De Wit, Maarten J

Key Interests:

Field mapping, The African Plate and the geology of Africa, Early Earth evolution, Gondwana, structural geology/ stratigraphy, tectonics and geodynamics of supercontinents, Metallogenesis, Cape Fold Belt, Greenstone Belts, economics of non-renewable natural resources. Earth Science Database Management.

Phone:27 21 650-3171     Fax: 27 21 650 3783

Email: maarten@cigces.uct.ac.za

 

Biographical Information

Philipson Stow Professor of Mineralogy and Geology, University of Cape Town, 1989-present.

Degrees: BA(Mod) Trinity College, Dublin, 1969;   

               PhD Cambridge University, 1972.

               MA Trinity College, Dublin, 1992;        

               DSc (Honorary) Queens University, Canada, 1993.

 

Past Work Environments:

Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, Columbia University, USA, 1972-1975.
United Nations Development Programme, Ethiopia, 1975-1978.
Bernard Price Institute of Geophysics, University of the Witwatersrand, 1978-1988.
Universidad de Chile, Santiago, 1974.
Queens University, Canada, 1981-1982.
Imperial College of Science and Technology, London, 1983.
Lunar and Planetary Institute, Houston, 1985-1986.
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, 1992-1993.
University of Utrecht, Netherlands, 1996-1997.

 

Research Interests

Earth and Rock Systems; tectonics and stratigraphy; some present focii are: early-earth processes and greenstone belt studies; Cape Fold Belt-Karoo Basin; Gondwana supercontinent; economics of exhaustible resources, externalities and intergenerational equity; real costs of global pollution. Field studies are central to most of the research: projects are in progress along the south and west coasts of South Africa; throughout the Cape and the Karoo; in the Transvaal (Barberton, Thabazimbi-Pietersburg); in Madagascar, S India, N Mozambique and Brazil, West Africa and Angola.  GIS is a major research media for these projects.  The African Plate and the Geology of Africa; Metallogenesis and crustal recycling.

 

Selected Publications

·          Ashwal, LD and de Wit (1997).  Greenstone Belts.  Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, 830pp.

  • de Wit, MJ (1998).  Granite, greenstones, cratons and tectonics: does the evidence demand a verdict?  Precambrian Research, 91, 181-226.
  • de Wit, MJ; Bowring, S; Ashwal, LD; Randrianasolo, LG and Rambeloson, RA (1999).  Structure, tectonics and geochronology of Neoproterozoic ductile shear zones in southwestern Madagascar with implications for Gondwana studies.  Tectonics, (in press).de Wit, M.J. (1999). 
  • Externality costs of copper minerals from hydrothermal mineral deposits. (Submitted to Economic Geology).

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