This month, as Senior Research Scientist Dr. Sue Welch departs SES to join Koloma, we reflect back in gratitude on her 16 years of dedicated service. Dr. Welch has enriched the SES community through her research, teaching, and mentoring. Her science contributions have impacted isotope and trace element geochemistry, microbial systems in soils, natural waters and at the extreme edge of life in the subsurface, the role of weathering on the global cycling of elements, the evolution of fluids from energy-centric engineered systems like gas shale and CO₂ storage, and nutrient cycling at the interface of fresh and ocean waters. She couples the use of numerous types of analytical instrumentation to interrogate complex systems - isotope ratio mass spectrometry, inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry, X-ray diffraction, UV-vis spectroscopy, ion chromatography, and high-resolution electron microscopy to name a few. 

She has been a teacher, mentor, and laboratory trainer for many both undergraduate and graduate students of Drs. Cole, Lyons, and Carey as well as others in SES, the Dept. of Geography, College of Engineering and CFAES. She has equipped countless students with job-ready skills in analytical chemistry, taught them the art of quality assurance, and helped them sidestep data interpretation pitfalls and extract deeper insights from their data. Countless students and faculty have benefitted from her sage advice on experimental design and scientific interpretation. Dr. Welch’s research council and contributions will be missed. We wish her an exciting future at Koloma.