Sengor, A. M. £elal (earth scientist)

 
(1955- ) Turkish Plate Tectonics

After the plate tectonic paradigm was accepted, there came a group of equally noteworthy Earth scientists to elucidate the details of this coarse model. Premier among that group is ^elal Sen-gor. One of the reasons for his unparalleled success is his ability to move around the world to find the perfect example of a feature he wishes to study unfettered by differences in language and culture in addition to finding the best possible collaborators. His research covers a large variety of topics; the one he is best known for is the disappearance of ocean basins. When two continents collide, the ocean basin between them is destroyed. The only records of once huge bodies of water are the rocks around the suture zone between the two old continents, which now appear as one. His paper “Classical Theory of Orogenesis,” exemplifies this work. Sengor has been especially interested in the destruction of the Tethys Ocean, which included the most spectacular continental collisions of the late Mesozoic to Ceno-zoic, including the Alps, the Himalayas, and the Zagros of northern Iraq and Iran. Not only do the remnants of this ocean basin contain significant economic deposits, but also the continued convergence is responsible for many of the most destructive earthquakes in history including many in Sengor’s home of Turkey. This work constitutes Sengor’s regional research.

Sengor has also performed research on many theoretical aspects of plate tectonics. He discovered that many extensional basins form in continental collision zones at high angles to the suture zones and helped name them “impacto-gens” as a variation of aulocogens, which are basins, formed in extensional settings. He studied these aulocogens as formed in triple junctions in the initial stages of divergent margins worldwide. He also studied “tectonic escape” of landmasses laterally along strike-slip faults away from continental collision zones. This idea had been previously proposed for the Himalayas but Sengor extended the concept worldwide. He even defined a new type of continental collision he named “Turkic-type orogeny” as described in his paper “Turkic-type Orogeny and its Role in the Making of Continental Crust.” Other topics of interest mostly center around plate collisions and the evolution of continental crust. To document these processes, Sengor worked in a phenomenal number of areas from China to the Alps to the Caribbean but mostly in his beloved Turkey.

Sengor was born on March 24, 1955, in Istanbul, Turkey. Both of his parents’ families were immigrants from the Balkan provinces of the Ottoman Empire, which had been ravaged by wars. Both families are among the richest in Turkey. As a result, Sengor grew up in splendor and a highly educated household where he became multilingual. In 1969, he transferred into the Robert Academy in Istanbul, which is reportedly one of the 50 best high schools in the world. He gained his love for geology there and graduated in 1973. Upon graduation, Sengor traveled to Germany for one year where he enrolled in the Goethe Institute in Munich and Berlin. In 1974, he enrolled in the University of Houston, Texas, but transferred to the State University of New York at Albany in 1976. He spent his entire college career there earning a bachelor of science degree in geology, summa cum laude, in 1978, a master of science degree in geology in 1979, and a Ph.D. in geology in 1982. He was an advisee of both john dewey and kevin burke. Upon graduation, Sengor joined the faculty at the Istanbul Technical University in Turkey, where he passed from lecturer to professor over the next several years and where he remains today. He is currently the head of the department and has been since 1998. During this period, Sengor was a visiting scientist at the University of Oxford, England, and the Lunar and Planetary Institute in Texas. ^elal Sengor married Oya Maltepe in 1986; they have one son.

Sengor is in the midst of an extremely productive career. He is an author of some 165 articles in international journals, professional volumes, and governmental reports. Many of these papers are benchmarks in modern plate tectonics with some of the premier geologists. He is also an author of five books, one of which has been translated into Russian, German, and Chinese. Examples of his books include Orogeny, and volumes include The Cimmeride Orogenic System and the

 Sengor at the front of the Mont Blanc basement in the Swiss Alps

Sengor at the front of the Mont Blanc basement in the Swiss Alps

Tectonics of Eurasia and Tectonic Evolution of the Tethyan Region. In recognition of his many contributions to geology, Sengor has received numerous honors and awards. He is a foreign associate of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences. He is one of 10 founding members of the Turkish Academy of Sciences (youngest ever) and the first Turkish member of the Academia Europaea (youngest member ever). He received an honorary doctorate from the Universite de Neuchatel. He was also awarded the Bigsby Medal and the President’s Award from the Geological Society of London, the Medaille du College de France, the Parlar Science, Service and Honor Award from the Middle East Technical University, the Lutaud Prize (Grand Prize) from the French Academy of Sciences, the Director’s Plaque from the Turkish Geological Survey, the Rammal Medal from the French Society of Physics, the Social-democrat Populist Party of Turkey Plaque of Recognition and the Science Award from the Turkiye Bilimsel ve Teknik Arasterma Kumuru. He has even had two fossils named after him.

Sengor has also performed outstanding service to the profession and the public. He has served on virtually every major scientific board in Turkey, including serving as the science and technology adviser to the president of Turkey. He represented Turkey in international programs, including the International Lithosphere Project, the Ocean Drilling Program, and even in the NATO Scientific Affairs Division. He has also served numerous editorial roles including associate editor of Tectonics and of Geological Society of America Bulletin, as well as a member of the editorial board for Journal of Structural Geology, Tectonophysics, Earth Evolution Sciences, Bulletin of the Turkish Association of Petroleum Geologists, Turkish Journal of Earth Sciences, Earth Sciences History, Geologica Balanica, Terra, Geologische Rundschau, Asian Journal of Earth Sciences, International Geology Review, and Eclogae Geologicae Helvetiae.

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