David R. Montgomery

David R. Montgomery ( born September 7, 1961) is a professor in the Department of Earth and Space Sciences at the University of Washington in Seattle (USA). He heads the research group is also working on the geomorphology and Quaternary Research Center on the geology of the Quaternary.

Montgomery earned a bachelor's degree in geology in 1984 from Stanford University and his Ph.D. in 1991 at the University of California, Berkeley, in geomorphology. He conducts research on the development of topography and the influence of geomorphological processes on ecosystems and human societies. His publications include studies on the role of the topsoil in the history of civilization, the evolution and the local extinction of the salmon to morphological processes in mountain catchments, to the formation of mountain ranges and applications of digital topography. He conducted field studies in eastern Tibet and the Pacific Northwest of the United States.

2008 Montgomery received a MacArthur Fellowship. For his book Dirt: The Erosion of Civilizations ( dt: . Dirt Why our civilization the ground under their feet loses ) he was awarded in the same year with the Washington State Book Award in the category of nonfiction.