About

Ross Nelson Mitchell

Mailing Address

Mailing address:  PO Box 208109, New Haven CT 06520-8109

Street address: 210 Whitney Ave., New Haven CT 06511

Bio/Research:

My interests center on the supercontinent cycle which may have been operational throughout most of Earth history. The supercontinent cycle describes not only the suturing and rifting of continents via plate tectonics but also the wholesale organization of mantle convection patterns, which has consequences for true polar wander. Prior to Pangea, the latest supercontinent, paleomagnetism is the only quantitative method for reconstructing continents. I conduct extended paleomagnetic sampling campaigns grounded in field geology. Synthesizing newly acquired data with the global paleomagnetic database, I aim to both generate paleogeographic maps for 3 billion years of Earth history and evaluate how such empirical constraints shape plate tectonic and true polar wander theory. I also pair these studies of ancient supercontinents with detailed magnetostratigraphic profiles of Phanerozoic time and electron-probe analyses of magnetic mineralogy in order to test the limits of paleomagnetism as a paleogeographic method.