Current Research Interests

Using geochemistry of mafic lavas and phenocrysts to unravel melt generation, segregation and transport processes in the lithosphere and asthenosphere, with particular interest in continental rift zone magmatism and the development and maintenance of mantle reservoirs

My graduate students typically conduct field work and extensive laboratory analysis as they develop their own ideas into a research thesis. Current research efforts involve work in areas of continental extension (various localities in the East African Rift) and arc volcanism (Indonesia and Turkey).

Recent Awards

Presidential Award for Excellence in Science, Mathematics and Engineering Mentoring (2005)

Graduate Students Supervised

• Wendy Nelson (PhD candidate) Isotopic heterogeneity in the South African Superplume
• Sabrina Innocenti (PhD candidate) Petrographic, textural and geochemical constraints on eruptive behavior of Merapi Volcano, Indonesia
• Tyrone Rooney (PhD 2006) Geochemical evidence for progressive continental rupture in the Main Ethiopian Rift
• Roeland Doust (MS 2003) Volcanic hazards of Mount Agung, Bali, Indonesia.
• Kelly Knight (MS 2002) Tertiary basalt magmatism in Turkana Kenya, with implications for evolution of the East African Rift System
• Keith Reinhardt (MS 2000) Effects of severe flooding on base cation cycling in the Staunton River watershed, central Virginia Blue Ridge
• Andrea Korsak (MS 1997) Sources of sulfur to Yellow Creek and Coal Run, Otter Creek Wilderness, West Virginia: a stable isotope approach
• Ross Fitzhugh (MS 1995) Controls on longitudinal and seasonal variation of stream acidity in a headwater catchment on the Appalachian Plateau, West Virginia
• Leif Riddervold (MS 1995) Sources of nitrogen to the high marsh/upland transition zone of a Virginia back-barrier system
• Susan Ingersoll (MS 1994) Heterogeneous sulfate adsorption in soils derived from pre-Cambrian granite gneiss in Shenandoah National Park, Virginia (co-supervised with B.J. Cosby)
• Scott Robinson (MS 1993) Variations in clay mineralogy and sediment texture in salt marsh soils of the Eastern Shore of Virginia

• Biltan Kurkcuoglu (PhD Ankara 2002; TUBITAK international postdoctoral fellowship) Geochemical evolution of post-collisional basalts in northern Anatolia, Turkey
• Supriyati Andreastuti (PhD University of Aukland 1999) Textural constraints on explosive volcanism at Merapi and Montserrat volcanoes (supervised with Barry Voight)
• Karen Bartels (PhD MIT 1991) Establish 1-atmosphere experimental laboratory and conduct experimental studies of elemental partitioning in mafic alkalic lavas (1 atm to 20 kbar)
• Dongmei Yu (PhD Geneva 1990) Oxygen isotopic analysis of precipitation and stream water from Staunton River, Virginia: determining the effects of the 1995 flooding on water storage

Undergraduate Student Research Supervised

• Leigh Patterson (BS 2006). Microdeformation structures in xenoliths from the Main Ethiopian Rift.
• Sheri Cahill (BS 2002). Petrology and geochemistry of mafic lavas from the western escarpment of the Ethiopian plateau.
• Kim Gehman (BS 2002). Geochemistry of Cretaceous basalts in Tortola, British Virgin Islands.
• Mike Davis (BS 2002). C hemistry of first-order streams near Wilkes-Barre, PA.
• Lauren Cooper (BS 2001). Petrology and mineral chemistry of Merapi andesites.
• Denise Werkman (BS 2000). Paleoclimatic history of Lake Turkana, northern Kenya.
• Meredith Hill (BS PSU 2002). Geochemistry of the Main Ethiopian Rift.
• Erica Campbell (BS Tuskeegee 2005). Mineral chemistry of Main Ethiopian Rift basalts.
• Robin Chantal (BS University of New Orleans 2006). Thermal structure of the Kenya plateau.
• Gabe Akec (BS PSU 2007). Eruptive constraints on lava chemistry, African Western Rift.