Lucien Nana Yobo
Texas A&M University-College Station, TX·Earth & Environmental Science
Huge volcanic eruptions and periods of low ocean oxygen have repeatedly reshaped Earth's oceans, climate and life. The key question is timing: did the volcanism happen at the same moment as these environmental crises, and could it have caused them?
- Fields
Earth & Environmental Science
- Topics
large igneous provinces
Caribbean Large Igneous Province
oceanic anoxic events
- Grants
- 2 known grants, through Aug 2029
What they work on
- Determine the timing, duration and eruption rates of the Caribbean Large Igneous Province by U-Pb dating of zircon crystals with CA-ID-TIMS, using ash layers from ocean drilling cores and Colombian field sections.
- Test whether Caribbean volcanism drove Oceanic Anoxic Event 2 or 3 using Re-Os isotopes and platinum-group elements in sediments, and use zircon chemistry and hafnium isotopes to distinguish mantle plume from arc magmas.
- Tie Late Devonian mass extinctions to black shales from inland seas in North and South America using conodont fossil dating, Re-Os geochronology and redox geochemistry that tracks ocean oxygen.
- Estimate Late Devonian carbon burial, CO2 drawdown and oxygen rise by refining the Macrostrat database, and build uranium and carbon isotope records from Western Australian carbonates.
More about the research
Answering this requires precise rock ages and chemical records of ocean conditions. The two projects address this question for two intervals: the Cretaceous Caribbean volcanic province and the Late Devonian mass extinctions.
Why it matters
Understanding how massive volcanism and ocean oxygen loss affected the carbon cycle and marine life helps explain how Earth's climate system reacts to large disturbances. The work adds precise timelines for past crises, reuses national ocean drilling core collections, and improves an open geologic database. It could inform understanding of how today's habitable planet developed.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Collaborative Research: Constraining the timing of emplacement of the Caribbean Large Igneous Province and its relationship to Oceanic Anoxic Events
NSF · Sep 2026 – Aug 2029
Collaborative Research: Integrated Late Devonian Earth evolution: Diverse perspectives on ocean-climate-biosphere interaction from Laurentia and Gondwana
NSF · Nov 2024 – Oct 2027
Closest labs
Kevin Konrad
Oregon State University, OR·Earth & Environmental Science
Determine when the Manihiki and Hikurangi Plateaus formed, how long that took, and whether eruptions came in pulses, using high-resolution 40Ar/39Ar dating of their lavas.
Celina Suarez
University of Arkansas, AR·Earth & Environmental Science
Establish a refined chronology of terrestrial ecosystem change across the Cretaceous Thermal Maximum, using carbon-isotope chemostratigraphy and radioisotopic dating of zircon, eggshell and pedogenic (soil-formed) carbonates.
Clara Blattler
University of Chicago, IL·Earth & Environmental Science·Early-career
Test hypotheses about the size and meaning of the Great Oxidation Event and the Lomagundi-Jatuli Event, using Paleoproterozoic carbonate rocks drilled in Fennoscandia in 2007.
The school
Texas A&M University-College Station: 23 labs on PI Pages, $1.4B a year on research, 768 research doctorates a year.
Reach out
A start for your email. Fill in the brackets.