Carl Wilhelm Correns (19 May 1893 – 29 August 1980) was a German geologist who pioneered the field of

sedimentary petrology Petrology () is the branch of geology that studies rocks and the conditions under which they form. Petrology has three subdivisions: igneous, metamorphic, and sedimentary petrology. Igneous and metamorphic petrology are commonly taught together ...

. He was noted as an influential teacher and for his textbook ''Einführung in die Mineralogie'' (1949). Correns received the

Roebling Medal The Roebling Medal is the highest award of the Mineralogical Society of America for scientific eminence as represented primarily by scientific publication of outstanding original research in mineralogy. The award is named for Colonel Washington A ...

of the Geological Society of America in 1976. Correns was born in

Tübingen Tübingen (, , Swabian: ''Dibenga'') is a traditional university city in central Baden-Württemberg, Germany. It is situated south of the state capital, Stuttgart, and developed on both sides of the Neckar and Ammer rivers. about one in thr ...

to botanists

Carl Erich Correns Carl Erich Correns (19 September 1864 – 14 February 1933) was a German botanist and geneticist notable primarily for his independent discovery of the principles of heredity, which he achieved simultaneously but independently of the botani ...

and Elisabeth Widmer. He went to the universities of Tübingen and

Münster Münster (; nds, Mönster) is an independent city (''Kreisfreie Stadt'') in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is in the northern part of the state and is considered to be the cultural centre of the Westphalia region. It is also a state distr ...

with an interruption during

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

. After serving as a reserve officer, he returned to complete his PhD at the

University of Berlin Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (german: Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, abbreviated HU Berlin) is a German public research university in the central borough of Mitte in Berlin. It was established by Frederick William III on the initiative o ...

in 1920. His thesis supervised by J.F. Pompecki was on petrography and paleontology of Devonian limestone. He was inspired by the book ''Lehrbuch der Mineralogie'' by

Paul Niggli Paul Niggli (26 June 1888 – 13 January 1953) was a Swiss crystallographer, mineralogist, and petrologist who was a leader in the field of X-ray crystallography. Education and career Niggli was born in Zofingen and studied at the Swiss Feder ...

that he came across in Christmas of 1920 and attended seminars by Arrien Johnsen at Berlin. He joined the Prussian Geological Survey from 1922 to 1926 after serving as an assistant to Erich Kaiser at the University of Munich. He then worked on colloidal chemistry under

Herbert Freundlich Herbert Max Finlay Freundlich (28 January 1880 in Charlottenburg – 30 March 1941 in Minneapolis) was a German chemist. His father was of German Jewish descent, and his mother ( Finlay) was from Scotland. His younger brother was Erwin Fi ...

at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institut and joined as Privatdozent at the University of Berlin. In 1926 he joined the Meteor Expedition into the South Atlantic on the recommendation of

Fritz Haber Fritz Haber (; 9 December 186829 January 1934) was a German chemist who received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1918 for his invention of the Haber–Bosch process, a method used in industry to synthesize ammonia from nitrogen gas and hydrogen ...

. He then joined

Rostock University The University of Rostock (german: link=no, Universität Rostock) is a public university located in Rostock, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Germany. Founded in 1419, it is the third-oldest university in Germany. It is the oldest university in continen ...

at the newly created department of geology and made use of X-ray diffraction to study minerals. He took a special interest in clay minerals, studying Mecklenburg soils and the ocean-bed core samples from the Meteor Expedition. He became a full professor in 1929. He was made head of the Institute for Sedimentary Petrology in 1939 and worked at Göttingen until his death. He was noted for his teaching, mentoring nearly 61 doctoral students and his textbook ''Einführung in die Mineralogie'' (1949) was considered a landmark in geology. He also published ''Die Entstehung der Gesteine'' (1939) in which he examined the formation of sedimentary rocks.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Corren, Carl Wilhelm 1893 births 1980 deaths 20th-century German geologists Scientists from Tübingen Members of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences