9528422 Samson This grant provides $150,000 as partial salary support for a laboratory technician over a three year period. Specifically, the technician will be responsible for the day-to-day management, operation and maintenance of a thermal ionization mass spectrometer (TIMS) and an X-ray fluorescence spectrometer (XRF) for the Earth Sciences Department at Syracuse University. This proposal is a Phase I technician support proposal under the EAR/IF program. The addition of a lab technician at Syracuse will allow these facilities to be opened up to a wider regional community of users and allow these PI's to enhance their scientific productivity in research areas such as the tectonic investigation and geochemical characterization of slates in the southern Appalachians utilizing Uranium-Lead geochronologic techniques to establish the timing of orogenic events and Neodymium isotopic analyses to yield insights into the petrogenesis of these terranes. ***
