Scientists Who Study Rocks

These geologists are exploring granite rocks on a mountain ridge. Click on image for full size (24 Kb) USGS

Geology is the study of rocks and geologists are the people who study them! There are many different types of geologists.

• Mineralogists study minerals.
• Petrologist study rocks.
• Structural geologist study how plate tectonics moves and squishes rocks.
• Paleontologists study Earth history and fossils.
• Geomorphologists study how the land surface is shaped by water, wind and ice.

What is a geologist like? Well, they are all very different. Click on the links below to get to know some famous geologists.

• Florence Bascom was a mineralogist and petrologist.
• Charles Darwin was the first scientist to publish the theory of evolution.
• Stephen Jay Gould expanded Darwin's theory with his own ideas.
• Friedrich Mohs was the mineralogist who created a way to identify minerals by their hardness.
• Leonardo da Vinci did a little bit of everything! He was a famous artist and also discovered how sedimentary rocks and fossils form.