Researchers in geology, geophysics, geochemistry, and hydrology

Nathaniel Arbiter

Nathaniel Arbiter (1911–2008) was an American mineral engineer and hydrometallurgist, Professor of Mineral Engineering at Columbia, elected to the National Academy of Engineering in 1977.

Nedal Nassar

Nedal T. Nassar is an American mineral economist and criticality scientist who leads the Materials Flow Analysis Section at the U.S. Geological Survey's National Minerals Information Center.

Neil C. Sturchio is an American geochemist and Professor Emeritus at the University of Delaware whose research applies isotope tracers to hydrology and synchrotron X-ray methods to mineral–water interfaces.

Nelson Horatio Darton

Nelson Horatio Darton was an American geologist with the United States Geological Survey who mapped the Great Plains and Black Hills and named the Ogallala formation.

Sep 20, 2026

Nicholas J Shackleton

Sir Nicholas John Shackleton (1937–2006) was a British paleoclimatologist at the University of Cambridge who established oxygen isotope stratigraphy as the master chronology of the ice ages.

Nick Zentner

Nick Zentner is an American geologist who has taught at Central Washington University since 1992 and hosts the Emmy-winning PBS series Nick on the Rocks.

Nicolas Dauphas

Nicolas Dauphas is an isotope geochemist and cosmochemist who holds the Chair of Cosmochemistry at the University of Hong Kong and was elected to the US National Academy of Sciences in 2024.

Nicolas J. Beukes

Nicolas J. Beukes, known as Nic Beukes, was a South African Precambrian sedimentologist at the University of Johannesburg, elected to the US National Academy of Sciences in 2022.

Nicolas Luco

Nicolas (Nico) Luco is an American research civil engineer at the U.S. Geological Survey in Golden, Colorado, specializing in probabilistic seismic hazard analysis and leading the National Seismic Hazard Model.

Nikolai P. Lavyorov

Nikolai P. Lavyorov (Николай Павлович Лавёров) was a Soviet and Russian geologist who founded uranium deposit research and served as vice president of the Academy of Sciences for 25 years.

Nikolai Sobolev (Николай Владимирович Соболев)

Nikolai Sobolev (Николай Владимирович Соболев) was a Russian mineralogist and petrologist in Novosibirsk, an Academician best known for proving diamond inclusions are syngenetic and opening ultrahigh-pressure metamorphic diamond study.

Nikolay P. Laverov

Nikolay Pavlovich Laverov (1930–2016) was a Russian geologist who served as vice president of the Russian Academy of Sciences from 1988 to 2013 and pioneered uranium geology.

Nikolay Sobolev

Nikolay Vladimirovich Sobolev (Соболев Николай Владимирович; 1935–2022) was a Soviet and Russian mineralogist and petrologist in Novosibirsk known for work on diamonds, kimberlites, and ultrahigh-pressure metamorphism.

Noah Planavsky

Noah Planavsky is an isotope geochemist and professor at Yale University known for using chromium isotopes to reconstruct Earth's oxygenation and for applying weathering chemistry to carbon removal.

Norman D. Newell

Norman D. Newell (1909–2005) was an American paleontologist at Columbia University and the American Museum of Natural History, known for his work on mass extinctions.

Norman L. Bowen

Norman L. Bowen (1887–1956) was a Canadian experimental petrologist whose 1922 reaction series showed that many igneous rocks crystallize from one parent magma; his 1928 book established physical chemistry as petrology's basis.

Norman Sleep

Norman Sleep, born 1945, is an American geophysicist and emeritus professor at Stanford University, elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1999, known for mantle convection and planetary thermal evolution.

Olaf Holtedahl

Olaf Holtedahl (1885–1975) was a Norwegian geologist, professor at Oslo, who led polar expeditions to Novaya Zemlya and Antarctica and first recognized the great Precambrian–Cambrian glaciation.

Oliver C. Mullins

Oliver C. Mullins is a petroleum geochemist, Schlumberger Fellow, and National Academy of Engineering member known for downhole fluid analysis, the Yen-Mullins model, and reservoir fluid geodynamics.

Orville Frank Tuttle

Orville Frank Tuttle (1916–1983) was an American experimental petrologist who showed that granite forms from a water-bearing melt and designed the Tuttle bomb pressure vessel.

Osmond Fisher

Osmond Fisher (1817–1914) was an English clergyman and geologist, rector of Harlton, who wrote the first geophysics textbook, The Physics of the Earth's Crust (1881), anticipating convection currents and continental mobility.

Othniel Charles Marsh

Othniel Charles Marsh was an American vertebrate paleontologist, the first professor of the field at Yale, who named Apatosaurus, Stegosaurus, and Triceratops and waged the Bone Wars.

Otto Nordenskjöld

Otto Nordenskjöld (Nils Otto Gustaf Nordenskjöld) was a Swedish geographer and explorer who led the Swedish Antarctic Expedition of 1901–1904, during which his ship was crushed by ice.

Owen Thomas Jones

Owen Thomas Jones (1878–1967) was a Welsh geologist who established the Ordovician and Silurian succession of central Wales and became the first Professor of Geology at Aberystwyth.

P. Jonathan Patchett

P. Jonathan Patchett, also published as P. J. Patchett, is an isotope geochemist and emeritus professor at the University of Arizona known for establishing the Lu–Hf dating system.

P.E. LaMoreaux

Philip E. LaMoreaux, Sr. (1921–2008) was an American hydrogeologist who led the USGS Ground Water Branch, served as Alabama's state geologist, founded the consulting firm PELA, and joined the National Academy of Engineering in 1987.

Pamela L. Nagler

Pamela L. Nagler is an American USGS scientist in Tucson, Arizona, known for satellite measurement of riparian water use and a 2009 Presidential Early Career Award.

Panagiotis Karkanas

Panagiotis (Takis) Karkanas is a Greek geoarchaeologist known for sediment micromorphology; since 2014 he has directed the Wiener Laboratory for Archaeological Science at Athens, and was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 2018.

Paolo D’Odorico

Paolo D’Odorico is an ecohydrologist and the Thomas J. Graff Professor of Natural Resources at the University of California, Berkeley, known for work on desertification and virtual water trade.