INDIANAPOLIS -- Faculty from the Department of Earth Sciences have been awarded several grants to research topics ranging from glacial deposits in Antarctica to arc magmatism in the North Pacific. The school has at least one team on every continent conducting high-quality research that will have a significant impact.
Africa: Lixin Wang
Wang and his team are assessing the effects of non-rainfall water input on dry-land ecosystem functions. The research will attempt to identify the source areas of fog/dew using stable isotope analyses and will assess how much fog and dew contribute to ecosystem function.
Asia: Broxton Bird
Bird and his team are investigating Indian summer monsoon (ISM). This project will directly contribute to the understanding of hydroclimate variability in a densely population region that depends heavily on ISM.
Europe: Greg Druschel
Druschel and his team are working on a speciation and iron chemistry project. The team has been collecting samples and doing in-situ measurements using electrochemical instruments in various geothermal areas of Iceland.
North America: Pierre Jacinthe
Using the Eagle Creek watershed in Central Indiana, Jacinthe and researchers are investigating the effect of tillage management on nutrient cycling, water budget and crop productivity during drought years and identifying the socio-economic barriers to the adoption of conservation practices.
South America: Broxton Bird
Bird and his team are conducting a comprehensive high-resolution geophysical survey of Laguna de Tota, Colombia, using a small single-channel air gun seismic reflection system and a CHIRP sub-bottom profiler. Results from this survey will be used to characterize the sediments and sequences contained within Tota’s basin, including a determination of their maximum thickness and the identification of depositional center(s) and structures.
Antarctica: Kathy Licht
Licht and her team are working to complete a provenance study of glacial deposits in Antarctica to provide the first broad-scale geo- and thermochronologic survey of detrital minerals in till to help characterize bedrock beneath the East Antarctic ice sheet and constrain Antarctica’s glacial history. Together these allow us to better understand Earth's history of mountain-building, erosion and glaciation and will contribute to making better predictions of the impacts of future climate changes.
Australia: Lixin Wang
Wang is also involved in research projects in Australia investigating the spatial distribution of infiltration after shrub encroachment and land-surface interactions in grassland ecosystems using stable isotope techniques.