Philip Kuenen

Philip Henry Kuenen was a Dutch geologist, born in Dundee in 1902 and active at Groningen University and Leiden. After studying geology at Leiden under Karl Martin and B. G. Escher, he took part in the Snellius expedition to the seas around the Sunda Islands in 1929 and 1930, became a lecturer at Groningen in 1934 and was made a full professor in 1946. He is best known for marine geology, on which he published a book, and for his work on turbidites and turbidity currents. His other contributions include geochemical calculations on sediments and the water cycle, studies of sea level change, the rounding of sediment particles and normal faulting on the continental slope. He liked to test ideas through experiments as well as in outcrops. He opposed the 1970 plan to end geological research at Groningen and died in Leiden in 1976.