News
Graduating Geo Student Wins Award and Scholarship
May 02, 2018
Jory VanEss, a graduating senior in the Geology Department at Grand Valley State University has been selected by the Geology Department and recognized by the Council on Undergraduate Research's Geoscience Division (GeoCUR) for his Excellence in Student Research. The research completed by VanEss was the foundation of his capstone research project. He recently presented his research at the North Central Geological Society of America meeting in Ames, IA (April, 16, 2018), where his poster presentation was selected as First Place among 88 the Undergraduate Student Poster Presentations at the meeting. Jory was also one of 7 Geology Department majors recently selected to receive a Tremba scholarship in recognition of academic performance, intellectual ability and professional promise.
Jory’s research established an approach for determining the 3D strain ellipsoid in olivine-rich samples used for Electron Backscatter Diffraction (EBSD) work, part of ongoing work with his mentor and other students. The samples were collected from the southern Appalachians in western North Carolina and the story of these rocks contributes to understanding of the formation of the mountains more than 450 million years ago. Jory was creative in exploring several approaches to this problem and developing protocols using several different analytical and image-processing programs.
CUR’s Geoscience Division (GeoCUR) established this award in 2014.