Department Seminar Series
Department Seminars will take place in Tate Hall room B20 on Thursdays at 4:00 p.m. Email announcements are sent out the Monday before the seminar. If you would like to be added to the seminar announcement list, please contact Kaleigh Swift at [email protected].
* denotes seminars that are closed to the public
Fall 2025
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
Earth’s ecosystems were dramatically reshaped by the Cretaceous–Paleogene (K–Pg) mass extinction. It has often been suggested that dinosaurs were doomed to extinction following a long-term decline in diversity and that ecological response to the extinction was gradual and prolonged. However, the structure and composition of ecosystems before and after the extinction event have long been debated because the best fossil records from the latest Cretaceous and early Paleocene are from northern North America. Our new paleontological and geological data from the San Juan Basin in New Mexico help to fill this gap. Ecological modeling of Cretaceous North American terrestrial ecosystems show that dinosaur communities were not gradually declining. Instead, they were diverse and thriving right up to the boundary, forming distinct northern and southern biotic provinces driven by temperature differences across the continent. These provincial patterns persisted through the latest Cretaceous, underscoring the abruptness and severity of the K-Pg extinction. Following the impact, terrestrial ecosystems remained partitioned into regionally distinct assemblages, proving insights into patterns of recovery. Despite documented differences in composition and structure, plant communities across North America experienced multiple regionally synchronous turnover events that do not have clear climatic drivers, though evidence for shifts in canopy structure suggest ecological restructuring and potentially altered environmental conditions. These regional patterns of ecosystem change following the K-Pg boundary point to ecosystem instability, potentially linked to Deccan Traps volcanism, that resulted in a protracted ecosystem recovery lasting millions of years after the impact.
February 12
Dr. Pete Makovicky, Professor, Earth & Environmental Sciences, University of Minnesota
New insights into carnivorous dinosaur evolution from Patagonian fossils
February 19
Dr. Kathryn Kumamoto, Design Physicist, Space Science Institute, Lawrence Livermore National Lab
Results of the Double Asteroid Redirection Test, NASA’s First Planetary Defense Mission
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
TBD
April 9
Confronting Colonization
April 16
Dr. Dani Or, Nevada Engineering Distinguished Professor, Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Nevada - Reno
TBD
April 23
Dr. Ryan Emanuel, Associate Professor, Nicholas School of the Environment, Duke University
TBD
April 30
Dr. Jeff Marlow, Assistant Professor, Biology, Boston University
TBD
February 5
Dr. Dan Peppe, Associate Professor, Department of Geosciences, Baylor University
Abrupt ending, uneven recovery: Terrestrial ecosystems across the Cretaceous-Paleogene boundary
Tate Hall 401-20