View from along the southern San Andreas fault near MaCallum Pond in the Coachella Valley Preserve, California. Photo by Vince Cronin.
Vince Cronin's Credentials
Cronin's Professional Licenses and Certifications
- Certified Professional Geologist, AIPG (CPG-11830)
- Licensed Professional Geologist, State of Texas (#2296)
- Registered Professional Geologist, State of Wisconsin (#336); inactive
Cronin's Academic Degrees
- B.A. in Geology from Pomona College, 1979
- A.M. in Earth Sciences from Dartmouth College, 1982 (diploma awarded May 1983)
- Thesis: The physical and magnetic polarity stratigraphy of the Skardu
Basin, Baltistan, northern Pakistan
- Ph.D. in Geology (Tectonophysics) from Texas A&M University, 1988
- Dissertation: Cycloid tectonics: A kinematic model of finite
relative plate motion
Employment in Geoscience
- Baylor University Geosciences Department
- Tenured Full Professor since May 2007
- Associate Professor, August 2002-May 2007
- University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Geosciences Department
- Tenured Associate Professor, August 1994 to May 2002
- Assistant Professor, UW-Milwaukee, August 1988-August 1994
- Staff Geologist, Slosson and Associates, 1979-1980, 1983-84; consultant until 2007
- Internships
- Exxon, 1985
- Amoco (Denver), 1981
- Phillips Uranium Corporation, 1980
Some Accomplishments
- Editor, AGI/NAGT Laboratory Manual in Physical Geology [11th Edition], published January 2017.
- Co-chair, US Section of the International Association for Promoting Geoethics (IAPG)
- Fellow, Geological Society of America (GSA); elected 2003
- Meritorious Service Award, GSA Engineering Geology Division (EGD), 2004
- Chair, GSA-EGD, 1997-98
- Martine D. Meyers Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, 2001
- Designated a "Top Community Contributor" to the Science Education Resource Center's geoscience-education collection (2014)
- Solved the 3-plate problem of plate tectonics, explained the sigmoid shape of oceanic fracture zones, discovered the number of unique geometries of plate triple junctions, developed the cycloid model for the finite relative motion of plates, and wrote a primer on plate kinematics in Mathematica that explains it all.
- Developed the seismo-lineament analysis method (SLAM) for finding the ground-surface trace of seismogenic faults using earthquake focal mechanism solutions.
- Provided an early description of compound landslides.
- Described and established the approximate age of the oldest un/semi-consolidated sedimentary sequence in the Karakoram-Himalaya: the Bunthang Sequence of Skardu, Baltistan
- National Merit Scholar, 1975-79 at Pomona College
- Eagle Scout, 1970
Memberships and Affiliations
- International Association for Promoting Geoethics (IAPG, US Section)
- American Geophysical Union (AGU #10198639)
- Geological Society of America (GSA #1189230)
- American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS #41581210)
- Sigma Xi
- National Association of Geology Teachers (NAGT #10819821)
- International Association for Geoscience Diversity (IAGD)
- Association of Environmental and Engineering Geologists (AEG #22485)
- Earthquake Engineering Research Institute (EERI #13480)
- Paleoseismicity.org
- Seismological Society of America (SSA #80052)
- American Institute of Professional Geologists (AIPG #15859)
- American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG #249670)
- Boy Scouts of America (BSA #118726843)
Institutional representative or co-representative
Other Data
You can request a copy of my curriculum
vitae or two-page resume via an email message to Vince_Cronin@CroninProjects.org.
If you have any questions or comments about this site or its contents, drop an email to the humble webmaster.
All of the original content of this website is © 2017 by Vincent S. Cronin