About

Jeremy Keith Hourigan is a Professor in the Earth & Planetary Sciences Department at UC Santa Cruz. His expertise lies in thermochronology, structural geology, and tectonics. He is based in the Earth & Marine Sciences building, office A221, and can be contacted via phone at 831-459-2873 or email at hourigan@ucsc.edu. The information provided highlights his research focus on understanding geological processes through the study of thermochronology and structural geology, which are key to interpreting tectonic activity and the thermal history of rocks.

Research topics

• Geology
• Paleontology
• Computer Science
• Geochemistry
• Geography
• Geomorphology
• Physical geography
• Climatology

Selected publications

• A PORTAL TO THE PAST: TIMING OF SEDIMENT UNDERPLATING AT PORTAL RIDGE, CALIFORNIA

  Abstracts with programs - Geological Society of America · 2025-01-01

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  PublisherDOI

• AGE AND COMPOSITION OF EOCENE SANDSTONES IN WESTERN KAMCHATKA: APPLICATION TO THE STUDY OF PROVENANCE FOR PETROLEUM RESERVOIRS OF THE SEA OF OKHOTSK

  Geodynamics & Tectonophysics · 2025-10-17

  articleOpen access

  The lithology, composition, U-Pb LA-ICP-MS ages of detrital zircons from sediments of the Western Kamchatka Basin (Russian Far East) provide important insight into paleogeography and tectonic setting of the Sea of Okhotsk in the Eocene. Our study is based on mapping, structural observations, descriptions of the sections and lithology, composition of the sandstones, and U-Pb LA-ICP-MS dating and morphology analysis of detrital zircons from the Eocene sandstones of the Western Kamchatka Basin. The provenance for the sandstones is mainly associated with orogen recycling in magmatic arcs. The analysis of heavy minerals indicates mafic to sialic sources. The mafic terranes of the Asian margin on the west or/and Olyutorka-Kamchatka ensimatic island arc affected the mechanism transferring the basic material to the Western Kamchatka Basin in the Eocene. The sialic clasts originated from continental blocks of the Asian margin and the Okhotsk-Chukotka volcanic belt. New data allow us to prove that the erosion of the Okhotsk-Chukotka belt had a significant influence on the sedimentation system in the north of the Sea of Okhotsk in the Eocene. We can assume that the Paleo-Penzhina River system already existed in the Eocene. The existence of the sialic sources in Eocene allows us to assume the possibility of finding the good quality collectors in the Eocene deposits of the Western Kamchatka Basin and the north of the Sea of Okhotsk.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• New K-feldspar Pb isotope results for Mesozoic arc crust in the Pacific Northwest, U.S.A. and Canada: comparison with the Mojave-Salinia province of southern California and Implications for Baja-BC

  International Geology Review · 2025-06-30

  articleSenior author
  PublisherDOI

• DETRITAL ZIRCON AGES FROM UPPER CRETACEOUS–PALEOGENE FOREARC AND SUBDUCTION-ZONE STRATA OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA AND ENVIRONS COMPARED TO CORDILLERAN IGNEOUS BASEMENT AGES: IMPLICATIONS FOR LARAMIDE TECTONICS

  Abstracts with programs - Geological Society of America · 2023-01-01

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  PublisherDOI

• Evolution of provenance areas and petroleum potential of Barents SeaMesozoic deposits: dating of clastic zircon from Fersmanovskaya-1 well and paleogeography reconstructions

  Oil and gas geology = Geologiya nefti i gaza · 2023-07-10 · 1 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  ..., -,

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Evidence for large departures from lithostatic pressure during Late Cretaceous metamorphism in the northern Snake Range metamorphic core complex, Nevada

  Geological Society of America eBooks · 2022 · 12 citations

  • Geology
  • Geochemistry
  • Paleontology

  ABSTRACT The highest-grade Barrovian-type metamorphic rocks of the North American Cordillera exposed today are Late Cretaceous in age and found within an orogen-parallel belt of metamorphic core complexes for which the tectonic histories remain controversial. Thermobarometric studies indicate that many of these Late Cretaceous metamorphic assemblages formed at pressures of >8 kbar, conventionally interpreted as >30 km depth by assuming lithostatic conditions. However, in the northern Basin and Range Province, detailed structural reconstructions and a growing body of contradictory geologic data in and around the metamorphic core complexes indicate these metamorphic rocks are unlikely to have ever been buried any deeper than ~15 km depth (~4 kbar, lithostatic). Recent models controversially interpret this discrepancy as the result of “tectonic overpressure,” whereby the high-grade mineral assemblages were formed under superlithostatic conditions without significant tectonic burial. We performed several detailed studies within the Snake Range metamorphic core complex to test the possibility that cryptic structures responsible for additional burial and exhumation might exist, which would refute such a model. Instead, our data highlight the continued discordance between paleodepth and paleopressure and suggest the latter may have reached nearly twice the lithostatic pressure in the Late Cretaceous. First, new detrital zircon U-Pb geochronology combined with finite-strain estimates show that prestrain thicknesses of the lower-plate units that host the high-pressure mineral assemblages correspond closely to the thicknesses of equivalent-age units in adjacent ranges rather than to those of the inferred, structurally overridden (para) autochthon, inconsistent with cross sections and interpretations that assume a lower plate with a deeper origin for these rocks. Second, new Raman spectroscopy of carbonaceous material of upper- and lower-plate units identified an ~200 °C difference in peak metamorphic temperatures across the northern Snake Range detachment but did not identify any intraplate discontinuities, thereby limiting the amount of structural excision to motion on the northern Snake Range detachment itself, and locally, to no more than 7–11 km. Third, mapped geology and field relationships indicate that a pre-Cenozoic fold truncated by the northern Snake Range detachment could have produced ~3–9 km of structural overburden above Precambrian units, on the order of that potentially excised by the northern Snake Range detachment but still far short of expected overburden based on lithostatic assumptions. Fourth, finite-strain measurements indicate a shortening (constrictional) strain regime favorable to superlithostatic conditions. Together, these observations suggest that pressures during peak metamorphism may have locally reached ~150%–200% lithostatic pressure. Such departures from lithostatic conditions are expected to have been most pronounced above regions of high heat flow and partial melting, and/or at the base of regional thrust-bounded allochthons, as is characteristic of the spatial distribution of Cordilleran metamorphic core complexes during the Late Cretaceous Sevier orogeny.

