Dave is a lifelong resident of the Pacific Northwest, who spent his early years in Portland and has lived in Seattle since 1984. He earned a Ph.D. in chemical oceanography from the University of Washington in 1990. Dave is Principal Research Scientist with the Cooperative Institute for Climate, Ocean, and Ecosystem Studies (CICOES) at the University of Washington and is the Group Leader for the Earth Ocean Interactions Program at NOAA Pacific Marine Environmental Lab in Seattle.
Dave’s research concerns chemical exchange between the ocean and the solid earth. The main focus has been deep-sea volcanoes and the hot springs and chemosynthetic ecosystems they create, with a more recent interest in methane seeps. Dave uses the composition of hydrothermal fluids to learn about sub-seafloor processes ranging from magma degassing to microbiological productivity. The research requires a combination of shipboard field research and laboratory analysis and experimentation. To study deep-sea hot springs, Dave has invented specialized instrumentation including a sampler for hot spring fluids and particles and an incubator that can grow high-temperature microbes on the seafloor. He has been on 70 oceanographic expeditions, including 41 Alvin dives and 6 dives in other submersibles at hydrothermal sites around the Pacific and Atlantic.
Dave has been on four expeditions with Falkor: Axial Seamount Cruise (2013), Searching for Life in the Mariana Back-Arc (2015), Underwater Fire: Studying Submarine Volcanoes of Tonga (2017), and as the Principal Research Scientist for 2016’s Hydrothermal Hunt at Mariana.
Cruises:
