Brendan P. Murphy
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Dr. Brendan P. Murphy

Alaska

May 2018
USU Postdoc Fieldwork

Assisting a PhD student at Utah State, I ventured up the Dalton Highway to the Toolik Field Station on Alaska's North Slope for eleven days of ecological fieldwork. Nick Barrett's research is focused on understanding future climate change effects on ecosystems in Arctic lakes. As part of a long-term monitoring project, we spent most of our time ice fishing seven different lakes and caught Arctic Char, Lake Trout, and Arctic Grayling. Although we released the fish we caught, we first weighed & measured them, collected fin clips (for isotope and genetic analysis), tagged them (like micro-chipping your dog), and in some cases, we examined their stomach contents (a method known as "gastric lavage"). 

Hawai'i

Summers of 2011 - 2015
PhD dissertation research

Over four field seasons during my PhD, I went to Hawai'i to collect data for my dissertation research. I spent my time on the Kohala Peninsula, which is the oldest and northernmost volcano on the Big Island. One of my papers on this research can be found at http://www.nature.com

Fennoscandia

May 2014
Graduate course in economic geology

I started my travel by exploring Oslo, Norway for a few days before the official trip. I then met up with a UT economic geology class in Helsinki. Over the course of ten days we traveled throughout Finland and northern Sweden visiting quarries, open pit mines and going into underground mines. The trip was led by Dr. Rich Kyle & Dr. Brent Elliott, and through touring the mines I learned about both the geology and methods of extracting mineral resources, including but certainly not limited to gold, copper, lead, and phosphate.

Taiwan

May 2015
Feedbacks Among Climate, Erosion & Tectonics (FACET) Workshop

To be posted...

South Island, New Zealand

June 2015
Field site evaluation

To be posted...

Henry Mountains, Utah

June 2012
Johnson Research Group Fieldwork 

Early in my PhD at the University of Texas, our research group took a trip to the Henry Mountains of southern Utah to conduct fieldwork characterizing grain size and sediment changes after a large monsoon storm significantly modified a series of slot canyons that my advisor, Dr. Joel Johnson, had studied during his dissertation.

Reynolds Creek, Idaho

September 2011
Reynolds Creek Experimental Watershed

Assisted Dr. Lindsay Olinde in collecting repeat terrestrial lidar surveys of study reaches along Reynolds Creek. Additionally helped conduct surveys for RFID particle tracking after a large rain-on-snow flood event.

Sonora, Mexico

2011 - present
Cuenca los Ojos, Sonora, Mexico

Starting in 2011, I worked with Dr. Stephen DeLong maintaining a long-term monitoring project in collaboration with the Cuenca los Ojos Foundation (https://cuencalosojos.org/). Our goals were to monitor the changes taking place as part of this river restoration project in San Bernardino Valley, which is located just over the border in Sonora, Mexico. Over the years, we have collected both repeat terrestrial lidar surveys, RTK-GPS surveys, and drone-based aerial imagery for Structure from Motion (SfM).

Biosphere2

2010-2011
Landscape Evolution Observatory, Biosphere2

After completing my bachelors, I spent a year working for Dr. Stephen DeLong as a Research Technician during the development and design phase of the Landscape Evolution Observatory (LEO). This is an on-going, large-scale experiment housed within Biosphere2 in Oracle, Arizona. 
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  • About Me
  • My Research
  • People
  • Opportunities
  • Curriculum Vitae
  • Publications
  • Teaching
  • Field Photos
  • Contact
  • Links