Enviroarcheology
Human manipulation of the environment is nothing new. For thousands of years humans have modified natural wildfire cycles, induced artificial selection by selective harvesting, and built middens that collected the remains of past societies. Enviroarcheology is the application of earth science methods to answer archeological questions. I currently have projects in the Yucatan Peninsula and South Florida in geoarcheology.
**I am currently looking for students interested in pursuing a masters in bioscience to complete marine biology projects comparing modern ecological surveys to archeological material**
**I am currently hiring work study students to help with this research project!**
Email me (alecher@lynn.edu) if you are interested in joining the lab as either a graduate student or work study student.
Collecting sediment samples from an archaeological excavation in Palm Beach County.
Hydrology
Hydrology is the study of the water cycle, and coastal hydrology is the study of how the ocean and land-based water bodies (like rivers and groundwater) interact. In my studies of coastal hydrology I research how groundwater discharge to the ocean (commonly called submarine groundwater discharge or SGD for short) transports nutrients (like nitrate and phosphate) and gases (like methane) and trace metals (like iron and zinc) to the coastal ocean. As part of these studies, I evaluate how nutrients, methane, and trace metals impact the part of the ocean they are carried to by SGD. In other coastal hydrology studies I evaluate how mixing between ocean water and groundwater changes water chemistry in the coastal aquifer and on what time scales these processes occur. I also study freshwater hydrological systems in terms of groundwater discharge to lakes.
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| A column experiment I conducted in Israel to determine residence times of seawater in coastal aquifer. |
