Sambuddha Misra

Graduate Student

Chemical Oceanography
Major Professor: Dr. Flip Froelich

Geochemistry Group
Rm C-301, National High Magnetic Field Laboratory
Florida State University
Tallahassee, Florida 32306-2740

Research

Measuring Lithium isotopic variation in Cenozoic fossilified foraminiferan samples using ICP-MS is the core of my research work. Calcareous foraminifera secrete a test from the surrounding seawater in which they live and incorporate Li as a trace element and record the oceanic 7Li/6Li isotope ratio through time. The continental crust, hydrothermal fluid and sea water has markedly different Li isotopic signature.

Differences in foraminiferal δ⁷Li are likely to reflect fluctuations in hydrothermal and continental weathering rates over million year time scales. A seawater lithium isotope record may then provide additional texture to the current debate about changes in weathering rates, weathering intensity, uplift, tectonics and erosion, and sea-floor spreading and hydrothermal fluxes. My research objective to establish Li as a paleoproxy of ocean chemistry that will ultimately provide deeper understandings of Earth processes and their rates of change.