
Professor Laura Robinson
MA, MSc(Cantab.), PhD(Oxon.)
Expertise
My research interests are to understand the processes that govern climate on time scales ranging from the modern day back through hundreds of thousands of years using geochemistry.
Current positions
Professor of Geochemistry
School of Earth Sciences
Contact
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Research interests
My research interests are to document and understand the processes that govern climate on time scales ranging from the modern day back through hundreds of thousands of years. To do this research I use geochemical techniques, with an emphasis on radioactive elements including uranium series isotopes and radiocarbon. These elements are particularly valuable as they have a wide range of decay rates and geochemical properties and can be analysed in geologic materials such as corals, marine sediments and seawater.
Through a combination of field work (see the cruise blog link for an example) and lab work (see lab website link) I have been tackling questions relating to:
- Timing of Pleistocene climate change events
- Palaeoclimate reconstructions
- Deep-sea coral paleo-biogeography
- Impact of weathering on the ocean and climate
- Biomineralization
- Development of new geochemical proxies for past climate conditions
- Chemical tracers of ocean circulation
Projects and supervisions
Research projects
A deep-sea perspective on coral resilience in a changing world
Principal Investigator
Managing organisational unit
School of Earth SciencesDates
09/01/2023 to 08/01/2026
Exploring preferential 234U dissolution as a weathering tracer using the glacial tills
Principal Investigator
Managing organisational unit
School of Earth SciencesDates
31/03/2020 to 30/03/2022
Carbon cycling in a warming world: a deglacial test case
Principal Investigator
Managing organisational unit
School of Earth SciencesDates
01/02/2019 to 31/03/2023
8086 NE/S0017431 Carbon cycling in a warming world
Principal Investigator
Managing organisational unit
School of Earth SciencesDates
01/09/2018 to 31/08/2021
Deep sea corals in the South Atlantic: new insights from an interdisciplinary study
Principal Investigator
Managing organisational unit
School of Earth SciencesDates
01/06/2018 to 31/05/2020
Thesis supervisions
Publications
Selected publications
01/02/2012The Southern Ocean’s Role in Carbon Exchange During the Last Deglaciation
Science
Abrupt changes in high-latitude nutrient supply to the Atlantic during the last glacial cycle
Geology
Recent publications
15/01/2025Delayed onset of ocean acidification in the Gulf of Maine
Scientific Reports
Radiocarbon evidence of a North Atlantic intermediate water reconfiguration between the 1960s and 1980s
Earth and Planetary Science Letters
Arctic and Antarctic forcing of ocean interior warming during the last deglaciation
Scientific Reports
Ba/Ca of stylasterid coral skeletons records dissolved seawater barium concentrations
Chemical Geology
Enhanced subglacial discharge from Antarctica during meltwater pulse 1A
Nature Communications