Incoming Postdoctoral Fellows Joleen Carlberg, Brian Jackson, and Liyan Tian, along with new Administrative Assistant Kasey Cunningham.

September 1 marked the arrival at DTM of three Postdoctoral Fellows and a new member of the department’s administrative staff. The additions include Fellows Joleen Carlberg, Brian Jackson, and Liyan Tian and Administrative Assistant Kasey Cunningham.

Carlberg, DTM’s Vera Rubin Fellow, will be studying the chemical and dynamical relationships between extrasolar planets and their host stars.  She obtained her Ph.D. earlier this year from the University of Virginia, where her thesis focused on evidence for the accretion of planetary companions by rapidly rotating red giant stars.  Tian, who received her Ph.D. in Earth Sciences this year from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California, San Diego, will investigate mantle heterogeneity along the East Pacific Rise and Mid-Atlantic Ridge from the isotopic analyses of Li, B, and O in fresh volcanic glass samples.  Jackson, who received his Ph.D. in planetary sciences from the University of Arizona in 2009, studies tidal dissipation and orbital evolution of transiting extrasolar planets, particularly those for which there is observational evidence for atmospheric mass loss.

Kasey Cunningham received her B.A. in Communications and Journalism from Shippensburg University in Pennsylvania in May.  Her work experience includes news reporting and production, graphics design, and web publishing.  In addition to overseeing day-to-day office operations, Kasey will handle the department’s seminar series, fellowship applications, and stories for DTM’s web site.