Cosmic Forensics Research Group
Current Research Group
Prof. Carolyn Crow
Assistant Professor
Department of Geological Sciences
Carolyn's research focuses on the evolution of planetary crusts through analyses of samples. She is particularly interested in the process of impact cratering and the impact record of the Earth-Moon System.
Jennifer Davis
PhD Student
Department of Geological Sciences
Jenn's research focuses on the influence of impact cratering of geochronologic systems. She is working with samples from the Mistastin Lake impact structure and the KPg boundary in Colorado and New Mexico.
Amanda Alexander
PhD Student
SwRI & Department of Geological Sciences
Amanda studies planetary geology focusing on impact and shock physics using hydrocode simulations and lab experiments. Her research advisor is Simone Marchi at SwRI.
Helle Skjetne
PhD Student
SwRI & Department of Geological Sciences
Helle studies the terrain on Mars, Europa, and Pluto with a focus on secondary craters and regolith formation. Her research advisor is Kelsi Singer at SwRI.
Marcus Richards
Undergraduate Student
Ecology and Evolutionary Biology Department
Marcus' is conducting a petrologic study of an unusual lunar meteorite to better understand its origin.
Patrick Harper
Undergraduate Student
Department of Geological Sciences
Patrick is investigating the chronology and shock history of Martian meteorites.
Previous Students
Sean Pomeroy
Masters Student
Department of Geological Sciences
Sean is continuing our groups' effort to assess the thermal histories of planetary materials. As part of his research, he created a platform to constrain thermal histories from 40Ar/39Ar thermochronology.
Kristen (KC) Campbell
Summer Intern
Geo Lauchpad Program
KC helped develop and test new mineral separation techniques to isolate shocked zircons.
Cynthia Tong
Undergraduate
Department of Geological Sciences
Cynthia is investigating the composition of trapped impact melts in zircons found in Apollo samples. The goal of this project is to better understand the impact histories of these ancient samples and nature of the original zircon source region.
Evan Tucker
Previous Undergraduate
Department of Geological Sciences
Evan developed a new program for thermal modeling of meteorite Ar-Ar data called OPTIMuM. For his senior thesis, Evan used OPTIMuM to thermal histories of three samples from the Moon, Mars, and an H-chondrite. The goal of this work is to better constrain the peak heating and impact conditions experienced by these bodies.
Evan is currently a PhD student and NASA FINESST fellow in the Department of Aerospace Engineering at CU Boulder.
Anthony Green
Department of Geological Sciences
Anthony is testing the adsorptive properties of microporous materials for the application of gas collection in the international monitoring system. As part of his project, he has helped design and build a noble gas adsorption system that has brought a new analytical capability to CU.
