Gregory Henkes
· Associate Professor Stable Isotope GeochemistryStony Brook University · Geosciences
Active 2007–2025
Academic metrics are sourced from OpenAlex and public funding records; values may differ from Google Scholar.
About
Gregory Henkes is an Associate Professor in the Department of Geosciences at Stony Brook University. He holds a B.S. from Bates College (2008), a Ph.D. from The Johns Hopkins University (2014), and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard University (2014-2016). Since fall 2016, he has been a faculty member at Stony Brook. His research focuses on the stable isotope geochemistry of light elements such as hydrogen, carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, and sulfur, and their use as recorders of Earth's climatological, biogeochemical, and ecological evolution. His laboratory is dedicated to making novel stable isotope measurements from samples collected across a wide range of temporal and spatial scales. Currently, his research includes studying the temperature and isotopic evolution of seawater, the biogeochemistry of carbon and nitrogen in the ocean, the climate and environment of East Africa during the Cenozoic, carbonate clumped isotope geochemistry for understanding diagenetic, metamorphic, and igneous processes, and the use of isotopes as trophic level indicators in marine and terrestrial food webs. He is actively seeking talented undergraduates, graduate students, postdoctoral researchers, and visitors to join his research group and is affiliated with multiple departments and programs at Stony Brook, including the School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences, the Interdepartmental Program in Anthropological Sciences, and the Turkana Basin Institute.
Research topics
- Geology
- Paleontology
- Ecology
- Geochemistry
- Chemistry
- Earth science
- Environmental science
- Biology
- Oceanography
- Physics
Selected publications
A disordered kinetic model for clumped isotope bond reordering in carbonates
Earth and Planetary Science Letters · 2021 · 84 citations
Senior authorCorrespondingCarbonate clumped isotopes (Δ47) have become a widely applied method for paleothermometry, with applications spanning many environmental settings over hundreds of millions of years. However, Δ47-based paleothermometry can be complicated by closure temperature-like behavior whereby C–O bonds are reset at elevated diagenetic or metamorphic temperatures, sometimes without obvious mineral alteration. Laboratory studies have constrained this phenomenon by heating well-characterized materials at vario…
Methods in Ecology and Evolution · 2021 · 35 citations
Abstract Throughout their life history, many animals transition among heterogeneous environments to facilitate behaviours such as reproduction, foraging and predator avoidance. The dynamic environmental and biological conditions experienced by mobile species are integrated in the chemical composition of their tissues, providing retrospective insight into movement. Here, we present a unique application of nitrogen stable isotope clocks (‘isotopic clocks’), which integrate tissue turnover rates, c…
Geological Society of America Bulletin · 2021 · 15 citations
Abstract Methane seep deposits, comprising large, carbonate-rich mounds formed from hydrocarbon seepage, were widely distributed in the Late Cretaceous Western Interior Seaway (WIS) of North America. Well-preserved, methane-derived authigenic carbonates (MDACs) from these deposits have been shown to retain petrological, paleontological, and geochemical imprints of their ancient depositional setting, all of which are important for understanding the dynamics and evolution of the shallow, epeiric W…
Experimental constraints on siderite clumped isotope thermometry
Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta · 2022 · 9 citations
Cold low-latitude Ordovician paleotemperatures may be in hot water
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · 2025-03-06 · 6 citations
letterOpen access
Recent grants
Frequent coauthors
- 15 shared
E. Troy Rasbury
Stony Brook University
- 13 shared
William G. Ambrose
Conway School of Landscape Design
- 13 shared
Mae Saslaw
- 11 shared
Ethan L. Grossman
- 11 shared
Benjamin H. Passey
University of Michigan–Ann Arbor
- 10 shared
Alberto Pérez‐Huerta
University of Alabama
- 8 shared
Michael L. Carroll
Centre for Arctic Gas Hydrate, Environment and Climate
- 8 shared
Torben C. Rick
National Museum of Natural History
Labs
Henkes LabPI
Education
- 2008
B.S.
Bates College
- 2014
Ph.D.
The Johns Hopkins University
- 2014
Other, 2014-2016
Harvard University
Similar researchers at Stony Brook University
- Resume-aware match score
- Save to shortlist
- AI-drafted outreach
See your match with Gregory Henkes
PhdFit ranks faculty by your research interests, methods, and publications — grounded in their actual work, not templates.
- Free to start
- No credit card
- 30-second signup