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Environmental Earth Science Lab
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A lab that reads the history of the oceans and the creatures in them from records preserved in fish otoliths and shells.
AboutAbout the lab
Reading environmental records from tiny carbonates.
Ishimura Lab (Environmental Earth Science Lab) specializes in environmental analysis using stable carbon and oxygen isotope ratios of calcium carbonate.
Building on paleontology and geochemistry, the lab's recent focus is its "fish research": clarifying fish migration routes in detail to help conserve fishery resources.
The foundation of its research is analytical techniques and instrument development, and the lab collaborates with research institutions in many fields in Japan and abroad.
Undergraduate students are assigned to the Earth and Life Environment Division and work on their graduation research (for graduate students, the Earth and Life Environment Division of the Department of Human and Environmental Studies, Graduate School of Human and Environmental Studies).
Key terms
- stable isotope ratio
- The proportion of atoms of the same element that differ in weight (isotopes). It records the environment at the time of formation, such as water temperature.
- otolith
- A small calcium carbonate stone inside a fish's head. Like tree rings, it preserves a record of growth.
- foraminifera
- Tiny single-celled marine organisms with calcium carbonate shells. Their fossils are clues to past ocean environments.
ResearchResearch themes
The lab develops techniques to measure stable isotope ratios of calcium carbonate with high precision from extremely small samples, and applies them to the analysis of fish migration, paleontology, and the environment.
*Illustrative imageTracing fish migration from otoliths
Using an instrument that can analyze samples with high precision from 1/100 of the amount required conventionally, the lab reads the environmental history recorded in otoliths at more than 10 times the temporal resolution, aiming to clarify the migration histories and stock fluctuations of important fish species.
*Illustrative imageDeveloping an instrument for measuring trace carbonates
The lab developed MICAL, an analytical technique that measures the stable isotope composition of extremely small amounts of carbonate with high precision. Operated as a technique that achieves high precision, high sensitivity, and high accuracy at the same time, it is increasingly applied in fisheries science and biology.
*Illustrative imageAccurately reconstructing past oceans with foraminifera
The lab measures the isotopic composition of benthic foraminifera shells one individual at a time, and is developing a method to identify species with small species-specific offsets (vital effects) that can serve as "absolute environmental indicators" directly showing past seafloor environments.
MembersFaculty
- ProfessorToyoho Ishimura
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Report an errorAbout the images
The top and research theme images are illustrative and were not taken at the lab. They are cropped from Wikimedia Commons images. Cropped CC BY-SA images are provided under the same CC BY-SA license as the original (version shown on each line).
- Top image: “Fish otolith on sectioning saw - USGS” Dona Eidam/USGS / CC BY-SA 3.0 (cropped)
- Tracing fish migration from otoliths: “Otolith of Centrolphus niger” Clumpus / CC BY 4.0 (cropped)
- Developing an instrument for measuring trace carbonates: “Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometer ( )” IAEA Imagebank / CC BY-SA 2.0 (cropped)
- Accurately reconstructing past oceans with foraminifera: “Foraminifera-diagenesis0 hg” Hannes Grobe / CC BY-SA 4.0 (cropped)
- Related lab (Biochemistry Lab (Tohru Tsuchiya)): “CyanobacteriaColl1” Christian Fischer / CC BY-SA 3.0 (cropped)
- Related lab (Kogiso Lab): “Peridotite 5773” HAROUY Jean-Michel / CC BY-SA 4.0 (cropped)
- Related lab (Solid Earth Science (Mamoru Kato) Lab): “Seismogram on historical seismometer at Institute of Geophysis of the Czech Academy of Science (19)” Petr Brož (Czech Academy of Science) / CC BY-SA 4.0 (cropped)
- Related lab (Ecology Lab): “Rainforest cloud forming Kinabalu Sabah Borneo Kampong Kundasang 4” kallerna / CC BY-SA 4.0 (cropped)
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