Michelle Gavel

I joined the Bureau in spring of 2024 after five years of working various roles (bedrock mapper, GIS analyst, surficial geologist, geochronologist) at the Alaska Division of Geological and Geophysical Surveys. My most recent research has been in characterization of metamorphic terranes and intrusive suites using U-Pb zircon geochronology in the Yukon-Tanana uplands region of Alaska. I have also studied the exhumation history of the southern Rio Grande rift using multiple low-temperature thermochronometers (U-Th-He in apatite and zircon, apatite fission track). I am looking forward to expanding on and refining that work through mapping, integration of new geophysical data, and maybe even some more thermochronology!

• M.S. Geology, New Mexico State University, 2019
  • Low Temperature Thermochronlogic Constraints on Neogene Extension in the Rio Grande rift and Basin and Range of Southern New Mexico
• B.S. Geological Sciences, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 2016

• July 2019- March 2023: Geologist, Mineral Resources Section Alaska Division of Geological and Geophysical Surveys, Fairbanks, AK
  • July 2019-April 2021: Geologist, Engineering Geology Section
• August 2017-July 2019: Graduate Research and Teaching Assistant, New Mexico State University, Las Cruces, NM
  • Summer 2018: Energy Section Field Intern, Alaska Division of Geological and Geophysical Surveys, Fairbanks, AK
  • Summer 2019: NMSU Field Camp Teaching Assistant
• August 2016-2017: Hydrogeologist, South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control, Columbia, SC