A 2011 Addition to Curation
Future Lunar Sample Curator
Ryan A. Zeigler comes to us from Washington University in St. Louis, where he worked on lunar and meteorite samples as a research scientist in the Department and Earth and Planetary Sciences and a member of the McDonnell Center for Space Sciences. Over the past 12 years, Ryan has utilized electron-microprobe, neutron-activation, and ion-microprobe analyses to study the characteristics and origins of lunar meteorites and Apollo glass particles. His experience with lunar samples is extensive, as he has studied samples from all six Apollo missions and nearly every know lunar meteorite.
Ryan Zeigler
Ryan received his Bachelor of Arts degree in geology and history from State University of New York, Potsdam in 1998. He went on to graduate school at Washington University in St. Louis where he received his Master of Arts (2000) and Doctor of Philosophy (2004) degrees in Earth and Planetary Sciences under the tutelage of Drs. Larry Haskin, Randy Korotev, and Brad Jolliff. His PhD Thesis was a study of basalts and basaltic glass from the Apollo 16 site and of the basaltic lunar meteorite stones recovered in the LaPaz Icefield, Antarctica.
Ryan loves to travel for fun, and has been to six of the seven continents, with only South America still to go. Most recently, he was able to travel to Antarctica as a member of the 2010-2011 ANSMET field team where he and twelve other colleagues were able to collect over 1240 meteorites during a six-week field season in the Davis-Ward Nunataks region of the Dominion Range, the LaPaz Icefield, and the Patuxent Range.
The United States National Park system is of special interest to Ryan, and over the years he has traveled to more than 25 of the National Parks and at least a dozen of the National Monuments, mostly in the western United States. During his time at Washington University he helped to plan and lead several departmental field trips to parks all around the country to study the geology and natural features preserved within these parks.
A big ARES welcome to Ryan and we are looking to many great years of working together in ARES!