Washington, D.C.— Linda Elkins-Tanton, director of the Department of Terrestrial Magnetism, is resigning her position at Carnegie, effective May 9, 2014. She has accepted a position as the director of the School of Earth and Space Exploration at Arizona State University, starting July 1, 2014.
“Lindy will be greatly missed,” said Carnegie’s President Richard A. Meserve. “The breadth of her research interests combined with her management skills and her enthusiasm for outreach made her an excellent fit for leadership at Carnegie. We wish her the best in her future endeavors.”
Elkins-Tanton said: “I will miss Carnegie and, especially, my colleagues at DTM. ASU has provided me with a special opportunity to expand my horizons and to resume interacting with students again.”
Elkins-Tanton began her directorship in September 2011. Throughout her time at Carnegie, she continued her own research in the subject of volcanic provinces, which included field expeditions, as well as work on planetary formation processes. She has studied the relationship between large volcanic provinces, such as those found in the Siberian flood basalts, and global extinction events, such as the end-Permian extinction. She has also continued research on the chemical processes and physics of terrestrial planet formation, with a focus on the Moon, Mercury, Earth, rocky exoplanets, and planetesimals.
Elkins-Tanton received her B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. from MIT in geology, geochemistry, and geophysics respectively. Between her masters and doctorate, she spent 10 years in the private sector working in finance and publishing. After completing her Ph.D., Elkins-Tanton spent five years as a researcher at Brown University, followed by five years on MIT’s faculty, where she became an Associate Professor of Geology before accepting her position at Carnegie.