11 Dr. Eliot Atekwana Professor; Stable Isotope Geochemistry; Hydrogeology Greetings to all alumni and friends! I report to you a successful 2015. I spent the spring semester at the Botswana International University of Science and Technology (BIUST) in Botswana on sabbatical leave. I was back to OSU in the fall. I continue to teach, maintain an active research program and supervise students. In the spring, I taught GEOL-303 Geochemistry and Exploration at BIUST. At OSU, I taught GEOL-5000-359 Master's Thesis, GEOL-4300-001 Geology Colloquium, GEOL-5300-001 Geology Colloquium and GEOL-5243-001 Research Methods and Techniques in Geoscience in the fall semester. In international activities, I worked with my collaborator Dr. L. Molwalefhe and graduate students at BIUST to investigate carbon cycling in the Okavango River, carbon cycling in Lake Ngami in the Okavango Delta and paleoenvironmental change in the middle Kalahari. The sediments for investigating paleoenvironmental change were collected during the drilling of shot points for our National Science Foundation (NSF) active seismic experiment by our collaborators from MIT and UTEP. This is part of our NSF funded research “Collaborative Research: Integrated studies of early stages of continental extension: From incipient (Okavango) to young (Malawi) rifts”. My collaborators, students and I made eight presentations at scientific meetings and published papers in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Solid Earth, Journal of Hydrology, Chemical Geology, and Applied Geochemistry. We also had papers accepted for publication in Hydrological Processes and Science of The Total Environment. I continue to work on projects funded by Newfield Exploration Company, Chevron Energy Technology Company and the National Science Foundation. I continue to work with my MS students Stephanie Wisler, Nicole Paizis and Krystal Heibel and two undergraduate students. I served on several MS and PhD thesis committees throughout the year. Dr. Estella Atekwana Department Head; Regents Professor and Sun Chair; Biogeophysics; Near Surface Geophysics; Tectonophysics I hope this newsletter meets you all in good health. As usual this was a hectic year for me as I wore multiple hats. In the spring semester I taught my gravity and magnetics course in exploration. I had a very lively course and as is the tradition, I had a representative from Geosoft Inc. in Toronto Canada offer a three day workshop. Students learned how to process and interpret data for mineral and oil and gas exploration. Of particular interest was the use of gravity and magnetic data for constraining seismic data in salt environments. In May, I was part of a team of US scientists invited to participate in a "Research Partnership Workshop on Water Resources for Women Scientists from the US and Africa" in Windhoek, Namibia, May 10-12, 2015. Through this networking event, we now have collaborators at Namibia University of Science and Technology. In July I gave an invited keynote address at the Near Surface Asia Pacific Conference - 7-10 July 2015 in Waikoloa, Hawaii. I then left for Malawi mid-July to early August to work on our new NSF International Research Experience for Students project. In October I was in New Orleans for SEG where I chaired a session on potential fields. For the first time we also had a recruiting booth at SEG. Kudos to the SEG student chapter for initiating this. I attended AGU in San Francisco in December. OSU was well represented as we had seven student presentations. I ended the year in Cameroon where Eliot, Hendratta Ali (PhD 2009) and I had an international outreach event at three different institutions (The University of Bamenda, University of Buea, University of Douala and Institute of Mining and Petroleum). We held workshops for students and faculty and presented some of our research. We hope to use this initial visit to build partnerships with these institutions. In January, we presented the results of Year 4 activity to the remediation group at Chevron in Houston Texas. Unfortunately the oil prices have negatively affected the funding of this project and the funding has been severely reduced. In December I was asked to serve as Chair for a new AGU Honors Program: The Africa Awards for Research Excellence in Earth and Space Science. Three MS (Kitso Matende, Daniel Morse and Vincent Somwe) students graduated. Four new students and one postdoc have joined my research group. On the home front, Eliot and I are now empty nesters. Kyle now lives in Maryland, Kyra in Dubai, and Kyne (Fungtu) is a freshman at Georgia Tech. My nephew Nissi is a freshman at OSU. Please drop by to say hello when next you are in town or send me an email if you have any questions regarding the School. View of the fountains of fire, Kilauea Crater, Hawaii
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