January 2025
Dr. B was awarded the Jean “Chris” Purvis Early-Career Professorship at Georgia Tech. This endowed position is aimed at supporting teacher-scholars whose research and academics are focused on environmental studies, climate, and/or sustainability science. Woot!
December 2024
Isa and David traveled to Washington, DC to present posters on their respective ongoing doctoral research on Caribbean coral reef paleoceanography and paleoenvironmental reconstructions at the 2024 AGU Fall Meeting. Isa’s poster titled “Reconstructing 150 Years of Climate and Land Use Change in St. Croix, USVI: Geochemical Insights from Coral Cores” can be found as a PDF here. David’s titled “Southern Caribbean Records of Post-Industrial Sea Surface Temperature and Hydrology from the Massive Starlet Coral (Siderastrea siderea)” can be found as a PDF here.
November 2024
Lots of busy field research! David, Amanda, Dr. B, and Princeton collaborator Dr. Marcos Salas Saavedra traveled to Curaçao for a wet season sampling of Southern Caribbean reef seawater and to service monitoring instruments deployed within the island’s caves. To that end, if you ever find yourself in Curaçao, be sure to check out Hato Caves. You’ll learn a lot about the geologic history of the island from some incredibly knowledgeable and friendly guides… and also likely get a sneak peek at some of our research monitoring efforts w.r.t. climate change impacts on Curaçao’s warmth and aridity!
Isa, Maggie, Aminata, and Bora (GT EAS – Lynch-Stieglitz Lab) traveled to St. Croix similarly for a wet season sampling of local reef seawater in pursuit of constructing a modern perspective of reef metabolism rates *and* to constrain seasonal variability in coastal runoff of heavy/toxic metals onto local reefs. They also worked with collaborators at The Nature Conservancy and 9 – 12 grade teachers to conduct educational outreach programming on (1) careers in marine science and (2) the utility of corals as time capsules of land use at local high schools. Great work, team!
October 2024
David alongside 3 other Ph.D. students in the GT Ocean Sciences and Engineering (OSE) program traveled to the Florida Keys to present their ideas on artificially cooling coral reefs as part of the National Marine Sanctuary Foundation’s Coral Reef Thermal Stress Design Thinking Challenge & Workshop. Well done, team – read more about their efforts here!
