Presentation of the 2014 Roebling Medal of the Mineralogical Society of America to Bernard J. Wood

Abstract

It is my pleasure to introduce this year’s Roebling Medalist, Professor Bernard Wood from the University of Oxford. Bernie is known internationally for his pioneering work in many fields of petrology and geochemistry, from geothermometry of coexisting pyroxenes in igneous and metamorphic rocks to the formation and constitution of Earth’s core. His work on the redox state of Earth’s mantle is the definitive study and involves approaches that he has since extended to Mars. Bernie is a Londoner, attending William Ellis School on the edge of Hampstead Heath in the early 1960s. On leaving school he eschewed university in favor of the bright lights of the North Thames Gas Board. Sadly, his skills with a burette and flask did not cut the mustard in the heady world of domestic gas supply and he took up higher education as a student at the Northern Polytechnic, now assimilated into London Metropolitan University. Graduating with some distinction in Geology and Chemistry he went on to complete a Masters in Geochemistry at the University of Leeds and a Ph.D. in Physics with Roger Strens at Newcastle University on crystal field theory …