  PublisherDOI

• The Gabbro–Granodiorite Magmatic Complex of the Kronotsky Paleoarc (Eastern Kamchatka): Composition, Age, and Tectonic Position

  Geotectonics · 2022 · 2 citations

  Senior authorCorresponding
  • Geology
  • Geochemistry
  • Paleontology

  New U‒Pb (LA-ICP-MS) geochronological data have been obtained on accessory zircons from granodiorites and on detrital zircons from stream-sediment samples from the Shipunsky massif in the Eastern Kamchatka region. The age of accessory zircons from amphibole–biotite granodiorites has been estimated at 49–44 Ma. Detrital zircons have the Late Paleocene–Early Eocene age from ~57 to ~49 Ma. Based on the geological and geochronological data, the massif was formed in two stages: a gabbroid intrusion (56‒51 Ma) and the quartz diorite-granodiorite intrusion (49‒44 Ma). In terms of the petrographic and geochemical characteristics of the Upper Cretaceous–Eocene volcanic rocks in the Shipunsky Peninsula and granitoids in the Shipunsky massif, they were formed in the suprasubduction setting. The Shipunsky granitoids belong to the I-type granites. The Shipunsky massif was formed as a part of the Kronotsky intraoceanic paleoarc during the Paleocene–Eocene in two stages. The southern segment of the Kronotsky paleoarc collided with the Kamchatka continental margin and the deformed rocks of this massif were brought to the surface.

  PublisherDOI

• An auspicious landscape: Quantifying transient glacial incision in the Patagonian Andes from ~6 Ma to present

  2021-03-03

  articleOpen access

  <p>The topography, climate, and geology of the central Patagonian Andes provide an auspicious natural laboratory to track long-term rates of erosion in a dynamic mountainous landscape. Herein, we report a mountain-scale record of erosion rates in the central Patagonian Andes from >10 million years (Ma) ago to present, which covers the transition from a fluvial to alpine glaciated landscape. Apatite (U-Th)/He ages of 72 granitic cobbles from alpine glacial deposits show slow erosion before ~6 Ma ago, followed by a two- to three-fold increase in the spatially averaged erosion rate of the source region after the onset of alpine glaciations and a 15-fold increase in the top 25% of the distribution. This transition is followed by a pronounced decrease in erosion rates over the past ~3 Ma. We ascribe the pulse of fast erosion to local deepening and widening of valleys, which are characteristic features of alpine glaciated landscapes. The subsequent decline in local erosion rates may represent a return toward a balance between rock uplift and erosion.</p>

  PublisherDOI

• THE AGE AND ORIGIN OF CRYSTALLINE GNEISS IN THE PLOMOSA MOUNTAINS, WEST-CENTRAL ARIZONA

  Abstracts with programs - Geological Society of America · 2021-01-01 · 1 citations

  article
  PublisherDOI

• Supplemental Material: Nature and timing of Late Devonian–early Mississippian island-arc magmatism in the Northern Sierra terrane and implications for regional Paleozoic plate tectonics

  Figshare · 2020-02-01

  paratextOpen access

  Geosphere, February 2020, v. 16, no. 1, 258-280, doi:10.1130/GES02105.1, Supplemental Items. Item 1: Figure S1. Thin section image of the volcanic sandstone (wacke) from the block in the Sierra City mélange, polarizers crossed. Item 2: Volcanic sandstone (wacke) sample from the Sierra City mélange thin section description. Item 3: ArcGIS files for the digitized geologic map of the Bowman Lake and Sierra Buttes vicinity. Item 4: Table of sensitive high-resolution ion microprobe–reverse geometry (SHRIMP-RG) analytical U-Th-Pb data for zircons from magmatic rocks of the Northern Sierra terrane. Item 5: Laser-ablation–inductively coupled plasma–mass spectrometry (LA-ICP-MS) analytical U-Th-Pb data for detrital zircons from the sandstone sample, Sierra City mélange.

  PublisherDOI

Recent grants

• Collaborative Research: Orogeny, orography, and unsteady erosion: evolution of the Himalaya

  NSF · $189k · 2008–2013

Frequent coauthors

• Marty Grove

  33 shared

• M. T. Brandon

  24 shared

• Guangsheng Zhuang

  21 shared

• Glenn R. Sharman

  University of Arkansas at Fayetteville

  21 shared

• Bradley D. Ritts

  20 shared

• David L. Shuster

  Planetary Science Institute

  16 shared

• Gordon B. Haxel

  16 shared

• A. V. Soloviev

  Lomonosov Moscow State University

  13 shared

Education

• Assistant Researcher, Institute for Crustal Studies

  University of California, Santa Barbara

  2005

• Postdoctoral Associate, Geology and Geophysics

  Yale University

  2005

• Doctor of Philosophy, Geological and Environmental Sciences

  Stanford University

  2003

• Bachelor of Arts, Russian

  University of Vermont

  1996

• Bachelor of Science, Geology

  University of Vermont

  1996

• Exchange Studemt, Geochemistry

  St. Petersburg State University

  1995