Program Winter-Semester 2026/27

15.10.2026

13:15, Lecture hall C.011

Dr.  Charles-Édouard Boukaré (York University, Toronto)

From Early Earth to Hot Rocky Exoplanets

Abstract: Rapid advances in exoplanet research and planetary exploration are blurring the traditional boundaries between earth sciences, geology, planetary science, and astronomy. While a planet’s interior remains difficult to access, it plays a fundamental role in shaping surface conditions. For example, on Earth, plate tectonics and the presence of a magnetic field are direct manifestations of internal dynamics. The interior of the Earth, the planet we understand best, has been extensively studied over the past century using seismic imaging, geochemistry, petrology, and geodynamic modeling. These studies have uncovered major processes that have shaped, and continue to shape, our planet. The question now is: Do these processes also apply to other rocky planets? How can we extend our knowledge of Earth to planets within our solar system and beyond? And can studying other planets help us learn more about Earth itself. In this presentation, I will provide a specific example of how studying the Early Earth can help us understand a particular class of rocky exoplanets known as lava worlds.

Vita: Charles-Édouard Boukaré’s research focuses on understanding the deep interior structure and evolution of rocky planets. His work lies at the intersection of earth and planetary sciences, computational fluid mechanics, mineral physics, and high-pressure chemistry. He earned dual master’s degrees in Engineering Geology and Planetary Sciences in 2012 from the École Nationale Supérieure de Géologie de Nancy (France) before completing a PhD in Geophysics at Université de Lyon (France) in 2016. He then pursued postdoctoral research at Brown University (USA), EPFL (Switzerland), IPGP (France), and McGill University (Canada). He has been an Assistant Professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at York University (Canada) since 2023. Boukaré is particularly known for his work on magma oceans and early mantle dynamics. Over the past ten years, his innovative computational fluid dynamics models and thermodynamic analyses have provided new insights into the early evolution of the Earth, the Moon, Mercury, and exoplanets. In 2022, he was awarded the prestigious international Doornbos Prize for outstanding contributions to the study of the Earth’s deep interior. This honor, presented by the Committee on Studies of the Earth’s Deep Interior (SEDI) of the International Union of Geophysics and Geodesy, recognizes exceptional work by early-career scientists.

Invited by: Lena Noack

22.10.2026

13:15, Lecture hall C.011

Dr. Alex Webb (FUB)

Can a weather event move the solid Earth? (Adventures in salt tectonics)

Invited by: Jürgen Schmidt

29.10.2025

13:15, Lecture hall C.011

Dr. Helen Williams (University of Cambridge)

Novel Stable Isotope Tracers of Magma Ocean Crystallisation Processes and Early Earth Evolution

Abstract: Magma ocean crystallisation on Earth, likely taking place after the intense Moon-forming giant impact and the planetary-scale melting this produced, would have been a major event in the Earth’s history. Magma ocean cooling and crystallisation exerts considerable influence on planetary evolution because certain elements become concentrated in solid phases while others partition into melts, potentially into iron-rich liquids that would have sank to the very base of the mantle. This elemental redistribution would have set the physical properties, rheology and chemistry of the Earth’s mantle and the gases released from it, controlling our early atmosphere, mantle melting behaviour and the loss of heat from the Earth’s core. All of these factors have enormous implications for the Earth’s magnetic field, atmosphere, plate tectonics, and ultimately our planet’s habitability. However, while the theory behind magma ocean crystallisation has been extensively explored, evidence for their occurrence in the geological record is sparse.  In this presentation I will discuss how novel stable isotopes can, in conjunction with other geochemical tracers and geological observations, place new constrains on magma ocean crystallisation and early mantle evolution on Earth.

Vita:  I’m a geochemist and my research interests centre around the application of non-traditional stable isotope systems to understanding the formation and evolution of planetary interiors. I'm interested in topics such as accretion, core formation and the evolution of mantle redox state, isotopic tracing of depleted and enriched mantle components, element cycling and the oxidation state of subduction zones and the secular evolution of the Earth’s mantle.The research tools I use are the stable (naturally occurring) isotopes of the transition metals (elements such as iron, zinc, copper, nickel and platinum), geological samples of planetary mantles like volcanic rocks and meteorites, and high-pressure and/or high-temperature experiments that simulate the conditions inside planetary interiors. I’m presently working on projects relating to magma ocean crystallisation on Earth, likely taking place after the intense Moon-forming giant impact and the planetary-scale melting this produced, and how this may compare to magma ocean processes on other terrestrial planets.

Invited by:  Elis Hoffmann

05.11.2026

13:15, Lecture hall C.011

12.11.2026

13:15, Lecture hall C.011

19.11.2026

13:15, Lecture hall C.011

Dr.  Michael Sukop (Florida International University)

The Enigmatic Biscayne Aquifer: Field, Laboratory, and Computational Approaches

Abstract: The Biscayne Aquifer of southeastern Florida supplies water to approximately 6 million people. It is a Pleistocene eogenetic carbonate karst unconfined aquifer characterized by meter-thick strata of dense networks of 2-cm burrow ichnofossil touching vugs and bedding plane conduits. The porosity of the burrowed zones can be 50% or more and the rock can be difficult or impossible to core. The large pores and high porosity likely result in non-Darcian flow under quite low gradients (>10^-5) and contribute to extremely high hydraulic conductivities (Ks) that are challenging to quantify. While numerous arguments can be made against efforts to quantify a hydraulic conductivity of karstic rocks, enhanced understanding of the operative processes has fundamental value and may ultimately enable higher fidelity flow and transport modeling

Vita: Michael Sukop is professor of hydrogeology in the Department of Earth and Environment and the Institute of Environment at Florida International University in Miami, where he has taught and conducted research since 2003. He is a Fellow of the Geological Society of America, a licensed professional geologist, and a certified hydrogeologist in California. He principally works on groundwater issues in Southeast Florida, including saltwater intrusion, septic systems, injection wells, and groundwater inundation. He has expertise in groundwater and solute transport modeling especially as they apply to seawater intrusion and the physics of the Biscayne Aquifer. He co-authored Version 4 of the popular SEAWAT model for seawater intrusion. He is author and co-author of 2 books on Lattice Boltzmann computational fluid dynamics modeling. Publications are listed here: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=xFIZLe4AAAAJ&hl=en

Invited by: Nadine Göppert

26.11.2026

13:15, Lecture hall C.011

Dr. Thorsten Bauersachs (RWTH Aachen)

Title 

Abstract: 

Vita:

Invited by:  Stefanie Kaboth-Bahr

03.12.2026

13:15, Lecture hall C.011

Dr. Philip Pogge von Strandmann

Carbon Dioxide Removal - How do we keep the Earth habitable?

Abstract:  Keeping anthropogenic climate warming under any sort of reasonable limits will require the artificial removal of CO2 from the atmosphere. Most of the potential techniques of actually reducing atmospheric pCO2 involve accelerating parts of the geological carbon cycle. This talk will discuss two of these techniques, namely "mineral carbonation" and "enhanced rock weathering” - one of which is now operating on an industrial scale, while the other is beginning to be scaled up. However, there is little knowledge of the potential negative implications and efficiency. Hence we will examine the research on these techniques, and whether they have potential to actually be viable techniques for mitigating climate warming.

Vita: Philip is an environmental geochemist who mainly uses the “non-traditional” light metal isotopes to understand Earth surface processes, both in the modern and the geological record. While most of his work still focuses on palaeo-climate, and in particular chemical weathering, he has started using the same tools to understand the artificial carbon cycle, and what we might be able to do about global warming. Philip is the Professor for Sedimentary Geochemistry at Mainz University. Before that he was a Reader in Isotope Geochemistry at University College London, and his career has also included positions at Oxford and Bristol Universities.

Invited by: Timm John

10.12.2026

13:15, Lecture hall C.011

17.12.2026

13:15, Lecture hall C.011

07.01.2027

13:15, Lecture hall C.011

Dr. Peter Clift (University College London)

Mountain Building, Erosion, and Chemical Weathering as Triggers of Cenozoic Global Cooling

Abstract:  Climate is controlled to a large extent by atmospheric CO2 levels over geological time scales. CO2 concentrations reflect a balance between mantle outgassing during volcanism and chemical weathering of silicate rocks and subduction of C-bearing sediments back into the mantle. Global subduction budgets point to long-term net subduction of carbon during the Cenozoic removing carbon from the surface. Silicate weathering has also been linked to mountain building and especially the uplift and erosion of the Himalayas and Tibetan Plateau. Following a campaign of drilling Asian marginal seas it is now practical to estimate weathering and organic carbon burial fluxes in South and East Asia at least during the Neogene. These indicate a sharp rise since the Pliocene but much less impact earlier in the Miocene calling into question the role of India-Asia collision as a climate influence since ~24 Ma. Instead the role of weathering in low latitude arcs and ophiolite belts of the Maritime Continent may have been more important. Estimates from New Guinea imply that this was more impactful to global CO2 level than the Himalayas starting in the Late Miocene. Furthermore, enhanced weathering of extensive tropical continental shelves, especially Sunda Shelf, is now revealed as a crucial modulator of glacial cycles, enhancing cycle amplitude since the subsidence of Sunderland since the Mid Pleistocene Transition.

