Graduate Programs
The Department of Earth Sciences offers the M.S. and Ph.D. in Geological Sciences.
Graduate education in the Geological Sciences emphasizes general geology combined with specialization in fields such as evolutionary paleobiology, invertebrate paleontology, neotectonics, applied geophysics, earthquake physics, deep crustal and mantle processes, organic geochemistry, geohydrology, mineral deposits, stratigraphy, sedimentology, sedimentary geochemistry, basin analysis, landscape ecology, fire ecology, and natural resource conservation.
Feel free to contact faculty members with specific questions. Their phone numbers and E-mail addresses are in their Faculty Profiles.
The Earth Science Department is excited to announce its new Graduate Program in Global Climate and Environmental Change. Graduate students in this program will be broadly trained in Geological perspectives of climate change including:
- Using the excellent climate record preserved in the Sierra Nevada's glaciers, moraines and lakes to decipher the pattern of local climate change and the relationship to Cenozoic glacial cycles
- Global and regional drivers for climate change and associated feedback mechanisms: from changes in tectonic regimes to fluctuations in the jet stream
- Isotopic studies of modern glacial lakes, Quaternary lake cores and alpine soils
- Sedimentolgy of glacial deposits and stratigraphic relations with associated units
- Evidence of gas hydrate destabilization and impact on both recent and ancient global climate change