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What has the Earth’s magnetic field ever done for us?
Speaker: Claire Nichols
Associate Professor of the Geology of Planetary Processes, Department of Earth Sciences, St Edmund Hall, University of Oxford
Claire will be talking us about her work on the Earth’s magnetic field and it’s importance to us.
In her research Claire uses magnetism as a novel tool to understand Earth and planetary formation, the environment of early Earth and planetary habitability. Earth has undergone billions of years of complex physical and chemical evolution leaving many questions about its earliest history unresolved. By interrogating the magnetic signals preserved by ancient terrestrial and extraterrestrial materials much insight can be gained as to how our solar system and planet formed and how life subsequently emerged. Claire combines synchrotron and electron microscopy techniques with rock magnetism, paleomagnetism and fieldwork in an attempt to understand planetary formation and Earth’s earliest history.