I am a second-year PhD student based in Cambridge with the British Antarctic Survey. I research rock samples collected from the Shackleton Range of East Antarctica. The geology of the Shackleton Range has long been known to be of ancient origin, hosting a suite of Archaen-Palaeoproterozoic orthogneisses, granitoids and metasedimentary rocks. However, limited geochronological and geochemical analysis, coupled with it's isolated position within the East Antarctic shield/ice sheet, has precluded a clear understanding of it's formation and it's role in the tectonic assembly of East Antarctica during the dawn of plate tectonics on Earth.

My PhD aims to provide a comprehensive geochronological and geochemical overview of the Shackleton Range. The first phase of the project focuses on the Read Mountains in the range's southern region, which has been tentatively linked with similar craton-like suites/complexes across East Antarctica, as well as Palaeoproterozoic orogenic belts in southwestern United States. Until now, such data is very sparse for the Read Mountains. Therefore, this work has the potential to shed new light on its formation and offer key evidence for or against existing models for East Antarctic assembly and associated supercontinent reconstructions throughout the Proterozoic.