Sofia Della Sala

I am a PhD student, supervised by Professor David Pyle, Professor Tamsin Mather and Dr. Joost Frieling, on the NERC Environmental Sciences DTP course studying the volcanism, sedimentation and hydrothermal activity of Santorini, Greece.

Coming from a Chemistry background, I am interested in understanding the chemical composition of Santorini’s caldera and how it has evolved over the last 3.5k years. I am also intrigued by how much hydrothermal activity played a role in Santorini’s eruptive history and whether any hydrothermal anomalies in the sediment can give us insight into eruptive patterns and clues into the future.

I am currently using mercury to determine hydrothermal signals in deep-sea sediment cores from Santorini's caldera collected on the recent IODP 398 cruise. 

Please get in touch if you have any questions or want to find out more!

• I am a demonstrator on the undergrad fieldstrip to Santorini
• I demonstrate and have conducted tutorials for the 3rd year undergrad course: Volcanology, igneous processes and petrogenesis
• I have conducted tutorials for the 1st year course: Chemistry for Earth Sciences

I graduated from the University of Glasgow in 2021 with an MSci in Chemistry (First Class). I spent one year at the University of Bologna carrying out an organic Chemistry project and participated in a Volcanology summer school for a month with GeoTenerife in the Canary Islands. In between my undergraduate and my PhD I worked as a journalist for a year.

I am currently a senior editor for the Oxford Scientist magazine, as well as the graduate student rep for my year group. I love taking part in outreach and talking to the public about science!