William D. McCoy, wdmccoy@geo.umass.edu
B.A., SUNY Albany, 1972; M.A., Utah, 1977; Ph.D., Colorado, 1981.
Associate Professor
Geomorphology
William McCoy's primary research concerns Quaternary geomorphology and stratigraphy. He has worked on the chronology of alpine glaciation and lake-level changes in the western United States. Much of the lake-level work focused on the application of aminostratigraphic methods to Quaternary deposits of closed-basin lakes. That work resulted in an aminostratigraphic framework for the exposed records of Lakes Bonneville and Lahontan. Research has also been conducted on the determination of Quaternary paleotemperatures (based on rates of isoleucine epimerization in fossil mollusk shells) in the Great Basin and the investigation of the paleoclimates and paleohydrology that supported the greatly expanded Pleistocene glaciers and lakes of that region. Recently he has been involved in research projects concerning the aminostratigraphy of Pleistocene loess deposits of the midwestern U.S., China, and central Europe. In collaboration with Eric A. Oches, an aminostratigraphic framework has been developed for a region including the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, and Austria. Most recently, work is being conducted on loess aminostratigraphy and paleothermometry across Europe from Belgium to Ukraine, including Germany, Czech Republic, Austria, Hungary, Serbia, and Romania.
Professor McCoy, in cooperation with Professor Brigham-Grette, operates the Department's Amino Acid Geochronology Laboratory. The facility provides amino acid analyses of carbonate fossils for in-house projects as well as for the scientific community at large. Several new and interesting research areas are presently arising from collaboration with other scientists who find that measurement of amino acid racemization helps in their own work.
Markovic, S. B., Bokhorst, M. P., Vandenberghe, J., McCoy, W. D., Oches, E. A., Hambach, U., Gaudenyi, T., Jovanovic, M., Zöller, L., Stevens, T., Machalett, B., in press, Late Pleistocene loess-paleosol sequences in the Vojvodina region, north Serbia: Journal of Quaternary Science, doi:10.1002/jqs.1124 (published online Aug. 13, 2007).
Markovic, S. B., Oches, E. A., McCoy, W. D., Frechen, M., and Gaudenyi, T., 2007, Malacological and sedimentological evidence for "warm" glacial climate from the Irig loess sequence, Vojvodina, Serbia, Geochemistry Geophysics Geosystems, v. 8, Q09008, doi:10.1029/2006GC001565.
Markovic, S. B., McCoy, W. D., Oches, E. A., Savic, S., Gaudenyi, T., Jovanovic, M., Stevens, T., Walther, R., Ivanisevic, P., and Galic, Z., 2005, Paleoclimate record in the Upper Pleistocene loess-paleosol sequence at Petrovaradin Brickyard (Vojvodina, Serbia): Geologica Carpathica, v. 56, p. 545-552.
Oches, E. A., and McCoy, W. D., (2001) Historical development and recent advances in amino acid geochronology applied to loess research: examples from North America, Europe, and China. Earth-Science Reviews, 54, 173-192.
Oches, E. A., McCoy, W. D., and Gnieser, D., (2000) Aminostratigraphic correlation of loess-paleosol sequences across Europe. In: Goodfriend, G. A., Collins, M., Fogel, M., Wehmiller, J. F., and Macko, S. A., (eds.), Perspectives in Amino Acid and Protein Geochemistry. Oxford University Press, Oxford, p. 331-348.
Svoboda, J., Valoch, K., Cilek, V., Oches, E., and McCoy, W., (1998) Cerveny Kopec (Red Hill): evidence for lower paleolithic occupations. Pamatky Archeolocicke, 89, 197-204.
McCoy, W. D., Oches, E. A., and Cilek, V., (1996) Amino-acid chronology of Modrice fossil soil complex (Brno) region). Geological research in Moravia and Silesia in the year 1995, 3, 23-26.
Oches, E. A., and McCoy, W. D. (1995) Aminostratigraphic evaluation of conflicting age estimates for the "Young Loess" of Hungary. Quaternary Research, 44, 160-170.
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