Acquisition of a Rapid Sediment Analyzer

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This award supports acquisition of a rapid sediment analysis system for fine-grained sediments. The acquisition has an institutional contribution of one half of the system cost. The instrument being acquired operates on the principle of laser diffraction making analysis time very short. The instrument will be used to support research work that relates to paleoenvironmental change during the Pleistocene and Holocene. Specifically, sediments from the Antarctic continental shelf contain a very high resolution record of changing paleoenvironmental conditions over the last several thousand years. The instrument will be applied to studies of sediment records related to glacio-marine deposition which are related to advances and retreats of the Antarctic ice sheets. This instrument is an asset to a strong undergraduate research program and it will also benefit other undergraduate institutions in the region.