Research interests
I am a tectonic geomorphologist with a diverse research profile focusing on how the rocks, rivers, and hillslopes of Earth’s surface respond to climatic, tectonic, and volcanic forcings. I take a quantitative and multidisciplinary approach to examine the complex and competing influences of climate (e.g. rainfall and glaciation), tectonics (e.g. faulting and uplift), and surface processes (e.g. river incision, and volcanic deposition) on the evolution of landscapes around the world. Through a combination of field work and cutting-edge quantitative techniques including topographic analysis, thermochronology, cosmogenic radionuclide dating, remote sensing, and numerical modelling, my research addresses fundamental questions such as whether climate can influence tectonics or how Earth’s surface will continue to evolve in post-glacial conditions.
Biography
I received a BS in geology from Ball State University (USA) in 2005. From there, I began a MS project at the University of Cincinnati (USA), which took me to India to study long-term exhumation rates and short-term river incision rates of the Himalaya. In 2007, I finished my MS in geology and moved to Arizona. While at Arizona State University, I focused on the long- and short-term tectonic and topographic evolution of the Bhutan Himalaya. After completing my PhD in geology, I moved to Germany to begin a postdoctoral position at the University of Tübingen. Interestingly, this new post would provide me the first opportunity to study in depth the mountains of the USA. I spent a few years investigating how alpine glaciers have changed erosion rates and topography over the past several million years in the Olympic Mountains.
I joined the School of Earth Sciences at Bristol in 2017 as part of NERC Global Challenges Research Fund project. As a member of the BRACE team (Building Bhutanese Resilience Against Cataclysmic Events). In 2018, I started an AXA Research Fellowship to explore volcanic hazards, and in 2019 began a Royal Society Dorothy Hodgkin Fellowship to build on these concepts and study how volcanic mountain ranges evolve.