Judith Ann McKenzie (May 4, 1942 – August 11, 2023) was an American biogeochemist known for her research on past climate change, chemical cycles in sediments, and geobiology.
[10] McKenzie has enabled the ability of students to participate in field work through establishing summer schools within the International Association of Sedimentologists[6] and by establishing the Judith McKenzie field work award for graduate students using funds from the Emile Argand Award she received in 2016.
This research partially relies on quantifying stable isotopes of dolomite in Abu Dhabi sabkhas[14] and evaporites in Sicily.
[16] Cindy Lee, McKenzie, and Michael Sturm used stable isotopes to examine fluxes in particulate matter in a Swiss lake.
[18] McKenzie's work on the 'dolomite problem', an enigma whereby the past prevalence of dolomite is higher than what is found in modern environments,[19] has recently revealed that dolomite is precipitated by bacteria living under anoxic conditions which was first observed in the laboratory with sulfate-reducing Desulfovibrio,[20] and subsequently with microbes isolated from a coastal lagoon in Brazil[21][22][23] and in the coastal sabkha of Abu Dhabi.