About

Dimitri Sverjensky is a professor in the Department of Earth & Planetary Sciences at Johns Hopkins University. His research focuses on geochemistry, astrobiology, and the deep carbon cycle, with a particular interest in understanding how water in the deep Earth has influenced the evolution of the planet. Sverjensky specializes in theoretical geochemical modeling, collaborating with experimentalists and petrologists to integrate experimental data, petrologic observations, and theoretical models to investigate Earth's evolution and the processes occurring in other planets. His work has led to the development of a novel theoretical model for the behavior of water in the deep Earth, known as the Deep Earth Water (DEW) model, which elucidates the role of water at high temperatures and pressures in transporting carbon and other vital elements such as nitrogen and sulfur. This research has implications for understanding Earth's long-term habitability, the origin of planetary gases, and the formation of organic carbon species in subduction zones. Sverjensky's contributions include advancing the understanding of aqueous fluid-rock interactions, redox states of magmas, and the mechanisms of diamond formation, among other topics. His work is supported by collaborations with international researchers and has been funded by organizations such as the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation and the National Science Foundation.

Research topics

• Paleontology
• Chemistry
• Materials science
• Geochemistry
• Geology
• Composite material
• Inorganic chemistry
• Metallurgy
• Physics
• Environmental chemistry
• Earth science
• Biology
• Oceanography
• Ecology
• Mineralogy
• Geophysics
• Chemical engineering
• Organic chemistry

Selected publications

• The hidden role of Mg–Si–COH fluids on mantle wedge metasomatism

  Lithos · 2026-01-28

  article
  PublisherDOI

• Data associated with the publication: The complexity of deep aqueous fluids in planetary ultramafic mantles

  Open MIND · 2026-02-01

  datasetSenior author

  This dataset contains files used for and generated by the thermodynamic modeling software EQ3 and EQ6 software (Wolery, 1992), used to calculate aqueous speciation of fluids and fluid-rock reactions at high pressures and temperatures based on thermodynamic properties consistent with the Deep Earth Water model (Huang & Sverjensky, 2019). Three sets of previously published mineral solubility experimental data were modeled, with the results found in the folders “talc_quartz” (consistent with Luce et al. 1985, shown in Figure 1 of the main text), “talc_tremolite_quartz” (consistent with Luce et al. 1985, shown in Figure 2 of the main text) and “forsterite” (consistent with Macris et al. 2020, shown in Figure 3 of the main text). The models are run over a range of chlorine concentrations, consistent with the published experiments. The model results are used to refine thermodynamic parameters for several magnesium- and calcium-bearing chloride complexes. The databases containing these refined parameters for the modeled temperatures and pressures can be found in “Thermodynamic_Databases”. The “cooling_of_ultramafic_fluid” folder contains results for a model fluid cooled from 900 ºC to 650 ºC at 10 kb initially in equilibrium with spinel peridotite, demonstrating the application of these models for planetary interiors (shown in Figure 5 of the main text and Figures S4 – S8 in the Supporting Information).

  DOI

• Unconventional water and hydrous mineral formation from dry minerals and H ₂ fluids

  Science Advances · 2026-05-20

  articleOpen access

  Water availability in the lithosphere has been crucial to the geological evolution of Earth as well as the emergence and persistence of life. The global geological water cycle associated with plate tectonics has been understood as a system controlled by the presence of oxygen and hydrogen, either in fluids and melts or bound within mineral structures. However, recent work on H 2 production in the lithosphere indicates that a water mass equivalent to about 25 to 50% of global annual water inputs into subduction is converted to H 2 every year. This H 2 can be decoupled from the water cycle and potentially lost to space over geological timescales. Here, we show that the interaction of H 2 -rich fluids with oxygen-bearing minerals results in the formation of unconventional redox water. This influences the residence time of hydrogen in Earth’s interior and offers previously unidentified perspectives on how hydrous fluids, minerals, and melts may form in initially dry geological reservoirs.

  PublisherDOI

• Calibration of K-richterite in the Deep Earth Water Model (DEW) – a key for understanding mantle metasomatism

  2025-01-01

  article
  PublisherDOI

• High Solubility of Aragonite in Aqueous Fluids: Experiments and Models

  2025-01-01

  articleSenior author
  PublisherDOI

• Modelling Zr Transport in Crustal and Mantle Fluids

  2025-01-01

  articleSenior author
  PublisherDOI

• Biomolecules in the Interiors of Distant Worlds

  2025-01-01

  articleSenior author
  PublisherDOI

• Revision needed for the predicted standard free energy of aqueous CO2 at elevated temperatures and pressures

