Francine M.G. McCarthy is a Professor of Earth Sciences at Brock University. She has studied a number of microfossil groups, including pollen, dinoflagellate cysts, planktonic foraminifera and thecamoebians, in marine, lacustrine and wetland sediments of Miocene to Recent age. In addition to studying the response of thecamoebians to the biproducts of oil sands extraction, current projects include studying the influence of glacioeustasy on the architecture of the New Jersey margin, examining the biological affinity of freshwater  dinocysts and their potential as paleoecological indicators, and refining the geologic and environmental history of the Great Lakes.