Renée Jade Tamblyn
GMPV Geochemistry, Mineralogy, Petrology & Volcanology
The 2025 Division Outstanding Early Career Scientist Award is awarded to Renée Jade Tamblyn for groundbreaking work in petrochronology of subduction processes, komatiite hydration and production of H2 as an energy source for early life, as well as her role in developing a new in-situ method for Lu-Hf geochronology.
Only three years out from her PhD, Renée Tamblyn has made impressive strides, diving into research addressing some of the most intractable scientific questions. Her papers on petrology and geochemistry are already well known in the community and represent truly original work. The trajectory defined by her citations is very steep and citations are poised to double this year over last. She is first author on 7 of her 10 most cited papers.
Her earlier work as a metamorphic petrologist was focused on exhumation of high-pressure rocks in ancient and current subduction channels. She has shown that blueschist fragments that formed at 50 km depth were stored for a long time in the fore-arc mantle before they were exhumed in serpentine-mud volcanoes in the Mariana subduction zone. These fragments provide unique insights into metamorphic processes in an active subduction system.
Tamblyn contributed significantly to development of a novel analytical method for rapid mapping of metamorphic ages. She was part of a team that brought to fruition a new in situ method for Lu-Hf geochronology. Thereupon, she realized this could be used for campaign-style dating across terranes. She promptly applied this new method to dating garnet, coming with the first paper revealing polymetamorphic Lu-Hf ages in two eclogite locations across the Western Gneiss region in Norway.
More recently, Tamblyn turned her attention to the metamorphism of Archean komatiites, where she quantified magnetite production and the related amount of H2 generated on hydration and oxidation of these ultramafic lavas. This H2 is available as a potential energy source for early life in Archean oceans. She also showed that during burial and high-grade metamorphism of altered komatiites an aqueous fluid is liberated that facilitates the partial melting of metabasalts, producing some of the oldest felsic crust on Earth.
We can expect much more from Tamblyn as she is clearly fearless in crossing disciplinary boundaries and moving into new fields. The GMPV Division is proud to award Renée Tamblyn its 2025 Outstanding Early Career Scientist Award.