to Mt. Tammany, New Jersey, which contains the Taconic unconformity between cliff-forming Silurian conglomeratic quartzites and underlying Ordovician black shales. Students then traversed a small segment of the Appalachian Trail and other blazed paths, measuring structural attitudes and producing a simple geological map of the area. Such experience-based field training will become more feasible next year and beyond, as Yale College adopts a five-day October recess to complement its week-long break at Thanksgiving.

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VISITING FACULTY FROM OTHER INSTITUTIONS

Gurol Seyitoglu (gurol.seyitoglu@yale. edu) is a Professor in the Department of Geological Engineering at Ankara University in Turkey. Gurol plans to enhance his knowledge on morphotectonics. His current research is on various tectonic settings such as strike slip faulting, normal faulting in metamorphic core complexes and thrust Gurol Seyitoglu faults creating wedge geometries. He’s looking forward to the opportunity of discussing each case study from Anatolia with Mark Brandon ([email protected]) and David Evans ([email protected]), and comparing these structures with worldwide equivalents.

Jun Yao

Jun Yao ([email protected]) is a Professor at the School of Civil & Environment Engineering, University of Science and Technology in Beijing, People’s Republic of China. Professor Yao’s work at Yale is in collaboration with Ruth Blake (ruth. [email protected]) in the area of oxygen isotope analysis of oxy-anions. The study has applications in tracing pollution sources of phosphate, arsenate and selenates in water bodies, soils and sediments in China, with a broader objective of deciphering their fates and transport in soils and groundwater. Part of the overall goal will be to replicate research efforts in characterizing oxygen isotope signatures of phosphate within water columns of the South-East Duojun Wang China Sea and to understanding the biogeochemical processes involved in phosphorus-cycling in oceanic Duojun Wang ([email protected]) is an associate systems. Another area of interest is the microbial professor of Geophysics at Graduate University of and enzymatic degradation of organophosphate Chinese Academy of Sciences (GUCAS). His research pesticides in soils and water systems with the aim focus is on laboratory measurements of electrical of characterizing oxygen isotope values of the conductivities of mantle minerals under the condition phosphate in relation to natural biodegradation of high pressure and temperature and how can we processes. use these results to understand the Earth’s interior. Dr. Wang is currently working with Shun-ichiro Karato ([email protected]).

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RECENT AWARDS & HONORS: FACULTY

Congratulations to Ron rainfall, there is no established theory that explains the Smith (ronald.smith@ observed variability of monsoons, and that variability yale.edu), on being is poorly simulated and predicted by computer awarded the Jule G. models. Bill’s research involves developing and testing Charney Award by the theories for how Earth’s monsoons work. The award American Meteorological will fund his work on monsoon depressions. Society. The citation for the Award reads, “For Congratulations to Kanani fundamental contributions Lee ([email protected]) to our understanding of on receiving the National the influence of mountains Science Foundation’s most on the atmosphere, prestigious award, the NSF Ron Smith through both theoretical Career Grant, in support of advances and insightful observations.” The Award was junior faculty who exemplify presented at the Annual Meeting of the Society in the role of teacher-scholars January 2011. through outstanding research, excellent education Congratulations to John and the integration of Wettlaufer(john.wettlaufer@ education and research yale.edu) who has been named Kanani Lee within the context of the the Tage Erlander visiting mission of their organizations. professor at Stockholm’s Nordic Kanani studies the physical and chemical properties Institute for Theoretical Physics as well as the crystal structures of materials at high (NORDITA) for the year 2012. pressures and temperatures to better understand the The Swedish Research dynamics and structure of Earth and other planetary Council announced Wettlaufer’s interiors. Using the laser and resistively-heated appointment early in October. diamond-anvil cells and ab-initio computations, The post provides $350,000 she is able to simulate the extreme pressure and to support graduate students, John Wettlaufer temperature conditions on relevant planetary postdoctoral associates, and visitors, and will materials and can measure their changing properties underpin Wettlaufer’s work on projects related in situ. The knowledge of the materials at deep interior to climate change, planetary accretion, and fluid conditions is key to understanding the formation and dynamics. evolution of the Earth and planets in general.

Congratulations to William Congratulations to R. Boos (william.boos@ Maureen Long (maureen. yale.edu) for winning the [email protected]) for being Office of Naval Research awarded an Alfred P. Sloan Young Investigator Award. Research Fellowship. The award is for compelling The Fellowships seek to research with the potential stimulate fundamental to deliver game-changing research by early-career naval science and scientists and scholars of technology. outstanding promise. These Bill Boos’ research two-year fellowships are focuses on the fluid awarded yearly to 118 William Boos dynamics of Earth’s researchers in recognition tropical atmosphere and concentrates in particular of distinguished on monsoon circulations, which deliver water to performance and a Maureen Long billions of people in socially vulnerable, agricultural unique potential to make economies. Despite the importance of monsoon substantial contributions to their field.

