Short Biography

Education: PhD, Geology & Geophysics, University of Western Australia, 1986
Graduate Students:
Matthew Koehler
Michael Kipp
Jana Meixnerova
Erik Goosman
Current Research:
I am interested in the origin and earliest evolution of life on Earth and how that can be used as an analogue for life elsewhere in the Universe. My research techniques lie at the intersection of geology, biology and chemistry, examining the oldest and best-preserved rocks available. This involves fieldwork in the Australian outback, on the Greenland ice-cap and in the Canadian woods, amongst other places.

Examples of current projects include:

Early evolution of bacterialmetabolism - palaeontology and stable-isotope geochemistry of Archaean sedimentary rocks, with the aim of determining when the main forms of microbial metabolism first arose and whether this caused environmental change in the atmosphere and oceans.

Early Archaean atmospheric composition - detrital heavy minerals in Archaean fluvial sandstones, with the aim of determining whether their alteration patterns indicate primordial atmospheric greenhouse effect modulated by carbon dioxide or some other gas in order to counteract the weaker solar luminosity during Earth's early history.

Secular trends in marine nutrient fluxes and their ecological impact - phosphorus and nitrogen geochemistry in sedimentary rocks through time, with the aim of betterquantifying oceanic fluxes and budgets for these elements, identifying temporal trends in their sources and sinks, and determining whether these reflect or influenced ecosystem evolution.

Early evolution of continental crust - trace-element and radiogenic-isotope geochemistry of basalts ~3.5 billion years old across an ancient unconformity in the PilbaraCraton, Australia, with the aim of contraining the primordial growth rate of continental crust, the tectonic environments of the early Earth and the biological impacts of crustal differentiation.

Molecular fossils from early Precambrian rocks - organic geochemistry of well-preserved Archaean and Palaeoproterozoic hydrocarbons and kerogen, with the aim of discovering organic geochemical biomarkers that constrain the phylogenetic history of microbial ecosystems.
Recent Publications:
2016: Dacks, J.B., Field, M.C., BUICK, R., Eme, L., Gribaldo, S., Roger, A.J., Brochier-Armanet, C. & Devos, D.P. The changing view of eukaryogenesis – fossils, cells, lineages and how they all come together. Journal of Cell Science 129, 3695-3703.
2016: Som, S. M., BUICK, R., Hagadorn, J. W., Blake, T. S., Perreault, J. M., Harnmeijer, J. P., & Catling, D. C. Earth's air pressure 2.7 billion years ago constrained to less than half of modern levels. Nature Geoscience, 9, 448-451.
2016: Stüeken, E.E., Kipp, M.A., Koehler, M.C. & BUICK, R. The evolution of Earth’s biogeochemical nitrogen cycle. Earth Science Reviews 160, 220-239.
2016: Zahnle, K.J. & BUICK, R. Atmospheric Science: Ancient air caught by shooting stars. Nature 533, 184-186.
2015: Bradley, K., Weiss, B.P. & BUICK, R. Records of geomagnetism, climate and tectonics across a Paleoarchean erosion surface. Earth & Planetary Science Letters, 419, 1-13.
2015: French, K.L., Hallmann, C., Hope, J.M., Schoon, P.L., Zumberge, J.A., Hoshino, Y., Peters, C.A., George, S.C., Love, G.D., Brocks, J.J., BUICK, R. & Summons, R.E. Reappraisal of hydrocarbon biomarkers in Archean rocks. Proceedings of the National Academy of Science USA, 112, 5915-5920.
2015: Krissansen-Totten, J., BUICK, R. & Catling D.C. A statistical analysis of the carbon isotope record from the Archean to Phanerozoic and implications for the rise of oxygen. American Journal of Science, 315, 275-316.
2015: Stüeken, E.E., BUICK, R., & Anbar, A.D. Selenium isotopes support free O2 in the latest Archean. Geology, 43, 259-262.
2015: Stüeken, E.E., BUICK, R., Bekker, A., Catling, D.C., Foriel, J., Guy, B.M., Kah, L.C., Machel, H.G. & Poulton, S.W. The evolution of the global selenium cycle: secular trends in Se isotopes and abundances. Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta, 162, 109-125.
2015: Stüeken, E.E., BUICK, R., Guy, B.M. & Koehler, M.T. Isotopic evidence for biological nitrogen fixation by Mo-nitrogenase from 3.2 Gyr. Nature, 520, 666-669.
2015: Stüeken, E.E., BUICK, R. & Schauer, A.J. Nitrogen isotope evidence for alkaline lakes on late Archean continents. Earth & Planetary Science Letters, 411, 1-10.
2015: Stüeken, E.E., Foriel, J., BUICK, R. & Schoepfer, S.D. Selenium isotope ratios, redox changes and biological productivity across the end-Permian mass extinction. Chemical Geology, 410, 28-39.