Natural Science Forum / Earth Science / Mineralogy / January 2006

My Goodness George, I have no idea what AFAIK might mean and though
curious, I'm rather afraid to ask.   But it has the same feel as BOHICA
prounouced BOW HE KA.  It too is an interesting colloquialism.

I wrote to the Nobel Foundation this evening and asked them if a
geo-scientist ever won a Nobel prize and also if for example a
seismologist were to predict an important earthquake publically which
resulted in a scientific achievement and a humanitarian effort at the
same time, if that would qualify him/her for a prize.  When the results
are delivered, I'll let you know.

Petra

The Crafoord Prize, although it is shared with other disciplines:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crafoord_Prize

I wouldnt rule out a physics prize going to some aspect
of geophysics.   The prizes are bit "leaky" sometimes
crossing over into astronomy or biology.

I'd guess some crucial insight into the earth's magnetic
field might qualify.   My best guess would be the work
by Glatzmier and Richards that (1) first predicted the
magnetic field pushes the inner core to rotate slightly
faster than the rest of earth (2) and second being able
to observe this via seismic anisotropy.

The whole earth is sometimes used as an [astro]physical
observatory.  Perhaps if they discover some new aspect
of physics this way, this could qualify.  The question whether
gravitation of magnetism is pure inverse-squared crops
up now an then.  People have added an extra term to the
basic equations that distance limited.  There was some hallabuloo
about such a case in gravitation, then many careful experiments
to rule experimental artifacts (the case).
People have looked at very low frequency seismology (unsuccessfully)
for evidence of gravity waves or stange particles passin through the
earth. The motivating principle it to harness a detector that is
eight thousand miles wide.

I'd say the Curie-Bequerel award for radioactivity is pretty close to
geology.

From the About.dot.com article:
"The Nobel Prize's caretakers at the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences
do have the Crafoord Prize, meant to recognize and support sciences
beyond Nobel's original three. The geosciences take turns with
mathematics, astronomy and biosciences, coming up every fourth year. The
$500,000 prize is awarded to fund research, there's a nice medal, and
the academy holds a symposium for winners, but there's no party with the
King of Sweden and no world headlines. Its geologic winners are people
of the first rank, but the Crafoord Prize is clearly not as grand a
thing as the Nobel, nor is it awarded for the same criteria."

Remember, the Nobel was founded by the man who made his money in
dynamite--used in mining. Hence, the geological industries were/are
*supporting* the Nobel prizes. But what geological advances have
supported/benefitted mankind, which cannot be subsumed under physics or
chemistry? I don't know of any.

I always assumed that the US GSA's Penrose Medal was given to 'best of
the best' in the US" at least.