Niels van Helmond

Institute of Environmental Biology, Faculty of Science, Utrecht University

Short CV

- Born 26^th august, 1987, Deurne, The Netherlands
- 1999-2005 High School (VWO; N&G Track): St.-Willibrord Gymnasium – Deurne
- September 2005 – July 2008: BSc Earth Sciences (with distinction, GPA 3,3)

BSc Project: Forum Hadriani: A dendrochronological study to determine the age and origin of wood from a Roman quay and landing stage.

Supervision: Prof. Dr. Esther Jansma

- September 2008 – August 2010: MSc Biogeology (with distinction, GPA 3,3)

MSc Project: Palynological and organic geochemical characterization of marine and terrestrial Early Pleistocene climate in northwest Europe.

Supervision: Dr. Johan Weijers, Dr. Timme Donders (TNO) and Dr. Gert-Jan  Reichart

Internships & Conferences

- May - July 2008, ten weeks internship at the “Rijksdienst voor Archeologie, Cultuur en Monumenten” (RACM), nowadays “Rijksdienst voor het Cultureel Erfgoed”, the Cultural and Archeological Survey of the Netherlands.

- Aug. 2009 – Aug. 2010: ~Thirty weeks internship at the Laboratory for Organic Geochemistry, Faculty of Geosciences, Utrecht University.

- Sept. 2009-July 2010: Twelve weeks internship at TNO B&O, the Geological Survey of the Netherlands.

- Oct. 2009: 49^th Belgian-Dutch Palynologicaldays – “De pollendagen”

- Feb. 2010: One week internship at NIOZ, Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research, Department of Marine Organic Biogeochemistry.

- April 2010: Poster Presentation at Darwin Days & NAC10

PhD Project

Since the 1^st of Oct. 2010, PhD within the Biomarine Sciences Group, Department of Biology, Faculty of Science, Utrecht University.

Project title: “Ocean biogeochemistry in the mid-Cretaceous: reconstructing the nutrient-biosphere-climate link.” - What triggers ocean anoxia? Clues from integrating marine and terrestrial palaeobiological records -

Promotor: Prof. dr. Henk Brinkhuis
Co-promotor: Dr. Caroline Slomp
Co-promotor: Dr. Appy Sluijs Fig. 1) Configuration of the continents around the Cenomanian-Turonian boundary. (Christopher Scotese, The Paleomap Project)

During the mid-Cretaceous, the oceans recurrently became anoxic for extended periods of time. These oceanic anoxic events (OAEs) are interrelated with faunal and floral turnover, and major changes in biogeochemical cycling and climate. Detailed and quantitative insights in the causes, and spatial and temporal trends of the OAEs are still lacking. Marine palynology has only occasionally been employed in this context although it has the strong potential to provide marine and terrestrial signals. Here, we will combine existing and newly generated marine palynological and geochemical data to increase our understanding of the mechanisms leading to and consequences of global scale ocean anoxia across the Cenomanian-Turonian boundary ~94 Myrs ago (OAE2). We will focus specifically on (1) compiling burial records of carbon and nutrients and (2) the application and further calibration of palynological and geochemical proxies for trends in nutrient delivery, ocean anoxia, temperature and stratification in the Atlantic and Tethyan Oceans before and during OAE2. We will closely collaborate with a second project on the definition of model scenarios and comparison of model-generated and real cores. Our results will provide much needed quantitative and mechanistic insights in changes in ocean and biosphere functioning in a greenhouse climate.

Fig. 2) As a result of large scale ocean anoxia in the Mid/Late-Cretaceous, large packages of black shales are found worldwide, like these Italian black shales.