Click photo to visit our Freshmen Page.
The department's basement seismometer picked up a pair of strong earthquakes that struck off the coast of Baja, Mexico, on April 12, 2012, only minutes apart. The seismometer updates every 10 minutes. Click on image to see recent activity.
Moon rocks & meteorites land in Locy Hall! (Left) Prof. Donna Jurdy and graduate student Renee French receive the rare samples. (Center) Lunar samples. (Right) Thin sections. Students in EPS course, Finding a Habitable Planet, examined the samples which were on loan from NASA.
Students and field assistants celebrate one of the final installations of a SPREE (Superior Province Rifting EarthScope Experiment) station. These seismometers will record earthquakes from around the world. Click image for more info on SPREE.
Graduate student Young Ji Joo dissolves carbonates in samples with acid in the Sedimentary Geology lab.
Graduate student Allison Baczynski participated in the Bighorn Basin Coring Project site in Wyoming last August. Collected cores will provide a unique opportunity to directly compare sedimentological, geochemical and palynological data in an effort to better understand the causes and effects of past greenhouse events.
View from a helicopter flying over Scoresby Sund, East Greenland. Yarrow Axford sampled lakes in the Scoresby region with collaborators in summer 2011.
Graduate student Laurel Childress collected sediments for her research during a University National Oceanographic Laboratory System (UNOLS) training cruise. She sailed from Newport, OR to Astoria Canyon (offshore).
Book Cliffs, Utah - Earth 331, Field Problems in Sedimentary Geology, field trip, August 2011
Field trip to Baraboo, WI, for hands-on geological instruction as part of the EARTH 201 course. Click image for a photo album on this overnight event. 
Spring Break Yucatan (Mexico): Fun, Sun and Science. Click to watch the video explaining the goals and activities of this immersive learninng experience for undergraduate and graduate students. 
Andrew Jacobson (right) and former postdoc Joel Moore sit with the Picarro G1101-i, an instrument they will use to measure the concentration of carbon dioxide in Evanston's atmosphere. Photo by Amanda Morris. Click photo to see today's concentration levels.
Yarrow Axford and a colleague assemble a portable sediment-coring platform at a lake in West Greenland. Click to read more about this research program providing knowledge on climate and environmental change from lake sediment cores. 
Steve Jacobsen measures material properties under high pressure conditions in the new Mineral Physics lab.
Professor Okal at Tang Mud Volcano, Beluchistan, Iran, 2010.Student Research Highlight
Josh Townsend recieves 2012 Kraus grant from MSA
Graduate student Joshua Townsend has received the 2012 E.H. Kraus Crystallographic Research Grant from the Mineralogical Society of America for his proposal entitled, “Extra-solar planetary mineralogy: the role of H2O in crystal structures”. The award of $5000 will support his research in the area of high-pressure mineral physics.
Looking for connections: Greg Lehn and the changing climate in the Artic
It was quite a busy summer and fall for EPS graduate student, Greg Lehn. In July, he traveled to the U.S. Army Cold Regions Research and Engineering Lab (CRREL), in Fairbanks, Alaska. While he was there, Greg sliced and processed the frozen permafrost soil cores he and collaborators have collected over the past two summers from watersheds on the North Slope of Alaska. He then analyzed the elemental and isotope (Ca and Sr) composition of soil and soil water.
A Journey to the Yucatan
Led by Patricia Beddows, lecturer and assistant chair of Earth and planetary sciences, nearly 20 Northwestern students studied carbonate geology and aqueous geochemistry during an eight- day field trip to the Yucatan Peninsula. During the trip they snorkeled in cenotes, collected and dissected sediment cores, explored area rivers and enjoyed the region's culture and delicious Mexican fare.
Earth and Planetary Sciences
Nestled on the Evanston campus beside Lake Michigan, the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences (EPS) provides a close-knit, collegial atmosphere for undergraduate and graduate study. Students enjoy intimate access to our internationally renowned faculty and the department is recognized for a supportive and collaborative atmosphere where research and teaching are pursued at the forefront of earth and planetary sciences. A number of our faculty have been recognized with teaching awards and medals from professional organizations like GSA and AGU, and the university has recently completed construction of a state-of-the-art analytical facility for earth and planetary science research. To learn more about our department, undergraduate and graduate programs, people, analytical facilities, and more, please explore our website, download our annual newsletter, Epicenters, or contact us. Our contact information can be found in the footer of this web page.
How to find us: Follow the link to the Northwestern University Interactive Campus Map, choose Evanston campus, and enter Locy Hall.
Directions from O'Hare International Airport
News
>> See all newsUndergrads Alice and Jenny Elected to Phi Beta Kappa
Professor Donna Jurdy Wins Teaching Award
Banner Year for Undergraduate Research Grant Program Awards
Hiring a Radiogenic Isotope Laboratory Technician
For Freshmen Interested in Earth and Planetary Sciences...
Seminars
>> See all eventsMay 18, 2012, 3:30 PM
Episodic tremor and slip and implications for subduction zone geodynamics
May 25, 2012, 3:30 PM
A Seismic Conversation - Interplate Thrust Earthquakes and Off-Trench Flexural Earthquakes in Subduc
Photos
A warehouse of SPREE seismometors
Professor McInerney's Paleobiology class at the Field Museum of Natural History
Photo taken by Andrew Jacobson in Fiordland, NZ.
Caption: Grace Andrews and Greg Lehn sample the Cleddau River, Fiordland, New Zealand
Photo taken by Andrew Jacobson in Fiordland, NZ.
EARTH 201 students at Natural Bridge State Park in Baraboo, WI
Rosemary Bush on the road to camp in Ethiopia near the top of the highland plateau.
Rosemary Bush standing below a carbonized tree trunk preserved in volcanic ash. Ethiopia.
Rosemary Bush holding the part and counterpart (and a scale) of an incredibly well-preserved frog fossil in Ethiopia.
Andrew Jacobson's metal-free clean lab
Brian Kristall chisels a banded iron formation near Marquette, MI.
Greg Lehn collects water samples from a river on the North Slope of Alaska.
