| Geology Graduate Student Studies Groundwater Discharge from Sinkhole in Great Lake |
| Description |
Tom Novell, a Wayne State University graduate student working on
his Geology Masters Degree research project under the direction of Dr.
Mark Baskaran, is investigating the characteristics of groundwater
discharging from a sink hole on the bottom of Lake Huron. Tom is
using several different sampling and analytical methods to determine the
age of the sinkhole waters and to identify their sources. An important
part of his work is to collect and analyze groundwater samples for radium,
chlorine, oxygen and hydrogen isotopes. Radioactive chlorine isotopes, for
example, can be used to date the groundwater. The radioactive isotopes
are initially created by cosmic radiation from the sun and
incorporated into surface waters. As surface water infiltrates into the
subsurface to become groundwater, the initial radioactive chlorine
concentration decays at a constant rate over time, thus providing a means
to estimate the time that the water has spent underground, away from the
influence of cosmic rays.
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