Current Post: RCUK fellow

Room Number: 3.12

Telephone: 01603 593395 (+44 1603 593395)

Fax: 01603 591327 (+44 1603 591327)

Email: N.Pedentchouk@uea.ac.uk

Research interests

• development of compound-specific isotopic proxies for palaeohydrological and palaeoclimatic studies using modern terrestrial vegetation;
• climate change during the Quaternary in western Europe;
• experimental and field investigation of hydrogen isotope exchange between organic compounds and H2O in Cretaceous and Jurassic sediments;
• application of molecular and stable isotope methodology for food authentication and traceability;
• organic geochemical methods in forensic science.

Biography

My Ph.D. work in the Department of Geosciences, the Pennsylvania State University, USA (completed in 2004), concerned organic geochemistry of Early Cretaceous petroleum rocks from West African lacustrine basins. I investigated molecular and compound-specific C and H isotopic composition of bulk organic matter and individual biomarkers. Since my postdoctoral research at Yale University, USA (2004-2006), I have been involved in laboratory and field investigations of environmental and post-depositional processes that influence C and H isotopic composition of lipid biomarkers from terrestrial and aquatic plants. I was involved in field studies of modern tree leaves throughout climatic gradients in California and Hawaii, USA.

Starting in 2005, I have been leading a multiyear study that investigates isotopic composition of leaf wax biomarkers at an experimental set-up in Eastern Washington State, USA. This work has been carried out in collaboration with Mark Pagani at Yale University. As part of this collaboration, I have been investigating lacustrine and marine sedimentary records of hydrological conditions during the Holocene (the Yucatan Peninsula) and Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum (the Arctic Ocean), respectively. In 2007, I started a new project in collaboration with colleagues from the UK, Germany, Italy, and Spain in order to conduct a long-term investigation of stable isotope composition of leaf wax biomarkers from higher plants in Western Europe.

Significant Publications

Armstrong, H.A., Abbott, G.D., Turner, B.R., Makhlouf, I.M., Muhammad, A.B., Pedentchouk, N. & Peters, H. (2009) Black shale deposition in an Upper Ordovician–Silurian permanently stratified, peri-glacial basin, southern Jordan. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology, 273, 368–377, doi:10.1016/j.palaeo.2008.05.005

Pedentchouk, N., Sumner, W., Tipple, B. and Pagani, M. (2008) δ13C and δD compositions of n-alkanes from modern angiosperms and conifers: An experimental set up in central Washington State, USA. Organic Geochemistry, 39, 1066-1071, doi:10.1016/j.orggeochem.2008.02.005

Enders, S.K, Pagani, M., Pantoja, S., Baron, J.S., Wolfe, A.P., Pedentchouk, N. and Nunez, L. (2008) Compound-specific stable isotopes of organic compounds from lake sediments track recent environmental changes in an alpine ecosystem, Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado. Limnology and Oceanography, 53, 1468-1478. 

Pagani, M., Pedentchouk, N., Huber, M., Sluijs, A., Schouten, S., Brinkhuis, H., Sinninghe Damsté, J. S., Dickens, G. R., and the IODP Expedition 302 Expedition Scientists (2006) Arctic’s hydrology during global warming at the Palaeocene/Eocene thermal maximum. Nature, 442, 671-675, doi:10.1038/nature05043

Sluijs, A., Schouten, S., Pagani, M., Woltering, M., Brinkhuis, H., Sinninghe Damsté, J. S., Dickens, G. R., Huber, M., Reichart, G.-J., Stein, R., Matthiessen, J., Lourens, L. J., Pedentchouk, N., Backman, J., Moran, K. and the Expedition 302 Scientists (2006) Subtropical Arctic Ocean temperatures during the Palaeocene/Eocene thermal maximum. Nature 441, 610-613, doi:10.1038/nature04668

Pedentchouk, N., Freeman, K.H., and Harris, N.B. (2006) Different response of δD values of n-alkanes, isoprenoids and kerogen during thermal maturation. Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta, 70, 2063-2072, doi:10.1016/j.gca.2006.01.013

Pedentchouk, N., Freeman, K.H., Harris, N.B., Clifford, D.J., and Grice K. (2004) Sources of alkylbenzenes in Lower Cretaceous lacustrine source rocks, West African rift basins. Organic Geochemistry, 35, 33-45, doi:10.1016/j.orggeochem.2003.04.001