Yanming Ruan
Report of GLOMAR PhD student Yanming Ruan about his participation in the 29th International Meeting on Organic Geochemistry in Gothenburg, Sweden from 1 to 6 September 2019
Thanks to the funding by GLOMAR and the suggestions by my thesis committee, I was able to attend the 29th International Meeting on Organic Geochemistry (IMOG) held in Gothenburg, Sweden. IMOG is a biennial conference focusing on the latest advances in organic geochemistry. The conference aims to refine the understanding of organic matter cycles through geological time scales and integrated paleo-environmental and climatic studies. It is one of the biggest international conferences in this field.
The theme of IMOG fits well to my expertise, since I am mostly using organic geochemical approaches in my project. I presented my poster entitled “EVOLUTION OF FIRE REGIMES IN EAST JAVA SINCE THE LAST GLACIAL”. All conference participants had a certain level of pre-knowledge, which made the presentation easier. The poster session lasted for two days, which provided an opportunity for in-depth discussions with experts about the results as well as my project. Directly related with my study were the talk by Prof. Chikaraishi about leaf wax isotopes, another one by Dr. Smittenberg about the past atmospheric convection of Indo-Pacific warm pool, and the final oral presentation of the conference by Dr. Dietze about fire regime reconstructions in Siberia. Attending this conference helped further my research network with contacts and collaborations.
During the conference, I was able to learn the latest datasets, methods and trends by attending talk and poster sessions over broader topics, e.g. early life, petroleum systems, soils and microbes. The information enabled me to be more aware about potential projects for my future career. It was a motivating experience to be surrounded by enthusiastic researchers. Especially touching found I the story told by David Naafs of becoming an organic geochemist, who received the 2019 Schenck award.