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Maureen is an observational seismologist whose Congratulations to Senior primary scientific interests include the structure Research Scientist and and dynamics of the Earth’s mantle, with a focus Lecturer Ellen Thomas, on subduction zone dynamics and processes. Much (ellen.thomas@yale. of her research focuses on understanding seismic edu) for being elected anisotropy in the mantle; because anisotropy is a Fellow of the AAAS. a consequence of deformation, its measurement Ellen’s research is focused and interpretation give us some of the most direct on benthic foraminifera, constraints we have on mantle flow processes. In microscopic unicellular addition to using seismological observations, she organisms which make a integrates constraints from geodynamical models shell of calcium carbonate (both numerical and analog) and mineral physics or agglutinated sediment Ellen Thomas in New Zealand experiments into her work, and her research spans grains. She uses information all of these disciplines. Some of her current projects on the assemblages of these organisms and include the characterization of the mantle flow their stable isotope compositions to reconstruct field in subduction zone regions, investigations of oceanic productivity and the biological pump after the relationship between mantle processes and the asteroid impact and mass extinction and the tectonomagmatic activity, the measurement and end of the Cretaceous, ocean acidification and interpretation of seismic anisotropy in the D” region deoxygenation during extreme warm periods in Earth at the base of the mantle, and the development and history, changes in ocean productivity during the application of techniques for anisotropy tomography. formation of the Antarctic ice sheet, rates of sea level Maureen’s research has a substantial field component, rise during the last 10,000 years in Long Island Sound, and the deployment of broadband seismometers and the effects of anthropogenic eutrophication. in temporary arrays is one of the tools she uses to characterize mantle structure and processes.

RECENT AWARDS & HONORS: STUDENTS

Graduate Student Daniel Graduate Student Alison Nugent Field (daniel.field@yale. ([email protected]) was edu) is congratulated for the a co-winner of the award for Lougheed Award of Merit Best Student Presentation at the from the Alberta scholarshop 14th Conference on Mesoscale committee, this award is the Processes in Los Angeles. The Canadian version of NSF conference was sponsored by graduate fellowship. the American Meteorological Society. The title of her presentation was “Orographic Precipitation in the Tropics: Seeding the convection”. Alison Nugent Daniel Field, Graduate Student The Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History (YPM) Congratulations to graduate awarded its George Gaylord Simpson Prize for 2011 student Woosok Moon, (woosok. jointly to Daniel Peppe, G ’10 (daniel_peppe@baylor. [email protected]) who has been edu), and to April Dinwiddie (april.dinwiddie awarded a NASA Earth System @yale.edu); Congratulations to dan and April. Science Graduate Fellowship, YPM’s George Gaylord Simpson Prize is awarded the NASA equivalent to a NSF annually to a Yale University graduate student or Graduate Fellowship and the first recent doctoral candidate for a paper concerning recipient at Yale. evolution and the fossil record. The prize is named for George Gaylord Simpson (1902–1984; G ’26) one of Woosok Moon

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RECENT AWARDS & HONORS: STUDENTS

the most influential paleontologists of the 20th century Congratulations to and a major proponent of the modern evolutionary graduate student synthesis. Christopher Thissen (christopher.thissen@ Dan received the prize yale.edu) for the for his 2010 paper inaugural Stephen E. “Megafloral change in Laubach Research in the early and middle Structural Diagenesis Paleocene in the Williston Award from the Basin, North Dakota, Geological Society of USA” (Palaeogeography, America at it’s annual Palaeoclimatology, and meeting in the fall of Palaeoecology 28[3-4]: 2010. This is the first 224-234. named award given Dan is an by the Structural Christopher Thissen assistant professor Geology & Tectonics Division and is intended to in the Department promote cross-disciplinary research and teaching. of Geology at Baylor A structural geologist, Chris studies the governing Daniel Peppe University. His research dynamics of orogenic belts that occur as tectonic integrates paleobotany, paleoclimatology, and plates collide. His research links structural geology paleomagnetism to reconstruct past ecosystems and sedimentary petrology to better understand and to examine how terrestrial ecosystems respond “pressure solution,” a phenomenon that plays to climate change through time. His current work is an important role in focused on developing proxies for paleoclimate and the formation and paleoecology using modern leaf traits, characterizing deformation of both the paleoenvironment of the Neogene and Quaternary mountain ranges and in East Africa as it related to hominoid evolution, reservoir rocks. and reconstructing Cretaceous and Paleogene plant communities and paleoclimate across the Western Congratulations to Interior of North America. graduate student Erin Wirth, (erin.wirth@ April Dinwiddie (april. yale.edu) for being [email protected]) for the recipient of a NSF her paper: “Patterning of Graduate Research a compound eye on an Fellowship. Erin Wirth extinct dipteran wing”. Baltic amber is not the Congratulations to most likely place to find a Simon Darroch (simon. new take on evo-devo, but [email protected]) this paleobiological study who has been awarded provides an opportunity the William V. Sliter to study the structure, April Dinwiddie Student Research function, and developmental constraints on an Award for 2011 by the evolutionary novelty. Cushman Foundation April is currently a graduate student in the for Foraminiferal Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology Research. where she is studying the development and evolution of cuticular wing scales in butterflies.

