European Geosciences Union
Division on Stratigraphy, Sedimentology and Palaeontology
President: Helmut Weissert (ssp@egu.eu)
Deputy President: Marc De Batist
(marc.debatist@ugent.be)
The Stratigraphy, Sedimentology and Palaeontology Division (SSP) focuses its activities on all aspects of the sedimentary record. About 70 % of the Earth surface is covered by sedimentary deposits, which are eroded and deposited right at the contact between the solid lithosphere and the atmosphere, biosphere and hydrosphere. Sedimentary rocks record the history of our planet since almost 4 billion of years and play a pivotal role for our understanding of the evolution of life. This deep-time archive of Earth history is studied with a wide range of analytical techniques providing ever stunning details on the evolution of our planet. Sedimentary basins host important natural resources like coal, gas, oil, ore deposits and groundwater and therefore a better understanding of the physical, chemical and biological processes controlling the formation and distribution of sediments and sedimentary rocks is of utmost importance for our society.
The 2019 Jean Baptiste Lamarck Medal is awarded to Isabel P. Montañez for major contributions to the field of stratigraphy, in particular through the application of sedimentary geochemistry to address palaeoclimate and sequence stratigraphic concepts in deep time.
The 2019 Division Outstanding Early Career Scientists Award is awarded to Christian Zeeden for his outstanding research in the field of astrochronology and for his innovative statistical approaches in constructing astronomically tuned robust time scales.
The 2018 Jean Baptiste Lamarck Medal is awarded to James L. Best for major contributions to our understanding of physical sedimentary processes and their products in the geological record.
The 2018 Outstanding Student Poster and PICO (OSPP) Award is awarded to Emma Dunne The Late Triassic Latitudinal Biodiversity Gradient
The 2018 Outstanding Student Poster and PICO (OSPP) Award is awarded to Ricarda D. Rohlfs Weighted Voronoi calculations in crystal surface morphology: a fast approach
The meeting programme for the EGU General Assembly 2019 (7–12 April, Vienna) was published this month. With more than 1000 scientific sessions, debates, short courses and side events, and close to 17,000 abstracts, it promises to be a varied and exciting meeting. If you have not yet registered, please do so by the end of today to get reduced registration rates.
This month the EGU has also issued a response to potential changes to the European Research Council, one of the world’s leading and most respected funders of frontier research, designed and governed by scientists. "Without this close relationship with the research community, the ERC’s ability to support the very best frontier science will be compromised," the statement reads.
The EGU has also announced a new award for Earth, planetary and space science journalism this month. The Angela Croome Award is the newest edition to the EGU awards and medals portfolio, joining the newly renamed Julia and Johannes Weertman Medal, the recently launched Katia and Maurice Krafft Award for geoscience outreach and engagement, and many other prestigious honours.
Last but not the least, we are sad to report that Lily Pereg, Deputy President and Programme Group Chair of the EGU Soil System Sciences (SSS) Division and Executive Editor of the SOIL journal, passed away in January. Read the obituary on the EGU website.