Kate Freeman
Kate Freeman, Evan Pugh University Professor at Penn State, directs the Astrobiology Center on Isotopologue Research (ACIR) and is a scientist on the OSIRIS-REx sample return mission. Her research has advanced isotope analyses and biomarker studies, and their applications in biogeochemistry, paleoclimate, and astrobiology.
Jennifer Macalady
Jenn Macalady, Professor of Geosciences, is Director of Penn State’s Ecology Institute and Penn State’s Astrobiology Research Center (ARC). She is a leading expert on microbial ecology and geochemistry and has studied the geobiology of Italian caves and hotsprings for over 20 years.
Meet the Instructors
Miquela Ingalls is an Assistant Professor of Geosciences and faculty in the Biogeochemistry and Astrobiology programs at Penn State. Miquela studies modern and ancient carbonate environments, with a particular interest in how microbes interact with carbonate minerals in lakes. Miquela's group uses elemental, stable, and clumped isotope techniques to reconstruct past environments, biology, and aqueous chemistry.
Isabel is an Assistant Professor of Geosciences at Penn State. She uses computational and geochemical tools to understand mechanisms (e.g., CO2 and other gas emissions) by which volcanism affects the environment. She quantifies emissions using proxies based on mercury and sulfur, and she studies the environmental response to volcanic eruptions and gas emissions. She also seeks to understanding climate effects of volcanic eruptions within the last few thousand years. She studies both sedimentary rocks as paleoenvironmental archives and igneous rocks linked to Earth's volcanism.
Rachel is an Assistant Professor of Geosciences and an associate of the Penn State Earth and Environmental Systems Institute. Her research uses field data and numerical models to understand groundwater flow and transport processes in complex hydrologic systems. She aims to apply her work to understand water resource availability and improve predictions of environmental hazards, such as flooding and erosion.
Brian Kelley is an Assistant Professor of Geosciences at Penn State who investigates the relationship between environmental change, biological evolution, and carbonate sedimentation. Brian also worked as an industry geoscientist, where he studied world-class carbonate reservoirs in the Middle East, Europe, South America, and North America.
Kim Lau, Assistant Professor in Geosciences, is a sedimentary geochemist. She combines inorganic geochemical proxies, fieldwork, and modeling to understand paleoenvironmental change during critical intervals in the past as windows into the Earth system, as well as to improve our interpretations of the sedimentary geochemical record.
Max is an Assistant Professor of Geosciences at Penn State. He uses new geochemical tools to tackle unresolved questions regarding surface and near-surface processes on Earth, combining hard isotopic analyses and simple models to understand how these processes work today, and how they may have operated in the past.
Mackenzie is a Geobiology PhD candidate at New Mexico Tech working with cave-forming sulfur oxidizing bacteria to assess their bioleaching and bioremediation potential, as well as their role in nitrogen cycling in sulfidic cave systems. She holds a BA in Geology and an MSc in Geochemistry. She also has previous experience working as a production geologist at a high-altitude copper mine in the Peruvian Andes.