Simon Darroch

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Student News RECENT AWARDS

Congratulations Aaron Judah’s thesis was “Climate feedback Mechanisms Determined From Flux Towers and To the graduate students who were awarded the MODIS Sensor in a Semi-Arid area in Southern their PhDs within the past year. California,” his advisor was Ron Smith. Aaron is currently enrolled as a graduate student in the May 2011 PhD Graduates: Earth and Space Science Department at York University in Toronto, and he is also serving as Una Farrell’s thesis was “Taphonomy and a Commissioned Officer for the Canadian Armed Paleoecology of Pyritized Trilobite Faunas from Forces with 32nd Brigade—Engineers. Upstate New York,” her advisor was Derek Briggs. Una is working as a Collections Manager for the To the seniors who graduated in the class of 2011: Invertebrate Fossil Collection at the University of Kansas Biodiversity Institute where she is working Alexandra Andrew’s senior thesis was: “The effect with Bruce Lieberman, a former Yale postdoc. of diffusion on P-T conditions inferred by cation- exchange thermobarometry,” her advisor was December 2011 PhD Graduates: Zhengrong Wang. Alexandra is now a graduate student at MIT working with Tim Grove on Michelle Casey’s thesis was “Conservation of experimental petrology. Paleobiology of Long Island Sound Mollusks.”, her advisor was Derek Briggs. Michelle is a Visiting Chelsea Willett’s senior thesis was: “History of Assistant Professor of Paleontology at Oberlin long-term glacial erosion in the Patagonian Andes,” College in Oberlin Ohio. her advisor was Mark Brandon. Chelsea is now working working as an Assistant Staff Geologist Tom Hegna who will be defending this fall, is an at Roux Associates in Burlington, MA. Roux is an Assistant Professor in Invertebrate Paleontology at environmental consulting firm that works with Western Illinois University. His thesis will be “Fossils larger companies in brownfield remediation, and Phylogeny: The Evolution of Branchiopod litigation and engineered natural sciences. The job Crustaceans and the Conquest of Freshwater” and his involves helping to direct a lot of the company’s advisor is Derek Briggs. field work and sampling, as well as working with a Devin McPhillips’ dissertation was “Erosion team of other scientists to analyze data and draw and Mountain Evolution: New Insights from conclusions. Thermochronology (Sierra Nevada, California),” his Ariel Revan’s senior thesis was “Reconstructing advisor was Mark Brandon. Devin is currently an NSF an icon: Historical significance of the Peabody’s Postdoctoral Research Fellow hosted at the University mounted skeleton of Stegosaurus and the changes of Vermont. necessary to make it correct anatomically,” her Jakob Vinther’s thesis was “The role of fossils and advisor was Jacques Gauthier. Ariel is taking some phylogeny in understanding the early evolution time off to pursue other interests before deciding on of annelids and mollusks (lophotrochozoans),” graduate school. his advisor was Derek Briggs. Jakob is a Jackson Natasha Vitek’s “The giant fossil soft-shelled Postdoctoral Fellow at the Jackson School of turtles of North America,” her advisor was Jacques Geosciences in the University of Texas at Austin. Gauthier. Natasha received an NSF doctoral fellowship and she will be working at To the students who were awarded their the University of Texas. Master’s within the past year.

December 2011 Master’s Degrees: Matthew Ramlow’s senior thesis was “Sources of error within stable isotope and carbonate Jenny Hanna’s thesis was “Better Constraints on dissolution measurements of early Paleocene the Location of Anisotrophy Subduction Zones,” hyperthermals” and his advisor was Mark Pagani. her advisor was Maureen Long. Jenny is currently Matt has completed a summer internship with the preparing law school applications.

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STUDENT News

Verified Carbon Standard (VCS) in Washington capture and storage as a carbon credit. He says it was DC. The VCS is a internationally recognized carbon an amazing internship and he would be interested in standard which provides quality assurance within speaking with any other alums working in this field. the market for carbon credits. For his internship he helped provide research for developing new policy, Roxanne Carini (Applied Mathematics), “Pattern creating tools to quantify indirect emission that may formation in drying suspensions, or Cracks in Mud,” result outside of the project boundary and assessing her advisor was John Wettlaufer. Roxanne is heading the feasibility of such projects such a carbon to the University of Washington for graduate school.

