Geosciences Department - University of Rhode Island

Meritt, Debra L., and Veeger, A. I., 2002, Anthropogenic influence on the water chemistry of the upper Wood River basin , Rhode Island , USA (Abstract) : Geological Society of America, Abstracts with programs, Vol. 34, No. 1.

Veeger, A. I., Meritt, Debra L., and Corell, Mark, 2001, Assessing watershed-scale hydrologic response using d¹⁸O and dD; Pawcatuck River watershed, Rhode Island , USA (Abstract) : Geological Society of America, Abstracts with programs, Vol. 33, No. 1.

Veeger, A. I., and Meritt Debra, 2001, Isotope hydrology of the Pawcatuck watershed, southeastern Rhode Island (Abstract) : Geological Society of America, Abstracts with programs, Vol. 33, No. 1.

MeSupervisor: Dr. Anne I. Veeger

Thesis:: Linking water chemistry and land use in the upper Wood River basin

Personal Notes:

My interests include reading, traveling, languages (esp. translating ancient Greek), firewalking, gardening, and continuing professional development. I grew up in the city of Tonawanda in New York State ; when I was 23, I moved to Johnstown , PA , where I learned and practiced the pipefitting trade (through Local Union 354, Plumbers and Pipefitters). In 1995, I began my college career at University of Pittsburgh , where I studied Geology and Ancient Greek (Attic & Homeric). My time at URI has been spent learning more about hydrogeology, with frequent side-trips, if you will, into various and sundry aspects of science, technology, and medicine. As a National Science Foundation Fellow, I had the pleasure of teaching science to fourth-graders at Narragansett Elementary School during the 2001-2002 school year.

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Denver W. Fowler, PhD Candidate
e-mail: df9465@hotmail.com

Degrees: BSc; (Hons) _DUNELM,Geology, University of Durham, UK, 1995-98

MSc; Palaeobiology, University of Bristol, UK, 1999-2000

Area of specialization: Vertebrate Palaeontology

Supervisor: Dr. David E. Fastovsky

Dissertation Topic: Biostratigraphy of the ‘Alamosaurus fauna’

Publications/Presentations:

Fowler, D. W., Simmonds, K., Green, M., & Fowler, K. T., 2002, Reconciling academia and non-academia: an example of a collaborative palaeontological database for the Wealden of the Isle of Wight , UK., SVP 2002, poster session.

Personal Notes:
The last month of my summer 2002 fieldwork was spent in the San Juan Basin, New Mexico, collecting Dinosaurs from the Kirtland Formation (Late Cretaceous). We collected some significant new material including: a partial skull of the ceratopsian dinosaur Pentaceratops, various tyrannosaur limbs and teeth, and the most complete skull of Melvius (a bowfin fish) known to science! Action-photos can be seen at:
http://www.statemuseumpa.org
/Notes_from_the_field/html/index.html

The first half of 2001 I worked with the BBC on the television programme ‘Live from Dinosaur Island ’, a $3m summer special. I helped plan various logistic aspects of the show, and worked in part as a scientific consultant (my MSc thesis formed the basis of some narrative). I also ran one of the dig-sites (Site Orange) giving live broadcasts on both TV and the web. A cumulative total of over 14m people saw my ugly mug on TV. Some of the original web broadcasts can be found in the link below:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/dinosaurs/dinosaur_island/diaries/
iguanodon_latest4.shtml

Since 1995 I have worked at Dinosaur Farm, a small regional museum on the Isle of Wight (southern coast of England ). Here we prepare locally collected dinosaur bones in front of the public as ‘living exhibits’. Interaction and discussion with the public is the primary function of this field-based museum, making it unique; I have not encountered anything quite like it on my travels. I have designed numerous displays for the museum, some featuring specimens from my own collection. The museum website is modest, but expanding. It includes a few of my (poorer) illustrations:
http://www.dinosaur-farm.co.uk/

I started illustrating extinct animals primarily as a means to improve my knowledge of anatomy. Some of my early efforts can be found at:
http://www.dinosauricon.com/artists/df.html

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Kevin Neary, MS Candidate
e-mail:

Degrees:

Area of specialization:

Supervisor:

Dissertation Topic:

Publications/Presentations:

Personal Notes:

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Marcus Ross, PhD Candidate
e-mail: mros1106@postoffice.uri.edu

Degrees: BS in Earth Science, Pennsylvania State University , 1998
M.S. in Paleontology, South Dakota School of Mines and Technology 2002

Area of specialization: Invertebrate Paleontology

Supervisor: Dr.David E. Fastovsky

Dissertation Topic: Mosasaur abundance, diversity, and extinction in the Late Cretaceous.

Publications/Presentations:

Ross, M. and Pranger, T., in press, Microfossil vertebrate assemblage from the Hell Creek Formation, Southwest North Dakota ", Proceedings of the South Dakota Academy of Science.

Ross, M., Varriale, F. and Bell , G. 2002, Preliminary report on the geology and paleontology of the Lower Pierre Shale (Gammon Ferruginous, Sharon Springs, and Mitten Black Shale Members) at the Igloo Burning Ground, Igloo SD, Proceedings of the Kansas Academy of Science, p.51-52.

Personal Notes:
"Dinosaur Details" by Melissa Paugh. Research/Penn State, Vol. 19, no. 4, September, 1998. (This is a popular piece on my senior research project at Penn State , and can be viewed at:
http://www.rps.psu.edu/undergrad/dinosaur.html

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Mark Borelli, PhD Candidate
e-mail: mborrelli@uri.edu

Degrees: BS, Geology and Environmental Studies, Tufts University , Medford , Massachusetts , 1999

MS, Geological Science, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Area of specialization: Coastal geology, near-shore and coastal sedimentary processes, shoreline change and barrier island evolution

Supervisor: Dr. Jon C. Boothroyd

Dissertation Topic: Undecided

Publications/Presentations:

Borrelli, M. and Wells, J. T., 2002, Sediment bypassing, spit progradation and the Cape Lookout “jetty”. Shore and Beach, v. 70, no. 3.

Borrelli, M. and Wells, J. T., in review, Welding swash bars and spit growth: Evolution of a rapidly prograding barrier spit along a sediment-starved coast. Coastal Sediments.

Personal Notes:
Born and raised in and around Boston , Massachusetts .

Favorite Links:
http://www.geosociety.org/ (GSA homepage)
http://marine.usgs.gov/ (USGS Coastal and Marine Geology Program homepage)
http://www.nws.noaa.gov/ (National Weather service homepage)

Some of my current favorites:
http://www.repubblica.it/ (Trying to learn Italian and reading newspapers (online) is an easy way to get improvement)
http://baseball.espn.go.com/mlb/index (For the latest baseball scores and news)
http://www.uc.edu/geology/geologylist/ (A Geologist's Lifetime Field List; gotta keep checking things off!)

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Mark Correl, MS Candidate
e-mail: mcor8682@postoffice.uri.edu

Degrees: BA, Geology, Colgate University , 2000

Area of specialization: Hydrology

Supervisor: Assoc. Professor Anne I. Veeger

Thesis Topic: Hydrologic investigation of the Little Chazy Watershed in the Adirondacks of New York

Personal Notes:

Permanent residence, Cadyville , NY , Hobbies: Hiking A favorite link: www.adk46r.org

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Napussakorn Kashiyama, MS Candidate
e-mail: nkas9211@postoffice.uri.edu

Degrees: BSc. Chemistry, 1995, Srinakarinvirote University , Thailand

M.A.Sc. Environmental Engineering, 1999, University of Regina , Canada

Area of specialization: Hydrogeology (groundwater contamination)

Supervisor: Dr. Thomas Boving

Thesis Topic: undecided

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Prashanth GaliSukumar, MS Candidate
e-mail: prashanth@cs.uri.edu

Degrees: Bachelor of Engineering, Computer Science and Engineering , University Of Madras , India, 2000

Area of specialization: Computer Science – Software Engineering

Supervisor:

Thesis Topic: Generic Double Auction System: Using J2EE technology for simulating oral double auction systems in simulation laboratory for teaching and research purposes

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Udayan Dutta, MS Candidate
e-mail: ud17@yahoo.com

Degrees:
BS in Chemistry and Microbiology, Osmania University , Hyderabad , India , August 1997

MS in Chemistry, Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay , India , August 1999

MS in Chemistry, University of Kentucky , Lexington , KY , August 2001

Area of specialization: Computer Science

Supervisor:

Thesis Topic: Development of an efficient relational database for handling geotechnical data

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Yuichiro Kashiyama, PhD Candidate
e-mail: ykas8787@postoffice.uri.edu

Degrees:
B.Sc. (1999), Geology, University of Tokyo Advisor: Tatsuo Oji

M.S. (2001), Geosciences, University of Rhode Island, Advisor: David E. Fastovsky

Area of specialization: Geochemistry, Paleontology, Sedimentology

Supervisor: Dr. David E. Fastovsky

Dissertation Topic: Nutrient cycling and productivity in terrestrial ecosystems at the Cretaceous/Tertiary boundary, eastern Montana and southwestern North Dakota, USA

Publications/Presentations:

Kashiyama, Y., Fastovsky, D.E., King, J., Rutherford , S., & Montellano, M., 2001, Paleoenvironmental reconstruction of an extraordinary Mid-Cretaceous biota, Tepexi de Rodriguez , Puebla , Mexico . Geological Society of America Abstracts with Program, v. 33, p. 14.

Kashiyama, Y. & Tatsuo Oji, T., 1999, Fauna of low-diversity after the mass extinction: paleoecological study of fossil assemblages in the storm-dominated facies of the Hiraiso Formation, Inai Group (Lower Triassic). Abstracts with Programs, The 1999 Annual Meeting of the Palaeontological Society of Japan, p. 44.

Invited Presentation: Given at a symposium entitled “The mass extinction and the biotic recovery”, University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan , March 28, 2000 .

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