Issue of
September 24, 1997

Earth Sciences marks 50
-- make that 106 -- years

BY JANET BASU

This fall, as Earth Sciences celebrate its 50th year as a separate academic unit (founded in 1947 as the School of Mineral Sciences), Stanford's geologists, geophysicists and petroleum engineers work on projects that could not have been imagined even 50 years ago. And they are building on new academic initiatives that expand the school's faculty, add to the scientific instruments they use and add innovative courses that reach a broader range of students throughout the university. A few examples of what's up:

• Two new senior faculty members arrived this month, experts in fields that link the solid earth with its more fluid envelopes ­ one studies the nitrogen cycles in soil, water and air, the second catalogs historical changes in ocean temperatures that drive changes in weather and climate. A third new assistant professor specializes in cosmogeochemistry ­ the study of stardust. Four more new faculty are to be recruited soon.
  
  
• A new instrument, the Sensitive High-Resolution Ion Microprobe (SHRIMP), is capable of detecting the range of isotopes on a fleck of that stardust or taking the fingerprints of ancient grains of sand embedded in less-ancient rock. The ion probe, to be used jointly by Stanford and the U.S. Geological Survey, will be set up in the Green Building early next year.
  
  
• New courses have been introduced for undergrads, including an "energy" track for the school's popular 5-year-old Earth Systems interdisciplinary major, an "Earth" track for the experimental Science Core for non-science majors and quarter-long sophomore seminars for both majors and non-majors. Dean Lynn Orr said classes like his course in "bubbles, inkjets and surface tension" have been "so much fun that many of our colleagues are watching us and planning to get involved too."

Back in 1891, the first professor hired by David Starr Jordan for Stanford's new faculty was a geologist, John Casper Branner. The choice was so felicitous that in 1913, Branner succeeded Jordan as Stanford's second president. The Department of Geology expanded in the same era, to include mining and metallurgy in 1898, petroleum engineering in 1914. By 1930, petroleum and mining had moved from the School of Physical Sciences to the School of Engineering. Then, in 1947, all were reunited in a new school whose first dean, A.I. Levorsen, proposed to cover "all of the subjects having the common denominator of minerals and rocks."

Fifty years later, the school consists of three highly ranked departments: Geophysics, Geological and Environmental Sciences (GES), and Petroleum Engineering. The common denominator among the faculty is the study of the Earth's crust: how it moves, how it is constructed, what it contains. Under Orr's leadership, the school is adding a new emphasis on ocean margins to study the coastal geological and tectonic processes that have the greatest influence on humans and their environment, because most human populations cluster on coastlines.

The seven new faculty recruits come partly as a result of the ocean margins initiative, partly to reinforce some of the school's long-standing strengths. They include three and a half new billets, a substantial increase for a school that numbers just over 40 in tenure-track and research positions.

There are more indications of good times for the school. After years of cramped and temporary quarters, the earth scientists now occupy three buildings. The latest is Geology Corner in the Quad, re-opened last year as Braun Hall after six years of post-earthquake reconstruction. Graduate student enrollment is increasing, and while the school prides itself on its students' success in having found work in the meager job market of the past decade, for the first time in years even the news on employment is upbeat. The annual Job Fair, set for Oct. 14-15, is jammed with corporations that want to hire Earth Sciences graduates in fields ranging from oil recovery to environmental remediation.

A critical look leads to new visions

It took a serious process of soul-searching to reach this optimistic phase. In the winter of 1994-95, the school was scrutinized by a visiting committee appointed by the provost, including scholars from Stanford and other institutions. They challenged the earth scientists to do a self-critique as well.

The resulting analysis from both sides included some painful observations. The faculty was perceived by others in the university as "insular, not easy to work with." Contributions to undergraduate teaching were seen as fragmented. The school is host to the interdisciplinary Earth Systems major, but most of the faculty for that major came from other departments. The committee said the faculty was "comfortable and conservative regarding future research directions" at a time when other schools are doing "exciting fundamental science" by bringing together research on the Earth's surface, oceans and atmospheres.

The report also recognized the school's strengths. Many of its research groups are considered leaders in their fields. The Geophysics and GES departments consistently rank in the top three nationally among major universities for the quality of their geophysics, tectonics and structural geology programs, and the Petroleum Engineering Department is the only one of its type in an "Ivy League" institution.

