Sydney Goldberg

Published Article: The flower garden banks Siderastrea siderea coral as a candidate global boundary stratotype section and point for the Anthropocene series

​

In the summer of 2021, I worked as an undergraduate researcher in the Paleoclimatology and Anthropology Studies Lab (PAST) at Louisiana State University. The PAST Lab is actively developing paleoclimate records and data mining existing records to investigate past climate, specifically the Gulf of Mexico, the Caribbean, and tropical regions. My daily tasks included:

• Prepping materials to aid the organization in sample climatological data analysis of corals.

• Sonicating coral slabs with an ultrasonic cleaner to prepare the slabs for imaging and scanning.

• Scan and x-ray cleaned coral slabs for image analysis and dating.

• Weighing coral samples using a microbalance and keeping a continuous data record. 

• Acidifying coral samples to prepare for evaluation in the ICP-OES.

• Evaluate data from ICP-OES to distinguish the accuracy and precision of sample weighing and acidification.