Dr. Wentao Cao

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Dr. Cao joined the Department of Geology and Environmental Sciences in 2017, after graduating from the University of Iowa with a Ph.D. in Geoscience. He is currently working on petrological and tectonic projects using rock specimens (e.g. 'Christmas rock' and diamond-bearing kimberlite) from the Grenville Province in Canada, Central Qiangtang (Tibet), South Brasilia Orogen, and Botswana, along with other modeling projects. The goal of his research program is to further our understanding of petrological and tectonic processes operating in the root of mountain belts and upper mantle. 

Dr. Cao has received several internal awards at Fredonia and Iowa and obtained internal and external grants as a PI, co-PI or collaborator. He has (co)authored 17 research papers (1 in revision) and 31 conference presentations. He serves as an Associate Editor for Geochemistry, Geosphere, Lithosphere, and ES3 (Earth Science, Systems and Society). He is a member of various professional committees and a reviewer for peer-reviewed journals and funding agencies.

Teaching Interests

Mineralogy, Petrology, and Tectonics

Research Interests

Metamorphic Petrology, Continental Tectonics, Geochronology, and Thermodynamic Modeling.

Awards and Honors

• William T. and Charlotte N. Hagan Young Scholar Award, SUNY Fredonia (2024).
• Costello Interplay Award, SUNY Fredonia (2020).
• Instructional Incentive Award, SUNY Fredonia (2020).

Professional Membership

• Geological Society of America
• American Geophysical Union
• Mineralogical Society of America

Intellectual Contributions

• "Exhumation of an Ultrahigh-Pressure Slice From the Upper Plate of the Caledonian Orogen—A Record From Titanite in North-East Greenland," Tectonics (2024).
• "Identifying serpentine minerals by their chemical compositions with machine learning," American Mineralogist (2024).
• "Lithospheric Extension of the Accretionary Wedge: An Example from the Lanling High-Pressure Metamorphic Terrane in Central Qiangtang, Tibet," Geological Society of America Bulletin (2023).
• "Local Rapid Exhumation in Long-Lived Grenville Orogeny," GSA Memoirs 220: Laurentia: Turning Points in the Evolution of a Continent (2023).
• "Partial melting due to breakdown of phengite and amphibole in retrogressed eclogite of deep Precambrian crust: an example from the Algonquin terrane, western Grenville Province, Canada.," Precambrian Research (2021).
• "A late Permian–Triassic trench‐slope basin in the Central Qiangtang metamorphic belt, Northern Tibet: Stratigraphy, sedimentology, syndepositional deformation and tectonic implications," Basin Research (2021).
• "Secular change and the onset of plate tectonics on Earth," Earth-Science Reviews (2020).
• "The timing of brittle deformation: An example from the Cenozoic faults in the Youjiang fold-thrust belt in southwestern China," Geological Journal (2020).
• "Partial melting of zoisite eclogite from the Sanddal area, North-East Greenland Caledonides," European Journal of Mineralogy (2020).
• "Petrological implications of seafloor hydrothermal alteration of subducted mid-ocean ridge basalt," Journal of Petrology (2020).
• "Partial melting due to breakdown of an epidote‐group mineral during exhumation of ultrahigh‐pressure eclogite: an example from the North‐East Greenland Caledonides," Journal of Metamorphic Geology (2019).

Presentations

• "Late Cretaceous reactivation of a Paleo-Tethyan suture zone in Xizang of western China: extensional collapse of the proto-Tibetan plateau?" (2024).
• "The partial melting of ultrahigh-pressure eclogite," 14th International Eclogite Conference (2022).
• "Compositional Variation in Melts derived from Metabasalt in Subducted Oceanic Slabs: Constraints from Forward Petrological Modeling," 2022 American Geophysical Union Fall Meeting (2022).
• "Relationship between laboratory derived seismic velocities and constitution of kimberlites," 2022 American Geophysical Union Fall Meeting (2022).
• "Metamorphic conditions of a garnet-bearing gneiss from the high-pressure belt, western Grenville Province," 2022 Geological Society of American (GSA) Northeastern Meeting (2022).
• "Pressure-temperature evolution of garnet-bearing blueschist in central Qiangtang Block, northern Tibetan Plateau.," 2022 Geological Society of American (GSA) Northeastern Meeting (2022).
• "Titanite record of UHP exhumation from the upper plate of the Caledonian collision, North-East Greenland," International Eclogite Conference. (2022).
• "Pressure-temperature path of migmatite from Lac Dumoine Terrane, western Grenville Province.," Joint 69th Annual Southeastern/55th Annual Northeastern Section Meeting. (2020).
• "Pressure-Temperature path of the high-pressure belt in eastern section of the western Grenville Province," Joint 69th Annual Southeastern/55th Annual Northeastern Section Meeting. (2020).
• "Pressure-Temperature Path of Eclogite from the Grenville Province, Southern Ontario," Northeast Geological Society of America Annual Meeting (2019).