Leon Knopoff (July 1, 1925 – January 20, 2011) was an American geophysicist and musicologist. He received his education at Caltech, graduating in 1949 with a PhD in physics, and came to UCLA the following year. He served on the UCLA faculty for 60 years. His research interests spanned a wide variety of fields and included the physics and statistics of earthquakes, earthquake prediction, the interior structure of the Earth, plate tectonics, pattern recognition, non-linear earthquake dynamics and several other areas of solid Earth geophysics. He also made contributions to the fields of musical perception and archaeology.
In 1983, Knopoff published a paper in Nature with Steven Kilston, suggesting that earthquakes were linked to an "alignment of the sun and moon on opposite sides of the Earth that tugged the opposite sides of faults in opposing directions". They successfully predicted the 1987 Superstition Hills earthquakes.
Honors and awards
- Fellow of the American Geophysical Union, 1962.
- Elected to the National Academy of Sciences, 1963.
- Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, 1964.
- Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 1965.
- Fellow of the Guggenheim Foundation, 1976.
- Recipient of the Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society, 1979.
- Medal of the Seismological Society of America, 1990.
- Member of the American Philosophical Society, 1992.
References
- Gangi, Anthony F.; Fredricks, Robert W.; Hook, Joseph F. (November 2000). "A volume in honour of Leon Knopoff's 75th birthday". Geophys. J. Int. 143 (2): i–ii. Bibcode:2000GeoJI.143D...1G. doi:10.1046/j.1365-246X.2000.01278.x.
- ^ "Obituary: Leon Knopoff, 85, internationally distinguished UCLA scientist". Retrieved 2013-11-18.
- ^ Maugh, Thomas H. (3 February 2011). "Leon Knopoff dies at 85; UCLA scientist who applied computer modeling in earthquake research". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 15 June 2024.
- Sullivan, Walter (8 November 1983). "A Year of Earthquakes: Is There a Worldwide Link?". New York Times. Retrieved 15 June 2024.
- "National Academy of Sciences Member Directory". Retrieved 2013-11-18.
- Seaton, M.J. (March 1981). "Gold Medal Awarded to Knopoff, Leon". Quarterly Journal of the Royal Astronomical Society. 22: 1. Bibcode:1981QJRAS..22....1S.
- "APS Member History".
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- 1925 births
- 2011 deaths
- American geophysicists
- American seismologists
- Recipients of the Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society
- Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences
- Foreign fellows of the Royal Astronomical Society
- Fellows of the Royal Astronomical Society
- University of California, Los Angeles faculty
- Fellows of the American Geophysical Union
- Members of the American Philosophical Society
- Geologist stubs
- American physicist stubs