Andy Baker

Researchers working under metal sheeting, extracting a groundwater bore logger from the borehole

White limestone hillside with solution features. Trees on the right, person for scale.

A cave chamber, tree roots in background. The roots are far longer than the height of the trees on the surface.

Capricorn Caves sign for www.capricorncaves.com.au

Thanks to the Capricorn Caves team for another amazing research visit.
We downloaded cave hydrology loggers and a groundwater level logger, and ACKMA cave climate loggers. Visited the groundwater recharge zone above the cave. Saw lots of bats, and tree roots deep into the cave system.

A black duffle bag, red and blue cavers bag, ruggedised laptop and walking boots

It's starting to feel a lot like fieldwork...

(Capricorn Caves edition)
#caves #fieldwork #academia #science

Thanks to the @agu.org

@unswbees.bsky.social @sub-heterogenty.bsky.social

Six people standing in a room, Sydney cityscape behind them

It was 'student night' at IAH NSW in Sydney ( and online everywhere).

Thanks to Akhi Kumar, Danyang Sun, Nane Weber and Yaggesh Sharma for presenting their groundwater research.

I might have photobombed the official photo!

AGU Distinguished Lecture Series: Caves and their stalagmites: linking climate to groundwater recharge I am delighted to have been chosen as a lecturer in the American Geophysical Union Distinguished Lecture Series for 2025-2026. Would you like to hear about “Caves and their stalagmites: linki…

I am delighted to have been chosen as a lecturer in the American Geophysical Union Distinguished Lecture Series for 2025-2026.

Would you like to hear about all things climate, groundwater and caves...?

andy-baker.org/2025/10/14/a...

Happy #FossilFriday, the University of Texas is hiring two curators/non-TT professors for our Vertebrate and Non-vertebrate Paleontology Labs: apply.interfolio.com/175702

MOFs are in the news, thanks to a Nobel Prize for #Chemistry.

MOFs = metal organic frameworks, complex molecules. They can help break down environmental contaminants such as #PFAS, or PAHs such as naphthalene, as published by Ze Li this year:
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

MOFs are in the news, thanks to a Nobel Prize for #Chemistry.

MOFs = metal organic frameworks, complex molecules. They can help break down environmental contaminants such as #PFAS, or PAHs such as naphthalene, as published by Ze Li this year:
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Hi All, We are under a week away from out October tech talk! This month we will be hosting our annual student night so don't miss out. Four presenters will be giving talks on their research topics… | IAH NSW Committee Hi All, We are under a week away from out October tech talk! This month we will be hosting our annual student night so don't miss out. Four presenters will be giving talks on their research topics. Please see below for event details. As usual, this talk will be held in person, and online, with details to follow. Topic: Student Night Where: WSP Office Sydney - Level 27 When: Tuesday 14 October 2025 Time: 17:30 for an 18:00 start Event Info: TBC Teams Link: To be provided closer to the event Presenter: Yaggesh Sharma Title: Evaluating pond recharge potential in the Ramganga Basin with data-driven modelling approaches. Presenter: Danyang Sun Title: Classifying drip water responses in karst vadose zone: Insights from Yarrangobilly, Australia. Presenter: Nane Weber Title: Integrating karstification in large-scale hydrological simulations Presenter: Akhilesh Kumar Title: Soil Moisture and Vegetation Are Key Predictors of Precipitation-driven Groundwater Recharge at Australia’s National Groundwater Recharge Observing System (NGROS) Sites

It is IAH 'student night' next Tuesday in Sydney CBD, and there are #groundwater presentations from some of my #UNSW group. Open to all! Details are here:
www.linkedin.com/posts/iah-ns...

Deloitte will refund Australian government for AI hallucination-filled report - Ars Technica Consulting firm quietly admitted to GPT-4o use after fake citations were found in August.

If you sneak out a corrected government report before the long weekend, IMO it deserves sharing the week after. #ChatGPT #AI assisted report has fake references and quote.

arstechnica.com/ai/2025/10/d...

Opportunities matching 'earth' Search 4 Careers available at University of Calgary.

🚨FOUR tenure track positions in my dept @ucalgary.bsky.social @ucalgaryscience.bsky.social in applied & computational geophysics, subsurface geochemistry, sedimentary geology, and sustainable soil science. careers.ucalgary.ca/search/jobs?...

(please reskeet widely!) #academicsky 🧪⚒️🇨🇦

University of Leicester staff announce strike action over job cut plans Members of the University and College Union (UCU) at the University of Leicester have today announced that they will take 15 days of industrial action in response to the university's plans to slash jo...

"80% of staff backed strike action in a ballot with a turnout of 62%..." 😮

I'd missed this article via @ucu.org.uk: www.ucu.org.uk/article/1417.... Another #EarthScience / #Geology department under threat, along with several other academic areas.

Sleuth unearths citation, authorship issues at earth sciences journal Carlos Conforti Ferreira Guedes, a geology professor at the Federal University of Paraná in Brazil, came across a paper in the Journal of South American Earth Sciences earlier this year with irrele…

Made-up citations can indicate the use of generative AI in crafting the paper – but another detail caught his attention as particularly odd: The researchers on the paper, a study on the transformation of the Brazilian coastline, all listed affiliations in India.

Major Droughts Coincided with Classic Maya Collapse - Eos Understanding how individual cities responded to climate stress will help create holistic pictures of how these societies functioned.

An incredibly high resolution paleoclimate record has revealed several major, extended droughts that coincide with the period of Classic Maya collapse.

Understanding Groundwater Recharge: Impact of Rainfall and Fires Groundwater can be replenished by rainfall that percolates from the surface to the water table. The amount of rainfall that is needed to generate this groundwater recharge is hard to measure. We de…

New paper alert led by Christina Song & Micha Campbell

Working at Wombeyan Caves, we identified potential recharge events by logging cave drip water in a shallow cave

During our monitoring, an intense fire occurred above the cave. Find out what happened here...

andy-baker.org/2025/09/14/u...

