Helmut Jürg Weissert

Sedimentology, Palaeoceanography, Palaeocliamtology, history of the global carbon cycle, earth system's history, alpine geology

Helmut Weisserthas been teaching at the Department of Earth Sciences, ETH until end of 2014. He was awarded the title of Professor in 1993.

Helmut Weissert was born on 24 October, 1949 in Winterthur, Switzerland. He studied Natural Sciences at the ETH Zurich. In 1979 he completed his PhD at ETH in the field of paleoceanography. Helmut Weissert spent the following year as a post-doctoral student at the University of Southern California (Los Angeles). There, he worked with the marine geology group on quaternary climate reconstructions. From 1981 to 1982 he was a research associate at Basel University. In fall 1982 he joined the Department of Earth Sciences at ETH Zurich as a lecturer in the field of sedimentary geology and isotope geochemistry. He has published results of his research in more than 200 scientific articles and his citation index is > 11000 (2022).

Helmut Weissert has his research interests in the field of paleoceanography, palaeoclimatology,  the evolution of the biosphere and the Anthropocene. He is the director of several PhD projects focussing on the interaction of the past climate with the biosphere. From 2007-2011 Helmut Weissert was president of the "Platform Geosciences" in the Swiss Academy of Sciences. From 2011-2016 he was a member of the council of the Swiss Academy of Sciences (ScNat), from 2015 to 2016 he was Vice-President of ScNat. In 2011 and 2012 Helmut Weissert was distinguished Lecturer for ECORD,  the European branch of the Intergrated Ocean Drilling Program (IODP).

The 2013 Jean Baptiste Lamarck Medal (European Union of Geosciences)was awarded to Helmut Weissert for his "fundamental contribution to the application of carbon-isotope geochemistry to stratigraphy and palaeoceanography". For 2014 and 2015 Helmut Weissert was elected as Lecturer for the "Special Lecture Tour" of the International Association of Sedimentologists. He recieved the "Goldene Eule" for excellent teaching at the Department of Earth Sciences, ETH in the years 2006 and 2014. From 2015-2019, Helmut Weissert was President of the Division "Stratigraphy, Sedimentology, Paleontology" of the European Union of Geosciences (EGU). And from 2015-2019 he was member of the Council of EGU. He currently is Chair of the ScNat Commission "Research Networks".