Early Earth and High Temperature Geochemistry

Accessory Mineral Geochemistry

Our research focuses on using high temperature geochemistry, isotope geochemistry, and igneous petrology to understand magmatic systems with an intact rock record. Recently, this has focused on sites in the southwestern United States.

This research process is aimed at both uncovering the geologic histories of systems with a known history as well as serving as a ground-truth for the new geochemical and petrological tools which we develop. We then apply these tools to detrital accessory minerals from the Archean and Hadean to uncover more about the magmatic and environmental conditions on early Earth.

Early Earth Geochemistry

There are 13 sites on Earth that contain zircons (a type of mineral) older than ~4 billion years old.  By analyzing these minerals, we can begin to understand their formation environment and the environment of early Earth.

Specifically, we use in-situ techniques including mass spectrometry, electron microprobes, and other imaging to analyze accessory minerals from Western Australia. We work to answer questions related to Earth’s earliest environment, the dawn of plate tectonics, and early crustal processes.