David P. Adam
18522 Sentinel Court
Hidden
Valley Lake, California 95467
david@quercus.org
These studies have required the integration and assessment of a wide range of information from numerous disciplines, including geology, limnology, ecology, botany, climatology, and phycology; the analytical skills involved should be useful in more practical settings as well.
The climate history work involved selecting sites, organizing and operating successful drilling programs involving 5-10 people, designing and implementing core curation and sampling programs, data base design, implementation and maintenance, coordination of scientific work among several professionals scattered across the country, counting of hundreds of samples of fossil pollen, and presentation of results both to national and international scientific meetings and for publication.
The chrysophyte cyst work required development of techniques for collection, preparation, and observation of cysts using both optical and scanning electron microscopy, field collection of several hundred samples, photographing of thousands of cysts, development of a classification system for hundreds of previously undescribed forms, and design of a data base for storing the information.
The papers on ice ages treated them as perturbations in the energy budget of the earth, and used the physics of the atmosphere, hydrosphere, and continents to analyse the processes that must occur during glaciations. Although they were not so identified at the time, the ice ages papers provided early examples of the application of nonlinear dissipative dynamic systems to the earth sciences.
Air Quality Specialist, Lake County Air Quality Management District (part time). Manage a network of 23 computerized weather stations located at fire stations and private residences in Lake County. Includes data base management and design on both Macintosh and Windows platforms.
Research Associate, California Academy of Sciences, San Francisco, California
Postgraduate Researcher, Department of Wildlife and Fisheries Biology, University of California at Davis (part time). Data base design and management for a long-term study of the distribution of mercury in the Clear Lake, California ecosystem.
Geologist, U.S. Geological Survey, Menlo Park, California
Project Chief, Marine-Continental Correlations Project. Recovered five nearly-continuous cores ranging in depth from 23 to 102 m from the Klamath Falls region; also responsible for paleontological work on 300-m Owens Lake core collected by G. I. Smith. Designed new core processing and storage facility Menlo Park, including refrigerated core storage. Responsible for coordinating all scientific work on the cores, which involved 5 professionals 5 support personnel within the Branch of Paleontology & Stratigraphy, 5 professionals in other branches, professional collaborators in 7 universities. This work provided a major increase in our knowledge of the Quaternary climatic history of the western U.S., based on the study of continuous sections instead of event stratigraphy.
Team member, Alaska project . Handled logistics and purchasing of supplies and equipment for core sampling and logging operations for recovery of 1300-foot core at Ft. Yukon; spent 5 weeks on site during coring operations; coordinated logging of entire core for magnetic susceptibility and did most of that work. One-quarter time.
Team member, Alaska Interior Basins project. Planning and reconnaissance for proposed USGS deep drill hole in Yukon Flats. Development of drilling and sampling protocols for multidisciplinary effort, coordination of protocols and data base operations with similar efforts by Geological Survey of Canada. Collection and analysis of pollen samples from Pliocene deposits at Lost Chicken Mine, Alaska. One-half time.
Team member, Paleohydrology project, Nevada Test Site. In charge of work on chrysophyte cysts in both modern and fossil deposits; development of sampling protocols and forms for field work. Included extensive paperwork and required training, but very little actual work was permitted because of DOE Stop-Work Order.
Project Chief, Lakes and Playas, Nevada Test Site. Duties were not clear, but included extensive paperwork.
Team member, Pliocene project. Extended work on the Tulelake cores and developed a Pliocene bibliography of over 1,600 references.
Paleontology & Stratigraphy Branch Representative, Menlo Park. Served as local representative of the Branch Chief, handled local paperwork and space problems, and other duties as assigned. Quarter-time.
Project Chief and Palynologist, Tulelake Project. Team leader responsible for project initiation, logistics, core recovery, and scientific coordination of a multidisciplinary study of a 335-m sediment core, including work by eight professionals on pollen, diatoms, ostracodes, paleomagnetism, tephra, amino acid and radiocarbon dating, and geochemistry. Work included drilling, and also core description and sample selection for all investigations. Full time, FY 83-87; quarter-time FY 89.
Palynologist, Paleosecular Variations Project. Team leader in charge of pollen work for Walker Lake, Arizona. Half time.
Project Chief, Quaternary Climatic Changes. Responsible for selection of sites for study of continuous sequences in California, and for recovery of samples, appropriate analysis, and report preparation. Half time, 05/77-9/79; full time, 10/70-9/81; half time, 10/81-9/83.
Geologist in Charge, Menlo Park Scanning Electron Microscope Lab. Responsibility for selection, acquisition, maintenance, and scheduling of two scanning electron microscopes, energy-dispersive X-ray unit, and sample preparation equipment, and for training, and supervision of users. Used SEM to implement fundamental basic studies of distribution and taxonomy of chrysophyte cysts. Half time.
Clear Lake project. Team leader in charge of detailed sampling of 1000 feet of cores at 10 cm intervals for multiple paleoecological investigations and the coordination of all paleoecological work involving several professionals. Full responsibility for all pollen work. Developed computer programs for data base management, statistical processing of results, and graphical output. Half time.
NAS/NRC Postdoctoral Research Associate, U.S. Geological Survey.
Computer programmer, Laboratory or Tree-Ring Research, University of Arizona, Tucson. Produced first program for plotting tree-ring series by computer.