SAFL Welcomes Andy Wickert as New Faculty

The St. Anthony Falls Laboratory (SAFL) is pleased to announce the addition of Dr. Andrew Wickert, Assistant Professor from Earth Sciences; and Crystal Ng, Assistant Professor of Earth Sciences, to the SAFL faculty group.

A native to the Twin Cities in Minnesota, Andy Wickert was introduced to the natural sciences at a young age. He attended an environmentally focused elementary school in St. Paul, Minnesota, taking frequent class hiking trips and nature walks. “I think geology was appealing because it’s a historical science – you can look at data from human past or geologic past…and then connect them with environmental issues that we have today.”

He completed his Bachelors of Science degree in Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 2008, accumulating several undergraduate awards for research and scholastic achievement. His dissertation research, advised by Bob Anderson, focused on investigating the relationships between glacial ice sheet growth and decay and how the melting of continental ice sheets in North America during the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) changed the both the drainage area and discharge of rivers, which he refers to as “the threads that tie the ice sheets to the sea.”

His research modeled a drainage history of North America, computed using established ice-sheet and glacial isostatic adjustment (GIA) models, and through use of high-resolution chronological oxygen stable isotope ratios. The research demonstrated that most existing models of North American deglaciation overestimate net meltwater discharge down the Mississippi River since the last LGM.