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Iva Tomchovska
Iva Tomchovska
Graduate Student
Research Summary
I am a geobiology graduate student interested in the coevolution of Earth’s geologic processes and life. I got my undergraduate degree at the University of Miami (Go Canes!), where I applied various geochemical methods and tools in sedimentology to investigate carbonate microbialites in deglacial reefs from Mozambique. Currently, I am applying similar tools and techniques to understand the origins and formation of microbial carbonate structures called Thrombolites. Thrombolites have intriguing patterns and puzzling occurrences in the rock record. They are characterized by a clotted fabric at the mesoscale rather than a laminated fabric like their better-known counterparts, the Stromatolites. However, the mechanisms that lead to their diagnostic clot formation are subject to debate and remain, as of now, enigmatic.