Yale Drop Team, a Tragic Death, and an Asteroid

The Yale Drop Team is an official undergraduate organization that carries out reduced gravity research under the auspices of a competitive NASA educational program. The organization has 22 members, and one of the faculty supervisors is Geology and Geophysics professor, John Wettlaufer. The 22 students involved, who have participated in 8 parabolic flights in NASA planes, include G&G major Joseph O’Rourke ’12. Their research has been focused on the physics of plasmas and the solidification of fluids and formation of mushy layers in various gravities. One of the Team members, Michele Dufault ’11, died in a tragic accident on campus April 12, 2011, in the Sterling Chemistry Two Yale Drop Team members getting ready to carry out an experiment in zero gravity. Michele workshops. Michele was a physics Dufault ’12 is on the left, Roxane Carini, ’12, a physics major who did her senior research in G&G on mud cracks, on the right. and astronomy major, who took many courses in Geology and Geophysics, where was discovered in 1994 by Spacewatch at Kitt Peak, she had studied with both John Wettlaufer and is a 5 to 10 kilometer diameter object in orbit about Mary-Louise Timmermans. Hailing from Scituate 2.92AU from the Sun. The full name is now Asteroid Massachusetts she was fond of the ocean and began (15338) Dufault. The citation reads “Named in honor to take her interests in that direction as a senior. of Michele Dufault (1988-2011), an outstanding She spent last summer at Woods Hole working with astronomy and physics student at Yale College underwater vehicles and had planned to work in who died in a tragic accident just weeks before ocean science at the University of Washington this graduation. Michele was passionate about science coming academic year. and about encouraging others, especially young On July 26, 2011, word reached Meg Urry, Chair women, to pursue science careers” of Yale’s Department of Physics, that an asteroid has been named in honor of Michele. The asteroid, which

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RECENT AWARDS AND HONORS: ALUMNI

personality. They leave behind a legacy that will be valued and enjoyed for generations to come. Michael has spent his professional life at the intersection of natural resource business, policy, conservation, and finance with a passion for the natural and built environments that has produced a diverse, values-driven career with experience in land conservation and limited development, conventional and alternative energy resources, corporate Grenville Holland G’62 and project finance, and Congratulations to Grenville Holland G ’62 organizational strategy. Mike Dowling with his family. ([email protected]) who in 2008 was named Michael is vice The Right Worshipful the Mayor of Durham. Grenville chairman of the Colorado Oil & Gas Conservation arrived at Yale in the Fall of 1960 and returned to Commission, co-founder, long-time chairman, and Oxford in 1962 with an MS. At Oxford he completed trustee of the Colorado Conservation Trust; president his D.Phil and moved to Durham in 1965, initially on a of The Dowling Foundation; board member and 2 year post-doc government contract but the advent strategy chair of the national Land Trust Alliance. of the Apollo Space Programme in 1967 kept him in According to Mike, I have been privileged to live Durham working as a geochemist on lunar samples in one of the most beautiful places on earth and to from 1969 to 1977. He retired from the Department in work with devoted colleagues whose passion is its 2004 but is still active, although he has spent some conservation. This award is shared with all of them. time away to become the Right Worshipful the Mayor of Durham in 2008 (having begun his political career Congratulations to in 1981) becoming Alderman of the City in 2009.He is Henry Dick, G ’76, currently a Unitary (Regional) Councillor. ([email protected]) The Mayor of Durham is the 5th most senior in for being the Harry England and is only 1 of 2 Mayors with a ceremonial H. Hess Medalist Bodyguard (normally ex-soldiers (Durham Light of the AGU for Infantry) and police). London is the only other city 2011. The award is with a Mayoral Bodyguard. It is partly a matter “for outstanding of antiquity—the Mayor of Durham dates back to achievements in 1602. The reason he is not the Lord Mayor as befits a research of the city of this significance is because in 1602 when the constitution and Spencer, Henry, Lydia and Winifred on post was created by the then Bishop of Durham the evolution of Earth the city walls in Xi’an China. Bishop did not want that post to have higher rank and other planets”. The award brings two Yale alums than himself so he created “The Right Worshipful the together as Harry Hess was a class of 1931 geology Mayor of Durham”—which is kind of more distinctive major. than merely being a Lord Mayor! Henry writes: At Yale I worked with Dick Armstrong, mapping the Josephine Peridotite, and Congratulations to Mike Dowling ’74 G ’82 badgering Horace Winchell to teach me how to use ([email protected]), on being awarded the George the brand new electron microprobe purchased by E. Cranmer Award from Colorado Open Lands. Award Brian Skinner. By some combination of endurance, recipients are individuals who have gone above and learned from Dick, and a healthy disrespect for beyond what others have done and often get things convention, learned from Phillip Orville, I managed completed through determination and force of to write a PhD that had something in it to offend

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virtually every living igneous petrologist at the time. constituted an ocean ridge system as different from By some remarkable providential fluke the only the slow spreading Atlantic, as the Atlantic was job offer I had when I finished my PhD at Yale was from the fast spreading Pacific. Moreover, for a large at the only place I wanted to go: The Woods Hole portion of it, the Earth was simply splitting apart, with Oceanographic Institution. I’ve never looked back, and the mantle pulled directly to the seafloor with little or have had a better career here than I had any right to no volcanic activity. In other words, it seems that for expect: going from post-doc to senior scientist over 36 part of the oceans Harry Hess’s suggestion that the years, discovering wonderful things about the ocean ocean crust could be serpentinized mantle proved crust and mantle. I’ve been diving to the bottom of the correct. Indian Ocean in a yellow submarine, and got to break At present I am working on identifying the open the Arctic Ice Cap on the first science cruise of depleted remains of mantle plumes where they are the Icebreaker Healey with colleagues Peter Michael crossed by slow and ultraslow spreading ocean and Charlie Langmuir. We made the first geologic ridges, and doing cooperative research with Chinese survey and high-resolution bathymetric map of the geologists on the SW Indian Ridge—which is why the slowest spreading ocean ridge in the world—a feat that photo of myself and two of our children is in X’ian. no one really thought possible. Cooperation does have its benefits. I am also trying to My favorite professional achievement (in the RL figure out how to avoid retiring in the near future, and Armstrong tradition of why only get two or three like one of the Hogwarts professors, will probably be points, when you can have a couple of thousand?) was found still working at my desk long after I am dead. to point count a half a million points on thin sections of highly altered mantle peridotites from the Atlantic Congratulations to and Indian Oceans: showing that mantle hot spots are David Jablonski G ’79, likely hot. One of my more sophisticated colleagues (djablons@uchicago. at MIT at the time remarked that I wasn’t allowed to edu) William Kenan Jr. show things like that with such a mundane approach: Professor of Geophysical it was supposed to be the sole provenance of isotope Sciences at the geochemists. Another colleague simply suggested that University of Chicago, I enjoyed the pain. who was elected to the In 1990 I met my wife Winifred at a small pig roast National Academy of I was having for a hundred or so of my nearest and Sciences in recognition dearest friends, and after a long 5-week courtship, got of his distinguished and engaged to be married. That was twenty years ago continuing achievements and every one has been better than the last. Though in original research. David Jablonski she has a Harvard MBA, she gave up a career at IBM David focuses his to teach English at a local high school, and seems to research on macroevolution, which encompasses the love every one of her students. We have three children, study of large-scale patterns of evolution above the Helene—a sophomore at Rice, Spencer our artist, and species level, mass-extinctions and their long-term Lydia, our ballerina, now a senior and sophomore in consequences, diversification in time and space, and high school respectively. On the side we run a cut- the origin of evolutionary breakthroughs. your-own Christmas tree farm, and would be happy to provide any nearby Yalies with a tree at the family discount (retail + 25%). Several other things I enjoyed were to lead numerous expeditions to the southern oceans where the average sea state is 30 feet. This had the advantage that for some reason no one else had worked there. There was only one time when the ship almost rolled over. After 25 years, it finally dawned on me that this and other ultraslow ridges had tectonic and crustal accretion like no other, and that they

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RECENT AWARDS AND HONORS: ALUMNI

Congratulations to Charles from postmortem bias. I’m thus now testing how W. (Chip) Goodyear fully this proxy biological information is conserved as ’80, who was named a skeletal material undergoes permanent burial, with Successor Trustee of two newly funded projects that will core continental the Yale Corporation shelves with known histories of urbanization. Here in 2011. Chip’s career at the University of Chicago, where I’ve been on the has been notable in the faculty since 1985, I still teach and advise graduate mining industry, initially at students in stratigraphy and geologic fieldwork, Freeport-McMoRan, but most advisees are pursuing this new field of where he was Chief conservation paleobiology.” Financial Officer, then at BHP Billiton, the world’s Charles W. (Chip) Goodyear ’80 largest diversified resources company, where he started as the Chief Financial Officer, became the Chief Development Officer, and in 2003, was a appointed the Chief Executive Officer, which post he held until he retired from the job in 2009. Chip is currently President of Goodyear Capital Corporation.

