Conference: 2025 Interior of the Earth Gordon Research Conference and Seminar

This proposal will support the participation of early career scientists in the June 2025 Interior of the Earth Gordon Research Conference and Gordon Research Seminar. These meetings will focus on the impacts of volatiles, in particular water and carbon, on processes in the Earth’s interior. These impacts include the softening and melting of mantle rocks, with consequences on tectonic plates and the circulation of mantle material, and how the properties of Earth’s interior have evolved over time.

These meetings will examine how volatiles cycle between the Earth’s interior to its atmosphere, and the water and ice reservoirs at its surface, including processes such as volcanism and erosion and weathering. Another topic will be how the strength of mantle rocks affects solid Earth deformation in response to the changing masses of ice sheets, which impacts predictions of sea-level change.

This funding will enable early career scientists to learn from and contribute to the presentations and discussions at these meetings, and to build their research networks. By engaging new researchers in the community that studies the Earth’s interior, this proposal would contribute to workforce development and promote participation in research directions supported by the NSF Division of Earth Sciences.

This proposal will provide funding for the registration fees of early career scientists for the 2025 Interior of the Earth Gordon Research Conference (GRC) and Gordon Research Seminar (GRS). The GRS, designed for early career scientists, is scheduled for June 21-22, 2025, and the GRC, open to researchers at all career levels, will take place from June 22-27, 2025.

These meetings will be held at Mount Holyoke College in South Hadley, MA. The theme of the 2025 Interior of the Earth GRC is Volatiles, Melt and Viscosity: Consequences for Mantle Evolution and Climate System Interaction. The meeting will explore the cutting-edge of knowledge regarding: the distributions of volatiles and melt in the mantle; the nature of mantle viscosity, including whether it is intrinsically frequency-dependent or simply spatially variable; how volatiles and partial melt feed back into viscosity; the cycling of volatiles in the mantle, including subduction zone processes; and how metasomatism alters and potentially stores volatiles in the oceanic and continental lithosphere.

The meeting will also examine the processes that dominate the cycling of volatiles between the Earth’s interior and its climate system, including its atmosphere, oceans and ice sheets. Key topics include: the impact of volatiles on crustal magma storage and volcanic eruptions, both on Earth and on other planetary bodies; the interplay of magmatism and surface erosion in regulating atmospheric carbon in the recent plate tectonic regime; and the potential role of mantle overturn in atmospheric evolution billions of years ago.

Another focus will be the role of mantle viscosity in determining how the solid Earth responds to changing mass loads such as ice sheets and sea-level. The 2025 Interior of the Earth GRC will explore these fascinating and interwoven processes by integrating perspectives including geochemistry, petrology, geodynamics, seismology, geodesy, magnetotellurics, rock deformation, mineral physics, paleomagnetism, and geology.

The meeting will include morning and evening sessions with talks and discussion, engaging poster sessions, and free afternoons to promote interaction among participants. The theme of the 2025 Interior of the Earth GRS is Coupled Surface-Interior Interactions: The Role of Volatiles in Subduction and Eruption Processes. The GRS will include a keynote talk, talks and posters based on submitted abstracts, and a panel on Science Communication Methods and Careers.

Students and post-docs attending the GRS will be encouraged to participate in the GRC. A key broader impact of these meetings will be to engage and support early career scientists in study of the Earth’s interior and its links to the climate system, including researchers from underrepresented groups, and varied countries and institutions. We will implement strategies to create an inclusive meeting environment, where everyone is free to share their ideas in plenary discussions, poster sessions, meals, free afternoons, and a “Power Hour” discussion focused on careers and community-building.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.