Jim integrates plate tectonic data with field aspects of stratigraphy and structure to create regional evolutionary syntheses and to constrain petroleum systems. Jim has directed industry-sponsored research programs through Tectonic Analysis Ltd. since 1985, and has held academic research positions at Lamont Earth Observatory, Dartmouth College, University of Houston, Cardiff University (Wales) and is now an Adjunct Professor at Rice University in Houston.

Jim has a PhD in geology from Durham, England (1985), an MS from SUNY Albany (1982), and a BA from Colgate University (1979). Jim’s research programs and teaching have focused on Colombia, Venezuela, Trinidad, Barbados, the Andes, the Atlantic and its margins, the Caribbean islands, Mexico, and the Gulf of Mexico. Jim has published more than 100 papers and articles on these regions, and has been studying rifting, passive margin development, and the Caribbean’s basement and basins part-time with ION Geophysical since 2010. Jim is the recipient of the Robert Mitchum Best Paper Award from EAGE in 2014, and the Doris M. Curtis Medal in 2020 from the GCSSEPM in recognition of career research contributions.