  2025-03-15

  preprintOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  In the deep Earth cycle of carbon, CO2 is thought to play a key role. The Helgeson-Kirkham-Flowers (HKF) standard state thermodynamic properties of CO2 dissolved in water are well established by experiment and equations of state at ambient conditions and at upper crustal pressures and geothermal temperatures (Shock et al., 1989). They have been widely used to compute aqueous equilibria and mineral-fluid equilibria with other carbon species in codes such as SUPCRT92. Extrapolation of the HKF standard state Gibbs free energy equation of state of CO2 to higher pressures and temperatures, widely used in the Deep Earth Water (DEW) model, has not been adequately tested. Experimentally determined mineral solubilities provide such a test. However, under deep Earth conditions, the solubilities of mineral assemblages, such as classic decarbonation equilibria involve large amounts of dissolved CO2. As a consequence, model solubilities depend on the aqueous activity coefficient of CO2 as well as its standard state free energy. Fortunately, the activity coefficients for aqueous CO2 have been measured (Aranovich and Newton, 1999). In the same study, the decarbonation equilibria give us measured solubilities of CO2 when the mole fractions of CO2 are converted to molalities. Knowledge of the experimental activity coefficients and solubilities enable a direct test of predicted standard state free energies.For example, at 1.0 GPa and 800°C, using the hypothetical 1.0 m standard state for aqueous CO2, experimentally measured activity coefficients and solubilities in molality can be combined to give experimental activities of aqueous CO2. For two different equilibria at 1.0 GPa and 800°C, wollastonite-calcite-quartz (high CO2) and enstatite-magnesite quartz (low CO2), the experimental CO2 activities are close to two orders of magnitude lower than the values computed using the HKF equation of state The same discrepancy at 1.0 GPa and 800°C is obtained using the experimental solubility of graphite (Tumiati et al., 2017). The consistency of these three tests, all at 1.0 GPa and 800°C, requires a substantial revision to the HKF prediction of the aqueous standard state free energy of CO2. The latter becomes more positive than previously at elevated pressures and temperatures. In turn, a revised equation of state characterization of aqueous CO2 will imply less of the molecule CO2 relative to other aqueous carbon-bearing species under deep Earth conditions.Shock, E. L., H. C. Helgeson and D. A. Sverjensky (1989). "Calculation of the thermodynamic and transport properties of aqueous species at high pressures and temperatures: Standard partial molal properties of inorganic neutral species." Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta 53: 2157-2184.Aranovich, L. and R. Newton (1999). "Experimental determination of CO2-H2O activity-composition relations at 600-1000 C and 6-14 kbar by reversed decarbonation and dehydration reactions." American Mineralogist 84(9): 1319-1332.Tumiati, S., C. Tiraboschi, D. A. Sverjensky, T. Pettke, S. Recchia, P. Ulmer, F. Miozzi and S. Poli (2017). "Silicate dissolution boosts the CO2 concentrations in subduction fluids." Nature Communications 8(1): 616.  

  PublisherDOI

• Diamond formation mechanisms and the record of the processes involved

  2025-01-01

  article1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• Correction to “Synthesis and Stability of Biomolecules in C–H–O–N Fluids under Earth’s Upper Mantle Conditions”

  Journal of the American Chemical Society · 2025-02-06

  erratum
  PublisherDOI

Recent grants

• Collaborative Research: An Interdisciplinary Study of Chiral Molecular Adsorption on Mineral Surfaces

  NSF · $253k · 2007–2010

• Modeling Deep Earth Fluids and Diamond Formation

  NSF · $380k · 2016–2020

• Collaborative Research: An Interdisciplinary Study of Mineral-Biomolecule Interactions

  NSF · $284k · 2010–2015

• SI2-SSI:Collaborative Research: ENKI: Software infrastructure that ENables Knowledge Integration for Modeling Coupled Geochemical and Geodynamical Processes

  NSF · $218k · 2016–2020

• NSF-BSF: Composition and evolution of saline fluids in the upper mantle

  NSF · $564k · 2021–2025

Frequent coauthors

• Robert M. Hazen

  Carnegie Institution for Science

  147 shared

• Christopher L. Jonsson

  Geophysical Laboratory

  74 shared

• Caroline M. Jonsson

  Umeå University

  74 shared

• I. M. Daniel

  Université Claude Bernard Lyon 1

  52 shared

• Henderson James Cleaves

  Life Science Institute

  49 shared

• Ding Pan

  Hong Kong University of Science and Technology

  48 shared

• Zixin Chen

  40 shared

• Namhey Lee

  Johns Hopkins University

  37 shared

Awards & honors

• Deep Carbon Observatory (funded in 2010 by the Alfred P. Slo…
• Enabling Knowledge Integration (ENKI) project, funded by the…
• DEW-MELTS project, funded by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation…
• Modeling Deep Earth Fluids and Diamond Formation, funded by…