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10/28/2014

Searching for Clues: Suffolk Community College Science Students Probe Rocky Point Preserve with Radar to Solve Ground Depression Mystery

Suffolk County Community College Associate Professor of Earth and Space Sean Tvelia (not pictured) and his students, from left, Lucia Mallozzi, (baseball cap person unknown), David Burns,Leila Esmailzada, and Omar Azziz are working with Stony Brook University Prof. Dan Davis, kneeling- back to camera, to solve a local mystery: what caused a number of rimmed depressions in the ground throughout the Rocky Point Natural Resources Management Area that includes nearly 6,000 acres of pine-oak forest and open lands.

The students are using ground penetrating radar to determine the structure of the underlying surface and formulate hypotheses about the possible causes of the not-too-noticeable depressions. The students also assisted in conducting resistivity studies that will be used in conjunction with the results of ground penetrating radar.