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Environmental Sciences Lab
Faculty at ISU are actively engaged in numerous environmentally oriented research projects. Most of which support field and laboratory-oriented graduate and undergraduate research projects. For more information on individual faculty research projects, visit the faculty member web page.
Dr. Sandra Brake
- Microbial communities in acid mine drainage environments
- Geochemistry of coal-related acid mine drainage systems
- Plant stress associated with mining activities
Dr. Jennifer Latimer
- Phosphorus and carbon geochemistry of paleo-Lake Mababe, Botswana: indicators of landscape development and internal lake processes
- Phosphorus geochemistry during Cretaceous ocean anoxic events at Demerara Rise (OAE2)
- Export production in the south Pacific Ocean on glacial/interglacial time scales
- Paleoproductivity in the Bering Sea over the last glacial cycle
- Dust iron fluxes to the south Pacific Ocean
- Metal bioavailability and remobilization in stream and lake sediments impacted by acid mine drainage
- Export production in the south Atlantic Ocean at glacial terminations
Dr. Tony Rathburn
- Geochemistry and ecology of cold methane seeps
- Development of a quantitative means by which marine methane seepage can be determined in the geologic record
- Ecological and biogeochemical responses of modern and ancient seafloor ecosystems to organic loading and low-oxygen conditions
- Relationships between environmental changes and trace element composition of calcareous microfauna
- Seasonality in deep-sea microfauna as a response to environmental changes in the water column
Dr. Jim Speer
- Use of tree-rings to reconstruct environmental variables such as fire history, insect outbreak, and climate
Environmental Lab Equipment includes:
- Water depth indicator
- Constant- and falling-head permeameters
- YSI 600XL multi-parameter probe
- Desktop dissolved O2 meter
- Portable pH meter
- Portable sample filtration device
- Weighing scales
- Fume hoods
- Convection drying oven