Rachel SoPostdoctoral Scholar

Research Focus:

paleoclimate, organic geochemistry, stable isotope geochemistry

Email:

rso1@uchicago.edu

Office:

Hinds 285

Biography 

Preferred Pronouns: She/Her

I am a paleoclimatologist that uses biomarkers, compounds made by organisms that reflect the environment at the time the compounds were made, preserved in geological archives to reconstruct Earth's past climate states. I work primarily with sedimentary archives in terrestrial locations, such as lakes and river basins, deposited during the Cenozoic. I graduated with a B.A. in Earth and Planetary Sciences, and Environmental Sciences from Northwestern University in 2020, and a Ph.D. in Geological Sciences from the University of Southern California in 2026. My Ph.D. dissertation was on glacial-interglacial variability of lakes in the southwestern US in response to changing climate, and also on the environmental history of the western Amazon Basin over the last 10 Myr.

• Selected Publications

• So, R.T., Ibarra, D.E., Tierney, J.E., Jagniecki, E., Lowenstein, T.K., Jost, A.B., Olson, K., McGee, D. and Feakins, S.J. (2026a) Plant Wax Isotopic Reconstructions Reveal Thermodynamic Drivers of Hydroclimate Over the Last Two Glacial Cycles at Great Salt Lake and Bear Lake, Utah. Paleoceanography and Paleoclimatology 41, e2025PA005357.10.1029/2025PA005357.
• So, R.T., Jagniecki, E., Lowenstein, T.K., Jost, A.B., Kinsley, C.W., Olson, K.J., McGee, D., Tierney, J.E. and Feakins, S.J. (2026b) Salinity reconstructions using microbial lipids and U-series dating at Great Salt Lake, Utah, spanning two glacial cycles. ESS Open Archive.10.22541/essoar.176745549.94743633/v3.
• So, R.T., Lowenstein, T.K., Jagniecki, E., Tierney, J.E. and Feakins, S.J. (2023) Holocene Water Balance Variations in Great Salt Lake, Utah: Application of GDGT Indices and the ACE Salinity Proxy. Paleoceanography and Paleoclimatology 38, 18.10.1029/2022pa004558.