Katharine Cashman facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Katharine Cashman
FRS MAE
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Cashman in 2016
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| Born |
Katharine Venable Cashman
19 July 1954 |
| Alma mater | |
| Awards | Royal Society Wolfson Research Merit Award |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Volcanology |
| Institutions | |
| Thesis | Crystal size distribution in igneous and metamorphic rocks (1987) |
| Doctoral advisor | Bruce Marsh |
Katharine Venable Cashman (born 19 July 1954) is a famous American scientist. She studies volcanoes and is a professor of volcanology at the University of Bristol. She also used to be a professor at the University of Oregon.
Education and Early Career
Katharine Cashman started her studies at Middlebury College in Vermont. In 1976, she earned a degree in Geology and Biology. She then continued her education in New Zealand at Victoria University of Wellington. Later, she completed her PhD at Johns Hopkins University in Maryland in 1986. For her PhD, she studied how crystals grow inside volcanic rocks.
After finishing her studies, Dr. Cashman became a professor. She taught at Princeton University from 1986 to 1991. Then, she moved to the University of Oregon, where she became a full professor in 1997. In 2011, she joined the University of Bristol in the UK.
What Katharine Cashman Studies
Dr. Cashman is a volcanologist, which means she studies volcanoes. She looks at how magma (molten rock) moves inside the Earth. She also studies how volcanoes erupt and how lava flows on the surface. She has explored volcanoes on all seven continents!
Her research helps us understand why volcanoes behave the way they do. She is well-known for studying how tiny bubbles and crystals form inside magma. This helps explain how volcanic materials act during an eruption. She has worked with many volcano observatories in the US. She also helped advise the island of Montserrat about its volcano.
Dr. Cashman uses different scientific tools in her work. These include igneous petrology (studying rocks formed from magma), kinetics (studying how fast things change), microscopy (using powerful microscopes), and fluid dynamics (studying how liquids and gases move). She often focuses on volcanoes that produce runny lava, like those in Hawaii. She also studies how volcanic ash forms during eruptions. She has also researched volcanoes with thicker lava, such as Mount St. Helens.
Awards and Recognition
Katharine Cashman has received many important awards for her work. In 2016, she was chosen to be a member of the National Academy of Sciences. This is a very high honor for scientists in the United States. In the same year, she also became a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS) in the UK.
She is also a Fellow of the American Geophysical Union and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. She is a member of the Academia Europaea. In 2020, she was awarded the Murchison Medal by the Geological Society of London. This medal is given for important contributions to geology.
