Paul F. Hoffman

Paul Felix Hoffman ( born March 21, 1941 in Toronto, Ontario ) is a Canadian geologist and professor emeritus of Harvard University.

Biography

Hoffman studied geology at McMaster University ( Bachelor's degree 1964) and Johns Hopkins University, where he received his doctorate in 1970. From 1969 to 1992 he was a scientist at the Geological Survey of Canada. He also taught part-time at the University of California, Santa Barbara (1971 /72), the Caltech (1974 /75), the University of Texas at Dallas (1978 ) and at the Lamont - Doherty Earth Observatory of Columbia University ( 1990). He became a professor at the University of Victoria ( where he was an adjunct professor later) and from 1994 at Harvard University, where he is Sturgis Hooper Professor of Geology in 1992.

Hoffman was concerned with the development of the Earth in the Precambrian ( both plate tectonics, for example, the result of the supercontinent cycles, as well as the climate and environmental conditions ), which he undertook extensive field studies in north- western Canada and in South West Africa (Namibia). He is known in particular for his along with Daniel Schrag and other written contribution to the hypothesis of the Snowball Earth.

For his work, he has received numerous awards, in 2009 the Wollaston Medal of the Geological Society of London, Henno Martin Medal of the Geological Society of Namibia, the Miller Medal of the Royal Society of Canada, the Logan Medal of the Geological Association of Canada and 2010 the Walter H. Bucher Medal. In 2001 he received the Alfred Wegener Medal. He is a member of the Royal Society of Canada and a foreign member of the National Academy of Sciences and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.