Congratulations to Susan Kidwell G ’82 (skidwell@uchicago. edu) on being elected to Fellowship in AAAS. Susan, who is the William Rainey Harper Professor

in the Department Karen Fischer with AGU Past President Tim Killeen. of Geophysical Sciences, and Congratulations to Karen Fischer ’83 (karen_ member of the [email protected]) forFellowship in AGU, for her Committee on contributions to our understanding of mantle flow, Evolutionary seismic anisotropy and the continental lithosphere. Biology, University of Chicago writes: Congratulations to Zhicheng “I’m presently Jing, G ’10, (zjing@uchicago. working on field Susan Kidwell, April 2011, Baja edu) who will receive the experiments and modeling in modern environments AGU Mineral and Rock to understand the formation of fossil records, with Physics Graduate Research the aim of bringing very young paleontologic data Award. to bear on issues of environmental management Zhicheng is a Postdoctoral and conservation. It’s become clear from my meta- Scholar at the Argonne analytic work that the very young skeletal debris National Laboratory, encountered in modern seafloors does a remarkably University of Chicago where good job of capturing basic biological information— he conducts high-pressure so well, in fact, that when the taxonomic composition experiments to study the of these death assemblages does not match that properties of liquids using Zhicheng Jing of the local living community, we can infer that the synchrotron X-ray facility. community itself has changed recently, usually from human activities, rather than the mismatch arising

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ALUMNI NEWS

George Devries Klein, G ’60, martial art). A graduate school ([email protected]) has highlight was spending a summer published a co-authored book on as each others’ field assistants the “hydrocarbon Potential of Peru” and visiting all the national parks The complete citation is: between New Mexico and Montana Zúñiga y Rivero, F. J., Klein, G. D., (we had to camp somewhere on the Hay-Roe, H., and Álvarez-Calderon, route!). E, 2010, The hydrocarbon potential In 1987, Kim joined ARCO’s of Peru: Lima, Peru, BPZ Exploración research lab in Plano TX and Yen & Producción S.R.L.342 p. joined ARCO soon after. Kim Kim, Katy, Laura and Yen, Creede, Colorado. George has also been elected started off doing basin-scale Europe while brainstorming other to serve a three-year term to resource assessment and ended visualization applications with the House of Delegates of the up developing statistical software professors and grad students on American Association of Petroleum tools to enable geologists to do the CU campus. Unfortunately Geologists. Monte Carlo simulation for source 9/11 and the ensuing recession rock evaluation and prospect put an end to Kim’s job at CU. Yen Kim Nettleton ’79 (kim_touy@ appraisal. She especially enjoyed took a job with Eltron R&D as a yahoo.com) writes that she and training geologists in company research chemist while Kim got a Yen Touysinhthiphonexay ’78 offices in southern England, Alaska certificate in Direct Marketing and ([email protected]) met as and Jakarta. Yen specialized in rediscovered her analytical roots undergraduates in the Yale Geology geochemical and engineering and love of statistical data analysis. department. After a summer laboratory work -- analyses of Currently Yen works at Eltron together in New Haven, Yen headed brines from core flood experiments doing government contract off to Penn State to pursue a and corrosion inhibitor testing and research on technologies that will Master’s degree in geochemistry screening for Alaskan oil fields. help clean up water and air. Kim and then convinced Kim to apply While working at ARCO, they had works for Acxiom, a large marketing to Penn State as well for a Master’s two beautiful daughters, Katy and service and data provider, as in geology. They married in the Laura, and also ran a karate school a statistical consultant, data summer of 1979. (Yen) and did competitive and modeler, and developer of tools Ultimately, Yen received an MS precision figure skating (Kim). Both that automate and improve data in Geochemistry from Penn State, girls participated in karate and analysis. Katy recently graduated working on the quartz-magnetite skating, and also loved to visit the from Colorado College with majors oxygen isotope geothermometer. ARCO office and lab. in Drama and French, is currently He did additional graduate work Life changed when BP bought working as Assistant Stage Manager on the origin of graphite in ARCO in 2000. Yen’s research at Creede Repertory Theatre Montana’s Stillwater Complex and labs were decommissioned, so he (Creede, CO) and is planning a worked as a research associate to studied for and got an MCSE and career in stage management. Laura experimentally refine metallurgical started working in IT at Brinker will be a junior at Colorado College, phase diagrams. Kim focused on International. Kim was developing majoring in psychology, and is geomorphology and statistics, an Immersive Drilling Planner with currently enjoying working at the La earning an MS studying stream a Virtual Reality research group Puente Family Shelter in Alamosa erosion in the strip mines of that ultimately was outsourced to CO. She recently took a college Pennsylvania, a Ph.D. studying University of Colorado at Boulder. geology class, which has led to arroyo development in northwest Although it was hard to leave some fabulous family discussions, New Mexico and completed all the long-time friends in Texas, Kim especially when we visit Katy and course work for an M.A. in Statistics. and Yen jumped at the chance to hike around the Creede caldera and We both enjoyed interacting with move to Colorado and enjoy hiking, silver mines! the Penn State community through biking and skiing in the mountains. teaching, research assistantships, Kim enjoyed demonstrating the Congratulations to Craig Schiffries and extracurricular activities like ice Immersive Drilling Planner to oil ’80 ([email protected]) on hockey and Tang Soo Do (a Korean industry groups in Houston and his appointment as Director of

