Our Faculty

Luca Caracciolo's research integrates quantitative provenance analysis with basin evolution studies, focusing on the relationships between tectonics, sedimentation, and diagenesis. His methodological expertise spans sedimentary petrology, heavy mineral analysis, detrital geochemistry, and low-temperature thermochronology (fission track and U-Th/He dating). He employs advanced analytical techniques including Raman spectroscopy and QEMSCAN to model compositional data and link sediment mineralogy to pre- and post-depositional processes.

His applied research addresses critical challenges in the oil & gas and geothermal industries, particularly enhanced interpretation of facies heterogeneity, reservoir connectivity, and diagenetic controls on fluid migration. With combined academic and industry experience, Luca has worked on projects across all continents, including Europe, North and South America, Africa, Southeast Asia, Australia, and New Zealand.

Luca serves as Chief Editor for the Sedimentary Geology special volume "Sediment Generation and Provenance: Process and Pathways" and the forthcoming "Sediment Generation and Sediment Routing Systems" in Earth Science Reviews. He actively trains professionals from the O&G industry and maintains ongoing collaborations with industry partners worldwide.

Linda Bonnell leads Geocosm's geoscience research efforts and directs many of the company's reservoir quality prediction and risk assessment studies. She has been instrumental in developing Geocosm's Touchstone and Cyberstone systems for reservoir quality assessment — industry-standard tools used globally for predicting sandstone properties in the subsurface.

Linda served as an AAPG Distinguished Lecturer in 2003-2004, delivering presentations on diagenesis and reservoir quality to audiences worldwide. Her research has been published in leading peer-reviewed journals, including a paper that received the prestigious Wallace E. Pratt Memorial Award for best paper in the AAPG Bulletin in 2010.

She earned her Ph.D. in Geology from the University of Illinois in 1990, working under Tom Anderson. She subsequently held Research Associate positions at Washington University (with Lynn Walter) and Rice University (with Rob Dunbar). From 1993 to 1997, she was a Senior Research Scientist with Rogaland Research in Stavanger, Norway, before joining Geologica AS, a spin-off company. Linda co-founded Geocosm LLC in 2000 and maintains an appointment as Research Fellow at the Jackson School of Geosciences, University of Texas at Austin.

Rob Lander develops and applies diagenesis and petrophysical models for Geocosm. He co-invented Geocosm's Prism2D, Touchstone, and Cyberstone models, as well as Geologica's Exemplar® model — computational frameworks that revolutionized quantitative prediction of reservoir quality in petroleum exploration.

Rob has published more than a dozen scientific papers in peer-reviewed journals over the past decade and is the author of four "notable papers" in the AAPG Bulletin, including one that received the Wallace E. Pratt Memorial Award for best paper. He served as an AAPG Distinguished Lecturer in 2015, co-edited a special issue of the AAPG Bulletin on sandstone reservoir quality prediction in 2010, and co-convened a Hedberg Conference and a meeting hosted by the Geological Society of London.

He obtained his Ph.D. in Geology from the University of Illinois in 1991 under Dick Hay's supervision and was a Senior Research Geologist at Exxon Production Research from 1991 to 1993. He then joined Rogaland Research in Stavanger, Norway, and was among the founding staff members of Geologica AS in 1996, where he held positions as Scientific Advisor and Technical Director. Rob co-founded Geocosm LLC in 2000 and maintains an appointment as Research Fellow at the Jackson School of Geosciences, University of Texas at Austin.

Bill Heins is a sedimentary geologist specializing in the relationship between sediment genetic environments in the hinterland and reservoir quality in sedimentary basins. At ExxonMobil Upstream Research Company, Bill helped develop the patented SandGEM system for predicting sand composition and texture as inputs for reservoir quality forward models like Touchstone.

As Product Ambassador for Getech's Globe Knowledge Base, Bill assists petroleum companies in using paleogeographic and paleoenvironmental reconstructions to understand the geographic and stratigraphic distribution of hydrocarbon play elements. His work integrates tectonic evolution, climate history, and sediment routing to predict reservoir properties in underexplored basins worldwide.

Prior to his career as an Earth scientist, Bill was a consultant for the Strategic Management Group of Philadelphia, advising large technology-oriented multinational companies on competitor analysis and strategy formulation — experience that informs his systems-thinking approach to sedimentary basin analysis.

Bill earned a Ph.D. in Geology from the University of California, Los Angeles in 1992, as well as a B.A. in Geology and a B.S. in Economics from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania in 1984.

[Bio to be added]

Gert-Jan Weltje is Professor of Sedimentary Geology at KU Leuven, where his research focuses on quantitative sedimentology, compositional data analysis, and the statistical modeling of sedimentary processes. His work on unmixing models and end-member analysis has become foundational in provenance studies and sediment-source discrimination.

Pieter Vermeesch is Reader in Geochronology at University College London, where he develops and applies radiometric dating techniques to Earth surface processes. He created IsoplotR, a widely used open-source software platform for geochronological data analysis, and has pioneered methods for interpreting detrital age spectra in provenance studies.

Mette Olivarius is a senior researcher at GEUS specializing in sandstone diagenesis and its implications for geothermal energy systems. Her work focuses on how diagenetic processes control reservoir quality in sedimentary formations targeted for geothermal heat extraction, bringing critical applied perspectives to energy transition challenges.