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GEOLOGICAL SCIENCES AT BROWN UNIVERSITY
Ph.D., California Institute of Technology Research Topics: Geochemistry; geochronology; tectonic and metamorphic history of orogens; trace elements in plutonic igneous rocks. Research Interests: My major research interest is on understanding the processes that control the tectonic evolution of ancient collisional mountain belts. These regions provide windows into the middle and lower crust and record information about their behavior during continental collision. They also provide information on the relative disposition of the earth’s continental masses further back in time than is possible from deciphering the Mesozoic- to-Recent record of sea-floor spreading.Currently I and my students are working in various parts of the now far-flung Paleozoic circum-Atlantic orogens: the New England Appalachians, Scandinavian Caledonides, and Sierras Pampeanas of Argentina. This work employs sensitive isotope geochemical tools, particularly U-Pb geochronology, to constrain the age and origin of these rocks and the deformational fabrics they acquire during collisional and other tectonic events. This type of work requires an integration of field, petrographic, and laboratory expertise, the latter including clean laboratory operations and mass spectrometric analyses.
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