Stanford Doerr School of Sustainability
Showing 1-42 of 42 Results
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Jood Al Aswad
Ph.D. Student in Geological Sciences, admitted Autumn 2019
BioMy interests are in ecosystem recovery from mass extinction events and hyperthermal periods, spatial and temporal trends in the fossil record, ecophysiology, and taxonomic identification.
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Emily Ellefson
Ph.D. Student in Geological Sciences, admitted Autumn 2021
Current Research and Scholarly InterestsI am a palynologist, that is, I study fossilized pollen and spores! Previously I have worked on Permian-Triassic and Jurassic-Cretaceous palynology, but here at Stanford I'm excited to be exploring a new time interval and will be working on Silurian-Devonian palynology. My research will focus on how the evolution of terrestrial plants affected the marine redox record through palynology, paleobotany, and geochemistry.
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Susannah Herz
Ph.D. Student in Earth and Planetary Sciences, admitted Autumn 2023
Current Research and Scholarly InterestsI am interested in investigating the impacts of ocean anoxia through the end Permian mass extinction. My work utilizes a variety of isotope geochemistry techniques, including investigations of the sulfur, calcium, and thallium systems through both modeling and lab-based approaches.
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Stepfan Huntsman
Ph.D. Student in Geological Sciences, admitted Winter 2022
BioI've had an interest in rocks and fossils since I was a small child, amassing a large collection in my youth, but hadn't considered it a viable career path instead starting my path as a social scientist studying gender and sexuality. My interest in a career in paleontology peaked after finishing my first degree, leading me to pursue a second bachelors degree. While working on my undergraduate at Weber State I discovered a true deep love of plants as well as a curiosity about the methods they use to adapt to new environments, which has lead me to pursuing a doctoral degree here at Stanford University.
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Amanda Jackson
Ph.D. Student in Geological Sciences, admitted Autumn 2022
BioI’ve long been fascinated with volcanoes, and my research interests broadly include igneous petrology, trans-crustal magmatic systems, high temperature geochemistry, and geo/thermochronology. My first PhD project explores the formation of Catalina Island and investigates pluton assembly in continental rift settings. In my free time, I enjoy hiking, camping, backpacking, reading, yoga, and playing with my cat, Carl.
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Grant Long
Ph.D. Student in Earth and Planetary Sciences, admitted Autumn 2024
BioGrant was born in a small town in Massachusetts and quickly moved to York, Maine, a small beach town. He earned a BSc in Geology from the University of Vermont in 2022. Grant continued with his MSc degree at Stanford University in 2024, focusing on sediment dynamics in Chile.
Grant joined Stanford as an MSc student in the Fall of 2022 and is a part of the Tectonic Geomorphology Lab group led by George Hilley.
Grant’s focus is on landscape evolution in south-central Chile, making comparisons between the modern and glacial-interglacial timescales. -
Jacob Long
Ph.D. Student in Earth and Planetary Sciences, admitted Autumn 2023
Current Research and Scholarly InterestsUsing experimental rock physics and monitoring techniques to study the carbonation process and its impact on reservoir porosity, permeability, and other properties in carbon capture and storage projects.
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Valerie Breanne Rosen
Ph.D. Student in Geological and Environmental Sciences, admitted Winter 2015
Current Research and Scholarly InterestsNickel Isotopes as a Biosignature for Methanogenic Archaea
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Souradeep Mukherjee
Ph.D. Student in Earth and Planetary Sciences, admitted Autumn 2023
BioSouradeep is an Exploration Geologist-turned-AI Researcher developing decision-making algorithms to discover high-grade mineral deposits. With almost a decade of experience in on-field exploration of critical & strategic mineral deposits, he is now using his computer to unlock the full potential of mineral discovery.
Souradeep is currently a Doctoral Researcher at Stanford Mineral-X. His current work focuses on fusing multi-element soil geochemistry with 3D geological inference to build predictive models for subsurface intrusion-hosted Ni-Cu sulfide mineralization in the Curaçá Valley, Brazil. By leveraging machine learning, geostatistics, and compositional data analysis, he aims to reduce geological uncertainty and operational costs in mineral targeting, transforming how exploration is conducted in under-explored terrains.
Prior to Stanford, Souradeep held several technical and supervisory roles at the Atomic Minerals Directorate for Exploration and Research (AMD), Government of India, where he spearheaded multiple national-scale mineral exploration campaigns. He led the exploration and evaluation of uranium-bearing sediments in the Bhima Basin, the mapping of lithium-rich pegmatites in Karnataka, and the delineation of heavy mineral sand deposits across the east coast of India. His work included advanced geological mapping, structural interpretation, kinematic analysis, downhole geophysics, petrological microscopy, and geostatistical modeling—skills that now enrich his algorithmic thinking in research.
His research interests span compositional data analysis, geospatial modeling, machine learning for Earth systems, building intelligent decision making agents for mineral exploration and mineral prospectivity analysis. He is particularly passionate about bridging the gap between traditional geosciences and computational intelligence to power the next generation of resource discovery tools.
