Department of Geological and Environmental Sciences

News

  1. Home
  2. News & Events
  3. News
Dr. Gregg Marland is an affiliated research professor in the Department of Geological and Environmental Sciences at Appalachian State University.

Turning point: Global greenhouse emissions will soon flatten or decline [faculty featured]
Nov 24, 2025

In July, a team of scientists assembled on a video call to study an anomalous wobble in a data curve. This blip didn’t signal a new particle decay i...

Dr. Bob Swarthout is an associate professor in the Department of Chemistry and Fermentation Sciences and Department of Geological and Environmental Sciences.

Dr. Bob Swarthout co-authors chemical analysis of USS Arizona oil leak
Nov 10, 2025

BOONE, N.C. — Dr. Bob Swarthout, associate professor in the Department of Chemistry and Fermentation Sciences and Department of ...

According to the National Weather Service, Hurricane Helene made landfall in the Big Bend area of the Florida Gulf Coast as a Category 4 storm late in the evening of Sept. 26, 2024. The storm reached the Southern Appalachians on Sept. 27, 2024, causing widespread flooding, landslides, downed trees and power outages. Image courtesy of National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration/Cooperative Institute for Research in the Atmosphere

What made Hurricane Helene a historic storm?
Sep 9, 2025

BOONE, N.C. — In September 2024, Hurricane Helene brought record-breaking rain and wind to the High Country, leaving a lasting impact across the reg...

Dr. Cynthia Liutkus is professor and chair of Appalachian State University's Department of Geological and Environmental Sciences.

Dr. Cynthia Liutkus co-authors new study revealing 18-million-year-old proteins in fossil teeth
Jul 23, 2025

BOONE, N.C. — Dr. Cynthia Liutkus, professor and chair in Appalachian State University's Department of Geological and Environmental Scienc...

App State environmental science majors Kyia Wing, a senior from Suwanee, Georgia, left, and Kaden Cusack ’25, an App State alumnus from Cary, take a close look at the new boulder donated to the university’s rock garden by Albemarle Corp. Cusak graduated from App State in May, earning his bachelor’s degree in environmental science. Photo by Chase Reynolds

Rock garden and lab expanded at App State after Helene cleanup
Jul 2, 2025

BOONE, N.C. — Appalachian State University’s Fred Webb Jr. Outdoor Lab and Rock Garden — a resource for geology students, researc...

Water tracks, shown by the darker curvilinear parallel bands of green vegetation, transmit water downslope into the Upper Kuparuk River on the North Slope of Alaska in July 2019. Credit: Qifan Yang

Water Tracks: The Veins of Thawing Landscapes [faculty co-authored]
Jun 27, 2025

In the Arctic, one of the primary paths for water to flow is along water tracks, stream-like features that fill with and route water when the soil abo...

Tucker Terrell ’25, who graduated from App State in May with a bachelor’s degree in geology-environmental geology, far left, shows community members where a single headstone was located by App State researchers trying to determine the position of grave sites in an area formerly covered with brush behind the Fort Defiance site in Caldwell County. Photo by Bret Yager

App State researchers uncover hidden history at Fort Defiance
Jun 23, 2025

BOONE, N.C. — In a newly discovered graveyard at Fort Defiance in Caldwell County, an interdisciplinary effort led by Appalachian State Un...

UCalgary paleontologist Darla Zelenitsky and PhD candidate Jared Voris, left, helped identify the dinosaur species using fossils found in Mongolia. Photo by Riley Brandt, University of Calgary

Jared Voris '16 identifies second new dinosaur species
Jun 18, 2025

BOONE, N.C. — Appalachian State University alumnus Jared Voris '16 is the lead author of a new Nature study identifying a new sp...

App State senior Tucker Terrell, a geology-environmental geology major from Burlington, explains how he used ground-penetrating radar to locate unmarked burials of enslaved people at Fort Defiance, located near Lenoir in Caldwell County. The work helped confirm ancestral stories and the role of enslaved people in the fort’s history. Terrell is one of three undergraduate students who were honored with awards for their research at the university’s 28th Annual Celebration of Student Research and Creative Endea

Geology major Tucker Terrell receives award at Annual Celebration of Student Research and Creative Endeavors
May 8, 2025

Tucker Terrell, of Burlington, a senior geology-environmental geology major, used ground-penetrating radar to establish the location of burials of ens...

Brian Zimmer

Brian Zimmer receives April 2025 staff shout out
May 2, 2025

A student described Zimmer as "incredibly helpful, down to earth, and exciting." They added, "He made geology very fun and I had an amazing time learn...

Subscribe