PROFESSOR RELATED WEBSITES
  Department of Geological Sciences Centre for Interactive Graphics Computing (CIGCES)
  Geological Sciences Extension Building  
  University of Cape Town  
  Rondebosch, 7701, RSA  
     
  ph: #27 (0)21 650 3171/2925  
  fax: #27 (0)21 650 3783  
  email: maarten@cigces.uct.ac.za  
     
     
  Biography Research Publications Teaching Students Personal  
 
   
 
 
Degrees
  • BA(Mod) Trinity College, Dublin, 1969.
  • PhD Cambridge University, 1972.
  • MA Trinity College, Dublin, 1992.
  • DSc (Honorary) Queens University, Canada, 1993.
 
Employment
  • Research Scientist: 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.
  • Resident Visiting Scientist: 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.
  • Philipson Stow Professor of Mineralogy and Geology, University of Cape Town, 1989-present.
 
Professional Associations
 
 
 
 
Geodynamics; tectonics; stratigraphy; Gondwana; GIS.
 
Geodynamics; tectonics and stratigraphy; some present focii are early-earth processes and greenstone belt studies; Orogenic studies on the Cape Fold Belt-Karoo Basin; evolution of the Gondwana supercontinent; economics of exhaustible resources, externalities and intergenerational equity; real costs of global polution. 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 and Brazil. GIS is a major research media for these projects; this is operated from the Centre for Interactive Graphical Computing.
 
 
 
 
Selected Publications

de Wit MJ and Ransome IGD, Editors (1992). Inversion Tectonics of the Cape Fold Belt, Karoo and Cretaceous Basins of Southern Africa. Balkema, Rotterdam, 269 pp.

de Wit MJ and Hart RA (1993). Earth's earliest continental lithosphere, hydrothermal flux and crustal recycling. Lithos, 30, 309- 336.

Wilsher W, Herbert R, Wullschleger N, Naicker I, Vitali E and de Wit MJ (1993). Towards Intelligent Spacial Computing for the Earth Sciences in South Africa. S. Afr. Journ. Science, 89, 315-322.

de Ronde CE, de Wit MJ and Spooner ETC (1994). Evidence for Fe-oxide, seafloor-related, hydrothermal discharge vents in the 3.5 Ga Barberton Greenstone belt, South Africa. Geol. Soc. America Bull., 106, 86-104.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Current MSc students
 
 
 
 
 
 
Current PhD students