About

Jane McManus is an academic and author, known for her work in sports communication. Her book, The Fast Track: Inside the Surging Business of Women's Sports, was published in February 2025. She has also served as the Editor of The Year’s Best Sports Writing 2024. McManus spent nearly 10 years at ESPN, where she covered the NFL, worked as a columnist for espnW, hosted two radio shows including The Trifecta with Kate Fagan and Sarah Spain, and was a frequent analyst on programs such as SportsCenter, The Sports Reporters, and Outside the Lines. Before her tenure at ESPN, she covered a wide range of sports from high school competitions to the U.S. Open for The Journal News in Westchester, NY, and her work has appeared in outlets like Newsday, The New York Times, and USA Today. Additionally, she has led two academic centers focused on sports communication, first at Marist College and later at Seton Hall University.

Research topics

• Oceanography
• Computer Science
• Paleontology
• Geology
• Environmental resource management
• Climatology
• Environmental science
• Earth science
• Ecology

Selected publications

• Orbital Influences on Deep Ocean Oxygen Concentrations and Respired Carbon Storage

  Global Biogeochemical Cycles · 2025-06-01 · 2 citations

  articleSenior author

  Abstract Quantitative records of bottom water oxygen (BWO) are critical for understanding deep ocean change through time. Because of the stoichiometric relationship between oxygen and carbon, BWO records provide insight into the physical and biogeochemical processes that control the air‐sea partitioning of both gases with important implications for climate over Quaternary glacial‐interglacial cycles. Here, we present new geochemical data sets from Ocean Discovery Program Site 1240 in the eastern equatorial Pacific to constrain paleoproductivity (Ba xs flux) and BWO using a multiproxy approach (aU, Mn/Al, Δδ 13 C, and U/Ba). This combination of approaches allows us to quantitatively identify changes in BWO and to parse local and basin‐wide contributions to the signal. We find that upwelling, not dust input, is responsible for driving productivity changes at the site. Changes in local carbon export are not the primary driver of changes in BWO, which instead reflect basin‐wide changes driven by processes in the Southern Ocean. Our BWO results provide direct evidence for the role of orbital precession and obliquity in driving deep sea respired carbon and oxygen concentrations. We find variations in BWO on the order of ∼50 μmol/kg that occur with ∼23 kyr periodicity during the substages of Marine Isotope Stage 5, and variations of ∼100 μmol/kg on glacial‐interglacial timescales. These findings have important implications for the role of insolation in driving deep ocean respired oxygen and carbon concentrations, and point to physical and biogeochemical changes in the Southern Ocean as key drivers of planetary‐scale carbon change.

  PublisherDOI

• Abrupt weakening of deep Atlantic circulation at the last glacial inception

  Nature Communications · 2025-08-14 · 1 citations

  articleOpen access

  Abstract Deglaciations and glacial inceptions are the two equally important transitional periods that bridge the glacial and interglacial climate states, yet our understanding of deglaciations far exceeds that of glacial inceptions. Substantial variations in deep ocean circulation accompanied the last deglaciation, and model simulations recently suggested that a weakening of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) also occurred at the last glacial inception (LGI; 113-119 thousand years ago), yet evidence of such a change remains inconclusive. Here, we report three Pa/Th records from the western and central North Atlantic that display an abrupt weakening of the AMOC at the LGI. The magnitude of the reconstructed AMOC weakening approaches but never reaches the level of disruptions associated with the Heinrich ice discharge events. Our results may highlight a unique period of orbitally forced abrupt circulation changes and the importance of ocean processes in setting atmospheric CO 2 changes in motion.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Eastern equatorial Pacific paleo-productivity and carbon cycling during the late Pleistocene

  Earth and Planetary Science Letters · 2025-02-22 · 4 citations

  articleOpen access

  • EEP export production increased across the last two glacial terminations. • Upwelling and high-latitude nutrient leakage were the key drivers. • EEP export production was not the principal influence on global carbon cycling. A classical paradigm links enhanced marine biological production and resulting deep ocean carbon storage in the low latitude Pacific with reduced atmospheric CO 2 concentrations during Pleistocene ice ages. Subsequent studies of eastern equatorial Pacific paleo-productivity and associated processes do not unanimously characterize this system. Here, we present paleo-records of export production, sediment mass flux, dust flux, and bottom water oxygen derived from isotopes of U, Th, and Pa in marine sediments and synthesize existing paleo-records from a site in the eastern equatorial Pacific cold tongue over the last 160,000 years. Our results support the hypothesis that variations in marine export production were a consequence of changes in equatorial upwelling and in the nutrient concentrations of upwelled waters, not aeolian iron fertilization. We conclude that changes in marine export production in the eastern equatorial Pacific were not the principal driver of changes in local deep ocean carbon storage or atmospheric CO 2 across the late Pleistocene.

  PublisherDOI

• Are cyclic sediments periodic? Gamma analysis and spectral analysis of Newark Supergroup lacustrine strata

  Bulletin (Kansas Geological Survey) · 2024-04-16 · 13 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  Methodologies are suggested for the analysis of cyclic sediments. These include (1) linear analysis to determine whether cycles are of approximately constant duration and whether the relation between thickness and time is facies dependent and (2) multiple prolate-spheroidal windowing spectral analysis to determine whether time-series data indicate periodicities, either of the primary cycles or of higher or lower orders. The results of both methods are compared to a null hypothesis as a semiquantitative test of periodicity. Application of the methods to Newark Supergroup lacustrine cycles suggests that the primary cycles are approximately periodic and record a response to astronomical precession. The time represented by a given thickness of the different facies increases with the depositional water depth of that facies and with decreasing grain size. Precessional index cycles and long-period precessional index beats, or eccentricity, are strongly recorded in the spectra. Spectral results suggest but do not prove lengthening of the periodicities of orbital parameters since 200 Ma.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Implementing constructed wetlands for nutrient reduction at watershed scale: Opportunity to link models and real-world execution

  Journal of Soil and Water Conservation · 2024-05-01 · 9 citations

  articleOpen access

  The negative effects of nutrient pollution in streams, rivers, and downstream waterbodies remain widespread global problems. Understanding the cost-effectiveness of different strategies for mitigating nutrient pollution is critical to making informed decisions and defining expectations that best utilize limited resources, which is a research priority for the US Environmental Protection Agency. To this end, we modeled nutrient management practices including residue management, cover crops, filter strips, grassed waterways, constructed wetlands, and reducing fertilizer in the upper East Fork of the Little Miami River, an 892 km² watershed in southwestern Ohio, United States. The watershed is 64% agriculture with 422 km² of row crops contributing an estimated 71% of the system’s nutrient load. The six practices were modeled to treat row crop area, and among them, constructed wetlands ranked highest for their low costs per kilogram of nutrient removed. To meet a 42% phosphorus (P) reduction target for row crops, the model results suggested that the runoff from 85.5% of the row crop area would need to be treated by the equivalent of 3.61 km² of constructed wetlands at an estimated cost of US$2.4 million annually (or US$48.5 million over a 20-year life cycle). This prompted a series of projects designed to understand the feasibility (defined in terms of build, treatment, and cost potential) of retrofitting the system with the necessary extent of constructed wetlands. The practicalities of building this wetland coverage into the system, while leading to innovation in unit-level design, has highlighted the difficulty of achieving the nutrient reduction target with wetlands alone. Approximately US$1.2 million have been spent on constructing 0.032 km² of wetlands thus far and a feasibility analysis suggests a cost of US$38 million for an additional 0.409 km². However, the combined expenditures would only achieve an estimated 13% of the required treatment. The results highlight the potential effectiveness of innovative design strategies for nutrient reduction and the importance of considering realistic field-scale build opportunities, which include accounting for acceptance among landowners, in watershed-scale nutrient reduction simulations using constructed wetlands.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Site U1385

  Proceedings of the International Ocean Discovery Program. Expedition reports · 2024-06-11 · 3 citations

  book-chapterOpen access
  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Supplementary data for "Heinrich event ice discharge and the future fate of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation"

  Figshare · 2024-01-01

  datasetOpen accessSenior author

  This dataset contains the underlying uranium series data for the computation of mass flux via thorium normalization. The spatial range of the dataset is limited to the North Atlantic and the Arctic Ocean. The dataset extends from core-top to sediments dated 140 thousand years ago. In addition to the compilation of existing data, we also include new data generated from three cores - EW9303-GGC31 (50° 34.2’ N, 46° 21’W, water depth 1796 m), DY081-GVY005 (58° 36.6’ N, 43° 46.8’ W, water depth 1907 m), and V30-100 (44° 7.02’ N, 32° 30’ W, water depth 3519 m).The associated code used to analyze the compilation is also uploaded to a separate figshare repository (doi: 10.6084/m9.figshare.25633881). The associated GitHub has a tutorial and the latest updates: https://github.com/yz3062/Lit_thxs

  PublisherDOI

• Is collapse of the Atlantic Ocean circulation really imminent? Icebergs’ history reveals some clues

  2024-05-30

  preprintOpen accessSenior author
  PublisherDOI

• Expedition 397 summary

  Proceedings of the International Ocean Discovery Program. Expedition reports · 2024-06-11 · 7 citations

  book-chapterOpen access

  During International Ocean Discovery Program Expedition 397, we recovered a total of 6176.7 m of core (104.2%recovery) at four sites (U1586, U1587, U1385, and U1588) from the Promontório dos Príncipes de Avis, a plateau located on the Portuguese continental slope that is elevated above the Tagus Abyssal Plain and isolated from the influence of turbidites.The drill sites are arranged along a bathymetric transect (4692, 3479, 2591, and 1339 meters below sea level [mbsl], respectively) to intersect each of the major subsurface water masses of the eastern North Atlantic.Multiple holes were drilled at each site to ensure complete spliced composite sections, which will be further refined postcruise by a campaign of X-ray fluorescence core scanning.At Site U1586 (4692 mbsl), the deepest and farthest from shore, a 350 m sequence was recovered in four holes that extend as far back as the middle Miocene (14 Ma), which is nearly twice as old as initially predicted from seismic stratigraphy.Sedimentation rates are lower (averaging 5 cm/ky in the Quaternary) at Site U1586 than other Expedition 397 sites, and a few slumped intervals were encountered in the stratigraphic sequence.Despite these limitations, Site U1586 anchors the deep end-member of the bathymetric transect and provides an important reference section to study deepwater circulation, ventilation and carbon storage in the deep eastern North Atlantic.At Site U1587 (3479 mbsl), the second deepest site along the depth transect, we recovered a 567 m sequence of late Miocene to Holocene sediments that accumulated at rates between 6.5 and 11 cm/ky.The high sedimentation rates and long continuous record at this site will permit climate reconstruction at high temporal resolution (e.g., millennial) for the past 7.8 My.The Messinian Stage (7.25-5.33Ma) was recovered, which provides a valuable opportunity to study the Messinian Salinity Crisis in an open marine setting adjacent to the Mediterranean.Site U1385 (Shackleton site) was a reoccupation of a position previously drilled during Integrated Ocean Drilling Program Expedition 339.Expedition 339 Site U1385 has yielded a remarkable record of millennial-scale climate change for the past 1.45My (Marine Isotope Stage 47).During Expedition 397, we deepened the site from 156 to 400 meters below seafloor, extending the record to near the base of the Pliocene (5.3 Ma).Sedimentation rates remained high, averaging between 9 and 11 cm/ky throughout the sequence.The newly recovered cores at Expedition 397 Site U1385 will permit the study of millennial climate variability through the entire Quaternary and Pliocene, prior to the intensification of Northern Hemisphere glaciation.Site U1588 is the shallowest, closest to shore, and youngest site drilled during Expedition 397 and is also the one with the highest sedimentation rate (20 cm/ky).The base of the 412.5 m sequence is 2.2 Ma, providing an expanded Pleistocene sequence of sediment deposited under the influence Plain language summaryFrom 11 October to 11 December 2022, International Ocean Discovery Program Expedition took place off the coast of Portugal southwest of Lisbon.The main objective was to recover the exceptional sedimentary archive preserved beneath the seafloor on the Iberian margin to study past climate change at high temporal resolution.During the expedition, which carried 26 international scientists, four sites were drilled, recovering 6.2 km of marine sediments that accumulated rapidly, thereby providing a high-fidelity record of past climate change on timescales of hundreds to thousands of years and extending back millions of years ago.Climate signals contained in these marine sediment cores will be correlated precisely to polar ice cores from both hemispheres and with European pollen records, providing a rare opportunity to link oceanic, atmospheric, and terrestrial climate and environmental changes.The four drill sites are located at different water depths (1339, 2591, 3479, and 4692 m below sea level), permitting scientists to study how deepocean circulation and chemistry changed in the past, including its role in deep-sea carbon storage and atmospheric CO 2 changes.The sediment cores recovered during Expedition 397 will provide benchmark records of North Atlantic climate change at high temporal resolution from the late Miocene (about 8 million years ago) to present.This period includes the last 3 million years when changes in the Earth's orbit resulted in the growth and decay of large ice sheets in the Northern Hemisphere and a warmer world before this time when atmospheric CO 2 was similar to today.All cores recovered show strong changes in physical properties (such as color) that represent a response to known cyclic changes in Earth's orbit, which will aid in accurately dating the sediment.Many years of research will be needed to extract the detailed climatic signals from the kilometers of core recovered during Expedition 397, but the records to be produced will be vital for testing numerical climate models and understanding how the climate system evolved in the past and how it might change in the future.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Site U1587

  Proceedings of the International Ocean Discovery Program. Expedition reports · 2024-06-11 · 5 citations

  book-chapterOpen access
  PublisherOA PDFDOI

Recent grants

• A depth transect of sedimentary 231Pa/230Th in the western Atlantic since the last ice age

  NSF · $399k · 2009–2013

• Collaborative Research: An Abyssal Circulation Type Section for the North Atlantic

  NSF · $520k · 2009–2013

• Collaborative Research: Th-230 as a Sediment Focusing Indicator: constraints from He-3 in Interplanetary Dust Particles

  NSF · $211k · 2006–2008

• Reconstructing the paleo-budget of 231Protactinium in the North Pacific

  NSF · $594k · 2018–2023

• Collaborative Research: Testing the Reliability of Paleo Ventilation Estimates

  NSF · $227k · 2010–2013

Frequent coauthors

• Delia W Oppo

  89 shared

• Allison W Jacobel

  85 shared

• Kassandra M Costa

  80 shared

• Gisela Winckler

  Columbia University

  75 shared

• Robert F. Anderson

  71 shared

• James L. Cullen

  70 shared

• Yuxin Zhou

  67 shared

• Laura F. Robinson

  University of Bristol

  64 shared

Education

• PhD, Earth and Environmental Sciences

  Columbia University

  1997

• MA, Earth and Environmental Sciences

  Columbia University

  1992

• BA, Earth and Environmental Sciences

  Columbia University

  1989