Dr. Matthew J. Kohn earned his Ph.D. in Geology from Rensselaer Polytechnic
Institute in 1991. After a Post-Doctoral Fellowship studying stable isotope geochemistry
at UW-Madison, and teaching positions at Northern Illinois University, University of
South Carolina, and Washington State University, he joined the faculty at Boise State
University in 2007. Dr. Kohn's research interests include the development and use of
geochemical techniques to investigate orogenesis (including major element, trace element,
stable isotope, and radiogenic isotope geochemistry); chemical and isotopic analysis of
metamorphic minerals, climatic and physiological analysis of organic phosphates; stable
isotope, electron microprobe, ion microprobe and ICP-MS analysis; geochronology;
thermodynamics, kinetics and phase equilibria. Dr. Kohn is a prolific author and reviewer
for many geology journals. His field work has taken him to many locations around the
globe from New England to California, and from India and Argentina to the Swiss and
Italian Alps. 

Articles

Link

Strontium Isotope Zoning in Garnet: Implications for Metamorphic Matrix Equilibration, Geochronology and Phase Equilibrium Modelling (with J. Sousa, Mark D. Schmitz, Clyde J. Northrup, and F. S. Spear), Journal of Metamorphic Geology (2013)

In principle, garnet growth rates may be calculated from 87Rb/86Sr and 87Sr/86Sr measurements in garnet...

 

Link

Trace Element Concentrations in Teeth – A Modern Idaho Baseline with Implications for Archeometry, Forensics, and Palaeontology (with Jennifer Morris and Paul H. Olin), Journal of Archaeological Science (2013)

Concentrations of 69 minor and trace elements were measured in situ using laser ablation inductively-coupled...

 

Link

A New Chronology for Middle Eocene-Early Miocene South American Land Mammal Ages (with Regan E. Dunn, Richard H. Madden, Mark D. Schmitz, Caroline A.E. Strömberg, Alfredo A. Carlini, Guillermo H. Ré, and James Crowley), Geological Society of America Bulletin (2013)

Cenozoic South American Land Mammal Ages (SALMAs) have historically been correlated to the geologic...

 

Link

Trace Element Diffusivities in Bone Rule Out Simple Diffusive Uptake During Fossilization but Explain in vivo Uptake and Release (with Randolph J. Moses), PNAS (2013)

Diffusion rates of numerous trace elements in bone at 20 °C were determined using laser-ablation...

 

Link

Flattening the Bhutan Himalaya (with Stacey L. Corrie, Nadine McQuarrie, and Sean P. Long), Earth and Planetary Science Letters (2012)

A detailed thermobarometric transect of 35 samples across the Greater and Tethyan Himalayan sequences in...

 

Contributions to Books

Stable Isotopes of Fossil Teeth and Bones at Gran Barranca as a Monitor of Climate Change and Tectonics, The Paleontology of Gran Barranca: Evolution and Environmental Change through the Middle Cenozoic of Patagonia (2010)

Fossiliferous sediments at Gran Barranca span a remarkable range of ages from the middle Eocene...

 

Link

Stable Isotopes of Fossil Teeth and Bones at Gran Barranca as Monitors of Climate Change and Tectonics (with Alessandro Zanazzi and J. A. Josef), The Paleontology of Gran Barranca: Evolution and Environmental Change Through the Middle Cenozoic of Patagonia (2010)
 

Paleoaltimetry from Stable Isotope Compositions of Fossils (with David L. Dettman), Paleoaltimetry: Geochemical and Thermodynamic Approaches (2007)