Queen’s professor turns 40 years of playing with mud into prestigious Vega Medal | 24CA News
Playing round within the mud is one thing many individuals did after they have been children, however John Smol has made a profession out of it.
The biology professor at Queen’s University is an skilled in paleolimnology. The second a part of that title refers back to the research of lakes and rivers, whereas the primary factors to his specialty — reconstructing their historical past based mostly on sediment.
“Every lake has a history book at the bottom,” he mentioned, including it offers a file of what lived within the lake and the way the ecosystem round it has modified over time.
His work has taken him to among the most distant locations on the planet, from the High Arctic to Antarctic.
“Basically, we play with mud, but we play with it very precisely,” Smol mentioned with amusing.
That playtime has been rewarding each scientifically and, if his workplace is any measure, when it comes to status.
Certificates and honorary levels crowd the partitions. Medals and trophies crush the cabinets.
There’s even a sword hanging within the nook.
A ‘prolific’ scientist
Now Smol is going to need to make room for yet one more honour — he is been introduced because the winner of the Vega Medal 2023.
It’s a prestigious prize that is awarded by the Swedish Society for Anthropology and Geography (SSAG) about each three years.
Smol mentioned he seems like a little bit of a fraud based mostly on the corporate he is about to hitch.
“It’s heroes I’ve had since I was a teenager, like Roald Amundsen from the Northwest Passage, Ernest Shackleton, the anthropologist Louis Leakey, I mean, the list is just unbelievable.”
The recognition is humbling Smol mentioned, including plenty of the work has been finished by devoted college students and colleagues.
A quotation on the SSAG web site describes him as one of many “foremost experts” on the subject of finding out long-term environmental modifications in lakes and rivers.
It notes Smol’s file consists of greater than 670 journal publications and chapters, in addition to 20 books, stating he is “unquestionably one of the most prolific scientists in paleolimnology.”
Cult of Smol
A small placard outdoors Smol’s workplace presents the lab’s formal identify: Paleoecological Environmental Assessment & Research Lab (PEARL).
But three phrases typed out beneath in daring, black letters spotlight what number of actually confer with it: Cult of Smol.
His workplace could also be full of 40 years’ value of prizes, however Smol factors out one piece as notably particular.
It’s a framed drawing detailing a household tree of types, itemizing all of his college students and graduate college students as of 2016. It would wish a number of extra branches now, he joked.
That sort of progress and connection is likely one of the issues that has saved first-year PhD pupil Emma Graves at Queen’s.
“I really liked the community that we have and the family so to speak,” she defined. “That’s why I’ve stuck around.”
She described Smol as a pleasant and type supervisor who all the time finds time to examine in with college students.
Sarah Waldron, a grasp’s pupil, mentioned a lot of her mentors have been former “PEARL-ites,” the casual time period they use to confer with the individuals who make up their lab.
She and Graves teased Smol about the trophies cluttering up his workplace.
“The walls are getting very full. It’ll probably start bleeding over into our office area, I think,” Waldron mentioned with a smile.
“But it’s inspirational.”
A brand new swimsuit, match for a king
Smol mentioned he was really on his solution to settle for one more award in Argentina when he obtained an the e-mail asserting he’d received the Vega, including that even after so many prizes he nonetheless thought somebody could be enjoying a joke on him.
“I was very, very surprised,” he mentioned.
He’s set to journey to Sweden this week, the place the medal can be offered by King Carl XVI Gustaf of Sweden on April 21. Smol mentioned his spouse insisted he purchase a brand new swimsuit for the event.
Even after so a few years within the subject, and so many accolades, Smol mentioned he plans to maintain working and passing classes alongside to the following technology of students.
“I know what we’re doing is important. That’s a big motivator,” he mentioned.
“Sadly, new problems are always arising, so I don’t expect my students will run out of work in the future.”
