100 years of continental drift

• Published in: Science
• Main Authors: Romano, Marco, Cifelli, Richard
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: American Association for the Advancement of Science 2015
• Subjects: Alfred Wegener; continental drift; plate tectonics; Greenland
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/11573/1045614; https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aad6230; http://science.sciencemag.org/content/350/6263/915

Alfred Wegener (1880–1930) was a leading explorer, geophysicist, and meteorologist from Germany, and pioneer in the exploration of Greenland (1). His seminal volume of meteorology (2) is universally considered a fundamental manual for this discipline and was long a reference text for students and specialists. Wegener's preeminent scientific legacy, however, is the continental drift hypothesis. He first presented his thesis to the scientific community on 6 January 1912 at the Geological Society of Frankfurt am Main, but his famous monograph on the subject dates to 1915 (3).