据美国休斯敦大学网站消息，著名地球物理学家Robert E. Sheriff教授追掉会12月13日将在德州举行。 （A memorial service for Dr. Sheriff will be held at 2 p.m., December 13 at the Settegast-Kopf Co. at Sugar Creek, 15015 Southwest Freeway, Sugar Land, Texas. A reception will follow.）Robert E. Sheriff教授于今年11月19日在美国德州去世，享年92岁。 以下引自： http://www.geosc.uh.edu/news-events/stories/2014/1121-sheriff-memoriam.php Robert E. Sheriff, professor emeritus in the University of Houston’s Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences and long-time departmental benefactor, passed away in Missouri City on November 19. The department mourns the loss of such an admirable, selfless man. Dr. Sheriff had an illustrious career both in industry and academia impacting the lives of many colleagues, students, and the geophysics community worldwide. Those who knew Bob Sheriff share a common set of descriptions for him – mentor, teacher, friend, and role model. After starting graduate school in physics at Ohio State University, Dr. Sheriff interrupted his education to work for The Manhattan Project in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. It was there that he met his wife, Margaret. They married in 1945, and he returned to Ohio State to complete his Ph.D. in physics. Through the course of their marriage, they had six children – Anne, Rick, Jeanne, Susan, Barbara, and Linda. Dr. Sheriff began working for Chevron in California in 1950. Geophysics research was in its infancy, and he was eager to learn. Throughout the course of his career at Chevron, he traveled the world supervising work in numerous locations and relocating his family to Trinidad and Australia. Dr. Sheriff may be best known in the geophysics community for writing the Encyclopedic Dictionary of Applied Geophysics. What started out as a short booklet describing terms related to the rapidly growing geophysics industry grew to more than 400 pages. First published by the Society for Exploration Geophysicists in 1973, it is in its 4th edition. It is still the SEG’s best seller, with 7,500 copies sold in 2014. “It has been translated into at least 75 languages, maybe more,” said Hua-wei Zhou, chair of the UH Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences. “It is the exploration geophysicist’s bible; people refer to it all the time.” Dr. Sheriff came to Houston in 1970 and began serving as an adjunct professor of geophysics at UH. After retiring from Chevron, he was the vice president of development at Seiscom-Delta. In 1980, he became a full tenured professor at UH. He was a gifted teacher and cared deeply about his students. Dr. Sheriff would share his opinions without any reluctance and pointed out weaknesses of students, telling them how to improve. His input and guidance helped his students learn to be able to find issues and solve them later on in their careers. “Bob is the reason why I joined UH,” said Zhou, who holds the Margaret S. Sheriff College Professorship in Geophysics. “I read his books while I was in graduate school. When I finally became a colleague of Bob’s, he was bigger than anyone I had known before. He was so unselfish, helping people any way he could.” Over the years, Robert and Margaret Sheriff established four endowments at the University of Houston, giving almost $2 million in support of the Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences. The endowments are the Margaret S. Sheriff College Professorships in Geophysics, the Robert E. Sheriff College Professorship in Sequence Stratigraphy, the Robert and Margaret Sheriff Faculty Chair in Applied Seismology, and the Sheriff Endowment in Applied Geophysics. The Sheriffs also set up a scholarship through the Society of Exploration Geophysicists for international graduate students coming to UH to study geophysics. More than 100 students have been funded through their generosity. “Bob Sheriff was a huge figure, a guru in his field. He was much more than just a good and generous person. He was academically a giant,” Zhou said. To make a gift in Dr. Sheriff’s memory, the family has requested that contributions be made to the Robert and Margaret Sheriff Endowment in Applied Geophysic s at the University of Houston.
以下内容引自Geoexpro杂志2014 年11月第四期上 Thomas Smith 的文章“Never Hold Back”，以此纪念92岁高龄逝去的美国著名地球物理学家Robert E. Sheriff 教授（1922~2014）。 Possibly best known for the Encyclopedic Dictionary of Exploration Geophysics, first published in 1973, Bob Sheriff’s accomplishments go literally to the ends of the earth – from his family’s travels to his contributions to geophysics and education. Now in its fourth edition, the encyclopedic dictionary has remained one of the Society of Exploration Geophysics’ (SEG) best sellers. It is a valuable and comprehensive reference that is a must to just about anyone in the oil and gas business. This alone would have been a bequest that would have assured Bob’s place in the upper echelon of the science. However, his contributions to geophysics and seismology, teaching at the University of Houston and short courses around the world, writing text books and articles, have all made Dr. Sheriff a household name to both students and professionals in geophysics. Adding to this, the Sheriff Scholarships for the SEG Foundation that finances foreign graduate students at the University of Houston, as well as endowed Chairs and Professorships at the University, proves his influence is truly global. Getting Started After graduating with degrees in physics and chemistry, young Bob Sheriff entered graduate school at Ohio State to study physics. The year was 1943 when the US was deeply involved in World War II. Bob was soon to be out of university deferments necessary to stay in school so he interviewed with The Manhattan Project at Oak Ridge, Tennessee, where he landed a job. “The pilot plant was manned by a bunch of physics graduate students from all over the country,” says Bob. “We talked freely among ourselves… my Oak Ridge experience magnificent as we taught each other.” Working at Oak Ridge also brought Bob another life-changing experience. A sister of a pilot plant colleague joined The Manhattan Project team as a chemist. Bob was introduced to the new employee and they “hit it off beautifully”. Bob and Margaret, the chemist, were soon married in 1945. The couple stayed at Oak Ridge until the spring of 1946 before returning to Ohio State University to complete graduate studies. Bob was able to teach physics classes while in graduate school until he received a scholarship from the National Science Foundation. Margaret worked on a geology degree. While still a student, Bob interviewed with Chevron and received an offer for a job at their La Habra facility (a technical center that operated from 1948 until it was closed in 1999) in Orange County, California. Anne, their first of six children, arrived in 1950 and they made their move to “the mountains and a sea shore” as Margaret put it. Being from Kansas, California had quite the appeal and she thought they were “set for life”. Little did she know where their future adventures would bring them… Becoming a Wandering ‘Geo’physicist “I knew nothing about geophysics ,” says Bob. “Dr. Allen Reilly, the manager of the La Habra facility, was just starting geophysics research. He told me it was easier to teach geology to a physicist than physics to a geologist. This is how I became a geophysicist.” Bob joined SEG at that time “to get their magazine and learn geophysics” and has been an active member ever since. During his early days at Chevron, Bob was eager to learn all he could about geophysics, including how things were done in the field. This would lead to the start of a yearning to see the world. After a year and a half of assigned projects at La Habra, he was transferred to New Orleans where he worked with a geophysicist who was on Chevron’s research committee. They traveled to geophysical operations all over the country. “I got to meet lots of important people and see lots of situations,” recalls Bob. After transferring back to California, Bob began supervising seismic work in foreign locations, mainly Latin America and the Caribbean, and he spent a considerable amount of time visiting these locations. He was then transferred to Port of Spain, Trinidad. At that time, Margret was pregnant with their sixth child. Bob came back for the birth and when number six, Linda, was nine weeks old, Margaret and the family made the move to Trinidad. Two years later, they all moved on to Perth, Australia. The transfer to Australia came with an added benefit for the Sheriff family – a six-week vacation plus a week of travel time. “Between company geophysics courses and visiting our offices along the way, I managed to stretch our vacations to three months,” says Bob. Consequently they were able to plan some very extensive trips to all corners of the world. After over five years there, Bob requested a transfer back to the United States. “Our children knew a lot about the rest of the world but little about the US, so we figured it was time to move back,” Bob recalls. The ‘Glossary’ is Born While their time in Australia was filled with traveling adventures, Bob still had a job to do, which included training and familiarizing personnel with new terms and concepts in geophysics. To fill this need, he created a 30-page pamphlet describing various geophysical terms in an industry that was evolving quickly.Bob also used it as a recruiting tool when visiting Australian universities. The glossary was distributed to other companies that were part of the Australian joint operation. One of those companies was Shell, which distributed it throughout their organization. The Sheriff family returned to the States in 1966 and settled again in New Orleans. By then, one of the past SEG presidents had received a copy of the geophysical glossary that Shell had distributed and recommended it to the SEG membership. “I was asked to update and expand the glossary,” says Bob, “but I was concerned about Chevron releasing this update. Well, the current president of SEG was Neal Smith, also