Making the Himalaya
As well as raising Earth’s highest mountain range, the Himalaya, the collision between India and Asia has caused lively debate between geologists about how continental crust behaves during plate collisions. Matt Kohn will look at the various models for how the middle of the crust deforms. Does it ‘ooze’ like toothpaste, develop wedges like a snow plough, or become flattened like the collapse of a weakened pile? Each model carries with it its own implications for reconstructing how the Himalaya and the Tibetan plateau were formed.
Speaker
Matt Kohn (Boise State University)
Dr Matthew (Matt) Kohn was raised in the eastern US, and attended college at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and graduate school at the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (New York), where he received his PhD in 1991. After a series of research positions, he advanced from Assistant Professor to Associate Professor at the University of South Carolina before joining the faculty at Boise State University in Idaho, where he is currently a University Distinguished Professor. Dr Kohn is a fellow of the Geological Society of America and the Mineralogical Society of America, and is a MSA distinguished lecturer for 2012-2013. His research employs geochemical analysis to investigate mountain-building processes, paleoclimate, mineral growth and fossilization, and has taken him recently to Argentina, Norway, India and Bhutan.