Dr. Yani Najman

Photo of Yani - click for high res version E-mail y.najman@lancaster.ac.uk
Telephone +44 (0)1524 593898
Facsimile +44 (0)1524 593985
Room B512


Research summary :

I am interested in using the detrital record as an archive of paleotectonics, climate and erosion. I utilise emerging and established provenance techniques , in particular isotopic fingerprinting and detrital thermochronology, to advance the detrital approach and apply it to novel geological problems. In orogenic settings, my work is focused on the Himalaya and Tibet. Here I use the sedimentary archive of material eroded from the mountain belt and preserved in adjacent sedimentary basins to better understand the inter-relationship between tectonics, erosion and sedimentation, to reconstruct hinterland tectonics and investigate mountain-building processes, and to constrain the proposed influence of Himalayan erosion on global climate and ocean geochemistry. My most recent work is extending the detrital approach to extensional settings, where I am determining the provenance of the Nile delta in order to reconstruct its palaeodrainage, and the relationship between its hydrology, rift tectonics, and ocean-atmosphere interactions.
 

 
Principal Supervisor to PhD students :

  • Alex Henderson (Lancaster University), graduated 2010. "India-Asia collision and Himalayan evolution: constraints from the sediment record, Indus Molasse, Ladakh Himalaya".
  • Ruth Allen (Lancaster University), graduated 2008. "Accretionary prism sediments of Myanmar, Bangladesh and the Andaman Islands - evidence of early Himalayan erosion?".
  • Adam Szulc (Edinburgh University), graduated 2005. "Tectonic evolution of the Himalayas constrained by a detrital investigation of the Siwalik Group Molasse, SW Nepal".
  • Nicola White (Cambridge University), graduated 2001. "Early Miocene exhumation history of the NW Indian Himalaya".


Education, appointments and awards :
  • 2009-present: Senior Lectureship, Lancaster University
  • 2003-2009: Lectureship, Lancaster University.
  • 2000-2003: Royal Society of Edinburgh / BP Fellowship, University of Edinburgh
  • 1999-2000: Royal Society International Fellowship,University of Calgary, Canada.
  • 1995-1999: Royal Society Dorothy Hodgkin Fellowship : Cambridge University, (in collaboration with Edinburgh)
  • 1990-1995: PhD, Edinburgh University.
  • 1986-1990: BSc, Geology, Edinburgh University.
  • 2003: European Union of Geosciences Outstanding Young Scientist.
  • 1998: "Britain's Young Achievers".


Interests :

Long distance cycle touring and telemark ski touring, mountain biking, hill walking, independent & expedition travel.