Aquatic Organic Geochemistry » Students

Anna Belcher wins awards

rickkeil — Mon, 25 Oct 2010 02:38:45 +0000

Congratulations Anna! Miss Anna Belcher, who came to UW in 2008-2009 as an exchange student from the UK’s University of Southampton School of Ocean and Earth Science, and who returned in summer 2010 for three research cruises (Hawaii, Clayoquot and Washington Margin), has won two major awards.

In addition to receiving her MSci Oceanography degree in June 2010 with 1st class honors, Anna was also named one of the UK’s top 10 undergraduate students for 2010. The top-10 list is unranked, but we know Anna is number one!

You can read about Anna’s Top-10 ranking on

Anna was a featured guest on BBC Wales’ morning show with Jamie and Louise. Listen to Anna’s BBC Interview (Oct 12, 2010).

Anna was also awarded the inaugural Challenger Medal, the UK’s top prize for undergraduate research in Oceanography, and the Challenger Society’s only award that comes with a cash prize. Way to go Anna!

Follow this link for a selection of snapshots of Anna from her time here in our lab in Seattle. We’d like to think that we positively influenced Anna, and we certainly know she brought a bright light to our lab while she was here.

Nick Ward earns MS

rickkeil — Tue, 25 May 2010 23:05:39 +0000

Our beloved Nick Ward, wind surfer, bodacious sailor and general all-around good guy received his masters degree on Thursday May 20th after a 45 minute presentation on his research evaluating river nutrient and lignin chemistry in the Hood Canal region.

Nick’s research focuses on nutrient loadings into Hood Canal from two rivers in the south canal region. He is working on two manuscripts from his work, and after that will be transitioning to PhD work on the Amazon river.

Nick was co-advised by Rick Keil and Jeff Richey. To learn more about Nick and to learn about Jeff’s Rivers Research Group, follow this link…

S.U.R.F. Students make Donation to Lab

rickkeil — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 20:00:46 +0000

Our AOG lab is the happy recipients of a substantial donation by UW’s undergraduate club S.U.R.F. This group of amazing undergraduates and alumni from the School of Aquatic and Fishery Sciences put on a benefit rock concert last fall, and donated all the profits to our citizen science group SoundCitizen. In a private interview, Rick said he was “gratified that the undergraduate population here at the UW is so willing to work for causes they believe in” and that he was “looking forward to helping SoundCitizen mentor more undergraduates as they study and practice environmental sciences here at our great university”.

The money is being used to support undergraduate internships in SoundCitizen. “This substantial gift will help support the activites of SoundCitizen and will allow the undergraduates working in the lab to expand their analytical capabilities” said Keil.

New Faces in the Lab

rickkeil — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 21:30:58 +0000

Chloe Anderson, Amanda Hacking and Kelsey Powers

AOG is proud to have recruited three new undergraduates to work on SoundCitizen research. Welcome to Amanda Hacking and Chloe Anderson, both in their second year as Oceanography majors. Welcome back to Kelsey Powers, who was our summer intern in 2008. Thanks for (re) joining the team!

Kelsey McDuffee – MS Degree Recipient

rickkeil — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 21:39:56 +0000

Congratulations to Miss Kelsey McDuffee, who successfully defended her Masters Degree in Oceanography on July 9, 2009. Kelsey’s thesis “A 100 year sedimentary record of the contributions of marine, plant and soil organic matter to an anoxic fjord” provides a new level of understanding for both the geochemical processing of lignin and etherlipids in marine environments, but also establishes the first climate record based on marine records of terrestrial proxies on Vancouver Island BC.

Kelsey will spend the rest of the summer finishing up her MS manuscript and working on her PCC Certificiate in Climate Change Science.

For a slide show of Kelsey during her time with us, follow the link for more…

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Graduation 2009!

rickkeil — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 18:55:10 +0000

Graduation Day 2009 was sunny and splendid. Everyone enjoyed themselves except for Rick who wept constantly at the loss of his latest batch of kids. Forever growing up and leaving the UW nest…

On the left: In keeping with Cambridge tradition, which we learned about from our dean Arthur Nowell, new alumni Ali, Tricia and Britta hold one finger of their mentor Rick as they enter UW’s Husky Stadium for the conferral of their degrees…

Follow the link below for more pictures (on two pages).

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Download the hi-res versions as a single zip file (75mb)

Cruising to the Kermadec Arc!

rickkeil — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 02:14:04 +0000

Rick and Jaqui are gearing up to participate in a cruise to New Zealand’s Kermadec Arc. The cruise is a teaching partnership between the UW School of Oceanography and New Zealand’s Institute of Geological and Nuclear Sciences (GNS). We will be working with Cornel de Ronde and his group, which coincidentally includes Heidi Berkenbosch, UW SOO class of 2006 and Indian Ocean cruise participant. It will be fun to cruise with Heidi again.

We will also be fortunate to have Dan Fornari and Tim Shank from WHOI aboard with us. The cruise is part of the School’s undergraduate program. Please check out the class web site. Want to study to be an oceanographer? Come to UW and see the world! The image shown is from NOAAs web page on their cruises to the Kermadec Arc. Check it out!

Blast from the Past

rickkeil — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 18:31:17 +0000

Rick had the pleasure of meeting up with Dr. Dan Donato, class of 1997 and former AOG member, for dinner and beers. Dan is transitioning from his PhD at Oregon State University to a new postdoctoral appointment with the US Forest Service. You may remember Dan from such amazing AOG events as the FirstFriday debacle of November 1994 or the infamous trip to the sugarcane fields of Brasil in 1995, but he is perhaps best known as the lead author of the Biscuit Fire Paper of 2006 where he (gasp!) used science to refute a Bush administration policy. There is even a wiki page about the Biscuit Fire Publication Controversy. We stand beside Dan and wish him the best of luck has he travels the rim of fire quantifying carbon storage in tropical mangrove systems. Rick asked if his former helper needed a helper, but it looks as if Rick is staying put in cold and soggy Seattle for a while longer…

SoundCitizen Program Launched

rickkeil — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 17:01:11 +0000

Our citizen-action program SoundCitizen was officially launched on Saturday November 22nd. In cooperation with COSEE-OLC, Sea Grant, and the Seattle Aquarium, we now have more than 200 chemical sampling kits in the hands of everyday citizens. Check out the program - Soundcitizen.org

Clayoquot Cruise a Success

rickkeil — Sun, 06 Jul 2008 06:11:30 +0000

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images from leg 1: Rick, Cheryl, Kelsey P, Christine, Julie, Mitch, Miles, Shayma and Ray

Sixteen days at sea aboard the RV Barnes. Maybe that is a little too long. Thanks from Rick to Miles, Cheryl, Kelsey, Kelsey, Julie, Mitch, Christine, Brandon, Esther, Shayma and Ray for making the cruise a success. All our samples were collected, the experiment went well, and we collected many water, particle and sediment samples for analysis back in the lab.

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Images from leg 2: Rick. Miles, Kelsey M, Brandon, Esther, Shayma and Ray