Meet Jack. A PhD
student from University of Leicester looking into 3 million years of the Earths
history. His BGS sponsored PhD is part of a multi-million
dollar campaign to investigate the evolution and climate of Lake Ohrid
through the drilling and recovery of a 750 meter-long sediment core. Amazingly that's the
length of 90 double decker buses or 37 cricket pitches!! Here Jack introduces the project and
explains what he'll be up to over the next few months (and years):
The Project
Lake Ohrid is
on the border between Macedonia and Albania within the central-northern
Mediterranean. It is thought to be one of Europe’s oldest lakes, forming around
3 million years ago, and has over 200 species that are found nowhere else. This
makes it the most biologically diverse lake in the world, when lake size is
taken into account.
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| Lake Ohrid is on the border between Macedonia and Albania within the central-northern Mediterranean |
The lake is
being investigated to look at links between evolution and climate over its
extended lifetime. This is going to be done by drilling a core from the centre
of the lake where thick, undisturbed sediments have built up. The core will be
analysed for a number of different aspects including its isotope geochemistry, volcanic
tephra and fossil content. This will enable us to reconstruct the past climate
of the area and to see if any links between rapid breaks in environmental
conditions and biological evolution exist.
Furthermore, a 3
million year climate record will be one of the longest land-based data sets
recovered to date. Such a record will provide valuable information towards a
regional picture of the Mediterranean over the time period. This covers several
warm intervals, which not only may have driven evolution, but act as analogues
for a future warming world. The time frame and location also coincide with
initial human migration pathways and may add detail to the ‘Out of Africa’
hypothesis.
The SCOPSCO project
(Scientific Collaboration on Past Speciation Conditions in Ohrid) is funded by
several sources, including the German Research Foundation (DFG), the British
Geological Survey and the International Continental Scientific Drilling Program (ICDP) . It will involve a multi-disciplinary team of 70 scientists
from 10 institutions worldwide.
The PhD
My PhD
involves analysing the recovered core for its isotopic and geochemical
variations. From this I will be able to reconstruct past climatic and lake
conditions, feeding this information back into SCOPSCO to enable the
collaboration to meet its research objectives.
As the core
hasn’t actually been drilled yet (a whole other story!), since starting the PhD
6 months ago I have been working on a 10 meter “short” core recovered from
Ohrid in Summer 2011. So far this has mainly involved preparing samples for several
analysis techniques. In total the analysis amounts to 1390 samples – for a 10
meter core! Take a moment and remember the main core will be over 750 meters;
I’ve got my work cut out over the next few years!
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| Jack |
The PhD is
supervised by Prof. Melanie Leng and Prof. Randall Parrish (University of
Leicester/BGS) and Dr. Bernd Wagner (University of Cologne). It is funded by
the BGS University Funding Initiative (BUFI).
e-mail jl237@le.ac.uk
Twitter @jackabus87)
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