Meet Dr. Brian Schubert: Interview with a Geology Professor at UL Lafayette
Meet Dr. Brian Schubert, assistant professor in the UL Lafayette School of Geosciences since January 2013. He is one of two geology master小蝌蚪APP檚 program graduate coordinators and heads the stable isotope geochemistry lab (Schubert Lab), where master小蝌蚪APP檚 in geology students study how plants respond to changes in climate and atmospheric chemistry. 
小蝌蚪APP淲e look at how a plant growing outside today is responding to changes in temperature, precipitation, and carbon dioxide, and we look at relationships between chemical changes within that plant and these different environmental parameters,小蝌蚪APP Dr. Schubert explains. 小蝌蚪APP淲e小蝌蚪APP檙e trying to figure out ways of determining how these different environmental parameters have changed in the past.小蝌蚪APP
Dr. Schubert小蝌蚪APP檚 research requires digging up fossil plants and using stable isotope measurements to determine their chemical composition. Examining the fossilized plants小蝌蚪APP chemical composition provides insight about the temperature, precipitation, and carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere at the time the plant was fossilized. By studying fossil plants from specific time intervals in the Earth小蝌蚪APP檚 history, his lab can determine the atmospheric carbon dioxide levels up to 400 million years ago.
Most of Dr. Schubert小蝌蚪APP檚 research is conducted in the Arctic, an area that is rapidly changing and is still largely unexplored. He visits former forests in many remote locations around the world, including Alaska, Siberia, and northern Canada to extract these fossils and bring them back to the geology master小蝌蚪APP檚 program at the 小蝌蚪APP for analysis.
"For my work, you need the fossil plants and you need them to be of the right age for a time period when climate was fundamentally different or carbon dioxide levels were fundamentally different,小蝌蚪APP he says. 小蝌蚪APP淲hen you find a giant cypress log at 76 north latitude, you know something was fundamentally different that allowed this tree to be here. So then you figure out why, and what that means.小蝌蚪APP
That research has applications for both the energy industry and for additional environmental research.
小蝌蚪APP淎t the fundamental level, we小蝌蚪APP檙e studying organic matter derived from photosynthetic life, and that小蝌蚪APP檚 the same material that makes up our coal, our oil, our energy resources,小蝌蚪APP he says. 小蝌蚪APP淚n addition to that, models for the next 100 years are based on the geologic evidence that we have. We have temperature records and satellite data, but it only goes back 20 to 30 years so it小蝌蚪APP檚 not long-term records小蝌蚪APP攁nd that makes it hard to see what the trend is when you have such a short snippet of time.小蝌蚪APP
The fusion of energy and environmental research, he says, along with the absence of a doctoral program is what makes the master小蝌蚪APP檚 in geology at UL Lafayette a unique experience for students.
小蝌蚪APP淎 lot of geology graduate programs focus on either the exploration side or they小蝌蚪APP檒l focus on the environmental side, but here it小蝌蚪APP檚 very interdisciplinary, looking across chemistry, physics, and geology,小蝌蚪APP Dr. Schubert says. 小蝌蚪APP淎nd I think that because we don小蝌蚪APP檛 have a PhD program, it gives the master小蝌蚪APP檚 students an advantage because they小蝌蚪APP檙e the main research engines. That小蝌蚪APP檚 nice, when you小蝌蚪APP檙e a first-year master小蝌蚪APP檚 in geology student and you小蝌蚪APP檙e working on a really integral part of a key project.小蝌蚪APP
Learn more about our geology master小蝌蚪APP檚 program >
