Earth Sciences

Congratulations to Sami Mikhail on completion of his PhD with a thesis entitled “Stable isotope fractionation during diamond growth and the ’s deep carbon cycle”. (UCL supervisor: Dr Adrian P Jones, external supervisor: Dr Sasha Verchovsky, Open University and industrial supervisor: Dr Simon Lawson at DTC). Viva internal examiner: Prof Hilary Downes (Professor of Geochemistry, Birkbeck College) and external examiner: Prof Monica Grady (Professor of Planetary and Space Sciences at the Open University).

Sami’s research attempted to constrain the geodynamic cycling of carbon by studying the isotopes of carbon and nitrogen in mantle diamond samples and sometimes in little pieces of iron carbide trapped in mantle diamond samples. By studying two elements in a mineral that is effectively mono-elemental, Sami has found evidence of a few things to do with the Earth’s volatile cycling and relative budgets between reservoirs. He is also proud to say that he has also mastered the art of interpreting interpretations and tentative speculation.

Sami remains an Honorary Research Associate at UCL and is now doing a short postdoctoral study at the PSSRI, Open University before heading off to Washington DC to undertake a Carnegie postdoctoral fellowship at the Geophysical laboratory to address some of the questions that have arisen through the confusion derived from the work in his PhD thesis.