When he’s not deep into code or core samples, Souradeep contributes to scientific outreach, mentors young geoscientists, and advocates for data transparency and sustainability in the mining sector. He is also a writer, a poet and loves to write pieces on existential philosophy. -
Nidhi Utkarshbhai Patel
Ph.D. Student in Earth and Planetary Sciences, admitted Autumn 2023
BioPlants display enormous diversity of forms today that, have evolved over geological timescales after plants successfully colonized land. Currently, I am interested in learning more about evolutionary changes in plant structures including specialized reproductive organs of seed plants. I study plant fossil record from deep time and living plants with the aim to develop a better understanding of origins of plant reproductive structures and drivers of morphological evolution in plants. Previously, I have looked at spore-pollen record preserved in sedimentary rocks from Canada. These microscopic fossils and their distribution in space and time can help us elucidate the response of vegetation to past extinction events.
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Eliane Petersohn
Ph.D. Student in Geological Sciences, admitted Autumn 2022
BioI grew up in Curitiba, a city in southern Brazil, and, moved to Rio de Janeiro to join the Brazilian National Agency of Petroleum, Natural Gas and Biofuels (ANP) years ago.
I have a strong grasp of the oil and gas industry, where I have been working for more than 15 years. I have a bachelor’s and master's degree in geology from the Federal University of Parana, Brazil and, I have become a public servant of the ANP, where I have held different technical and managerial positions. I spent these past 15 years working on the ANP’s large-scale strategic projects, conducting a geological evaluation for Brazil’s bidding rounds, and developing a multiyear geological and geophysical data acquisition plan for the Agency. I was also responsible for coordinating the first phase of the onerous assignment process, which authorized the Brazilian Government to onerously assign to NOC Petrobras up to 5 billion barrels of oil. I have also been directly involved in the location of two wells, which discovered two of the country's largest oil fields (Buzios and Mero fields). As a geologist researcher, my main objective aims at acquiring capabilities and developing the knowledge required to manage reservoirs to maximize oil recovery and extend the lifespan of oil fields as well as acquire a solid understanding of oil reservoir management to bring innovative knowledge to Brazil and help create guidelines to monitor oil field development and production in my country. -
Matthew Reinhold
Ph.D. Student in Geological Sciences, admitted Autumn 2019
Current Research and Scholarly InterestsPlanetary habitability, specifically looking into the effects of tidal heating as both a source of energy to maintain habitable climates, and as a means of keeping small, terrestrial worlds warm, and thus geologically active for long periods of time. In addition, I am interested in the physical, geological and chemical processes on exotic worlds, like Saturn's moon Titan. How do the climates of such worlds evolve, and what kinds of geologic features would they produce on the landscape?
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Adrian A. Wackett
Ph.D. Student in Geological Sciences, admitted Autumn 2022
BioAdrian A. Wackett was born and raised in Saint Paul, Minnesota (unceded Wahpekute/Dakota lands). He double majored in Chemistry and Geosciences at Trinity University (TX) before returning to Saint Paul and completing his MS degree in Land & Atmospheric Sciences (specifically pedology/biogeochemistry) at the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities, where he studied global w'o'rming. Before coming to Stanford as an NSF GRFP Fellow he traveled extensively through Latin America and SE Asia (by bike) and worked as an independent researcher affiliated with the Department of Ecology and Environmental Sciences at Umeå University and the Climate Impacts Research Centre in Abisko, Sweden. He's passionate about exploring the interconnectedness of Earth’s systems through his research and is equally passionate about looking beyond academia to cultivate enduring relationships with the lands and peoples he works with.Previous topics of inquiry include coupling ant bioturbation to the erosion and weathering of hillslope soils in SE Australia, exploring earthworm invasions and their deterministic effects on soil carbon dynamics in Fennoscandian and Alaskan forests, and examining the biogeochemical diversity of ‘black smoker’ plume particles at deep-sea hydrothermal vents. His dissertation focuses on applying an array of isotopic tracers and synchrotron-based X-ray approaches to explore how landscapes record and respond to a diverse set of disturbances, from biological invasions in Earth’s northern biomes to extreme storm events in Puerto Rico to cultural burning and wildfires in California.
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Andrea Zorzi
Ph.D. Student in Geological Sciences, admitted Autumn 2020
BioBorn in Venice, Italy, I earned my BSc in Aerospace Engineering at Università degli Studi di Padova in 2017. For my MSc degree, I moved to the Netherlands and graduated in Aerospace Engineering at TU Delft in 2019, focusing on space flight, planetary sciences and radiative transfer modeling. Afterwards, I spent a year at the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research in Göttingen (Germany), conducting research on neural network applications for cometary gas expansion studies.
I've joined Stanford as a GS graduate student in Fall 2020 and I am part of the Planetary Modeling Group led by Prof. Schaefer.
My focus is on planetary impacts, how they affect the climate and chemical evolution of the atmospheres of planets in their early stages.
Personal website: https://azorzi.github.io/
