Earth Research

My research addresses the chemical development of the early oceans and atmosphere, and the environmental context of early evolution. Field mapping studies are the starting point for more topical laboratory-based studies involving geochemical, paleontological, and geochronological techniques. My research is focused on the reconstruction of environmental conditions associated with the Cambrian radiation of animals in Oman, Namibia and Siberia.

Some projects my current students and postdocs are working on include:

Josh Anadu

The Windsor Group is a 1-2 km thick carbonate-evaporite succession that precipitated from a number of restricted seas intermittently connected with the last vestiges of the Rheic Ocean (Schenk et al., 1994; Giles; 2009; Jutras et al., 2015; Gibling et al., 2019). The Windsor Group records two sequences of basinal freshening split into five subzones defined by sequence boundaries (MacNeil et al., 2018). The Macumber Formation is the basal unit of Sequence 1 and is conformably overlain by up to 500m of evaporites. As the sole basal member of the sequence, the interpreted depositional environment of the Macumber has played a defining role in the sequence stratigraphic model for the first sequence in the Windsor Group. In it's various localities, the Macumber Formation has been given a wide range of interpretations, including: 1) an offlap peritidal carbonate (Schenk, 1948), 2) a shallow sea cryptalgal laminate deposited in hypersaline waters (Geldsetzer, 1977; 1978; 1978), and 3) a deep-basin, deep-water microbialite deposited in hypersaline waters with idiosyncratic hydrothermal vent microbial communities and associated vent lithofacies (Schenk, 1994). We aim to investigate the later interpretation (deep water, hydrothermal vent microbialite) purported in the Ingonish Area by Schenk (2001) using mapped field relationships, carbonate petrography, isotope geochemistry, biomarker analysis, and paragenetic documentation.