Rahul Kumar has recently joined! Our team as a doctoral student. He perused Integrated Master’s in Applied Geology from Indian Institute of Technology (Indian School of Mines), Dhanbad, India. Rahul’s prior research was focused on the biogenicity of Archean age Organic Matter in the Banded Iron Formations (BIF) from Singhbhum Craton, India. He went to University College London, United Kingdom for advance study of those BIF rock samples. He was awarded Dean Summer Student Scholarship by Mathematical and Physical Sciences department.

During his doctoral period, Rahul is interested in identification of preserved potential bio signatures on Earths terrigenous analogous of Martian environments. He will be studying silica sinter deposit from hot springs of EL Tatio, Chile. In order to do this he will be performing various methodologies and sub disciplines of astrobiology such as sampling protocol, optical microscopy, DNA sequencing and bioinformatics, Confocal Laser Scanning Microscopy, SEM, FIB-TEM and isotopes of Boron, Carbon and Oxygen. Combining results from each separate analytical methods will give enough evidence to comment on the biogenicity of Organic Matter.