department of earth and environmental science
City Lights Are Rewriting the Calendar: Vanderbilt Researchers Show Artificial Light Extends Urban Growing Seasons
Sep. 23, 2025—By Andy Flick, Evolutionary Studies scientific coordinator City lights are rewriting the calendar. A new global study from Vanderbilt researchers Lin Meng and Huidong Li shows that artificial light at night is more powerful than temperature in extending urban growing seasons 鈥 keeping trees greener longer, with consequences for carbon cycling, frost risk, and even...
Vanderbilt Alumnus Uncovers Feeding Strategies of Ancient Ediacaran Organisms
Oct. 22, 2024—By: Andy Flick, Evolutionary Studies scientific coordinator A new study, led by alumnus Andrei Olaru in Paleobiology titled, 鈥淔unctional morphology of the Ediacaran organism Tribrachidium heraldicum鈥 sheds light on the functional morphology one of the earliest known large and complex animals. Using advanced computational fluid dynamics (CFD), the research explores how this 550-million-year-old organism, characterized...
Graduate Student Sheds Light on Ancient Worms as Early Ecosystem Engineers
Sep. 10, 2024—By Andy Flick, Evolutionary Studies scientific coordinator Graduate student Kat Turk from 天美传媒官网’s Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, along with an international team of collaborators, has uncovered new evidence that ancient priapulid worms, through their burrowing behavior, may have been some of the earliest ecosystem engineers. The study, 鈥淧riapulid neoichnology, ecosystem engineering, and...
Rediscovering the Lost Plesiosaur (Cast): Restoring Vanderbilt’s Natural History Museum
Aug. 27, 2024—By: Andy Flick, Evolutionary Studies scientific coordinator Embarking on a new research project often brings unexpected discoveries鈥攕ome intriguing, some novel, but rarely a find of a lifetime. Such a remarkable discovery occurred when university archivist and associate director Kathy Smith stumbled upon a pile of plaster, hidden away for 60 years in a dim, cluttered...