Hydrology Paper of the Day @andy-baker.bsky.social on how surface fire affects groundwater recharge due to rainfall in a karst cave situated in New South Wales, Australia: drip loggers utilized to quantify recharge and a model of how fractures, ash, vegetation and soil affects water inputs.

Women in Hydrology – The Story of a Special Issue It was 2021, and we were not feeling good.  COVID-19 was in full force.  Personally we were experiencing lockdown conditions, disruptions to our work, schooling and childcare arrangements.  Our social...

Mentors matter—especially in challenging times.
The latest #EGU special issue Women in #Hydrology shines a light on women who’ve broken ground in hydrological sciences, & the mentees following their path.

Essential reads on equity, inclusion, & resilience.

Check 👇

blogs.egu.eu/divisions/hs...

Three weeks on, and IOP have emailed me. They have confirmed inappropriate AI use in parts of two reviews, and have acted appropriately against the two reviewers. Good to see such fast action.

Peer Review in Transition: Helen King and Christopher Leonard on AI and the Future of Peer Review - The Scholarly Kitchen Today, we talk to thought leaders Helen King and Chris Leonard, who offer a nuanced look at how peer review might adapt, fracture, or reinvent itself in the AI era.

Impacted by poor AI use in the peer revie process? This is informative:
scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org/2025/09/18/p...

An update would be appreciated. And no, thank you for the offer.

Indeed

A professor and indigenous groundwater science leader speaks at a conference podium. Conference logo in background designed by Uncle Anthony Newcastle.

The start of Day 3 of the #IAH2025 international groundwater congress here in Naarm / Melbourne. Keynote speaker Prof Brad Moggridge reflects on yesterday's indigenous groundwater sessions.

The conference logo designed by Uncle Anthony Newcastle.

Decade of Research in Macleay Caves: Key Findings and Future Directions Around a decade ago, thanks to a government committee that I was a member of, I was encouraged to consider improving our understanding of the caves and karst in the Macleay karst region of Australi…

Improving our understanding of the hydrology of the caves and karst in the Macleay karst of Australia.

We have a new preprint, working with the Kempsey Speleological Society (KSS) members, the local experts on the the caves and karst of the region.

Find out more at andy-baker.org/2025/09/17/d...

Also, my first large international congress where delegates from the USA seem to be absent.

GI - An underground drip water monitoring network to characterize rainfall recharge of groundwater at different geologies, environments, and climates across Australia Abstract. Understanding when and why groundwater recharge occurs is of fundamental importance for the sustainable use of this essential freshwater resource for humans and ecosystems. However, accurately capturing this component of the water balance is widely acknowledged to be a major challenge. Direct physical measurements identifying when groundwater recharge is occurring are possible by utilizing a sensor network of hydrological loggers deployed in underground spaces located in the vadose zone. Through measurements of water percolating into these spaces from above, we can record the potential groundwater recharge process in action. By using automated sensors, it is possible to precisely determine when recharge occurs (which event, month, or season and for which climate condition). Combined with daily rainfall data, it is possible to quantify the “rainfall recharge threshold”, the amount of rainfall needed to generate groundwater recharge, and its temporal and spatial variability. Australia's National Groundwater Recharge Observing System (NGROS) provides the first dedicated sensor network for observing groundwater recharge at an event scale across a wide range of geologies, environments, and climate types representing a wide range of Australian hydroclimates. Utilizing tunnels, mines, caves, and other subsurface spaces located in the vadose zone, the sensors effectively record “deep drainage”, water that can move beyond the shallow subsurface and root zone to generate groundwater recharge. The NGROS has the temporal resolution to capture individual recharge events, with multiple sensors deployed at each site to constrain the heterogeneity of recharge between different flow paths, and to quantify (including uncertainty bounds) rainfall recharge thresholds. Established in 2022, the network is described here together with examples of data being generated.

Groundwater news from day 2 at #IAH2025 in Naarm / Melbourne.

NGROS presentations by Wendy Timms and Akhi Kumar on groundwater recharge.

Find out more on NGROS at gi.copernicus.org/articles/13/...

Why not establish something similar in your country?

#groundwater

New Transboundary Aquifer Map & Groundwater Level Trends: Meet IGRAC at IAH 2025! - IGRAC The launch of the new Transboundary Aquifers of the World Map and Groundwater Level Trends research. Meet us at IAH 2025 in Melbourne!

🗓️ Attending the #IAH2025 ? Mark this in your agendas! 👇

📉 #Research on 20-year #groundwater level trends. (16 Sep - 10:30)

🗺️ Transboundary Aquifers #map #launch (19 Sep - Poster Board P047)

🔗 un-igrac.org/latest/news/...

#IAHCongress #water #data #datascience #GroundwaterMatters #hydrogeology

Walhalla feayures in this open access paper led by Stacey Priestley with myself,  Marilu Melo Zurita, Margaret Shanafield, Wendy Timms and Martin Andersen
agupubs.onlinelibrary.…

Thanks to the Australian Research Council (ARC) for the infrastructure funding in 2022 that made this possible.

And at Walhalla, just like our other monitoring sites across Australia, there are not many recharge events, and rainfall in the top 10% is needed. In other words, only rain events of 20 mm or more might replenish our groundwater resource.

Day one of the #IAH2025 Congress and the fieldtrip led by Wendy Timms at the Walhalla Long Tunnel Heritage Gold Mine.

What has this to do with groundwater? Mines like this are observatories of groundwater recharges in action. And we have had loggers in the mine recording when recharge events occur.