2019 GSA James B. Thompson, Jr. Distinguished International Lecturers

The lecture tours are made possible through a gift to the GSA Foundation by James B. Thompson, Jr., whose bequest contributed to the endowment of two lecture tours by distinguished geologists, one a non-North American scientist to tour academic and related institutions within North America, and the other a North American scientist to tour foreign universities and geological institutions. Both tours are arranged under the guidance of GSA International.

The GSA International committee selected Laurent Jolivet (Sorbonne Université) as the incoming speaker from outside of North America who will present seminars of broad geologic interest in a tour of selected academic and related institutions within North America. Frank Corsetti (USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences) is the outgoing speaker from within North America who will present exciting and cutting edge geoscience research in a tour of foreign universities and geological institutions.

Laurent Jolivet

Laurent Jolivet was chosen as the 2019 James B. Thompson, Jr., Distinguished International Lecturer who will travel domestically. Laurent Jolivet is a well-known geodynamicists who studies tectonic evolution of the lithosphere at convergent plate boundaries using a wide range of tools and disciplines that includes structural geology, metamorphic petrology and numerical modeling. His research has contributed fundamentally to clarify the way the crust deforms at depth and how rocks return to the surface.

Laurent Jolivet is professor at Sorbonne Université, in Paris, after successive positions in Ecole Normale Supérieure (Paris), Université de Cergy-Pontoise, Université Pierre et Marie Curie (Paris) and Université d'Orléans. His main scientific interests are the geodynamics of subduction and collision zones, the mechanisms of continental crust extension in back-arc regions and passives margins, the exhumation of HP-LT metamorphic rocks, the long-distance interactions of collision and back-arc extension, the coupling between mantle flow and crustal deformation, crustal rheology, kinematic reconstructions. He worked for many years in eastern Asia (Japan, Korea, Vietnam, Russian Far East), in the Mediterranean region and Scandinavia. His favorite field area during the last 20 years has been the Mediterranean mountain ranges and back-arc basins. He has been the advisor of more than 30 PhD students and has published more than 200 papers in international peer-reviewed journals. He likes also teaching general geology, tectonics, geodynamics, in the class and in the field.

View Jolivet's CV

Frank Corsetti

Frank Corsetti was chosen as the 2019 James B. Thompson, Jr., Distinguished International Lecturer who will travel internationally. Frank Corsetti is highly recognized for his work in promoting diversity in science and well-known for his speaking ability. Corsetti studies the co-evolution of the Earth and its biosphere from a geobioligic perspective, with an interest in stromatolites/microbial signatures in the rock record, the origin of animals, and mass extinctions.

Corsetti is Professor and Chair of the Department of Earth Sciences at USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences. He has served as Associate Editor of Geobiology, Palaios, and the Journal of Sedimentary Research, and was recently awarded the Dickinson Medal from the Society for Sedimentary Geology (SEPM).

View Corsetti's CV