Amy Townsend-Small | |
|---|---|
 Townsend-Small in 2005 | |
| Born | 1976[citation needed] Seattle,Washington, US |
| Alma mater | Skidmore College,University of Texas at Austin |
| Awards | OEC's Science and Community Award |
| Website | University of Cincinnati Faculty Website |
Amy Townsend-Small is the director of the Environmental Studies Program as well as anassociate professor in the Department of Geology and Geography at theUniversity of Cincinnati.[1]
Townsend-Small was born inSeattle,Washington. She grew up inHolliston, Massachusetts, and graduated fromHolliston High School.[citation needed] While attendingSkidmore College in 1997, Townsend-Small spent a semester at theMarine Biological Laboratory inWoods Hole, Massachusetts as part of the Semester in Environmental Science program.[citation needed][2] During this semester she produced a research project investigating the use ofnitrogen stableisotopes as tracers of wastewater inputs to groundwater, and has continued to work with isotopes and marine environments since.[citation needed]
In 1998, Townsend-Small graduatedmagna cum laude fromSkidmore College, receiving abachelor's degree in bothEnglish literature andenvironmental biology.[1] She received aPhD inmarine science from theUniversity of Texas at Austin in 2006, where she had done dissertation research investigating carbon cycling and its relationship with climate in theAmazon River headwaters ofPeru.[3]
Townsend-Small's dissertation research focused on examining theparticulate organic matter (POM) carried downstream by rivers from theAndes Mountains inPeru to theAmazon River, paying special attention to the elemental and isotopic compositions ofcarbon andnitrogen in the POM.[3] After receiving her PhD, Townsend-Small worked at theUniversity of Texas at Austin as a postdoctoral researcher studying the connection betweenchanging climate and the export ofcarbon,nitrogen, and dissolved nutrients in rivers of theAlaskan Arctic.[4] In 2007, Townsend-Small began working as a Postdoctoral Scholar and Project Scientist in the Department of Earth System Science at theUniversity of California Irvine, where she conducted research regarding urbangreenhouse gas and water budgets inLos Angeles,California.[5] Since 2010, Townsend-Small has been at theUniversity of Cincinnati, where she is now an associate professor in the Department of Geology and Geography as well as the director of the Environmental Studies Program.[1] Her current research atUCI investigatesanthropogenic sources ofmethane andclimate change feedbacks to the globalcarbon cycle.[6]
In 2010, Townsend-Small led a research project known as UC GRO (Groundwater Research of Ohio), run by theUniversity of Cincinnati.[7] The study involved testing samples of groundwater from easternOhio for dissolvedmethane concentrations in order to determine the relationship between contaminated groundwater and the process ofhydraulic fracturing (fracking) fornatural gas.[8] In praise of the project's innovative and unique groundwater analysis techniques, theOhio Environmental Council (OEC) awarded Townsend-Small the Science and Community Award in 2014.[9]
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