Research Interests:

Dr. Ganqing Jiang’s research focuses on environmental and climate changes across critical transitions in Earth’s history. In particular, he utilizes an integrated field, petrographic, and isotope-geochemical approach to study the origin of carbon isotope anomalies and unusual oceanographic changes at the dawn of animal life and across the major Paleozoic greenhouse−icehouse transitions.

Through comparative study of the Neoproterozoic to Paleozoic sedimentary archives in the Great Basin of western U.S. and in other continents such as South China, Ganqing’s research attempts to better understand the causal relationships between carbon isotope excursions, ocean redox changes, sea-level changes and biotic innovations.

Selected Publications: (Full Publication list )

Tang, D., Zhou, H., Jiang, G., Shi, X., Li, X., Wang, L., Xu, L., Sun, L., Xie, B., Zhou, L., Song, H., Zhou, X., Wang, X., Zhao, H., Zhang, S., and Poulton, S. W., 2025, Terminal Mesoproterozoic (1.1−1.0 Ga) shallow ocean oxygenation and the rise of crown-group eukaryotes: GSA Bulletin, v. 137, p. 3452-3462.

Chen, C., Wang, J., Algeo, T. J., Chen, X., Wei, K., Wang, Z., Huang, Y., and Jiang, G., 2025, Coronene spikes in the Ediacaran Doushantuo Formation, South China: A combustion origin?: Global and Planetary Change, v. 253, p. 104943.

Gan, T., Tian, M., Wang, X.-K., Wang, S., Liu, X.-M., Jiang, G., C. Gill, B., Nolan, M., Kaufman, A. J., Luo, T., and Xiao, S., 2024, Lithium isotope evidence for a plumeworld ocean in the aftermath of the Marinoan snowball Earth: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, v. 121, p. e2407419121.

He, R., Pohl, A., Prow, A., Jiang, G., Huan, C. C., Saltzman, M. R., and Lu, Z., 2024, The dynamic ocean redox evolution during the late Cambrian SPICE: Evidence from the I/Ca proxy: Global and Planetary Change, v. 233, p. 104354.

Shi, Q., Shi, X., Jiang, G., Tang, D., and Wang, X., 2024, The rise of biogenic silicon cycling and microbial silicification promoted Mesoproterozoic chert deposition: Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology, v. 651, p. 112405.

Courses taught:

Undergraduate:
* GEOG 103: Physical Geography
* GEOL 102: Earth and Life Through Time 
* GEOL 362: Principles of Stratigraphy and Sedimentation

Graduate:
* GEOL 781: Carbonate Depositional Systems
* GEOL 766: Earth Systems Change
* GEOL 701: Research Methods in Geoscience