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Katharine Huntington Assistant Professor Office : arrives September 2008 (ESS mail address) Phone : 206-543-???? Fax : 206-543-0489 (shared) email : kate1* * = @ u . washington . edu web-page : http://www.gps.caltech.edu/~kateh/ |
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Education :
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Research Interests :
The
primary scientific problems that motivate me are in the area of
tectonics and landscape evolution, specifically, the interactions of
deformational, thermal, and surface processes that shape mountain
systems and landscapes.
My
interests include topographic and drainage basin evolution, temporal
and spatial scales of sediment delivery, transients in mountain
ranges related to climate change, and regional geology including
Himalaya-Tibet and western North America.
The
research tools I use and develop draw from the fields of regional
tectonics, geochronology, structural geology, geomorphology, isotope
geochemistry, and sedimentology, and include field-based, laboratory,
and numerical modeling approaches. I
am particularly enthusiastic about the application of two new tools
–
detrital thermochronology of modern river sediments for investigating
erosion and surface processes and ‘clumped’
13C-18C
carbonate thermometry for studying the elevation and climatic history
of Earth’s surface.
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Current Research :
In
November 2006, I began a postdoc at Caltech investigating Colorado
Plateau uplift and erosion using 13C-18C
carbonate
thermometry – a new tool with exciting applications to
paleoaltimetry and a wide range of geologic problems. My thesis work
at MIT focused on documenting erosion rates and patterns of faulting
in the Nepal Himalaya in order to test the hypothesis that
climatically driven erosion has focused deformation along the
Himalayan front through time. This work integrated
40Ar/39Ar
thermochronology, thermal-kinematic numerical modeling,
geomorphology, and structural geology approaches. My additional
research interests include sediment transport mechanics and sediment
delivery to basins in orogenic systems.
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Future Directions :
Future
hypotheses I want to test involve the temporal and spatial scales of
transients in active mountain ranges, as related to climatic and
tectonic forcing. Advancement of cutting-edge detrital
thermochronology/ cosmogenic radionuclide approaches and applications
of the 13C-18C
carbonate
thermometer naturally complement my broader goal of understanding the
nature of feedbacks between tectonics and surface processes at a
variety of timescales. Future projects will combine such approaches
with field geology and geomorphology studies in natural laboratories
and numerical modeling investigations to investigate linkages among
atmospheric, surficial, and solid Earth
processes.
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Graduate Student opportunities :
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Selected Publications : ( "Ruhl, K." = "Huntington, K. W." )
Publications (peer
review) Huntington, K.W., Ehlers, T.A., Hodges, K.V., Whipp, D.M. Jr., 2007. Topography, exhumation pathway, age uncertainties, and the interpretation of thermochronometer ages, Tectonics, 26, TC4012, doi: 10.1029/2007TC002108. Whipp, D.M., Ehlers, T.A., Blythe, A., Huntington, K.W., Hodges, K.V., Burbank, D.W., 2006. Plio-Quaternary erosion and kinematic history of the central Himalaya: Thermo-kinematic model of thermochronometer exhumation, Tectonics, 26, TC3003, doi: 3010.1029/2006TC001991. Huntington, K.W., Blythe, A., and Hodges, K., 2006. Climate change and Late Pliocene acceleration of erosion in the Himalaya, Earth and Planetary Science Letters, Vol. 252, 107-118. Huntington, K.W., Hodges, K., 2006, A Comparative study of detrital mineral and bedrock age-elevation methods for estimating erosion rates, Journal of Geophysical Research – Earth Surface, Vol. 111, No. F3, F03011 10.1029/2005JF000454. Ruhl, K., and Hodges, K..V., 2005. The use of detrital mineral cooling ages to evaluate steady-state assumptions in active orogens: An example from the central Nepalese Himalaya, Tectonics v. 24, TC4015. Hodges, K., Ruhl, K., Wobus, C., and Pringle, M., 2005. 40Ar/39Ar thermochronology of detrital minerals, Reviews in Mineralogy and Geochemistry v. 58, 239-257. Hodges, K., Wobus, C., Ruhl, K., Schildgen, T., Whipple, K., 2004. Quaternary deformation, river steepening, and heavy precipitation at the front of the Higher Himalayan ranges, Earth and Planetary Science Letters, v 220, 379-389.
Publications (other)
Ruhl, K., 1998. Honor Society Service Requirements, in Elements of Writing, Revised Edition (Fifth Course), James L. Kinneavy and John E. Warriner, eds., Holt, Rinehart and Winston, Inc: Austin, TX, p. 311.
Selected Abstracts
Huntington,
K.W.,
Mohrig, D.,
2007. Characterizing Turbidity Current Flow Conditions From Turbidite
Grain Size Distributions, Capistrano Formation, San Clemente, CA. AGU
Fall meeting.
Huntington,
K.W.,
Wernicke,
B.P., Eiler, J., 2007. Paleoaltimetry from “clumped”
13C-18O
bonds in carbonates, Colorado Plateau. Goldschmidt Meeting, Cologne
Germany.
Huntington,
K.W.,
Ehlers,
T.A., Hodges, K.V., Whipp, D.M. Jr., 2006. Age
Uncertainties, Topography, Exhumation Pathway, and the Interpretation
of Erosion Rates and Exhumation Kinematics from Thermochronometer
Age-Elevation Data, Eos
Trans. AGU
87(52), Fall Meet. Suppl., Abstract T11D-0464.
Huntington, K.W.,
Hodges,
K.V., 2005, Detrital thermochronology as a tool for studying the
evolution of transient landscapes. Eos
Trans. AGU,
86(52), Fall Meet. Suppl., Abstract H33F-06 invited.
Ruhl,
K.,
Blythe, A., Hodges, K., 2005, Accelerated Late-Pliocene Himalayan
erosion from fission-track and 40Ar/39Ar
thermochronology and the possible role of climate change.
Geological
Society of America Abstracts with Programs,
Vol. 37, No. 7. Paper No. 153-8.
Ruhl,
K.,
Ruhl, S., 2005, Teaching geologic time and rates of landscape
evolution with dice, sandboxes, and cutting-edge thermochronology.
Geological
Society of America Abstracts with Programs, Vol.
37, No. 7. Paper No. 60-12. Poster
Ruhl, K.
and
Hodges, K., 2004. Exhumation rates from bedrock and detrital
cooling-age elevation signals: effects of post-closure deformation in
the Marsiyandi Valley, Central Nepal, Eos
Trans. AGU,
85(47), Fall Meet. Suppl., Abstract T52A-05. Ruhl, K., Hodges, K., and Schildgen, T., 2003, Detrital mineral cooling-age signal variability and erosion rates, Marsyandi Valley, central Nepal, Eos Trans. AGU, 84(46), Fall Meet. Suppl., Abstract H52D-06. Full CV Link : |
Last Modified : 09/17/2007