Invited by: Alex Webb

14.01.2027

13:15, Lecture hall C.011

Dr. Dirk Sachse (GFZ Potsdam / HU Berlin)

Landscapes as Carbon Sponges - Fluvial landscape dynamics and the carbon cycle under natural and anthropogenic forcing

Abstract:  Humans have changed about 3/4 of the Earth surface since the last millennium and detectable human disturbance of landscapes dates back to the early Holocene. With these changes humans have altered biogeochemial fluxes, in particular the flow of carbon from the terrestrial realm into long-term geologic storage in the oceans. But the effect of those changes, its quantification and potential long-term legacy for the Earth’s carbon cycle is not well understood.I will show work on the emerging process understanding of the role of fluvial landscapes in the carbon cycle and discuss how human interaction with such landscapes changes fluxes. In particular I will discuss how our understanding of long-term geologic processes and biogeochemical cycling can be used towards landscapes, that become net-negative, or carbon sponges.

Vita: I am is a Senior Scientist at GFZ Potsdam (Section 4.6 Geomorphology), and lead the Organic Surface Geochemistry Lab. I hold a professorship in Organic geochemistry of the Earth surface system at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. I studied Geology in Jena, obtained a PhD in Organic Geochemistry from the Max-Planck Institute of Biogeochemistry in Jena and conducted postdoctoral research stays at MIT in Cambridge and the University of Washington, Seattle in the USA. I joined the University of Potsdam with a DFG Emmy Noether fellowship in 2009 and later GFZ, where I received an ERC Consolidator Grant in 2015. My research uses organic-geochemical and isotopic tools applied to lake and floodplain sediments to examine biogeochemical cycling and abrupt hydroclimatic change across timescales from decades to millions of years. I am particularly interested in the role of humans in shaping the Earth surface and altering its biogeochemical cycles.

Invited by: Anne Bernhardt

21.01.2027

13:15, Lecture hall C.011

Dr.  Jakob Geersen (Leibniz Institute for Baltic Sea Research Warnemünde)

Integrity of the Baltic Seafloor in the Anthropocene

Abstract: The Baltic Sea has a long history of anthro­pogenic disturbance, which began earlier than in most other oceans and marginal seas. Decades of bottom trawling, eutrophication and oxygen depletion already reduced habitat quality, biodiversity and ecosystem functioning. Considering morphology, physical structure, biogeochemistry, and the benthic ecosys­tem, there is not a single square meter of Baltic seafloor that is not anthropogeni­cally altered. Using marine geophysical data of different resolution and spatial coverage, we make the traces of seafloor modulating processes such as bottom trawling, ship anchoring or propeller wake erosion visible and subsequently evaluate their spatial distribution and intensity. This information is crucial in order to moderate conflicts of interest that arise from the rising demand for space of socio-economic players such as offshore wind, nature conservation, shipping, coastal protection, fishing, military, tourism and many more.

Vita: I am a senior scientist at the Leibniz Institute for Baltic Sea Research Warnemünde (IOW), where I am based in the section of Marine Geosciences. The study of marine geologic processes and their interplay with climate and anthropogenic stressors forms the heart of my research. I investigate these processes in open oceans, marginal seas, continental margins and coastal waters. One of the central topics is the integrity of the Baltic seafloor in the Anthropocene. I am convinced that studying the loss of seafloor integrity in the Baltic Sea, and its link to declining ecosystem health, can provide insight into how environmen­tal conditions and marine ecosystems may change more broadly in the Anthropocene, as increasing technological access brings larger parts of the global seafloor within reach of human activities. To derive information from the seafloor I use marine geophysical data of different resolution in conjunction with visual observations and sedimentary and geochemical archives.

Invited by: Anne Bernhardt

28.01.2027

13:15, Lecture hall C.011

04.02.2027

13:15, Lecture hall C.011

11.02.2027

13:15, Lecture hall C.011

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