Dr. Suzanne Birner

Assistant Professor of Geology and Earth Science
Contact for Geology Program

Contact Information

Margaret Cargill Science Bldg., Room 435
CPO: 2191
Email: birners@berea.edu
Phone: 859-985-3277

Spring 2021

Office Hours

Tue/Fri: 1 – 2 p.m. (in MAC 251, following class)
Wed: 1 – 3 p.m. (virtual)

Class Schedule

  • GEO 101 A (Mon/Tue/Thur/Fri: noon – 2:50 p.m.)

Degrees

  • B.S. with Honor, Geology, California Institute of Technology, 2012
  • Ph.D., Geological and Environmental Sciences, Stanford University, 2018

Papers and Publications

  • Birner, S.K., Cottrell, E., Warren, J.M., Kelley, K.A., and Davis, F.A. (2018) “Peridotites and Basalts Reveal Broad Congruence Between Two Independent Records of Mantle f O2” Earth and Planetary Science Letters.
  • Cottrell, E., Lanzirotti, A., Mysen, B., Birner, S.K., Kelley, K.A., Botcharnikov, R., Davis, F.A., and Newville, M. (2018) “A Mössbauer-Based XANES Calibration for Hydrous Basalt Glasses Reveals Radiation- Induced Oxidation of Fe” American Mineralogist.
  • Birner, S.K., Warren, J.M., Cottrell, E., Davis, F.A., Kelley, K.A., and Falloon, T.J. (2017) “Forearc Peridotites from Tonga Record Heterogeneous Oxidation of the Mantle Following Subduction Initiation.” Journal of Petrology.
  • Davis, F.A., Cottrell, E., Birner, S.K., Warren, J.M., and Lopez, O.G. (2017) “Revisiting the Electron Microprobe Method of Spinel-Olivine-Orthopyroxene Oxybarometry Applied to Spinel Peridotites.” American Mineralogist, doi:10.2138/am-2017-5823.
  • Birner, S.K., Warren, J.M., Cottrell, E., and Davis, F.A. (2016) “Hydrothermal Alteration of Seafloor Peridotites Does Not Influence Oxygen Fugacity Recorded by Spinel Oxybarometry.” Geology, doi:10.1130/G38113.1.

Honors and Awards

  • 2018 Awarded NSF Postdoctoral Fellowship; accepted Assistant Professor position at Berea College instead.
  • 2016 GeoPRISMS AGU Student Award, for talk entitled “Records of Upper Mantle Oxygen Fugacity Gleaned from High-Density Sampling of Basalts and Peridotites at Ultraslow Ridges”, AGU Fall Meeting.
  • 2016 Harriet Benson Fellowship Award, Department of Geological Sciences, Stanford University.
    2016 Certificate for Outstanding Mentoring, School of Earth, Energy, and Environmental Sciences,
  • Stanford University.
  • 2016 McGee Grant, funding to measure oxygen fugacity in peridotites and basalts from the Southwest Indian Ridge, Stanford University.
  • 2014 McGee Grant, funding to spend three weeks at the Smithsonian Institution to further develop an improved oxybarometry technique for spinel peridotites, Stanford University.
  • 2013 Outstanding Student Paper Award, for talk entitled “Variations in Oxygen Fugacity among Forearc Peridotites from the Tonga Trench”, AGU Fall Meeting.
  • 2013 Honorable Mention, GeoPRISMS AGU Student Award, for talk entitled
    “Variations in Oxygen Fugacity among Forearc Peridotites from the Tonga Trench”, AGU Fall Meeting.
  • 2012 ARCO Stanford Graduate Fellowship, Stanford University.
  • 2012 James Michelin Scholarship in Geology and Geophysics, California Institute of Technology.