The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences does not award Nobel Prizes for geosciences, astronomy, mathematics, or biosciences, but it does recognize one of those fields each year with its Crafoord Prize. This year’s prize, in geosciences, will be presented in September to Dan P. McKenzie, Royal Society Professor of Earth Sciences at the University of Cambridge. The prize is worth $500 000.
The academy is honoring McKenzie “for fundamental contributions to the understanding of the dynamics of the lithosphere, particularly plate tectonics, sedimentary basin formation and mantle melting.” During the 1960s, early in his career, McKenzie made key contributions to the authoritative theory of plate tectonics, which, until that time, was frequently viewed with skepticism by scientists.
His research during the next decade focused on the deformation that occurs in the boundary zones between the plates, especially where these boundaries cross continents. According to the academy’s announcement, McKenzie’s “analysis...
