Featured Students and Alumni
Student Photo Contest
Mammoth Lakes, California, Athena Vohs, 2023 Student Photo Contest Winner
North Slope, Borough, Alaska, Laney Harner, 2022 Student Photo Contest Winner
Seneca Rocks, WV, Nathan Rohrbaugh, 2021 Student Photo Contest Winner
Pictured Rocks, MI, Christopher Greising, 2020 Student Photo Contest Winner
Bryce Canyon, Utah, Zack Loffer, 2019 Student Photo Contest Winner
Cathedral Beach, Spain, Amy Cox, 2018 Geology Student Photo Contest Winner
Perito Moreno Glacier, Southern Patagonia, Evin Maguire, 2017 Geology Student Photo Contest Winner
Mt. Fuji, Japan, Kyle Tobias, 2016 Geology Student Photo Contest Winner
Alyssa Reinhardt awarded Ohio Space Grant Masters Fellowship
Congratulations to graduate student Alyssa Reinhardt for her recently announced Ohio Space Grant award which provides her with a research stipend fall
semester of 2022. Her funded research is to examine how seasonal changes in water availability can affect some soil processes such as soil respiration and weathering of sulfide minerals. Alyssa will combine local measurements of soil gas composition and soil physical properties with remote sensing data to predict and understand how weathering rates can change seasonally across a landscape. Nice job Alyssa and all the best on the research project!
Kyle Smart, PhD Applied Geology student, receives International Travel Award
Kyle Smart has received the Graduate Student Senate International Travel Award for his upcoming participation in this summer's 18th International Symposium on Microbial Ecology to be held in August 2022 in Lausanne, Switzerland. Kyle's strong proposal and impressive letter of recommendation solidified his success in being chosen for this award.
Max Barczok, 4th year PhD Applied Geology candidate awarded a University Fellowship
Max was awarded a Pathfinder Fellowship ($5k) from the Consortium for the Advancement of Hydrologic Science, Inc. (CUAHSI) to support his dissertation work in Abisko, Sweden last summer. As part of this field work, Max helped organize and participate in an international collaboration to study the effects of a warming climate on soil chemistry and biology in the Arctic Region. His work there will provide important insights into how changes in temperatures can affect carbon dynamics in regions that are at the front line of climate change.
He has also received a student research grant ($2.5k) from the Geological Society of America and was also granted the Alexander Sisson Research Award ($1260) in recognition of the high merit of his research proposal.
Additionally, Max was lead PI on a proposal to the Advanced Photon Source (APS) at Argonne National Lab. Max also recently participated in related experiments at the Canadian LightSource (CLS) in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. The APS and CLS are federally supported laboratories, and access is free and determined by merit-based proposals. These facilities produce incredibly bright X-rays and can be applied across all scientific disciplines.
The techniques used there include X-ray scattering, spectroscopy, and imaging methods, and can obtain molecular-scale information related to the structure and chemical composition of materials. Experimental time at these facilities yields cutting-edge information that cannot be obtained at even the most high-tech university laboratory using standard bench-top techniques. Max’s lead role in these experiments is a very rare experience for most Ph.D. students in STEM fields. The summation of these activities puts Max in a rare company among his peers and has put him on a path towards significant academic success.
Alum Dr. Dulcinea Avouris awarded the Elsevier Early Career Scientist Award for 2019
Dr. Avouris's paper "Validation of 2015 Lake Erie MODIS image spectral decomposition using visible derivative spectroscopy and field campaign data" has been identified as outstanding by the editors of Journal of Great Lakes Research, so you have been awarded the Elsevier Early Career Scientist Award for 2019 which includes a cash prize of US$750. You can read the paper here.
PhD Candidate Md Abu Raihan Chowdhury Wins National Award
Geology PhD candidate Md Abu Raihan Chowdhury is the 2020 recipient of the Mineralogical Society of America's Grant from the Edward H. Kraus Crystallographic Research Fund. The award is $5000 for research expenditures. Raihan's proposal is entitled "The role of mineral surface coatings on colloids in controlling metal transport in acid mine drainage-impacted areas."
The Mineralogical Society of America's Grant for Research in Crystallography is funded by the Edward H. Kraus Crystallographic Research Fund with contributions from MSA members and friends. The grant awards up to $5,000 for research in the field of mineralogical crystallography. This grant targets projects within the areas of mineralogy, crystal chemistry, petrology, mineral physics, biomineralization, and geochemistry that can employ a variety of crystallographic, spectroscopic, analytical, and computational techniques.
Alumna Hannah Schlaerth receives NSF Graduate Research Fellowship
Recent Geology Alumna Hannah Schlaerth (BS 2018), now a PhD student at the University of Southern California, was awarded a prestigious NSF 
Graduate Research Fellowship to tackle two of society's biggest challenges: urban air pollution and climate change. With less vegetation and more built surfaces that absorb solar radiation, urban regions are hotter than surrounding rural areas (a phenomenon known as the Urban Heat Island [UHI] effect). Urbanization thus imposes heat stress that threatens the health and well-being of urban residents. Simultaneously, urban areas have high concentrations of aerosols due to emissions from vehicles, power production, and manufacturing facilities. These aerosols can either offset the UHI by reflecting solar radiation and increasing cloud reflectance or can increase warming by absorbing solar radiation. In turn, the UHI can impact aerosol distributions through changes in atmospheric ventilation and phase-partitioning of semi-volatile species. Hannah's research aims to quantify these interactions by pairing a variety of aerosol measurement techniques with climate-chemistry models. Current research in these two disciplines is siloed, yet understanding how atmospheric aerosols interact with the UHI is pertinent to improving quality of life for vulnerable urban populations. Hannah's current research measures black carbon, a carcinogenic aerosol that causes climate warming, and CO2 from ship exhaust in the Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach. Her research will go to the California Air Resource Board for a cancer risk assessment and will help inform future emissions regulations.