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ALUMNI NEWS

the Deep Carbon Observatory, buck-up and help fill up some white Dinosaur State Park in Rocky Hill. headquartered at the Carnegie space in the newsletter. While at the DEP I held a part- Institution of Washington’s It’s been a circuitous route from time adjunct faculty appointment Geophysical Laboratory. The being awarded a Ph.D. in Vertebrate for several years in the former Deep Carbon Observatory is an Paleontology (1983) to actually Department of Geology & international, multidisciplinary gaining full-time employment as Geophysics at the University a Paleontologist, but if nothing of Connecticut, Storrs, where I else, we paleos learn adaptation… taught the courses Invertebrate I began my professional career Paleontology and The Age of the after graduation as a stratigraphic Dinosaurs. geologist with the Bureau of Finally tiring of dealing with Economic Geology (BEG) at the contaminated strata and ground University of Texas, Austin, where water, and likewise contaminated I met my future wife Anne. Major politics, I turned to the US projects at the BEG included Forest Service (FS) for a job as a subsurface characterization of District Geologist administering bedded evaporates as potential development of solid mineral host strata for a proposed national high level nuclear waste repository in the Texas Panhandle (site ultimately rejected in favor of the Yucca Mountain/Nevada test site—a result everyone pretty much predicted at the time (further Craig with son Ethan (age three) at Arenal note: funding for proposed Yucca Volcano (Costa Rica) during a minor ash Mtn repository dropped from 2011 eruption. federal budget)), and reservoir effort designed to transform characterization of Cretaceous our understanding of carbon’s delta-platform low-permeability chemical and biological roles in natural gas sandstones of East Earth’s interior. Supported by Texas. This was followed by several the Sloan Foundation and other years of geological consulting organizations, the Observatory will for a small firm in the Hudson Mike Fracasso on location in the Cretaceous Pierre Shale, Wallace Ranch address implications of the deep Valley of New York, focusing on paleontological site, Buffalo Gap National carbon cycle for life, energy, and environmental permitting of hard Grassland, South Dakota, 2010. the environment by addressing rock quarry and soft rock mining resources. I settled in Douglas, questions such as the nature and operations. Wyoming, to manage FS projects extent of deep microbial life, the I eventually circled back to requiring environmental permitting fluxes of carbon dioxide from Connecticut to spend nearly a of 5 of the largest surface coal the world’s volcanoes, and the decade with the CT Department mines in North America, all located distribution and characteristics of of Environmental Protection (DEP) on the Thunder Basin National deep carbon reservoirs. as a hydrogeologist in the Resource Grassland (coal from those 5 Conservation & Recovery Act mines generates @ 10% of US Mike Fracasso G ’83 (mfracasso@ (RCRA) Corrective Action program electricity). I also served as the fs.fed.us) writes: “After reading chasing chlorinated solvent and District’s paleontology coordinator news of former G & G student heavy metal contaminant plumes and administered other solid contemporaries in recent issues of around industrial sites (where mineral operations on district the Department’s newsletter and I quickly learned that power (this may come as a surprise to becoming re-acquainted with the politics and campaign $$ trump all you academic geologists, but Skinners and others at last Fall’s science), with a short stint as an federal minerals are not silicates, GSA in Denver, I decided it’s time to interpretative paleontologist at carbonates, sulfides, etc.; rather,

