Pierre-Marie Termier

Pierre-Marie Termier (1859 to 1930) was a French geologist born in Lyon, the son of Joseph François Termier and Jeanne Mollard. At eighteen he entered the Polytechnic School and then the Paris School of Mines in 1880, and after graduating he became professor at the school of mines at Saint-Etienne. In 1894 he moved to Paris, where he taught for the rest of his career. He was elected to the French Academy of Sciences in 1909 in the mineralogy section, two years later became director of the French geological cartography service, and in 1930 was made vice-president of the Academy. He carried out geological studies of the Alps, Corsica and North Africa, and he was a proponent of the nappe concept and of tectonics as a mountain-building force. The wrinkle ridge Dorsum Termier on the Moon is named after him.