a Chevron employee, who thought ‘releasing it to SEG would be good for the company’. I reported this to my manager and it was first published as one of the issues of Geophysics magazine.” Bob received the Kauffman Gold Medal, which is awarded for outstanding contributions to the advancement of the science of geophysical exploration. The little 30-page glossary had by then grown to 429 pages in its 4th edition as the Encyclopedic Dictionary of Applied Geophysics. A Second Career While in New Orleans, Bob was contacted by his old boss, Lloyd Geldart, from La Habra, California, who was teaching at McGill University in Montreal. Bob was asked to review the chapter on seismic work for a revised geophysics book series by Eve and Keys. “I told Geldart that the chapter was not acceptable because it did not describe geophysics as it is done today,” says Bob. “Consequently, I joined a group of authors and wrote the new seismic chapter for the book.” This would be the start of Bob joining the academic ranks and writing more geophysical text books. Bob was transferred to Houston in 1970, retiring from Chevron after 25 years of employment, and went to work with Seiscom Delta. While at Chevron in Houston, he had joined the University of Houston as an adjunct geophysics professor for four years, and continued teaching for another five years during his employment with Seiscom Delta. In 1980, the very respected geophysicist, Milton Dobrin, who had developed the university’s geophysics program, died suddenly while jogging in the early morning hours in Houston. That is when Bob began his second career in earnest, becoming a full tenured professor. Bob not only taught at the University, but also spent a lot of time teaching short courses for the American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG) on a number of different subjects. One he is particularly proud of was Seismic Stratigraphy. He had written a paper on the subject, and subsequently a book, and was invited to help teach the course in 1975. He brought this new concept to many skeptical geologists and geophysicists. The project turned out to be a success and was repeated for several years, eventually expanding to four courses a year. Bob taught other courses for different sponsors, especially overseas. “To provide time to teach these courses plus some sightseeing, I often took halftime positions at the university,” recalls Bob. “People were eager to have me teach them and I ran across many good students. That is when Margaret and I endowed the Sheriff Scholarships of the SEG Foundation. It finances two foreign graduate students every year at the University of Houston. It is wonderful to give deserving students the opportunity to advance their education. It is one of the things I have been very proud of.” Bob quit teaching in 2006 but his manner of teaching lives on through the people he touched along the way. Hua-Wei Zhou came to the University of Houston in 1989 partly because of Bob’s influence on exploration geophysics. He had this to say about Bob Sheriff: “…a giant figure in the world of exploration geophysics… When I think about Bob, a number of key words pop up in my mind: kindness, honesty, hardworking, seeking perfection, generosity and wisdom.” Wouldn’t everyone want such a legacy? http://www.geoexpro.com/articles/2014/10/never-hold-back
综合SEG网站资料，下面简要介绍SEG的历史，欢迎大家在评论中翻译和讨论。（ www.seg.org ） SEG History The Society of Exploration Geophysicists is a not-for-profit organization that promotes the science of applied geophysics and the education of geophysicists. SEG, founded in 1930, fosters the expert and ethical practice of geophysics in the exploration and development of natural resources, in characterizing the near surface, and in mitigating earth hazards. The Society, which has more than 33,000 members in 138 countries, fulfills its mission through its publications, conferences, forums, Web sites, and educational opportunities. SEG（The Society of Exploration Geophysicists ）是美国勘探地球物理学家学会的简称。它是为了促进地球物理教育与应用的菲赢利组织。SEG创建于1930年。SEG创建的初衷在于培养地球物理专家以及更好的让地球物理在勘探开发自然资源，近地表表征，减少地质灾害等方面发挥积极作用。SEG在138国家中拥有33000个会员， 通过 出版物， 会议，论坛， 网站和 教育机会 等履行其使命。 1930 On March 11, twenty-nine men and one woman met in Houston at the University Club to found the Society of Economic Geophysicists. Donald C. Barton was elected the first president. On 20 May, a constitution and bylaws were adopted, and two papers were published in mimeograph form. 1931 The group's name was changed to Society of Petroleum Geophysicists (SPG), and the first convention was held in conjunction with AAPG. 1932 SPG became the "Division of Geophysics of the AAPG." The Society continued to meet with AAPG through 1955. 1936 The first issue of Geophysics published. 1937 Once again the name of the organization was changed, this time to Society of Exploration Geophysicists. Accepted as an Affiliated Society by AAPG 1939 Patents section first appeared in Geophysics . 1940 First Cumulative Index published. Membership: 892. 1946 Constitution amended to permit establishment of Local Sections. 1948 Council created and met in Denver. First Local Sections chartered. Student Sections formed. Best Paper Award first presented. 1950 First Distinguished Lecture Tour organized. Membership: 2566. 1951 EAGE organized. Back issues of Geophysics available on microcards. 1952 SEG Crest adopted. 1953 Geophysical Prospecting appeared as a quarterly. 1954 Executive Committee voted to separate the Annual Meeting from the AAPG. First Associate Editors appointed to assist the Editor of Geophysics . 1955 SEG held its last joint meeting with AAPG, then celebrated its twenty-fifth anniversary with a separate meeting in Denver. 1956 The first Yearbook was published, and SEG's scholarship program was initiated with $12 125 distributed to thirteen students. 1960 A silver anniversary issue of Geophysics published listing "classic" papers of the first twenty-five years of the journal, which were selected by a panel of judges. Membership: 5724. 1961 The SEG Medal Award (later renamed in honor of Reginald Fessenden) was created. 1965 When the SEG staff moved into the Society's new building in June, there were 5837 members. 1968 SEG accepted an invitation from the Society of Petroleum Engineers to become a cosponsor of the Offshore Technology Conference. R. E. Sheriff published in Geophysics , the "Glossary of terms used in Exploration Geophysics," the precursor of his Encyclopedic Dictionary . Sheriff received the Virgil Kauffman Gold Medal in recognition of the glossary. 1969 Emeritus Membership was established in 1970. Membership: 7306. 1971 The fiftieth anniversary of the reflection seismograph was observed at the Midwestern Meeting in Oklahoma City with the dedication of a monument near the site of the tests of that technique. 1972 The first book published jointly with AAPG, Stratigraphic Oil and Gas Fields-Classification, Exploration Methods, and Case Histories , appeared. It was to be twenty-five years before the second joint publication effort by the two societies. 1973 Sheriff produced SEG's all time best-seller, Encyclopedic Dictionary of Exploration Geophysics . The addition of three new student sections brought the total to twenty-eight. 1978 The Maurice Ewing Medal Award was established as SEG's highest award. 1979 Geophysics began monthly publication, and fifteen Continuing Education courses were offered. 1980 In the 50th anniversary year of the Society, when the total membership was 14 172, there were 12 319 registered at the Annual Meeting. Eleven of the original thirty founders of SEG attended and were honored at that meeting. That attendance record has not been broken. 1981 A record $4 billion was spent on geophysical acquisition and processing in 1981. More than 100 000 attended the OTC that year. 1982 Geophysics, The Leading Edge of Exploration , debuted in June. The SEG scholarship program passed the million-dollar mark with awards of $130 800. Expanded abstracts were required for all papers presented at the 52nd Annual Meeting. 1984 The Geophysical Resource Center was completed and occupied. It was dedicated the following year. 1985 Two special issues were published to commemorate the fiftieth year of publication of Geophysics . A new film about geophysical exploration, Seeing the Unseen: Geophysics and the Search for Energy and Minerals , was produced. The First Annual Gulf Coast Exploration and Development Meeting was held, and the first joint meeting of the China Petroleum Society and SEG took place in Beijing. SEG's membership of 19 559 was the highest total to that point, and would remain the record for 10 years. 1986 Shell Companies Foundation donated $100 000 for books and periodicals to the SEG Library in the Geophysical Resource Center, and the building was named the Cecil and Ida Green Tower. 1987 Seismic Data Processing , zdogan Yílmaz's best seller, was available at the Annual Meeting in New Orleans. This was to become the second all-time revenue producer behind Sheriff's dictionary. The SEG Foundation was reorganized. 1988 An agreement with AAPG, SPE, and SPWLA led to the formation of an Intersocietal Coordinating Committee. The first EAEG-SEG joint research workshop under a new agreement to hold alternating workshops every other year and the first ASEG-SEG joint meeting were held. 1989 Initiation of the SEG Foundation Trustee Associates. 1990 A 15-tape set video short course, given by Oz Yílmaz and based on his Seismic Data Processing , was produced by Western Geophysical and offered to SEG to market. Membership: 14 964. 1991 Attendance at the 61st Annual Meeting in Houston was 10 670. The Executive Committee adopted a policy of holding a midyear meeting annually in a venue outside North America. 1992 Successful meeting held in Moscow. Record income of just under $7 million for the year. 1993 GEOROM , a set of CD-ROMs containing fifty-seven volumes of Geophysics - 1936-1992 - fully searchable, was produced. The mortgage on SEG's building, the Geophysical Resource Center, was retired. 