ERIN ARGYILAN

Erin Argyilan of Indiana University is known for her lively teaching style and leading some of the best geology field trips in the Chicagoland area. She takes people of all ages on interactive tours that lead to dune climbing, animal identifying, and accessing some of the rarest plants in the world. Read on to learn about the major mystery surrounding the Cretaceous Period’s effect on midwestern geology.

- Jessica Renslow

GEOLOGISTS STUDY THE EARTH AND ITS HISTORY. WHAT TYPE OF GEOLOGY DO YOU SPECIALIZE IN?

I specialize in coastal processes. That means working to understand how coastal landscapes are built and how they are reconstructed through time. __

WHY DID YOU BECOME A GEOLOGIST?

I didn’t take a direct path. I went to University of Illinois at Chicago and studied biology as an undergrad, and earth sciences in graduate school. Human interaction with the landscape began to really interest me. I ended up working in an OSL (optically stimulated luminescence) lab. The lab could actually state when a sand grain last saw light. This gave us the ability to figure out dates with the sand, especially when other methods won’t tell us how old an object is. Wow. This curiosity streak of mine led me to geology and being a Great Lakes researcher.

WHAT WERE YOU LIKE AS A KID?