IRES: Landscapes of Deep Time in the Red Earth of France: Research Training in Paleoclimate

University Of Oklahoma Norman Campus, Norman OK

Investigators

Abstract

This project will evaluate sediments deposited 300-million years ago in France at a time of abundant ice on the planet. This project will engage several teams of undergraduates from underserved populations - particularly indigenous peoples of the Plains and Southwest states - in scientific research within a culturally sensitive context. A total of 13 students will travel to France over three years to conduct field and lab work on red sediments analogous to the types of sediments and landscapes familiar to them in the U.S. They will work with both U.S. and French scientists in collecting data in both the field and the laboratory, while also learning about the history and culture of a part of France with a geologic history analogous to that of their homeland. This project will further our understanding of how Earth's surface conditions can behave under conditions analogous to the present. This IRES project will involve three student groups per year undertaking fieldwork in France. Students will test the hypothesis that Carboniferous-Permian strata of basins preserved near the Central Pangaean Mountains (France) archive a record of moderate-elevation glaciation and widespread loess deposits in the paleo-tropics. One PhD student and 4 undergraduates per year will participate in this project, and students from underserved groups, particularly indigenous peoples of the Plains and Southwest states, will be encouraged to participate. These students will conduct fieldwork to document facies attributes, including detailed grain-size analyses, quartz microtextural, geochemical, and geochronological analyses in discrete projects that when merged will test the overarching hypothesis. The proposed research will contribute to the experience base and expertise in sedimentologic/geochemical/geochronological analyses for all participants, while developing datasets and results that will be disseminated largely by student participants. Students from the Native populations will be drawn into a foreign experience that will widen their horizons, yet simultaneously demonstrate a place-based learning wherein stories of past climates are teased from studies of the land. Results will provide important constraints on paleoclimate of tropical eastern Pangaea. Support of the hypothesis would require a large shift in long-accepted reconstructions of climate in eastern Pangaea, whereas a failure of the hypothesis will require renewed efforts to understand meridional climate states across central Pangaea. The Late Paleozoic Ice Age is Earth?s most recent pre-Quaternary glaciation, and thus a common target for climate modelers, using the same models as those employed for climate prediction. Hence, calibrations to these models are critical for understanding broader aspects of Earth's climate system in both deep- and near-time intervals. In summary, the intellectual merit of this project lies in testing hypotheses of Earth?s deep-time climate behavior in order to refine our knowledge of Earth's climate system, including future states. The broader impacts include providing students of underserved populations research opportunities that will help cultivate interest in science and forge new international collaborations.