Reports: DNI853196-DNI8: Resolving the Silurian Petroleum System on the Western Margin of the Appalachian Basin: Integrated High-Resolution d13C, Conodont, and Chitinozoan Bio-Chemostratigraphy and the Continuing Search for the Source of Silurian-Hosted Hydrocarbon Resources
printer friendlyThe start of the project was postponed for one year as I awaited my post-doc’s graduation. Dr. Alyssa Bancroft successfully defended her dissertation from The Ohio State University in August, 2014, and is now in residence at the University of Iowa. Dr. Bancroft is one of the only conodont workers under the age of 55 in the world, and as a Silurian conodont specialist, she is ideal for this project. She is now in Iowa City, and is working on the project, but that did not start until September 1st, 2014, and as a result, there is very little to report in Project Year 1.
I have been in contact with Dr. Dean Dunn at the ACS about the situation and he is aware of the progress and personnel associated with this project. Since Dr. Bancroft’s arrival, we have fully set up our conodont laboratory and are actively working on several components of the project, including the production of the Conodont Alteration Index (CAI) map of the Silurian of the Appalachian Basin. This is all work done during Project Year 2, and will therefore be explained in detail in next year’s report.
A new radioisotopic date from the ‘Kalkberg’ Bentonite in the Appalachian Basin (NY) has been returned from the laboratory at Boise State University as part of an unrelated PhD project of a student of mine here at Iowa (not technically part of this grant, and not paid by this grant). However, the data is useful for this project and has provided new information about the duration of the Pridoli Epoch and the placement of Silurian-Devonian boundary in North America. The concordia plot for the 'Kalkberg' bentonite sample CV-2 is included as the graphical TOC.
