Subir Kumar Banerjee (19 February 1938, Jamshedpur) [1] is an Indian-American geophysicist, known for research on rock magnetism, palaeomagnetism, and environmental magnetism. [2]
Banerjee studied at the University of Calcutta with a bachelor's degree in physics in 1956 and at the Indian Institute of Technology with a master's degree in 1959. He received in 1963 his Ph.D. in geophysics from the University of Cambridge, where his supervisors were John C. Belshé and Edward Bullard. As a postdoc at the Mullard Research Laboratories in Redhill, Surrey, Banerjee did research on ferrite. At the University of Newcastle, he held an appointment as lecturer from 1966 to 1969 and worked under the supervision of Kurt Hoselitz (1916–2010) and Kenneth Creer (1925–2020). For the academic year 1967–1968 Banerjee was at the Ampex Corporation and at Stanford University. At Stanford he was mentored by Allan V. Cox. [2] For the academic year 1969–1970 Banerjee was a lecturer at the University of Pennsylvania and worked in the laboratory of the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia. For the academic year 1970–1971 he was at the Lamont–Doherty Earth Observatory. At the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis he was an associate professor from 1971 to 1974 and thereafter a full professor of geophysics. [3] In 1974 he gained fame for the book The physical principles of rock magnetism, co-authored with Frank D. Stacey. [4] [5] In 1970s Banerjee investigated samples of lunar rocks. [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] In 1976 he was appointed an adjunct professor in the University of Minnesota's Program of Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies. [11] In 1990 he founded the University of Minnesota's Institute for Rock Magnetism (IRM) and became its director. [12]
Banerjee's research deals with magnetism of rocks with applications to paleomagnetism and geomagnetism. His research pertains to the remanent magnetization of magnetic oxides in rocks. He and his colleagues have collected paleomagnetic data from sediments in lakes and soils and applied this data to archaeological, paleoclimatic and environmental studies. He was involved in the development of rapid methods for the paleomagnetic study of soils and their use in stratigraphy and climate reconstruction dating as far back as the midpoint of the Middle Paleolithic. [4]
In 1983 Subir Banerjee received a D.Sc. from the University of Cambridge. He was elected in 1984 a Fellow of the American Geophysical Union (AGU) and in 2006 a Fellow of the American Physical Society (APS), as well as the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (AAAS). [13] From 1986 to 1988 he served as president of the Geomagnetism and Paleomagnetism Section of the AGU. The AGU honored him in 2003 with the William Gilbert Award [14] and in 2006 with the John Adam Fleming Medal. [2] Banerjeee was awarded the Louis Néel Medal from the European Geosciences Union in 2004. [4]
Paleomagnetism is the study of prehistoric Earth's magnetic fields recorded in rocks, sediment, or archeological materials. Geophysicists who specialize in paleomagnetism are called paleomagnetists.
A geomagnetic reversal is a change in a planet's dipole magnetic field such that the positions of magnetic north and magnetic south are interchanged. The Earth's magnetic field has alternated between periods of normal polarity, in which the predominant direction of the field was the same as the present direction, and reverse polarity, in which it was the opposite. These periods are called chrons.
A back-arc basin is a type of geologic basin, found at some convergent plate boundaries. Presently all back-arc basins are submarine features associated with island arcs and subduction zones, with many found in the western Pacific Ocean. Most of them result from tensional forces, caused by a process known as oceanic trench rollback, where a subduction zone moves towards the subducting plate. Back-arc basins were initially an unexpected phenomenon in plate tectonics, as convergent boundaries were expected to universally be zones of compression. However, in 1970, Dan Karig published a model of back-arc basins consistent with plate tectonics.
The Lunar Magma Ocean (LMO) is the layer of molten rock that is theorized to have been present on the surface of the Moon. The LMO was likely present on the Moon from the time of the Moon's formation to tens or hundreds of millions of years after that time. The LMO was a thermodynamic consequence of the Moon's relatively rapid formation in the aftermath of a giant impact between the proto-Earth and another planetary body. As the Moon accreted from the debris from the giant impact, gravitational potential energy was converted to thermal energy. Due to the rapid accretion of the Moon, thermal energy was trapped since it did not have sufficient time to thermally radiate away energy through the lunar surface. The subsequent thermochemical evolution of the LMO explains the Moon's largely anorthositic crust, europium anomaly, and KREEP material.
Pyrolite is a term used to characterize a model composition of the Earth's mantle. This model is based on that a pyrolite source can produce mid-ocean ridge basalts (MORB) by partial melting. It was first proposed by Ted Ringwood (1962) as being 1 part basalt and 4 parts harzburgite, but later was revised to being 1 part tholeiitic basalt and 3 parts dunite. The term is derived from the mineral names PYR-oxene and OL-ivine. However, whether pyrolite is entirely representative of the Earth's mantle remains debated.
