AGU Recognizes Contributions to Geophysics

A highlight of the American Geophysical Society’s annual fall meeting held in San Francisco last December was the presentation of awards and medals. The following individuals were recognized for research in their particular areas of expertise.

The 2000 Walter Bucher Medal went to James H. Dieterich for his work that, according to the citation, has “revolutionized the understanding of frictional processes in rocks, their description by constitutive relations, and implications for earthquake nucleation and seismicity rate changes.” Dieterich is a research geophysicist on the earthquake hazards team at the US Geological Survey in Menlo Park, California.

Joseph L. Reid, a professor emeritus of oceanography at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in San Diego, California, was given the Maurice Ewing Medal for 2000. AGU cited him for, among other things, his “outstanding original contributions to observational physical oceanography.”

James R. Holton received the 2000 Roger Revelle Medal for the “combination of intellectual depth in his work in dynamic meteorology and the powerful links that he has forged joining dynamics, chemistry, radiation, and climate.” Holton is chairman of the atmospheric sciences department at the University of Washington, Seattle.

The 2000 Inge Lehmann Medal went to Richard J. O’Connell, a professor of geophysics at Harvard University. O’Connell was honored “for determining that the whole mantle was subject to flow; for his model of the mantle flow associated with plate motions and subduction; for creating a model that globally predicted plate motions in which plate tectonics stir the upper mantle; and for the way he has connected geophysics with geochemistry.”

Juan G. Roederer received the Edward A. Flinn III Award for 2000. The prize is given to those individuals who personify AGU’s motto, “unselfish cooperation in research.” This motto has been a “motivating principle for Juan Roederer in his organization of national and international programs over three decades,” according to the citation. Roederer is a professor emeritus of physics at the Geophysical Institute at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks, and senior adviser of the Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics in Trieste, Italy.

The first David Perlman Award for Excellence in Science Journalism- News went to Richard L. Hill, a science writer at the Oregonian, for his report on new research indicating that a huge earthquake could occur directly beneath western Oregon. The story entitled “Quake Forecast Shifts to Land” appeared in that newspaper on 4 May 1999; it is available online at http://www.oregonlive.com/news/99/05/st050408.html .

Quentin C. Williams, a professor of Earth sciences at the University of California, Santa Cruz, received one of two Macelwane Medals. Williams was recognized for his “creative and prolific contributions on the behavior of Earth and planetary materials under a vast range of physical conditions,” according to the medal citation. The other Macelwane Medal went to Scott C. Doney, a chemical oceanographer with the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado. In addition to his many scientific endeavors, he was recognized for his research to “better understand and model the response of the marine biogeochemical system to climate variability and to predict potential climatic feedbacks via the exchange of [carbon dioxide] and other radiatively or chemically important gases between the atmosphere and ocean.”