Global Change / Surficial Processes / Quaternary Science

This program includes faculty rostered in the departments of Geological Sciences, Geography, and Anthropology, as well as in the Institute of Arctic and Alpine Research (INSTAAR). The primary laboratories are housed in the Benson Earth Sciences Building on the Main Campus and in INSTAAR on the East Campus. Related facilities include remote-sensing capabilities are housed in Center for Study of Earth from Space (CSES, a part of CIRES) and in the World Data Center for Glaciology on the East Campus. The Mountain Research Station, maintained by INSTAAR, 25 miles west of Boulder, provides access to the upper montane, sub-alpine, and alpine environments of the Colorado Front Range. A significant portion of the Water Resources Division of the U.S. Geological Survey is located on the East campus.

Research Programs

The main interest in these programs is to understand the processes responsible for Quaternary climate and environmental change, and the linkages between the components of the various systems that control the Earth's surface environment and their implications for the future. Field programs include the Quaternary stratigraphy of the Rocky Mountain West; glaciation, glacial isostasy, environmental change and paleoceanography of the Eastern Canadian Arctic, Svalbard, Alaska, and adjacent seas; Quaternary faulting in the western U.S.; timing and rates of sea-level change at a variety of sites around the globe; modern glacial processes and ice physics; paleopedology; cold-climate and surface-water hydrology.

Research Facilities

Laboratory-based research is concentrated in the primary analytical facilities at INSTAAR. Quaternary geochronology, including racemization dating, high-precision strontium dating, acceleration radiocarbon dating, and light stable-isotope research, all take place at the Center for Geochronological Research of INSTAAR. Soil-forming processes and sediment transport mechanisms are addressed in the soils, X-ray, and sedimentology laboratories in the Department building. Micropaleontology, palynology, and entymology are the focus of facilities in the Department, Museum, and INSTAAR.

Department Faculty

Click on names below for further information, including recent publications.

Robert S Anderson: Process geomorphology, paleoclimate, geochronology using cosmogenic radionuclides
John T. Andrews - Emeritus: Glacial and glacial-marine processes; Quaternary history of Arctic areas, particularly Canada; climate change (Canada, Alaska, Greenland margin).
Alexander F. H. Goetz - Emeritus: Director of CSES. Remote sensing, geophysics, and planetary evolution.
Scott Lehman: Paleoclimatology, paleoceanography, radiocarbon research
Tom Marchitto: Paleoclimatology, paleoceanography, carbonate geochemistry, rapid climate change
Jason Neff: Biogeochemistry
Gifford H. Miller: Director, Center for the Geochemical Analysis of the Global Environment at INSTAAR. Quaternary stratigraphy and geochronology; Paleoclimatology, glacial geology, human impacts; amino acid racemization (Iceland, Arctic Canada, Australia, Madagascar).
James Syvitski: Director of INSTAAR, Sediment transport, oceanography, marine geophysics,
numerical modeling (climate-ice-water-sediment interactions)
Greg Tucker: Landscape evolution, geocomputation, drainage basin geomorphology, climate change impacts, numerical modeling, topography of active mountain ranges, coupled geomorphic-sedimentary systems
James W.C. White: Light stable-isotope geochemistry, paleoclimate from ice cores; carbon-cycle dynamics; mixing histories and formation of ground water (Greenland, global)

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