MARIO E. BAUR

Professor; AB and MS, University of Chicago; PhD, Massachusetts Institute of Technology; General Electric Coffin Fund Fellow; NSF Predoctoral and Postdoctoral Fellow.


RESEARCH DESCRIPTION:

In my research, I apply methodologies of physical and analytical chemistry to study problems in the chemistry of the Earth, to understand how the present composition of the terrestrial atmosphere and hydrosphere arose, and how human activities may be modifying our chemical environment.

Specific areas of current interest include:

1. Production, cycling and sequestration of volatiles on the Earth-carbon cycling, CO2 content of the atmosphere and oceans and its influence on the climate and biota; factors influencing sea level, and oceanic temperatures and salinity, through geologic time; origin and variation of atmospheric oxygen and nitrogen;

2. The fate of organic materials in sediments and in the oceanic water column; their modes of chemical breakdown and transfer, especially as related to cycling of carbon;

3. Combustion and pyrolysis of natural materials and the dependence of these processes on atmospheric and climatologic conditions;

4. Modeling of the response of organisms and ecosystems to changes in environmental conditions, using thermodynamic and statistical mechanical methods.

KEY CONCEPTS AND WORDS:

Physical Chemistry: applications to the earth and environmental sciences; carbon cycling; conversion of organic materials; combustion and pyrolysis; modeling of ecological networks; thermodynamics; statistical mechanics.

Last Revision: 10/25/95 // mk