Projects for graduate students at WWU

Volcanology
I have had several graduate students work on volcanology-related theses. Dave Tucker worked on the eruptive stratigraphy of the Hannegan Caldera northwest of Mt. Baker. The Hannegan caldera erupted about 4 million years ago and is a precursor to Mt. Baker volcanism. This caldera is a rare representative of explosive volcanism in the Cascades during the Pliocene. It is associated with approximately coeval granitic wallrocks.
Dylan Taylor worked on very young (<15,000 yrs) basaltic cones and flows related to Glacier Peak. Glacier Peak has erupted dominantly dacitic magmas (both as explosive Plinian eruptions and as lava flows) and the basalts are an intriguing view of the more mafic parts of the system. The relationship of these basalts to the dacites is poorly understood.

Available research projects: there are an unlimited number of volcanology projects in the Cascades that can be devised and undertaken by graduate students. The examples given here are certainly not an exhaustive list:

(1) Glacier Peak is a high priority, as this volcano has not been mapped in detail, and its petrology is poorly understood. This is surprising given how active this volcano is. Thus any projects that involve mapping and dating segments of the volcano or studying individual flows in great detail are sorely needed.
(2) Mt. Baker has been the subject of an exhaustive study by Wes Hildreth of the USGS. He has described Mt. Baker as a "rather boring" andesitic volcano, but there are aspects that warrant further study, including the mafic olivine bearing flows of the southern flanks, and further study of the petrology of the ignimbrites and associated dikes/stocks within the Hannegan caldera. Figuring out the mixing process responsible for the generation of Mt. Baker andesite is also a high priority.
(3) Mt. Rainier has been studied in great detail by Tom Sisson of the USGS, and he has outlined two potential projects. One would involve study of extremely hydrous, amphibole-bearing flows that might be indicative of a correlation between high water contents and large subducting slab component. Another study would involve interpretation of textural variations within of plagioclase-bearing flows to try to work out what the textures are telling us about eruptive processes.
(4)Dacites of Mt. Meager
(5)Older eruptions of Mt. St. Helens

Island arc crustal sections (plutonic roots to volcanic carapace of ancient systems)
I have several ongoing projects in Mesozoic arc systems in the US Cordillera and in Asia. The goal here is to work in areas where ancient arcs have been uplifted and exposed so that their deep levels are available for study. My students and I combine field mapping with petrological and geochemical analyses to understand the evolution of magmas that make up the arc and their relationship to the country rock. Current projects include study of deep level Cretaceous plutons in the North Cascades of Washington (Tenpeak, Cardinal Peak, and Entiat plutons), the Jurassic Bonanza arc on Vancouver Island in Canada (plutonic to volcanic levels), the Jurassic Talkeetna arc in Alaska (plutonic to volcanic levels), and the Cretaceous Kohistan arc of Pakistan (plutonic to volcanic levels).

Available research projects:

(1) I am looking for a graduate student to work on the Tenpeak pluton project. The pluton is interesting in that it crystallized at ~9 kbar (~30 km depth) in the deep crust of a magmatic arc and preserves fantastic evidence for magma mixing during its evolution. The pluton bears magmatic epidote. It is coeval with a pluton about 5 km to the south (the DirtyFace pluton) that may have been emplaced at shallow levels in the crust, implying a major fault between the two plutons.
(2) Volcanic rocks from the Jurassic Bonanza arc represent a unique and uninterrupted volcanic arc that is exposed for a strike length of ~500 km on Vancouver Island. These volcanics are quite variable in their chemistry, but no detailed study has been undertaken. They represent a very unique opportunity to document variations in chemistry along strike of an ancient arc and compare them to variations along active chains such as the Aleutians or Mariana arc.