Paleoecology Research
My research involves reconstructions of past environments through the use of botanical microfossils. I get cores of sediment from the bottoms of lakes and extract fossil pollen, charcoal, and diatom shells from it. I take samples from different levels of the core, assuming that the deepest levels are the oldest and those close to the surface are the youngest. I get radiocarbon dates to confirm the actual age of several sediment layers. For each sample, I identify and count pollen from different species of trees and grass and use statistics to figure out the vegetation type and probable climate at the time that the plants distributed that pollen. Most lakes in the US are less than 20,000 years old, but Pittsburg Basin sediment record goes back at least 130,000 years. I also measure amounts of fossil charcoal to determine how often the vegetation burned. Finally, fossil diatoms, the shells of microscopic algae, can tell me about water chemistry conditions, which also depend on climate.
© 2001 Rebecca Teed.
Last updated 1 March 2001
