Welcome!
This is the home page for Cari Johnson and the Sedimentary Basins Research Group at the University of Utah, Department of Geology and Geophysics.
We have a 'work hard, play hard' attitude around here, and fully take advantage of all-season access to spectacular Utah Geology and Scenery! Please browse the links at left for more information on research, courses, personnel, etc. Feel free to contact me with any questions or comments.
About Professor Johnson
Cari with sand volcanoes in Carboniferous turbidites, County Clare, Ireland.
I grew up in Texas and in Utah, and later attended Carleton College in Minnesota as an undergraduate geology major. I then made my way back West for graduate school at Stanford University with Steve Graham, doing research on rift basins in southern Mongolia. I came back 'home' to the University of Utah as an Assistant Professor of Geology in 2003.
My research program is broadly aimed at understanding the sedimentary record of tectonic, climatic, and eustatic signals, and the relative roles of these forcing factors as well as autogenic processes in defining and creating the sedimentary record. I take a multidisciplinary approach to this complex problem, building on my interests and expertise in field-based sedimentary geology, but also integrating such diverse subdisciplines as geophysics (seismic interpretation), geochemistry, rock deformation, geochronology and thermochronology, and petroleum geology. My research also cultivates a global perspective, and I have recently conducted research in (or using data from) Mongolia, Azerbaijan, Utah, South Africa, and California.
Areas of recent research (see my CV page for publications, grants, etc.)
• Tertiary lake systems of western North America
• Improved petroleum reservoir prediction using Lidar and outcrop analogs
• Fluvial-deltaic depositional systems analysis, central Utah
• Sequence stratigraphy and controls on sedimentation, Kaiparowits plateau, Utah
• Cenozoic sequence stratigraphy, San Joaquin basin, California
• Mesozoic-Cenozoic slip history of the East Gobi fault zone, southern Mongolia
• Geochemistry and sequence stratigraphy of the Maikop series, Azerbaijan
• Effective strategies for using emerging visualization technologies in geoscience research and teaching