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ALUMNI NEWS

they are solid or liquid, and right…). And I’ve also gained locatable, leasable, or salable). some experience with newsletter Administering federal geologic editing; in my current position I was resources over an area roughly “volunteered” to serve as editor for 190 mi N-S and 90 mi E-W, nearly the FS M&GM internal newsletter 3 times the area of Connecticut, “Diggin’ Deep.” was a logistical challenge, but Lessons learned?...As in proved to be both a figurative and paleontology & evolution, literal breath of fresh air (Converse adaptation is the key to professional County in WY is consistently ranked survival. For all you paleos with as having the best air quality in the degrees-yet-to-be-awarded and Porter, Derek, Riley and Melody Burkins. nation…not in proximity to the coal facing dismal job prospects, there’s geology and field methods with my mines) compared to hazardous always hope in landing that paleo wonderful husband, Derek, before waste contaminant characterization position…although it may take a finishing a post-doc at Dartmouth. studies. couple of decades…” In 1999, careers took us to Passage of the national On October 23, 2011, as this Washington DC, where I had the Paleontological Resources Newsletter was going to press, honor of working for US Senator Preservation Act in 2009 led Mike informed us that he has been Patrick Leahy of Vermont for the FS Minerals & Geology appointed National Paleontology a first year as the GSA-USGS Management (M&GM) program Program Coordinator for the Forest Congressional Science and to create a Washington Office Service’s M&GM CNO office, and Technology Fellow, then for another (WO) position in paleontological will be relocating from Ogden, Utah, two years as his legislative aide for resource administration, and I was to Denver, Colorado in January energy, environment, and natural positioned through FS regulatory 2012. His email address and other resources. Returning to Vermont experience and academic/ contact information will remain the to start our family, I joined the professional background to take same. University of Vermont (UVM) in a successful run at the job. M&GM roles ranging from Director of WO program functions have since Melody Brown Burkins ’90, Federal Relations to Associate Dean been reorganized and renamed as ([email protected]) in the College of Engineering and the Centralized National Operations writes: After graduating from Mathematical Sciences while (CNO) office—located “centrally” in Yale, I spent an incredible summer Derek dedicated himself to the geologic activity hub of Denver, with the Juneau Icefield Research our family and community not DC! Program in southeast Alaska as full-time father to our two At present I’m located in a before heading to Dartmouth amazing boys. In 2009, I became “detached” CNO office in the FS for both an MS and PhD in earth the Senior Director for Research Region 4 HQ in Ogden, UT, where sciences. My first round of research and Strategic Initiatives at UVM, my focus is on paleontological was in Irish ore deposits, mentored advancing research priorities resource administration in by geoscientist and science and managing partnerships the Intermountain Region, historian, Naomi Oreskes, and her with academia, government, encompassing Utah, Nevada, husband, hydrogeologist Ken Belitz. and industry. I also serve as Interim southern Idaho & southwestern The lure of field work in icy Director of the Vermont Advanced Wyoming. Antarctica—and the opportunity to Computing Center. Along the way I’ve managed work with ecosystems expert, Ross I remain active in science and to gain a family including my wife Virginia, and isotope geochemist, policy issues as Vice Chair of the Anne and daughters Lauren and Page Chamberlain —led me to four U.S. National Committee for the Dana (in college and high school, years of soil ecosystem research International Union of Geological respectively), who’ve all managed in the Antarctic Dry Valleys. Sciences (USNC/IUGS), service on to put up with boxes of fossils in Three amazing field seasons, several coalitions for Vermont’s energy storage and extended outcrop hundred isotope measurements, future and agricultural economy, stops while traveling (“come on, and a doctorate later, I headed to and involvement with UVM’s I’ll only be a few minutes”…yeah, the Swiss Alps for a term to teach new Institute for Environmental

22 Geology & Geophysics News Fall 2011 ALUMNI NEWS

Diplomacy and Security (IEDS). end of the Red Sea Rift, I am happy On the home front, I am rapidly to be surrounded by fascinating learning the art of music promotion geology even if my ability to study as my husband’s singer-songwriter it is, at this point, quite limited! I career takes off (http://www. have a spare room and would gladly myspace.com/derekburkins) and welcome those of you who are able am making time to run, ski, and and interested.” mountain bike so I can try (try!) to keep up with my sons, now 6 and Walton Green G ’07 (wagreen@ 8, who already rail around Vermont bricol.net) writes: After leaving single-track like pros. Finally, I enjoy Yale in 2007, I took a post-doc at keeping my Yale connections by the Smithsonian Institution, first interviewing prospective students with Carlos Jaramillo in Panama each winter and making plans City, Panama, then with Scott to attend Yale Alumni Club Wing in Washington, DC. In 2008, I in Vermont events this fall—who married Katy Black, and moved to knew there were so many Yalies up Baltimore, commuting from there north? I feel truly lucky for all that I to DC and Panama, working on have, all that I am able to do, and all leaf venation patterns, graphical

that the future holds. analysis of pollen data, and the Winifred, Katy and Walton. relative influence of phylogeny and ecology on extinction. I also physicians and moved to Baltimore. revisited an idea from Leo Hickey’s Last autumn, Katy and I moved paleobotany course at Yale: the to Boston. Here I’ve been working lycopsids, an important Paleozoic with Andy Knoll and Missy plant group, apparently had a Holbrook at Harvard, looking at peculiar physiology involving ancient lycopsid physiology and its concentration and transport of CO2 effects on biosphere-atmosphere from roots to leaves in internal gas feedbacks in the late Paleozoic, spaces. A highlight of this time was while writing up data from my time dinner with Benjamin Zaitchik (G at the Smithsonian, looking for ’06), Albert Colman (G ’02) and a permanent job, and (as of July our wives; we were all Harvard 18th) taking care of our daughter undergraduates and Yale Geology Winifred. Alena with Bedouin kids, Petra, Jordan. PhDs who married Hopkins Alena Bartoli ’01 (admin@enter- east.com) currently splits her time between the US and Jordan, where she runs her own business, Eastern Experience, a consulting company that facilitates learning experiences in Jordan and the region. Her projects vary, including everything from running trips for GEOLOGY & high school students to assisting foreign scholars in the organization GEOPHYSICS NEWS of local research projects to Alumni Please Note: location scouting for film and photo shoots. “Living among the towering We would especially like to hear from you. sandstone cliffs of Lawrence of Please send your news to [email protected]. Arabia’s Wadi Rum, at the north

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