Welcome new postdocs: Dr. Eveleth & Dr. Kim (August, 2017)

Two new postdoctoral research associates, Dr. Rachel Eveleth (Duke) and Dr. Hyewon Kim (Columbia), are joining the Computational Biogeochemistry Group in UVA Environmental Sciences this month. They will bring their ocean biogeochemistry research expertise to bear on science questions in the Palmer LTER and NASA NAAMES projects.

After completing her PhD in Earth and Ocean Sciences at Duke University (advisor: Prof. Nicolas Cassar), Dr. Eveleth returned to her alma matter, Bowdoin College, for a year as a Visiting Assistant Professor, before moving to UVA as a Postdoctoral Research Associate. She is interested in bio-physical coupling and it’s impact on carbon cycling, especially in the rapidly changing high-latitude oceans. Her previous work focused on the use of dissolved gas tracers (O2, Ar and pCO2) which capture biological and physical processes at high resolution in the surface ocean. During her postdoc, she will use modeling and remote sensing approaches to expand the spatial and temporal scale of my research questions. She is particularly interested in the role of sea ice variability (ice type, thickness, retreat mechanism etc.) in controlling bloom timing and carbon export along the Western Antarctic Peninsula and in other ice influenced regions. She will also explore links between plankton bloom dynamics and biogeochemistry in subpolar and polar regions. In future years she additionally hope to branch into geoscience education research and continue teaching undergraduates.

Dr. Kim holds a Ph.D. in Earth and Environmental Sciences from Columbia University & Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory (advisor: Prof. Hugh Ducklow). Her research aims to gain a better understanding of how ocean microbial and biogeochemical processes are influenced by large-scale climate dynamics through mediatory local-scale physical forcings. Since 2013 she has been involved in the Palmer Long-Term Ecological Research (LTER) program where she has worked on various projects regarding climate-biogeochemical coupling using a diverse spectrum of mathematical/statistical approaches and modeling. Here at UVA, she will be woking on implementing a time-evolving conceptual ecosystem model to the coastal West Antarctic Peninsula to explore the variability of microbially-mediated carbon flows and their relation to climate/physical variability along the peninsula. Besides her research, she is also very passionate about teaching and mentoring students who are interested in general earth and ocean sciences as well as climate sciences in polar regions in both formal and informal settings.