Sam Matson & Isaac Gagner (Univ of NE State Museum) are using our SEM to examine 12 Ma algal mats from Ashfall Fossil Beds State Historical Park. Several mats preserve tracks, likely from bone-crushing dogs that scavenged on the rhinos, horses, and camels that died at the waterhole from inhaling ash

Eric Leonard from Colorado College is accessioning 21 cores collected in the Canadian Rockies between 1979 and 2004. The material will be split and archived in our repository to support future research.

Aidan Brennan from Western Washington University is splitting cores collected in the Cascades of northern Washington to understand the timing, rate of motion, and morphology of deep seated slope deformations. Field photo by Alex Grant, USGS

The CSD's Town Hall at GSA Connects will occur on Sunday, Oct. 11 from 6:30-9:30 PM in the Hyatt Regency Denver Centennial Ballroom B! We hope to see you there!

Connecting Science 🌍 in Samani at the ICDP Horoman Workshop: International and Japanese scientists gathered in Samani, Japan, near UNESCO Global Geopark Mt. Apoi, to define scientific targets for drilling and CO₂ injection in the Horoman peridotite ℹ️ www.icdp-online.org/projects/by-...

THAW Workshop Call (Yellowknife, NWT Canada): Thawing of permafrost and cryosphere-associated gas hydrates by Arctic warming 📍February 24-27, 2027, Yellowknife, NWT Canada ℹ️ MORE INFO: www.icdp-online.org/projects/by-... 👉 WORKSHOP CALL PDF: www.icdp-online.org/fileadmin/Ne...

📢 JOB OPPORTUNITY | ICDP Education & Outreach Science Coordinator 🌍 Interested in supporting international scientific drilling education and outreach? Find out more and submit your application here: www.gfz.de/en/career/jo... 📅 Application deadline: 14 Oct. 2026

VGSP Isabel Strachan from McGill University is sampling cores from lakes in Guatemala for analysis of fecal stanols. She will compare census data with the human waste indicators to see if quantitative demographics can be determined from the sediment proxy.

The ICDP DeepDust team has already collected 2151 feet of core from the Permian sediments of western Oklahoma. The cores record the history of equatorial Pangea during a crucial time of environmental change on Earth.

VGSP Julia Bradshaw and Victoria Toriello from University of Connecticut and Aspen Hein from University of Oklahoma are sampling cores from Lake Tanganyika as part of the NSF BoCP project. The studies will allow for more detailed reconstructions of past environments and future changes in the lake

Marta Wojewódka-Przybył from the Institute of Geological Sciences, Polish Academy of Sciences, is sampling sediment cores collected from Lake Atitlán, Guatemala. She will analyze remains of tiny crustaceans to reconstruct how lake biological communities responded to climatic changes.

Tyler Karp and Ella Wood from the University of Chicago are sampling archived cores collected in the Pittsburgh Basin in southern Illinois in 1995. This is a pilot study to determine if lipid biomarkers in the sediment can detect the differences in the population densities of large herbivores.

VGSP Oluwatunmise Akanmu from Georgia Southern U has split and described the cores he collected in Blue Ridge Lake, a reservoir formed following dam construction in 1930. He will combine sedimentological observations with geochemical analysis to study nutrient storage and environmental change.

The Trans Amazon Drilling Project team has finished splitting and sampling their cores from the 925 m deep borehole at Marajo, Brazil. Sample analysis will continue at the researcher's home institutions for phytoliths, charcoal, diatoms, ostracods, pollen, fish fossils and other geochemical proxies.

CSD Facility staff are in the field in Turkana, Kenya supporting planning for the TARGET project. We are working on site selection, water access, camp planning, community engagement initiatives, and relationship development: www.icdp-online.org/projects/by-...

This month 25 team members from 15 institutions and 5 countries are working to process 734 meters of core collected at the second drill site for the Trans Amazon Drilling Project. Initial results from their first site have been published in Scientific Drilling: sd.copernicus.org/articles/35/...

Researchers from Washington University in Saint Louis are sampling cores collected from lakes Lachuá and Amatitlán in Guatemala for leaf waxes which will help them reconstruct Holocene hydroclimate and ecosystem changes.

CSD Facility staff presented at the ICDP Workshop DeepCHB: Deep Chew Bahir Drilling Project in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. This project aims to drill deep enough to access the base of the Quaternary, enabling detailed reconstructions of the region’s climatic, ecological, and anthropogenic evolution.

Researchers from the University of Kentucky are splitting gravity cores collected from Lake Tanganyika. Ancient environmental DNA and other proxies will be analyzed from subsamples of these cores to study the food web dynamics of this critical East African fishery.

The deadline for the 2026 CSD Research Support Grant has been extended! Applications are now due July 10, 2026 at 5pm EST. CSD will offer a grant-making program designed specifically to support early career scientists conducting research in areas that touch the CSD mission.

CSD Facility staff collected cores with the Kentucky Geological Survey in Lake Metropolis, Paducah, KY. They are investigating changes since European colonization, flood events, and heavy-metal pollution. The lake sits in the Ohio River floodplain, ~100 km before the confluence with the Mississippi.

The Administration's Office of Management and Budget (OMB) released a proposed rule that would politicize federal science grantmaking, replacing scientific rigor with ideological gatekeeping. AGU President Brandon Jones on why it's important to make your voices heard: spklr.io/6011E3zfZ

In Oct 2023, U Kentucky researchers and CSD staff cored Jackson Lake in Grand Teton Nat. Park. Underwater landslide deposits in the cores record earthquakes on the Teton fault that will help reconstruct the timing, magnitude, and recurrence intervals for assessing future quakes youtu.be/cZ3jjZYGWV0

Jackson Lake Uwitec Coring

In October 2023, researchers from the University of Kentucky joined colleagues from Continental Scientific Drilling Facility to core the deepest parts of Jackson Lake in Grand Teton National Park,…

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Amarbat Otgonganbat from SUNY ESF is sampling cores he collected in Lake Dood Tsagaan, Mongolia to analyze biogenic silica and diatom taxonomy to determine whether water quality changes over the past few hundred years could be responsible for the decline in the endangered humpback whitefish.

VGSP Lina Cabrera Saenz from Florida Inst of Tech is describing cores from Ecuador and Peru in regions with a long history of human occupation. She will use XRF data to study the ecological legacies of cultivation and forest management in Amazonia. Read more here journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10....

We are excited to roll out the zero waste program in the lab! facilities.umn.edu/our-services/waste-recycling-reuse/zero-waste

We are hiring a new lab manager to operate the XRF core scanner in Duluth. Responsibilities include operating the XRF, interfacing with users, and overseeing data management. Requires regular travel between Duluth and Minneapolis - Apply now to join the team! hr.myu.umn.edu/jobs/ext/373...

Charlie Alavi from Western Kentucky University is sampling 13 cores collected during different projects in Jackson Lake, WY to isolate charcoal fragments preserved in the sediment. Charlie will compare their results with the historical record of fire activity in the area.

Students in Jill Coleman Wasik's Environmental Analysis at University of Wisconsin River Falls visited the lab to split and describe the cores they collected at Twin Lakes, WI this past winter.

INVITATION: Joint ICDP/ECORD Townhall Meeting 2026 📍 Location: Austrian Academy of Sciences, Dr. Ignaz Seipel-Platz 2, 1010 Vienna 📅 Date: Monday 4 May 2026 ⏰ Time: 19:00 CEST (7 PM), 18:30 Arrival of Guests 📌 Mark your calendar and join us for an inspiring experience at EGU26!