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In the mid-1850s, Thomas Henry Huxley, who coined the term 'coccolith', described their presence in oceanic sediments dredged from the sea floor. Subsequent recognition of their occurrence in the Upper Cretaceous English Chalk, largely unconsolidated pelagic sediment, and similar, more lithified limestones in the Jurassic of the Alps, led to their being considered major rock-forming elements through much of geological time, although they are now known to be limited to the Late Triassic–Recent interval. Unlike Charles Darwin, who did not travel abroad following the voyage of the Beagle, Huxley made a number of trips to Italy and Switzerland and is recorded as a guest in the exclusive Hotel Kursaal Maloja in the Engadin in 1893. While staying there, he made a number of excursions on foot and his presence was thought significant enough that it is recorded in an inscribed granitic stone tablet, erected in 1896, describing him as'the illustrious writer and naturalist'. His rambles would have led him past outcrops of tectonically emplaced true oceanic calcareous sediment of Early Cretaceous age, here shown to have originally contained coccoliths that were largely destroyed under the imprint of Alpine metamorphism of sub-greenschist to greenschist facies. To this extent, Huxley could have come close to recognizing true oceanic sediments exposed on land, but the dissimilarity between these Swiss Alpine deposits and the friable English Chalk would not obviously have led to the investigation of the former for the organisms he had christened as 'coccoliths'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 1890, former students of Arnold Guyot at the University of Neuchàtel dedicated a 'large glacial boulder from Neuchâtel' to his memory, now in front of Guyot Hall at Princeton University. We established that this block originated with all certainty from Upper Carboniferous conglomerates of the Salvan–Dorénaz Basin, the relics of which crop out in the Alps of western Switzerland and eastern France. During the Last Glacial Maximum, the boulder travelled from the lower Rhône Valley on the back of the Pleistocene Rhône Glacier to Neuchâtel from where, later, it crossed the Atlantic and was transported to Princeton. Guyot's name is familiar to geologists because of the term 'guyot', introduced 1946 by Harry Hess for 'curious flat-topped peaks scattered over millions of square miles in the Pacific basin', many of which are now known to represent drowned carbonate platforms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Tectono-sedimentary breccias, known as ophicalcites, overlie serpentinised peridotites at a Jurassic ocean–continent transition along the Penninic-Austroalpine transition in the Eastern Alps of Switzerland. Deformation of the exhumed mantle rocks and breccia formation occurred under decreasing temperatures and along low-angle detachment faults exposing the mantle rocks at the sea floor and was coupled with hydrothermal activity and carbonation of the serpentinites at shallow depth and/or at the sea floor. Carbon isotopes in the ophicalcites persistently show marine values; however, the interpretation of oxygen-isotope values remained controversial: are they related to Jurassic hydrothermal activity or do they reflect Alpine metamorphic overprint? Here we discuss recent interpretations that relate oxygen isotope values measured in ophicalcites exclusively to Jurassic hydrothermal activity; to this end we use data that we earlier obtained along a north–south profile across Graubünden (eastern Switzerland). We revisited the sites of controversial interpretation along a north–south profile in eastern Switzerland. Along this profile, oxygen isotope values in ophicalcites and overlying pelagic sediments, up to 25 my younger than the ophicalcites, show identical values and become systematically lower with increasing Alpine metamorphism; they strongly deviate from values in ophicalcites and pelagic sediments measured along the Mid-Atlantic Ridge or ancient Atlantic ocean-continent transitions as e.g. in the Iberia–Newfoundland transect. The oxygen-isotope values measured in Alpine ophicarbonates thus reflect isotopic resetting during the Alpine orogeny, related to fluid-rock interaction during regional metamorphism. Hydrothermal processes that accompanied the formation of ophicalcites are not disputed; however, they cannot be traced by oxygen isotope geochemistry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

They do not reflect the temperatures of carbonation of the serpentine host rocks or the formation of calcite in veins and cements or of marine biogenic calcite in pelagic sediments associated with the ophicalcites. However, at other localities like Arosa, the ophicalcites co-occur with basalts, similar to the ophicalcites at Falotta (Platta Nappe). 4), with the oxygen isotope values from Marmorera-Cotschens (Coltat et al. [4]) added Coltat et al. ([5]) distinguish between "cooler ophicalcites" in the South-Penninic nappes and the ophicalcites of the Platta Nappe. [Extracted from the article]

Rudolf Trümpy (1921-2009) was one of the great Alpine geologists of the twentieth century and an influential figure in the international geological community. He played a dominant role in the change of opinion concerning the Alpine evolution by showing that normal faulting dominated the early development of the Alpine realm from the Triassic to the early Cretaceous. This provided a convenient model for later plate-tectonic interpretations of collisional mountain belts. His further recognition of strike-slip faulting during all stages of the Alpine evolution presaged the realisation that the Alps were not built by a simple open-and-shut mechanism. Trümpy was educated during an intellectual lull, a time when simplistic models of the earth behaviour inherited from the middle of the nineteenth century became prevalent under the influence of a close-minded, positivist approach to geological problems. This period, which we term the Dark Intermezzo, lasted from about 1925 to 1965. The grand syntheses of Suess and Argand which preceded this period were viewed from this narrow angle and consequently misunderstood. It was thought that earth history was punctuated by global orogenic events of short duration taking place within and among continents and oceans whose relative positions had remained fixed since the origin of the planet. These views, summarised under the term 'fixism', were developed when the ocean floors were almost totally unknown. When data began coming in from the post World War II oceanographic surveys, the world geological community was slow to receive and digest them. Trümpy followed these developments closely, realising that his work was important in placing the geology of the mountain belts within the emerging, new theoretical framework. He adopted the position of a critic and emphasised where detailed knowledge of the Alps, unquestionably the best known mountain belt in the world, supported and where it contradicted the new ideas. His voice was listened to carefully and subsequent developments have shown his critique to have been prescient. It is regrettable that he did not publish some of the theoretical criticisms he communicated to his colleagues during scientific meetings and informal conversations. His hesitance in becoming involved in theoretical arguments in geology may have stemmed partly from his scientific upbringing during the Dark Intermezzo and partly because he genuinely believed that he was better off sticking to what he thought he knew for sure. He nevertheless stressed that it is important for geologists 'to dream'. It is often said about teachers that one should do what they say, not what they do. In Trümpy's case, it was the opposite. Both scientifically and as a human being, he was a most admirable man. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An obituary for Hans P. Laubscher, Professor emeritus of Geology at the University of Basel, is presented.

Albert W. Bally, Professor emeritus of Geology at Rice University in Houston, passed away on the 30th of July in Houston. In Switzerland, Bally obtained his baccalaureate and began to study Geology at Zurich University. As Bally noted in his curriculum vitae, 'August 1981 marked my return as geologist to Italy, almost 30 years after publication of my Ph.D. thesis in 1954'. [Extracted from the article]

The article announces that A. M. Celâl Şeng ör has received the Gustav-Steinmann-Medal 2010.

The article presents the author's comments on the contribution of the association Geologische Vereinigung to the development of the field of geology and earth sciences. He says that the organization is celebrating its 100th anniversary in 2010. Its first meeting was held in 1910 at the Senckenberg Museum in Frankfurt, Germany. The author also talks about the periodical "Geologische Rundschau," published by the association.