Rate My Professor Katherine Adelsberger

Katherine A. Adelsberger serves as Professor and Chair of Environmental Studies and holds the Douglas and Maria Bayer Endowed Chair in Earth Science at Knox College, where she has been a faculty member since 2008. She earned her Ph.D. in 2008 and A.M. in 2005 from Washington University in St. Louis, and her B.S. in 2002 from Beloit College. Adelsberger specializes in geoarchaeology, examining the geologic aspects of human-environment interactions, including site formation and taphonomic processes at archaeological sites, paleoenvironmental conditions during human history, and how societies adapted to environmental changes. Her fieldwork encompasses digging and desert walking as a field geologist. She co-directs the Dhiban Excavation and Development Project in Jordan since 2009, alongside projects such as Geologist for NYU Excavations at Amheida (2010-present), Dakhleh Oasis Project in Egypt (2004-present), Abydos Survey for Paleolithic Sites (2005-2008), Kharga Oasis Prehistory Project (2004-2008), Tensas Basin Coring Project in Louisiana (2004-2008), Dubai Desert Survey in the United Arab Emirates (2007), and Mound A Excavation at Poverty Point State Historic Site in Louisiana (2005). Recent research includes desert pavement development, spring deposits, paleochannels of ancient river systems, and local studies at Green Oaks on prairie burns, erosion, soil nutrients like phosphorus, and landscape management for prairie restoration and agriculture.

Adelsberger's publications include 'Desert pavement development and landscape stability on the eastern Libyan Plateau, Egypt' (Geomorphology, 2009), 'Paleolandscape and paleoenvironmental interpretation of spring-deposited sediments in Dakhleh Oasis, Western Desert of Egypt' (Catena, 2010), 'Geochemical and mineralogic characterization of Middle Stone Age tools of Laetoli, Tanzania' in Paleontology and Geology of Laetoli (2011), 'Basin-scale reconstruction of the geological context of human settlement: an example from the lower Mississippi Valley, USA' (Quaternary Science Reviews, 2008), and 'Sedimentology' in Encyclopedia of Geoarchaeology (2017). She has received the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship (2003-2008), Geological Society of America Student Research Grant (2007), Claude C. Albritton, Jr. Award (2007), Douglas C. Kellogg Award (2007), Sigma Xi Grant-in-Aid of Research (2006), and multiple Knox College grants including Faculty Research Grants (2016-2017) and NSF Major Research Instrumentation Grant (2014). Adelsberger teaches geoarchaeology, paleoenvironmental reconstruction, and geographic information systems. She serves on the Public Relations Committee of the Geological Society of America Archaeological Geology Division and the Kellogg Award Committee of the Society for American Archaeology, and holds memberships in the American Geophysical Union, American Quaternary Association, Geological Society of America, Society for American Archaeology, Phi Beta Kappa, and Sigma Xi. Her contributions advance understandings of landscape history, water management strategies, and soil dynamics in archaeological and modern contexts.