The EOS Alumni and Friends Newsletter Number 8 (2005) The EOS Dream “ We believe that the Department has almost unlimited potential to become an international force in the earth, ocean and atmospheric sciences and that it should settle for nothing less.” EOS External Review Committee Report, 2005. MESSAGE FROM THE HEAD It is hard to believe that I have been Head of EOS for 5 years. As the anniversary approached, any fatigue had to take a back seat because the anniversary automatically triggered an external review of the Department and it was this event that dominated the past year. In the fall of 2004, the Dean’s office struck an international External Review Committee charged with providing a report on our progress and problems to be submitted to the Vice President Academic and Provost at UBC, Lorne Whitehead. The Committee consisted of Glenn Caldwell (Earth Sciences, University of Western Ontario (Chair)), Alan Green (Institute of Geophysics, ETH, Switzerland), Louis Legendre (Laboratoire d’Oceanographie, Villefranche, France), Paul Mueller (Geological Sciences, University of Florida) and Peter Taylor (Earth and Space Science and Engineering, York University). We set up a web site dedicated to the Review Committee through which the members had access to all pertinent information on EOS research, teaching, enrolment, administration, space, infrastructure and finances. In December 2004, the Committee spent a tightly packed two days in EOS, taking tours and meeting with the entire Department (Faculty, staff, students), senior administrators at UBC, and representatives from government and industry. The report arrived in February of this year and, in short, we got an ‘A’! The Committee commented on the constellation of senior EOS stars with internationally recognized research programs, now complemented by a large group of young rising stars brimming with creativity and new ideas. They commended EOS for curriculum reform and teaching innovations that have led to an increase of over 70% in undergraduate enrolment and almost 50% in graduate enrolment since 2000. We were also recognized as a leader in outreach to both the rest of campus and the community at large. In this edition of the newsletter we cover recent achievements in most of these areas and, where appropriate, we have interleaved pertinent comments (in blue) from the External Review Committee. What I want to do in my message, however, is focus on the main problem that the Review Committee identified. To some extent we have become victims of our own success. Laboratory space for new Faculty has been difficult to come by and to finance, offices are full to bursting, and we are still scattered across campus in four different buildings and as many satellite sites. We now offer more classes than ever and some have large enrolments. Unfortunately, there are only seminar and small classrooms in our buildings and, consequently, EOS instructors have become nomads lugging equipment and teaching materials across campus in search of adequate classroom space. We also have ambitions to expand the Pacific Museum of the Earth to promote an understanding of the Earth, its history and resources to the public at large. We are particularly interested in greater involvement with schools, both directly through school visits and indirectly through helping the Faculty of Education train Earth Science teachers. All this requires space. As many of you will know, EOS drew up plans for a new building some time ago and the External Review Committee made a strong recommendation for the resurrection of these plans as a sure route to the long term success for our Department. The senior administration at UBC seems to have heeded the External Review recommendation to the extent that committees are now meeting to discuss the scale of the building and potential sources of funding. The photograph on the front page shows a model of the building as originally conceived. There is no doubt that, given our record and current trajectory, this accommodation would help establish EOS as one of the foremost Earth Science departments in the world. At the beginning of this article, I mentioned fatigue and I must confess that I need to take a short break from administration so that I can recharge my research program and update my teaching skills. In the meantime, the rudder will be in the very capable hands of Kelly Russell as Acting Head ([email protected]; (604) 822-2703) and Raymond Andersen as Associate Head ([email protected]; (604) 822-4511). I will return next year to begin a second contract as Head of EOS and I very much look forward to communicating with you all again about the challenges and opportunities that await us. Paul L. Smith Alumni and Friends Newsletter, 2005 2 Earth and Ocean Sciences Table of Contents MINING AND GLOBAL CHANGE Research Highlights Greg Dipple and his Research Mining and Global Change ..............................3 Drugs from the Ocean ......................................5 Other Scientific Achievements.........................8 Newcomers ...................................................................... 10 Retirements ..................................................................... 12 A Year in the Museum ................................................... 13 Student News Student Societies ............................................. 15 Enrolments ...................................................... 16 Theses............................................................... 16 Awards and Honours...................................................... 17 Remembrance ................................................................. 18 Alumni Feedback............................................................ 19 Keep in Touch Form....................................................... 21 EOS Department Photograph........................................ 22 Professor Greg Dipple leads the UBC research team that is documenting uptake of atmospheric carbon dioxide in mine residue. Carbon Sequestration in Mine Residue RESEARCH HIGHLIGHTS Greg Dipple, Principal Investigator “EOS scientists are highly regarded nationally and Some mine tailings react with the atmosphere to fix carbon internationally for their original research in a wide range of dioxide (CO2) within mineral structures, thereby sequestering it disciplines and sub-disciplines. The quality of the research is from the atmosphere where it has been linked to global warming. demonstrated by the good to excellent quality of their published The rapidity and extent of CO2 fixation is due to the vast scientific papers, which for the most part appear in national and increases in silicate mineral surface area that are a direct result international journals of the highest repute. The annual volume of mineral processing. Mine residues may thus provide the (quantity) of scholarly publication is another measure of the optimal environment for CO2 disposal and therefore have stature of the EOS scientists and a contributing factor to their unrealized environmental and economic value. increasing national and international recognition. For the size of A new research project within the Mineral Deposit Research the faculty and the fields in which they work, an annual Unit examines the mechanisms and rates of CO2 uptake in publication rate of well over 200 peer-reviewed contributions to tailings from active mines, and is developing a verification books, journals, and conference proceedings that rate protocol for bound CO2. The project has attracted international maintained now for several years -- is commendable in the media coverage, including this review from the American extreme. Prestigious medals and research fellowships awarded Chemical Society journal Environmental Science and to EOS scientists by national and international organizations, Technology. and numerous prizes awarded to them for their publications and presentations, offer still further testimony in support of the Mine tailings soak up greenhouse gas Committees judgment.” EOS External Review Committee Report, 2005 Researchers have shown for the first time that tailings, the mountains of rubble left after mining for nickel and asbestos, absorb significant amounts of CO2. The discovery, made at mines in Québec, British Columbia, the Yukon Territory, and Australia, could help mines earn credit for what is considered the most permanent form of greenhouse gas sequestration. “We were examining tailings to characterize them as a feedstock for an industrial reactor for CO2 sequestration but found that the tailings were already reacting directly with the atmosphere,” says Greg Dipple, a geologist at the University of British Columbia. The surprising discovery, presented November 23 at the Yukon Geoscience Forum in Whitehorse, came after scientists used isotopic tracers to show that atmospheric CO2 was the precursor of the carbon-containing compounds in the rocks. Alumni and Friends Newsletter, 2005 3 Earth and Ocean Sciences EOS graduate student James Thom sampling surface waters Scanning electron photomicrograph of dypingite mineral from waste rock of the Cassiar Mine, British Columbia. rosettes that trap one third of their mass in atmospheric carbon dioxide. The rosettes formed within tailings of the Clinton Creek Mine, Yukon. The field of view is 0.2 millimetres. The sequestration reaction requires water, which comes from rainfall and ponds in which tailings are sometimes stored, Dipple says. Atmospheric CO2 forms carbonic acid in water, and as the water evaporates it