Month: May 2024

ESE Spotlight: Banusha Kugabalan on stress and shock effects in rock magnetism

Picture of Banusha, next to her picture, her title: PhD candidate

Banusha Kugabalan is a PhD candidate at the Department of Earth Science and Engineering (ESE) at Imperial. Her work revolves around stress signals in rocks, that occur after ‘shock events’ (like meteorite impacts and earthquakes) causing the magnetic minerals in rocks to align with the magnetic field and record the stress field.

Researchers like Banusha can study magnetic signatures to learn about past impacts and earthquakes on Earth and other planets.

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ESE Spotlight: Mark Boyd on tiny dust grains across space and Earth

Picture of Mark Boyd, next to his picture, his title: Planetary Science PhD candidate
Mark Boyd is a PhD candidate at the Department of Earth Science and Engineering (ESE) at Imperial. He studies tiny, spherical dust grains found in space and on Earth. These ‘microspherules’ hold clues to help us better understand ancient environments and climates.

In this ESE blog post, Mark tells us more about what inspired him to pursue his PhD and shares his hopes for the potential of his research.

Describe your PhD project in a tweet:

I study the tiny to understand the huge – micro-sized, spherical dust grains (including extra-terrestrial material called micrometeorites) that hold clues about planetary and environmental processes.

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