Liz Safran

As a geomorphologist, I concern myself with how landscapes are shaped by processes, like landsliding or river incision, that mobilize and redistribute material at Earth’s surface.  My projects have largely focused on how rivers carve down through bedrock in a variety of settings, ranging from the Bolivian Andes, to the Laramide Region of the continental interior U.S., to the uplifted volcanic plateaus of eastern Oregon’s high desert.  Most recently, I am interested in how streams in the Finger Lakes region of central New York are sculpting gorges and waterfalls in response to to lake level fall associated with deglaciation some 14,000 years ago.