Eric Mittelstaedt

Eric Mittelstaedt is an assistant professor in the Department of Geological Sciences at the University of Idaho. Eric studies the dynamics of mid-ocean ridges including long-term tectonic deformation, interaction with mantle plumes, magmatism, and hydrothermal circulation. Specifically on the TREET project, Eric is using video imagery and temperature measurements to quantify the fluxes of diffuse hydrothermal venting within the Kick'em Jenny caldera and throughout the Barbados mud volcanoes. Constraining the flux of these gas-rich fluids will provide information on the natural production rate of methane and other gases and their contribution to the atmosphere.

Eric Mittelstaedt graduated from the University of California, Los Angeles in 2002 and completed his PhD in Geology and Geophysics at the School of Ocean and Earth Science and Technology, University of Hawaii in 2008. Between 2008 and 2010, Eric was an NSF international post-doctoral fellow at the FAST Laboratory in Orsay, France where he worked with Dr. Anne Davaille on laboratory experiments of mid-ocean ridge spreading. After completion of this fellowship, Eric had a second post-doctoral position at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution where he worked with Drs. Adam Soule and Daniel J. Fornari on the geophysics of the Northern Galapagos Volcanic Province, just north of the Galapagos Islands.