September 4*
Dr. Justin Revenaugh, Department Head, Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Minnesota
Welcome to the 2024-2025 School year!

September 11
Dr. Crystal Ng, Associate Professor, Earth & Environmental Sciences, University of Minnesota
“First We Must Consider Wild Rice”: A Tribal-University Research Collaboration Around Manoomin (Ojibwe)/Psiη (Dakota

September 18
Dr. Emily Beverly, Assistant Professor, Earth & Environmental Sciences, University of Minnesota
Using Earth's climate history to understand our past and future.

September 25
Dr. Brook Crowley, Professor, Departments of Geosciences and Anthropology, University of Cincinnati
Reviving ghosts: An isotopic investigation of Madagascar’s extinct lemurs

October 2
Dr. Patrick Chuang, Professor, Earth and Planetary Sciences, UC Santa Cruz
What is and is not possible in a fossil-fuel free world?

October 9
Dr. Emily First, Assistant Professor, Mineralogy & Petrology, Volcanology, Planetary Science, Macalester College
Fractal facets and chemical correlations: How crystals record magmatic processes on Earth and beyond
 

October 16
Dr. Sebastian Behrens, Associate Professor, Civil, Environmental, and Geo-Engineering, University of Minnesota
Microbial interactions with anthropogenic pyrogenic carbon (biochar) in soils and wastewater

October 23
Dr. Elvira Mulyukova, Assistant Professor, Department of Earth & Planetary Sciences, Northwestern University
What Makes the Lithosphere weak?

October 30
Dr. Elowyn Yager , Professor & Co-Director, Center for Ecohydraulics Research, University of Idaho
From roots to shoots: the impacts of vegetation on river processes and restoration 

November 6
Seminar Cancelled - Geology Movie Night

November 13
Dr. Mauricio Ibañez-Mejia, Associate Professor, College of Geosciences, University of Arizona
Caught in the Act: recent lower-crust formation and gravitational loss in the north Andean arc

November 20
Dr. Eva Golos, Assistant Professor, Department of Geoscience, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Seismic constraints on temperature, melting, and lithospheric evolution of the southwestern United States

November 27
No Seminar - Thanksgiving Break


December 4 
Dr. Rory McFadden, Science Education Associate, Science Education  
Approaches to strengthening quantitative skills for undergraduate geoscience students 
 

Spring 2026

January 22
Dr. Elizabeth Griffith, Professor, School of Earth Sciences, The Ohio State University
Marine barite reveals change in ocean chemistry & carbon cycle

January 29
Jill Pelto, Artist; Science Communicator, Jill Pelto Art, North Cascade Glacier Climate Project
Layers: Painting Complex Science Stories
 

February 5
Dr. Dan Peppe, Associate Professor, Department of Geosciences, Baylor University
Abrupt ending, uneven recovery: Terrestrial ecosystems across the Cretaceous-Paleogene boundary

February 12
Dr. Pete Makovicky, Professor, Earth & Environmental Sciences, University of Minnesota
New insights into carnivorous dinosaur evolution from Patagonian fossils

February 19
Dr. Sam Shaheen, NSF Earth Sciences Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of Earth & Environmental Sciences, University of Minnesota
Hydrologic and Human Influences on Carbon Cycling in Groundwater

February 26
Dr. Jack Williams, Professor, Department of Geography, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Building open community data systems to study ecological responses to past climate change, at regional to global scales
 

March 5
Dr. Brady Foreman, Professor, Geology Department, Western Washington University
Fluvial response to the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum

March 12
No Seminar - Spring Break

March 19
Dr. Nick Swanson-Hysell, Associate Professor, Earth & Environmental Sciences, Associate Director, Institute for Rock Magnetism, University of Minnesota
The Grenvillian Orogeny Halted Rapid Plate Motion and Inverted the Midcontinent Rift as the Supercontinent Rodinia Assembled
 

March 26
Dr. Tripti Bhattacharya, Associate Professor, Earth and Environmental Sciences, Syracuse University
Pliocene climates from southwest North America and their implications for 21st century rainfall extremes

April 2
Dr. Ángel A. Garcia Jr., Assistant Professor, Department of Geology and Environmental Science, James Madison  University
Advancing Cave and Karst Science via Multidisciplinary Research with Undergraduate Students and Community Collaborators

April 9
Mary LaGarde (White Earth Nation), Executive Director, Minneapolis American Indian Center
From Resilience to Revitalization: The Urban American Indian Community
 

April 16
Dr. Peter Kang, Associate Professor, Earth & Environmental Sciences, University of Minnesota
Toward Predictive Understanding of Complex Subsurface Systems: Beyond Disciplinary Boundaries.

April 23
Dr. Ryan Emanuel, Associate Professor, Nicholas School of the Environment, Duke University  
Environmental Justice for Environmental Science: The Challenges and Rewards of Community-Centered Research in a Time of Global Change

April 30
Dr. Jeff Marlow, Assistant Professor of Biology, Boston University
Rock-Hosted Life: Microgeography and Microbial Metabolism at Deep-Sea Hydrothermal Vents
 

May 5
Kathryn Kumamoto, Design Physicist in Planetary Defence, Lawrence Livermore National Lab
Results of the Double Asteroid Redirection Test, NASA’s First Planetary Defense Mission

Abstract
Potentially hazardous objects in space (e.g., asteroids that might collide with Earth) pose a threat to Earth and humanity. An impact from the largest objects, for instance, could cause an extinction-level event. The field of planetary defense focuses on identifying and responding to these threats. This talk will give a brief overview of LLNL’s planetary defense work before focusing on the lab’s contributions to the Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) mission, NASA’s first planetary defense test mission. The DART mission was a demonstration of the kinetic impactor mitigation strategy, where the spacecraft is slammed directly into the asteroid to change the target’s velocity through momentum transfer. DART successfully struck the target asteroid Dimorphos on September 26, 2022, changing its velocity by 2.7 mm/s. The lab’s expertise in hypervelocity impact physics and simulating complex multi-physics problems was vital to preparing for and analyzing the results of this historic event.