About the Wooster Tree Ring Laboratory
The Wooster Tree-Ring Lab, starting in what was once a small office in the Scovel basement, has now spread into three areas including the sanding room, tree-ring annex, and the main lab. The lab and annex are equipped with three zoom disecting microscopes, Velmex measuring tables, and storage space for tools and samples. Equipment in the lab is for the collection and preparation of wood and sedimnet samples. Such tools include increment borers, chainsaws, belt sanders, electric drills and various lake and bog coring equipment. We mainly work with living old-growth oaks and beams from historical structures in Northeast Ohio and Alaskan glacier preserved subfossil logs. In addition to the work with wood we core and analyze sediment records from bog and lakes in Ohio. Click here for more lab photos.
The WTRL staff consists of undergraduate students led by Dr. Greg Wiles
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Dr. Greg Wiles: Director (1998 - present) He began studying climate change using tree-rings and glaciers as a doctoral fellowship at the University of Buffalo. After earning his Ph.D. he won a post-doctoral fellowship at the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory of Columbia University. Greg has worked with tree-ring and glacier research all over the world traveling to Antartica, Madagascar, and Northwest Territories of Canada. For more on the research of Greg Wiles click here. |
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Sophie Lehmann: Lab Assistant (June 2005 - present) Slehmann08@wooster.edu (330) 263-4451 Major: Geology Sophie is a junior working primarily on historical structures and living trees in North East Ohio and extending the tree-ring record with old-growth oak samples. For more about Sophie click here. |
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Nathan Malcomb: Lab Assistant (January 2006 - present) Nathan is a senior who can be seen running or riding his bike throughout Wooster's local parks and forests in search of that perfect old growth oak to core. Nathan worked with Greg, Eva Lyon, and Dan Lawson of CRREL in Glacier Bay, Alaska collecting log samples and cores from recently uncovered glacier killed trees. |
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Major: Geology
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Anton Heitger: Graduate 2006 (December 2004 - June 2006) B.A. College of Wooster Anton began his Tree-Ring career analyzing tree-rings from a fallen
barn in Orrville, Ohio, where he successfully dated the structure to 1835.
This fueled his fire to date more historical structures. He aided Greg
Wiles with sampling barns, cabins, and houses, in which he developed and
modified current devices to evolve the Historical Structure Dating department
of WTRL. He is also interested in the dynamics of glaciers in coastal Alaska, and wrote his Junior I.S. on the glacial history of Glacier Bay, Alaska. To combine his two interests, Anton worked with Greg and Anne Krawiec in Columbia Bay, Alaska to date the advance of the Land Lobe Glacier using tree-rings. For more on Anton's Independent Study click here. |
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Anne Krawiec: Graduate 2006 (May 2005 - May 2006) B.A. College of Wooster Senior Independent Study: A 267 Year Long Reconstruction
of Spring Lake Erie Levels Based Anne is from Alabama, She completed her research in Alaska with Anton and Greg at Columbia Glacier. |
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Peter Johnson: Graduate 2006 (July 2005 - May 2006) B.A. College of Wooster Senior Independent Study: Reconstructing Little Ice Age Glacial Histories for Crescent and Amherst Glaciers, College Fiord, Alaska. Peter is orginally from Tennessee, he is going to Australia in August to live for 6 months. He hopes to come back to the states to find a job with an environmental private consulting or possibly go to grad school. If that doesn't work out, he would love to go to Chile and core some trees...oh and maybe go to Europe to find his future wife. |
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Elyse Zavar: Lab assistant (May - June 2005) Major: Geology
Elyse worked in the WTRL on Russian conifers for the College of Wooster's Environmental Action and Analysis (EAA). She has worked on other projects with Dr. Wiles, such as bog cores from Brown's Lake Bog in Shreve, Ohio and Debris flows and millpond sediments in Wooster Memorial Park here in Wooster, Ohio. Elyse is currently working with Dr. Mark Wilson a Wooster geology professor who specializes in Invertebrate Paleontology and Sedimentology/Stratigraphy, they are researching in Poland for Elyse's Senior I.S. |
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Will Driscoll: Graduate 2005 (June 2004 - May 2005) B.A. College of Wooster Senior Independent Study: A New Dendroclimatic Tree Ring Network from Lake Clark National Park and Preserve, Alaska Will worked with Greg and Nick Young in Lake Clark National Park and Preserve in Alaska. Will is also an avid ultimate frisbee player, he recently returned from China where he taught elementary students Science and English.
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Nicolas Young: Graduate 2005 (June 2004 - May 2005) B.A. College of Wooster Senior Independent Study: Using Tree-Ring and Glacial Records from
Southern Alaska to Investigate Nick worked with Matt Beckwith-Laube at Arcadis in Cleveland, but recently left to pursue other interests, currently Nick is a graduate student in Buffalo, New York. |
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Andy Horst: Lab Assistant (June 2004 - May 2005) Major: Geology Andy joined the lab to assist in dating the plethora of cores that Will,
Nick and Greg brought back from Lake Clark National Park in Alaska. |
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Matthew Beckwith Laube (May 2004) B.A. College of Wooster Major: Geology Senior Independent Study: Tree Ring Dated
1000-Year Advance of Columbia Glacier, Matt worked with Greg in Columbia Bay, Alaska collecting tree-ring sample to date the advance of Columbia Glacier. He is currently working for Arcadis, a geological consulting firm, in the Cleveland, Ohio office. |
The Wooster Tree Ring Lab · The College of Wooster · Wooster, Ohio 44691· Phone: (330) 263-2298 · Fax: (330) 263-2249 · Email: Gwiles@wooster.edu
