Friedrich Ahlfeld

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Friedrich (Federico) Ahlfeld (* 6. October 1892 in Marburg , German Reich; † 9. January 1982 in Cochabamba , Bolivia) was a German-Bolivian mining - engineer and geologist . He is considered the "father of Bolivian geology".

Life

Friedrich Ahlfeld, son of the gynecologist Johann Friedrich Ahlfeld and of Elisabeth Vollmer, daughter of the Hamburg marine painter Adolph Friedrich Vollmer studied mining at the Bergakademie von Clausthal (now Clausthal University of Technology ) from 1910 to 1919 , with an interruption due to the First World War on geology and reservoir science .

In 1921 he received his doctorate with his thesis on the minerals of the Prussian province of Hessen-Nassau . In the following two years, as a consultant, he visited Italy , Austria , Yugoslavia and Romania, among others . He finally came to Bolivia via Venezuela in 1924 , where he was hired as a geologist by “Mauricio Hochschild & Compania” (La Paz). During this time he also visited the countries of Peru and studied the antimony deposits there (Puno, 1926)

From 1927 to 1928 Ahlfeld took part in an Andean expedition under the well-known geographer Carl Troll , which led to the Cordilleras , among other places . A year later he toured South Rhodesia , Zimbabwe , the Congo and Tanzania in Africa and attended the International Geological Congress in Pretoria .

Back in Marburg he studied mineralogy between 1929 and 1932 and was given a position as a lecturer in mineralogy, petrography and economic geology, which he held until 1934. He signed the confession of professors at German universities and colleges to Adolf Hitler in November 1933. During this time he repeatedly traveled to South America and examined, among other things, the silver mines of Colquijirca near Cerro de Pasco and the El Misti volcano in Peru. He also worked as an advisor to the Russian government of Tashkent and reported in his publications on the mineralogy and deposits of Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan .

He spent the years 1935 to 1946 again in Bolivia, initially as head of the geology department at the state mining and oil authority. He then researched the tin deposits of Hunan as a geologist for the Chinese government and then as chief geologist in the Mining Ministry.

He was then appointed professor at the Argentine Mining Academy in Jujuy , where he stayed until 1948.

In 1955 he returned to Bolivia to support various organizations as a geological advisor, including the United Nations from 1956 to 1960 and the German Geological Mission from 1959 to 1963. In addition, he was (also 1956 to 1960) Professor of Geology and Mineralogy at the University of San Andreas, and in 1963 Professor of the Bolivian Technological Institute in La Paz. In 1960 he traveled to Germany for the last time and in 1961 also visited Switzerland .

Outstanding activities

During his time in Bolivia, Ahlfeld made many important contributions to the mineralogy of Bolivia, in particular the tin and tungsten deposits. In his research, he discovered, among other things, the mineral 1929/30 Ramdohrit and described in 1959 along with Ramdohr and Berndt mineral Angelellit . He also did pioneering work in the field of the crystallization behavior of cassiterite in relation to temperature.

Ahlfeld's extensive, regional studies served as the basis for oil research and in 1950 led to the discovery of new oil fields near Santa Cruz . There was probably hardly a part of the country or a mine from the Andes to the jungles of the lowlands that he did not visit.

Works

  • Geología de Bolivia (1946, 1964 with Branisa)
  • Las especies minerales de la Republica Argentina (with Angelelli, 1948)
  • Los yacimientos de Bolivia (1954)
  • Las especies minerales de Bolivia (with M. Reyes, 1955)
  • Tin and Tungsten (1958)
  • