Laura Gardner
Graduate Student, Northwestern University
About
Laura is a PhD candidate in the department of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Northwestern University working in the Mineral Physics Laboratory. Her primary research explores Earth's deep water cycle using mineral inclusions within sublithospheric diamonds. She is a regular synchrotron user and employs synchrotron X-ray computed microtomography and X-ray diffraction to identify and characterize high-pressure and -temperature mineral phases. She also uses Raman and Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy to characterize geological samples. Laura assists with the Mineral Physics Lab's dual-laser confocal Raman spectroscopy system and has recently helped improve the system to better accommodate fluorescent biological and geological samples.