Studies of Cave Sediments: Physical and Chemical Records of Paleoclimate

by John Mylroie (Editor)

This book is for geoscience researchers and students with interests in climate change, paleohydrology, and sedimentology. Studies of Cave Sediments is unique in that it is the first comprehensive volume on cave sediments, provides case-studies from around the world, gives guidance on appropriate applications of techniques, and their limitations, synthesizes methods that can be used to decipher complex deposits, and includes chemical deposits (speleothems) as well as clastic sediments.

322 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2003

About the author

John Mylroie is Professor Emeritus of Geology at Mississippi State Univer­sity. After childhood in rural upstate New York, he attended Syracuse University, graduating in 1971 with a Zoology degree Summa Cum Laude and Phi Beta Kappa, also lettering on the soccer team (national champions in 2022, a half century later). He met Joan Saxon, a fellow Zoology major and Phi Beta Kappa, in Chemistry lecture his freshman year; they were married in 1970. Draft number 69 in the first draft lottery sent John to the Navy for a year as a sonar technician. While subsequently work­ing in the electronics laboratory of the Biology Department at SUNY Albany, John decided to turn his sporting interest in caves into a career. He entered the Geology PhD program at Rensselaer Polytechnic Insti­tute in 1974, graduating in 1977 and taking a faculty position at Murray State University in western Kentucky where Joan earned an MSc in microbiology and taught as an instructor.
John and Joan decided to start a family in 1981, and by November 1983 had three sons, the latter two appearing as undiagnosed identical twins (surprise!). With five mouths to feed, John took the Department Head position in the Geology and Geography Department (now Geosciences) at Mississippi State University in 1985. Joan later became a Geography instructor. John continued his island cave research program, often taking the entire family into the field. The National Speleological Society awarded him their Science Award for his work on island caves in 2000, and the Honorary Member Award, the society’s highest award, for lifetime contributions to cave science in 2008. Joan and John have completed field work in twenty-five countries, and they have published hundreds of professional papers, reports, field guides, and articles. Their work on islands across the Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian Oceans, as well as the Caribbean and Mediterranean Seas, has given them insight into how peoples and cultures interact with the environment in remote settings.
After a career of writing factual material in scientific literature, John decided it was time to make things up and write fiction. He has writ­ten books in the science fiction, fantasy, apocalypse, mystery, and spy thriller genres.