He has published over 180 refereed papers on topics ranging from the origins of Earth's atmosphere to detecting life on other worlds to diagnosing human disease.
[3] He received a Ph.D. in geochemistry from the California Institute of Technology in 1996, advised by Gerald Wasserburg, where he developed methods for ultra-sensitive determination of rhenium and iridium in seawater.
[2] Anbar's research group uses multi-collector inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (MC-ICP-MS) to study natural variations in the “non-traditional” stable isotope abundances of transition metals as biomarkers and as probes of ancient ocean oxygenation.
[10] They have also worked to develop the uranium isotope system as a paleoredox proxy, opening up the carbonate sedimentary record for investigation of changes in ocean oxygenation and their linkages to evolution.
[19][20] In 2014, he was appointed a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Professor in recognition of his work in digital learning innovation.