Gareth started following the work of Darren Gröcke, Durham University, Department of Earth Sciences.
Gareth started following the work of Chris Siebert, University of Oxford, Earth Sciences.
Gareth started following the work of David Carpenter, University of Bristol, Department of Earth Sciences.
Gareth New record: paper submitted on the 15th Jan Published on the 31st march!! :)
Graduate Student, Earth and Environmental Sciences
Thesis Title: Extent, Onset and Duration of seawater anoxia during the Creataceous OAEs and the mid-Miocene cooling event. An integrated Mo-isotope and organic geochemical study.
About
My current research involves the application of both novel isotopic (Mo-isotope system) and geochemical proxies (elemental ratios, trace metal analysis and organic biomarker analysis) to constrain changes in seawater redox over Cretaceous Oceanic Anoxic Events (OAEs) 1a and 2, as well as over the Miocene cooling event.
OAEs were transient and infrequent events associated with widespread, synchronous accumulation of organic carbon within the world’s oceans. These events are often associated with other severe environmental perturbations such as: extensive volcanism, faunal turnovers and abrupt global warming. Although it has been inferred that these stratigraphically isolated but globally widespread occurrences of elevated organic carbon contents are the result of the development of anoxia, the causal link has remained elusive. To date, it has not been possible to constrain the severity or lateral extentof anoxia, or the precise timing of its onset and duration. These are the key issues, on which my research is focused, and by utilising the Mo-isotope system combined with other geochemical proxies for anoxia, I aim to determine when and how seawater anoxia developed during both the Cretaceous (OAEs 1a & 2) and the Miocene (cooling event).
Work is, and will continue, to be conducted on samples collected at high resolution from well-preserved sections in Italy, California and Morocco that contain records of the lithological expression of the OAEs (and the Miocene cooling event), and also samples from deep oceans over the same time intervals (with the exception of the Miocene cooling event). Therefore allowing comparison of the development of anoxia in different environmental settlings, facilitating a comparison with the literature, which should permit the testing of models and potentially provide evidence allowing the distinction between of causes and effects to be identified.
