Ken Buesseler

Ken Buesseler is a marine radiochemist who studies the fate and distribution of radioactive elements in the ocean. Their radioactive decay properties can tell us something about time-scales, or how quickly processes take place. Applications include studies of the ocean carbon cycle where the naturally occurring isotopes of thorium tell us how quickly and how much carbon is carried on sinking particles from the sun lite surface ocean through the ocean twilight zone to the deep sea. His lab has also been active in response to radioactivity released from disasters such as the impact of radioactivity released from the Fuksuhima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant, and from earlier sources such as Chernobyl or atomic weapons testing at the Marshall Islands.