Neal Blair

Professor, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering

A228 Technological Institute
2145 Sheridan Road
Evanston, IL 60208

E-mail address: n-blair@northwestern.edu  
Phone: (847) 491-8790
Fax: (847) 491-4011

Curriculum Vitae

Education

• B.S. (Chemistry) University of Maryland.
• Ph.D. (Organic Chemistry) Stanford University.

Research

The cycling of the element carbon is fundamentally important to the functioning of our planet. My research has focused on the biogeochemical transformations of carbon with an emphasis on process-oriented studies of the evolution and fate of organic matter in surficial environments. Methanogenesis, methane oxidation, and the influence of macrofauna on organic carbon turnover are some of the processes that have been investigated in field areas ranging from the North Carolina slope to the Amazon shelf. Delineating the transformations of carbon from source (mountains) to sink (marine sediments) in small watershed systems ranging from Northern California to Papua New Guinea and New Zealand is a recent focus of research. Understanding what controls the persistence and/or breakdown of organic species in the environment is the major impetus for this work. My group has specialized in the development of novel stable isotope and radiocarbon tools to study carbon-cycling processes.

Teaching Activities

• EARTH 314 - Organic Geochemistry
• CIV_ENG 3xx - Biogeochemistry

Professional Activities

• National Ocean Sciences Accelerator Mass Spectrometry Advisory Board (10/05-06, chair 2007)
• NASA "Landscapes to Coast" panelist (2006)
• RioMar Planning Workshops (2001, raconteur for 2004)
• Biocomplexity Workshop on Animal-Sediment Interactions (2002, invited speaker)
• Carbon Erosion Workshop (2002), Palmerston North, New Zealand (invited international reviewer and speaker)
• NSF MARGINS Source to Sink planning workshops (1999 - invited speaker; 2000, 2003, 2006)

Selected Publications

• Early diagenetic cycling, incineration, and burial of sedimentary organic C in the central Gulf of Papua (Papua New Guinea). JGR-Earth Surf. (2007) in press (R.C. Aller, N. E. Blair, and G.J.Brunskill).
• Geomorphologic controls on the age of particulate organic carbon from small mountainous and upland rivers. Global Biogeochem. Cycles (2006), 20, GB3022, doi:10.1029/2005GB002677 (Leithold, E. L., N. E. Blair, and D. W. Perkey)
• Carbon remineralization in the Amazon-Guianas tropical mobile mudbelt: a sedimentary incinerator. Continent. Shelf Res.(2006) doi 10.1016/j.csr.2006.07.016 (R.C. Aller and N.E. Blair).
• Sedimentation and carbon burial on the northern California continental shelf: the signatures of land-use change. Continent. Shelf Res. (2005) 25: 349-371 (E. Leithold, D.W. Perkey, N.E. Blair. T. Creamer).
• Intramolecular carbon isotopic composition of monosodium glutamate: Biochemical pathways and product source identification. J. Agricultural and Food Chemistry (2005) 53: 197-201 (W.B. Savidge and N.E. Blair).
• Patterns of intramolecular carbon isotopic heterogeneity within amino acids of autotrophs and heterotrophs. Oecologia (2004) 121: 178-189 (W.B. Savidge and N.E. Blair).
• Early diagenetic remineralization of sedimentary organic C in the Gulf of Papua deltaic complex (Papua New Guinea): net loss of terrestrial C and diagenetic fractionation of C isotopes. Geochim. Cosmochim. Acta (2004) 68:1815-1825 (R.C. Aller and N.E. Blair).
• From bedrock to burial: the evolution of particulate organic carbon across coupled watershed-continental margin systems. Mar. Chem. (2004) 92: 141-156 (N.E. Blair, E.L. Leithold and R.C. Aller).
• Seasonal and within-plant gradients in the intramolecular carbon isotopic composition of amino acids of Spartina alterniflora. J. Exp. Mar. Biol. Ecol. (2004) 308: 151-167 (W.B. Savidge and N.E. Blair).