Bremen International Graduate School for Marine Sciences

Victoria Kürzinger

Report of GLOMAR PhD student Victoria Kürzinger about her participation in the EGU General Assembly 2022 from 23 - 27 May 2022

The EGU General Assembly 2022, the first-ever fully hybrid EGU meeting, was held in Vienna from the 23^rd to 27^th of May 2022. The EGU offered a wide variety of geoscientific topics, so I used the conference not only to improve my knowledge of my own research area, but also to “broaden my horizons”.

Already on the first day I had my seven-minute oral presentation, where I presented the main results of my research and first manuscript on “Elemental sulfur formation in the Kemp Caldera hydrothermal system, Scotia Sea”. Besides sessions related to my work, e.g., “Fluid flow in the upper crust: geysers, hydrothermal vents, mud volcanoes and cold seeps”, “Volcanic hydrothermal systems and hydrothermal alteration” or “Fluid-rock interaction: Kickstarter of metamorphic, deformation and geo-engineering processes”, I joined presentations different from my current research, but which I was eager to attend. Hence, I participated in the session “Integrating stratigraphy, sedimentology, paleoclimate and human evolution in- and out of Africa”. Because I am also very interested in paleontology, anthropology and archaeology, I took a course in European Prehistoric Archaeology in the first year of my master program. Therefore, I was happy to have the opportunity to participate in the presentations on this topic at the EGU.

Due to Corona, this conference was held in hybrid form, which sometimes caused some (technical) problems and delays. For example, there was little opportunity for a questions or discussions after a presentation, as time was very limited (also due to technical problem). The hybrid meeting was also the reason why there were no poster sessions this year, only presentations. For my next conference visit, I would like to attend a poster session because I think it is much easier to get in contact or talk to people than during a presentation session.

Of course, there was also the possibility to use and enjoy the time outside the EGU. All participants were offered a special discount for a visit to the Natural History Museum Vienna. I gratefully accepted the offer and had a very nice visit to the Natural History Museum on the last day.

For me, the EGU was a very good experience. It was the first conference (in presence) that I attended so it was good to be there with some of my colleagues who were more experienced. Sometimes it was a bit difficult for me to pick out the most interesting things from the enormous number of topics and presentations, because some very interesting sessions were running at the same time, so I could not visit every presentation I would have liked to hear. Finally, I would like to thank GLOMAR who supported me financially for this conference.