WHAT CAN LACCORE DO FOR YOU?

Limnogeologists and paleolimnologists come from a broad range of disciplines and backgrounds, and many who use lake sediment analysis as a research tool are not lake scientists per se. Interdisciplinary studies are challenging, and even relatively small-scale core collection and analysis can be expensive and time-consuming if researchers have to develop or purchase their own tools and instruments. LacCore, the National Lacustrine Core Facility, funded by NSF, supports all scientists working in lakes with free and low-cost services, logistical help, and instrument time. The Facility does not seek to impose standardization on a diverse community, but instead to facilitate and economize best practices of core collection, analysis, and curation. LacCore continues to add cutting-edge instrumentation and core processing tools, and to expand its online presence in order to reach more limnogeologists, especially students. A new initiative working with Tribal College students to study the paleoecology of wild rice lakes on the Fond du Lac Reservation in northern Minnesota is aimed at increasing diversity in geoscience through place-based teaching and training the next generation of limnogeologists.