(Stanley) Keith Runcorn was a British physicist whose paleomagnetic reconstruction of the relative motions of Europe and America revived the theory of continental drift and was a major contribution to plate tectonics.
Plate reconstruction is the process of reconstructing the positions of tectonic plates relative to each other or to other reference frames, such as the Earth's magnetic field or groups of hotspots, in the geological past. This helps determine the shape and make-up of ancient supercontinents and provides a basis for paleogeographic reconstructions.
In geology, the slab is a significant constituent of subduction zones.
Catherine L. Johnson is a planetary scientist known for her research on the magnetic fields of planets including Mercury, Venus, Earth and its moon, and Mars. In 2023, she was elected to the National Academy of Sciences.
Robert Norman Clayton was a Canadian-American chemist and academic. He was the Enrico Fermi Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus of Chemistry at the University of Chicago. Clayton studied cosmochemistry and held a joint appointment in the university's geophysical sciences department. He was a member of the National Academy of Sciences and was named a fellow of several academic societies, including the Royal Society.
Crustal magnetism is the magnetic field of the crust of a planetary body. The crustal magnetism of Earth has been studied; in particular, various magnetic crustal anomalies have been studied. Two examples of crustal magnetic anomalies on Earth that have been studied in the Americas are the Brunswick magnetic anomaly (BMA) and East Coast magnetic anomaly (ECMA). Also, there can be a correlation between physical geological features and certain readings from crustal magnetism on Earth. Below the surface of the Earth, the crustal magnetism is lost because the temperature rises above the curie temperature of the materials producing the field.
Kenneth Craig Macdonald is an American oceanographer and marine geophysicist born in San Francisco, California in 1947. As of 2018 he is professor emeritus at the Department of Earth Science and the Marine Sciences Institute at the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB). His work focuses on the tectonics and geophysics of the global mid-oceanic ridge including its spreading centers and transform faults, two of the three types of plate boundaries central to the theory of plate tectonics. His work has taken him to the north and south Atlantic oceans, the north and south Pacific oceans, the Indian Ocean, the Red Sea and the Sea of Cortez, as well as to the deep seafloor on over 50 dives in the research submersible ALVIN. Macdonald has participated in over 40 deep sea expeditions, and was chief- or co-chief scientist on 31 expeditions.
Kevin C. A. Burke was a geologist known for his contributions in the theory of plate tectonics. In the course of his life, Burke held multiple professorships, most recent of which (1983-2018) was the position of professor of geology and tectonics at the Department of Earth and Atmospheric Science, University of Houston. His studies on plate tectonics, deep mantle processes, sedimentology, erosion, soil formation and other topics extended over several decades and influenced multiple generations of geologists and geophysicists around the world.
Catherine G. Constable is an Australian earth scientist who is a professor at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography. Her research considers palaeo- and geo-magnetism. Constable was awarded the American Geophysical Union William Gilbert Award in 2013 and elected Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2017.
Susan Halgedahl is a geologist known for her research into the physics that govern magnetic rocks and for her work on fossils from Utah's Wheeler Formation.
Catherine Chauvel is a geochemist at the Institut de Physique du Globe de Paris known for her research on the impact of volcanic activity on the chemistry of the mantle, continental crust, and island arc geochemistry.
Andréa Tommasi is a geoscientist from Brazil known for her research on geodynamics and terrestrial deformation. She is a recipient of the CNRS silver medal and an elected fellow of the American Geophysical Union.
Simon L. Klemperer is a geophysicist and professor of Geophysics and Geological Sciences at Stanford University. He is best known for his contribution in lithospheric structure and tectonics studies.
The magnetic field of Mars is the magnetic field generated from Mars's interior. Today, Mars does not have a global magnetic field. However, Mars did power an early dynamo that produced a strong magnetic field 4 billion years ago, comparable to Earth's present surface field. After the early dynamo ceased, a weak late dynamo was reactivated ~3.8 billion years ago. The distribution of Martian crustal magnetism is similar to the Martian dichotomy. Whereas the Martian northern lowlands are largely unmagnetized, the southern hemisphere possesses strong remanent magnetization, showing alternating stripes. Scientific understanding of the evolution of the magnetic field of Mars is based on the combination of satellite measurements and Martian ground-based magnetic data.
James Gregory "Greg" Hirth is an American geophysicist, specializing in tectonophysics. He is known for his experiments in rock deformation and his applications of rheology in development of models for tectonophysics.
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