This opportunity funds research in sedimentary geology and paleobiology, including how life, ecosystems, and biogeography changed over geologic time using fossils from plants, animals, and microbes. It also supports work on the sedimentary rock record and the processes that form it, including dating and reconstructing environmental change and rates of geologic events. Priority topics include studying modern and ancient sediment production and deposition, Earth’s deep-time climate systems, and the physical/chemical history of sediments and associated resources.

Sedimentary Geology and Paleobiology supports studies of: (1) the changing aspects of life, ecology, environments, and biogeography in geologic time based on fossil plants, animals, and microbes; (2) all aspects of the Earth's sedimentary lithosphere – its insights into the geological processes and rich organic and inorganic resources locked in rock sequences; (3) the science of dating and measuring the sequence of events and rates of geological processes as manifested in Earth's past sedimentary and biological (fossil) record; (4) the geologic record of the production, transportation, and deposition of modern and ancient physical and chemical sediments; and (5) understanding Earth's deep-time (pre-Holocene) climate systems.