careers – Earth Sciences blog

14th March 2024

Behind the scenes of the Sedgwick Museum’s Petrology Collection, with Robert Seidel

Walk into the Sedgwick Museum and you are instantly immersed in a realm of fossil beasties: from the iconic Iguanodon from which the Museum derives its logo to the recently-discovered giant millipede, Arthropleura.

The Museum is perhaps less well known for its rock and mineral collections, which are of international scientific value and also serve as a key resource for teaching and research in the Department of Earth Sciences and elsewhere.

14th February 2024

Stepping from Science into Policy – Dorothea Moser on interning with the Government Office for Science

Dorothea is a fourth-year PhD student and polar ice core scientist based jointly between Cambridge’s Department of Earth Science and the British Antarctic Survey, where she investigates the characteristics of melt layers in ice cores and their potential for paleoclimate reconstruction. In Autumn 2023, Dorothea spent three months on an internship with the Government Office for Science. In this blog post, she talks about her experience.

2nd November 2022

Friends of the Sedgwick Museum Summer Placements 2022

We are four Earth Sciences undergraduate students from the University of Cambridge. We use samples from the Sedgwick Museum’s collections in our studies, so these placements were an exciting chance for us to work behind the scenes on current projects in the Museum. We each spent 1-4 weeks on a project during the summer of 2022, generously funded by the Friends of the Sedgwick Museum.

5th July 2022

Careers in earth sciences – Jenny Omma talks big data and rock analysis

Jenny Omma is Chief Geologist at Rocktype — a mineralogy consultancy using big data to revolutionize rock analysis.

After studying for her M.Sci in Natural Sciences, and continuing at Cambridge to do a PhD in earth sciences, Jenny spent five years in industry before setting up her own company in 2014. We caught up with Jenny in the following blog post to find out more about her career path and work in the energy and mineral sectors.

5th April 2022

In Conversation with Prof. Helen Williams

Prof Helen Williams joined the Department of Earth Sciences in 2016 and is currently Professor of Geochemistry. She reflects on her life and work with Erin Martin-Jones.

8th March 2022

Celebrating International Women’s Day 2022

To mark International Women’s Day (8 March), we reflect on and celebrate the role of women within our organization.

International Women’s Day is a time to reflect on achievements and progress made, recognize challenges and focus greater attention on women’s rights and achieving equal opportunity status in all walks of life.

We look back over a year of research news and blog posts from women in our Department; from graduate students to lecturers and staff at the Sedgwick Museum. Through their stories, and in their own words, we hope to reveal the breadth of research and educational activities that women undertake across our organization.

11th February 2022

Celebrating International Day of Women and Girls in Science 2022

Today is International Day of Women and Girls in Science (11 February), a celebration of women and girls in science led by UNESCO and UN-Women.

In this blog post, we bring together stories from women researchers across our Department to highlight the variety of roles within Earth Sciences.

To mark this day, we asked our researchers what pieces of equipment or items they rely on for their everyday research – whether they spend most of their time collecting data in the lab, field or via computer models.

4th August 2021

Cambridge seismology graduate named one of 2021 Top 50 Women in Engineering

Image of mountainous backdrop, with winding road extending into the distance

Grace Campbell is an earthquake geologist and remote sensing specialist in Arup‘s Natural Hazard and Risk Management Team.

After gaining a Master’s degree in Earth Sciences at UCL, Grace moved to Cambridge to study – firstly for an MPhil in Environmental Science and Remote Sensing at the Department of Geography, then moving to Earth Sciences to undertake a PhD on earthquake hazards in central Asia.

Grace has now worked at Arup for 5 years, and was recently recognised as one of 2021’s Top 50 Women in Engineering. We caught up with Grace in the following blog post and heard more about her work on natural hazard and risk management.