Welcome to new members of the School: Cruz-Uribe, Putnam, and Allen
As we approach a new academic year, we are very pleased to welcome two new faculty members and a NOAA Fellow to our School. Both faculty members are the first to hold new, privately funded, named professorships in the school. We once again express our appreciation to the donors for these positions.
Aaron Putman is returning to UMaine (Ph.D., 2011) as the George H. Denton Professor. Aaron has spent the past four years at the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, first as a Postdoctoral Research Scientist then as an Assistant Research Professor. Aaron’s research and teaching interests are broad, but focus on the interactions of Earth’s surface, cryosphere, and atmosphere. He is an internationally recognized scholar, having performed field work in Asia, South America, New Zealand, Antarctica, the U.S., and Europe. Aaron has published twenty-six papers, with more in review. Aaron’s wife, Katherine Allen, will also be joining us as a NOAA Climate and Global Change Fellow, working in the area of Geochemistry and Paleoclimate, particularly as they relate to ocean chemistry and biological activity.
Alicia (Cici) Cruz-Uribe is the Edward Sturgis Grew Professor in Petrology and Mineralogy. Cici comes to us after spending a year at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution as a Postdoctoral Investigator, following her Ph.D. at Penn State. Cici is primarily a metamorphic petrologist and geochemist, with a focus on kinetics and the chemical evolution of the mantle at subduction zones. She will establish a piston-cylinder experimental petrology laboratory beginning this fall. In addition to bringing new energy and expertise, her presence fills an important gap in petrology left by the retirement of Daniel Lux this year.