Over the past years the Karst Research Group at USF has successfully organized the so-called BEST OF KARST. This event consists of a lecture (or series of lectures) presented by a highly esteemed karst scientists from the US or overseas and 2 days of field trips highlighting the karst and caves of Central Florida.

Our previous BOK speakers:

2018: Lewis LAND: Evolution of groundwater residence time in a high mountain aquifer system (Sacramento Mountains, USA): Insights gained from use of multiple environmental tracers

2017: Harvey DuCHENE: Tectonic influences on petroleum migration and speleogenesis in the Guadalupe Mountains, New Mexico & Texas

2016: Jay L. BANNER: Past, present, and future climate change impacts on water in a semi-arid region: science and policy

2014: E. Calvin ALEXANDER, Jr.: The Soudan Iron Mine: A Martian karst analog

2013: Penelope BOSTON: Caves as Integrated Systems: Life and Times in the Near Subsurface Critical Zone

2012: Louise HOSE: What we can learn about speleogenesis from modern dynamic, sulfide-rich, hypogenic caves: Did “snotittes” play a role in forming Carlsbad Cavern, Lechuguilla, and other giant cavern of the world?

2011: Hazel BARTON: Rock Eating Microbes: The Reality of Biospeleogenesis

2010: Ronald KERBO: A Retrospective of the U.S. National Park Service's Cave and Karst Program

2009: John MYLROIE: Syndepositional karst: Making limestone and caves at the same time

2009: Joan MYLROIE: Cave Cartography: A Tool for Understanding Carbonate Islands

2008: Derek FORD: Trees of Stone: Detecting Climates and Climate Change in Stalagmites in Caves & How to enlarge a National Park: A Case Study of South Nahanni River National Park, Reserve, Northwest Territories, Canada

2008: Henry SCHWARCZ: Stone Water Bottles: Using Fluid Inclusions to Reconstruct Past Climate & Using Stable Isotopes to Solve Murder Mysteries

2007: Arthur N. PALMER: Origin and Patterns of Solution Caves and Porosity

2007: Alexander KLIMCHOUK: The Diversity of Karst Types: From Deep- Seated Karst to Deepest Caves" and reception