David Headley Green

David Headley Green AM FAA FRS
Born	(1936-02-29)February 29, 1936 Launceston, Tasmania
Died	September 6, 2024(2024-09-06) (aged 88) Hobart, Australia
Alma mater	University of Cambridge (PhD, 1962), Australian National University (PhD)
Awards	Murchison Medal (2000)
Scientific career
Fields	Experimental petrology
Institutions	Australian National University University of Tasmania

David Headley Green AM FAA FRS (29 February 1936 to 6 September 2024) was a geologist and experimental petrologist. He was director of the Australian National University research school of earth sciences from 1994 to 2001, and received many senior medals and awards for his work. He was appointed a Member of the Order of Australia in 2006.

Education

Green completed a Bachelor of Science BSc at the University of Tasmania in 1957. He then began work as a geologist with the Australian Bureau of Mineral Resources (1957 – 1959). He was awarded an MSc from the University of Tasmania in 1960, and DSc in 1988. In 1958, he was awarded an 1851 Exhibition overseas scholarship, and he went to the University of Cambridge. There, he completed a PhD in 1962 with a study of the ultramafic rocks of the Lizard peninsula in Cornwall, under the supervision of petrologist C.E. Tilley.

Career

Green took up a research fellowship at the Australian National University in 1962, and was subsequently a fellow and senior fellow until 1976. He held the post of visiting professor at Caltech in 1975, and then moved to take up the post of professor of geology at the University of Tasmania in 1977. In 1994, he returned to the Research School of Earth Sciences, Australian National University as director. He retired in 2001.

Research

Green was an experimental petrologist. For much of his early career he worked closely with geologist and geochemist Ted Ringwood, also at ANU, and they wrote a series of influential papers on the origins of [[basalt|basaltic] magmas, on the transformation from gabbro to eclogite and on the nature of the upper mantle.

Awards

Green received many awards and medals over the course of his career, including

• Edgeworth David Medal, Royal Society of New South Wales (1967)
• F. L. Stillwell Medal, Geological Society of Australia (1977)
• Jaeger Medal, Australian Academy of Science (1990)
• Mawson Medal and Lecture, Australian Academy of Science (1982 )
• Royal Society of Tasmania Medal (1993)
• Abraham Gottlieb Werner Medal, Deutsche Mineralogische Gesellschaft (1998)
• Murchison Medal (2000)
• International Gold Medal, Geological Society of Japan (2007)

He was elected Fellow of the Royal Society in 1991. He was awarded the Member of the Order of Australia (AM) for ‘service to the earth sciences’ in 2006. Honorary fellowships: Mineralogical Society, London (2004), American Geophysical Union (2004), Geological Society of Australia (2008)

Family

Green was married to Helen for 65 years. He died on 6 September 2024 in Hobart. He had 6 children, 17 grandchildren and 5 great-grandchildren.