(1944- ) British Geochemist
In rare instances, an Earth scientist assumes a position of scientific adviser in an upper level of government. For example, frank press was the science adviser to President Carter. Similarly, Sir Keith O’Nions achieved such a stature in the sciences that he was asked to serve as chief science adviser for the Ministry of Defense for the United Kingdom. Now top government officials seek his opinion on geologic issues like uranium resources, oil and gas exploration, but also on biomedical research, astronomy, materials science, and chemical warfare.
The geologic research that brought Keith O’Nions to such a position of distinction involves the large-scale evolution of the Earth from literally a pile of rock at the time of formation to the complex interrelated systems of today. He studies this evolution using geochemical systems. He has used a variety of isotopic systems through novel methods of mass spectrometry. These data have revealed some basic information on fundamental questions like the convective circulation patterns in the mantle as revealed by studying basalts from mantle plumes and mid-ocean ridges. He investigated the origin and growth of continents and continental crust and the construction of mountain ranges using neodymium isotopes. Nd isotopes were also applied to sediment systems and for ocean water mass tracing. Later, O’Nions and colleague Ron Oxburgh correlated He isotope distributions with heat flow from the Earth and documented that there is a slow but constant escape of gases that were trapped deep within the Earth at the time of formation. This research evolved into devising a relationship between groundwater flow and hydrocarbon accumulation.
To address such large-scale questions, O’Nions has traveled the world to find just the right geological feature. He has collected loess from China, rocks and gases from Iceland, samples from the Massif Central, France, and rocks from northwest Scotland, to name a few. He even worked in Africa where he sampled the oldest known gabbro at the time. The Modipe gabbro of Botswana is about 2.5 billion years old. The study was to measure remnant magnetism to determine the magnetic field strength at that time. An accident in a VW microbus at the edge of the Kalahari almost ended O’Nions’s career prematurely. Luckily, he survived the accident.
Keith O’Nions was born on September 26, 1944, in Birmingham, England, where he spent his youth. He attended the University of Nottingham, England, where he earned a bachelor of science degree in geology and physics in 1966. He crossed the Atlantic Ocean to complete his graduate studies at the University of Alberta in Edmonton, Canada, where he earned a Ph.D. in geology in 1969. Keith O’Nions married his grammar school sweetheart Rita Margaret Bill in 1967; they have three children. He remained at the University of Alberta as a postdoctoral fellow for one year before accepting a second, Unger Vetlesen Postdoctoral Fellowship at Oslo University in Norway. That position was cut short when O’Nions accepted a position at Oxford University in England. He advanced from demonstrator (now assistant lecturer) in petrology (1971-1972) to lecturer in geochemistry (1972-1975), but left Oxford to join the faculty at the Lamont-Doherty Geological Observatory of Columbia University, New York, in 1975. He returned to England in 1979 as a Royal Society Research Professor at Cambridge University, where he was also named a Fellow of Clare Hall in 1980. O’Nions returned to his alma mater at Oxford University in 1995 to assume the position of professor of physics and chemistry of minerals as well as department head, which he held until 1999. In 2000, he assumed his current position as chief scientific adviser for the Ministry of Defense for the United Kingdom on loan from Oxford University for three years.
Sir Keith O’Nions is amid a very productive career. He is an author of numerous scientific articles in international journals and professional volumes. Many of these papers establish new benchmarks in the geochemical evolution of the Earth and appear in high-profile journals like Nature. In recognition of his research contributions to Earth sciences, O’Nions has received several prestigious honors and awards from professional societies. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of London. He is a fellow or foreign member of the Norwegian Academy of Sciences and the Indian Academy of Sciences. He received the Macelwane Award from the American Geophysical Union, the Bigsby Medal and the Lyell Medal from the Geological Society of London, and the Arthur Holmes Medal from the European Union of Geo-sciences.
O’Nions has performed significant service to the profession in addition to his obvious service to the public. He served on numerous committees and panels for the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) of Great Britain. He has been involved in the European Union science committees as well as the Council for Science and Technology of England. He is also involved with the Geological Society of London, as well as the American Geophysical Union though more so while he was in the United States.
