Columbia, Mo (May 13, 2016) – Assistant Professor James Schiffbauer (http://paleo.missouri.edu/people/schiffbauer.shtml) of the Department of Geological Sciences has been named to receive the 2016 MU Provost’s Outstanding Junior Faculty Research Award. The award recognizes faculty, who are in the early phases of their careers, for superior research and creative activity on the MU campus.

Dr. Schiffbauer is interested broadly in the evolution and ecology of our earliest animal ancestors, and the geobiological and environmental factors that influence soft-tissue fossil preservation. He studies pathways of exceptional preservation, largely focused at the Ediacaran–Cambrian transition during the dawn of animal life.

Jim received his Honors BA in Biology from West Virginia University (2000), dual MS degrees in Marine Biology and Coastal Ecosystems from Nova Southeastern University (2004), and a PhD in Geobiology from Virginia Tech (2009). Following a two-year post-doctoral position in the Virginia Tech Department of Geosciences, he spent a year as an Assistant Research Professor at the Virginia Tech Institute for Critical Technology and Applied Science Nanoscale Characterization and Fabrication Laboratory and an Adjunct Professor in the Virginia Tech Department of Geosciences, studying advanced microbeam analytical methods in geosciences. Jim joined the Mizzou Department of Geological Sciences in 2012.

Previous winners of the award include Prof. Eric Sandvol and Professor Emeritus Mike Underwood of the Department of Geological Sciences.

Dr. Schiffbauer will receive the award in a ceremony in early Fall 2016.