Over the past 25 years, Stanford has placed more professors in academic earth sciences departments than any other university in the nation. In one field, petroleum engineering, its alumni account for one-fifth of the world's doctoral degrees. They also are leaders in industry ­ for example, Stanford alumni hold significant corporate and government decision-making positions in virtually every country where oil, natural gas or hydrothermal energy are found.

However, this solid record stood on somewhat shaky ground, in the context of a rapidly changing environment for science, particularly for earth sciences. With the boom-and-bust nature of the oil industry and serious cutbacks at the U.S. Geological Survey, the school's two traditional collaborative partners have cut back sharply on research. Funding agencies for basic science are demanding that research proposals include an aspect of social value, a practical pay-off as well as a contribution to basic knowledge. At the time of the report, job opportunities were declining for both bachelor's and doctoral degree holders ­ and more openings were available for students trained in environmental remediation and hazard studies than in oil discovery.

"The next important step for the school's faculty is to work together to develop an integrated vision," the visiting committee wrote. "To be successful in these efforts, the school must think more expansively, articulate itself more effectively and overcome its perceived insularity."

"That exercise we went through, taking a hard look at ourselves, I think was good," Orr says now. "It made us think about where the opportunities are for us to have an input on our fields. It also made us look hard at how we can do a better job of reaching out within the university."

Meeting in a series of intensive retreats, the earth scientists developed an academic plan that defined their existing strengths in five areas: geochemistry and geochronology; fluid flow in the earth's crust; sedimentary systems, basin structure and evolution; continental dynamics; and environmental earth sciences. In each of those areas, Orr said, the scientists can satisfy society's key needs for knowledge and technology. He said that this is science that opens access to water, energy and minerals; that finds ways to remediate environmental damage and prevent future damage; that helps reduce vulnerability to hazards like earthquakes and volcanoes.

In particular, Orr predicted, "Environmental earth sciences will be so important in national and international arenas that it will continue to grow throughout the school."

One new academic direction was added: the Ocean Margins Initiative, a plan to add faculty whose work would dovetail with strengths of existing labs and add an emphasis on coastal geological processes as keys to environmental change, tectonics and other events that affect the human populations on the ocean shore. The initiative includes ties to the scientists at Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute, where Orr is a trustee. And it promises to strengthen the earth scientists' bridge to the biological scientists who share responsibility for the Earth Systems major.

Armed with that vision and with a substantial bequest earmarked for the school, the earth scientists made their case to the provost for three new faculty billets. They got approval to hire one full professor and two assistant professors under the ocean margins flag. The school also has been searching for a petroleum engineer specializing in advanced reservoir simulation and for a soil scientist for the department of geological and environmental sciences. And one new faculty billet has been approved on a 50/50 basis, shared between the earth scientists and the Institute for International Studies.

Learning experiences

Two and a half years after the committee's report, the view is good from Mitchell Hall ­ or at least it will be when the construction fences come down after a summer of seismic strengthening for the school's headquarters building.

Orr is particularly proud of the way his faculty has taken the initiative to increase the school's contributions to undergraduate teaching. He said that the school has the highest percentage of faculty advisers for freshmen. "[And] if you look over the last few years, you see the science core, the sophomore seminars, Earth Systems. . . . I think the university can see that we are reaching out beyond our walls," Orr said.

Earth Sciences has long been primarily a graduate school, with about 40 undergraduate majors each year. The Earth Systems major has added spark to the undergraduate program, attracting more than 100 majors to tracks focusing on environment, energy and other topics that take advantage of courses in earth sciences, geology and public policy. The program has attracted sterling students: So far it boasts a Fulbright Scholar, a Truman Scholar, several National Science Foundation grant recipients, and 10 of the 12 participants in the 1996-97 Goldman Environmental Honors program.

The earth scientists also have traditionally offered courses aimed at students outside the school. When a year-long science, mathematics and engineering course was proposed for non-science majors, a team of earth scientists and biologists led by geophysics chair Mark Zoback was the first to offer plans to teach the course. The 1996-97 "Earth" track of this Science Core was "an intense learning experience ­ for both students and professors," Zoback says. The team will be back with a fine-tuned version of the course for this year.

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