A paper by Denniston and 10 others, including a 2014 Cornell College graduate, is published this week in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The article, "Extreme rainfall activity in the Australian tropics reflects changes in the El Niño/Southern Oscillation over the last two millennia," presents a precisely dated stalagmite record of cave flooding events that are tied to tropical cyclones, which include storms such as hurricanes and typhoons.
Denniston is one of few researchers worldwide using stalagmites to reconstruct past tropical cyclone activity, a field of research called paleotempestology. His work in Australia began in 2009 and was originally intended to focus on the chemical composition of the stalagmites as a means of reconstructing past changes in the intensity of Australian summer monsoon rains. But Denniston and his research team found more than just variations in the chemical composition of the stalagmites they examined; they discovered that the interiors of the stalagmites also contained prominent layers of mud.
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