1994 A nine-year decline in membership was interrupted when gains were shown in each category of membership. GEOROM was expanded to include selected articles from The Leading Edge plus Sheriff's Dictionary , The Cumulative Index, and Expanded Abstracts from the Annual Meeting. An SEG Home Page, hosted by Stanford University and maintained by volunteers led by Brian Spies, was established. 1995 A CD-ROM of the Expanded Abstracts of that meeting was offered at the Annual Meeting in Houston. 1996 The donation of a Sun Netra Webserver to SEG by Sun Microsystems allowed the Web site to be moved to the Business Office, enabling the entire Internet operations to be done in-house. 1997 The Distinguished Instructor program was inaugurated, wherein a selected individual presents a short course in various sites around the globe. The first instructor is Ian Jack. A constitutional amendment was approved which increased the membership of the Nominations Committee from the historical three most recent past-presidents by four members to be selected by a prescribed method from the Sections and Associated Societies. 1998 An all-time record of 1457 booths were sold for the Annual Meeting in New Orleans. The SEG Museum was reorganized by the addition of a Virtual Museum and Traveling Museum to the existing museum in Tulsa. The Distinguished Educator program was launched and Robert R. Stewart of the University of Calgary was chosen as the first honoree. A new logo was adopted by the Council to reflect the Society's increasingly international nature. 1999 Despite a turbulent year in the petroleum industry, the Annual Meeting in Houston drew 11 103 attendees, and there were 1276 booth sales--second-highest total ever. Also, paid membership grew to nearly 16 000, the highest total since 1987. A major redesign of the SEG Web site was completed, and an equipment donation from Sun Microsystems helped prepare SEG for a bold digital future. 2000 SEG Annual Meeting returns to Calgary for the first time since 1977. This is only the third time the meeting has been held outside the United States. Sally Zinke becomes the first woman to hold the office of SEG President. The increasing percentage of members residing outside the U.S. causes the International Affairs Committee to be radically restructured and renamed the Global Affairs Committee. Membership: 16 894. 2001 The SEG Executive Committee authors a strategic vision of the future of geophysics and SEG’s role in it. While SEG's Annual Meeting is under way in San Antonio, the terrorist attacks of September 11 take place. The meeting proceeds with only minor disruptions. Mary L. Fleming, director of programs at the American Statistical Association, is selected executive director in December. 2002 The fourth edition of SEG's all-time best-selling book, retitled Encyclopedic Dictionary of Applied Geophysic s to reflect the increasingly diverse employment of the membership, is published. Attendance at the Annual Meeting is disappointing, probably because of the out-of-the-mainstream venue (Salt Lake City) and the travel restrictions imposed after the terrorist attacks a year earlier. However, the meeting has one of the all-time magical moments of any SEG convention—the multimedia presentation of Robert Ballard, discoverer of the Titanic , which wows hundreds of junior high students and experienced geoscientists. 2003 SEG membership exceeds 20 000 for the first time, and a majority of members lives outside the United States. 2004 To address income disparity among geophysicists around the world, the Council approved a three-tiered dues structure that allows Active membership at all three levels. Membership approaches 23 000. 2005 SEG marked its 75th anniversary with celebrations at section meetings throughout the world, a special publication, retrospective journal articles, a video about geophysics and the Society, an extra distinguished lecture, historical photos on the SEG Web site, and special exhibits at the Annual Meeting in Houston. Membership surpassed 25 000 late in the year. 2006 SEG held a highly successful Annual Meeting in New Orleans barely a year after Hurricane Katrina devastated the city. Membership exceeded 27 000 late in the year. 2007 The SEG Foundation launched a US$15 million major-gifts campaign, “Advancing Geophysics Today, Inspiring Geoscientists for Tomorrow,” aimed at accelerating the rate of geophysical innovation and knowledge transfer and attracting more young people to careers in the geosciences. 2008 SEG opened its first office outside the United States in Beijing, China, on 3 April. The SEG Foundation exceeded its US$15 million campaign goal, celebrating pledges totaling more than US$17 million during a celebration at the Annual Meeting in Las Vegas, USA. At year’s end, pledges totaled US$17 232.410. SEG membership exceeded 33 000. 2009 Despite a worldwide recession, SEG's Annual Meeting in Houston drew more than 9,200 delegates and filled four exhibit halls with technical session posters and exhibits.
标签: 地球物理学家
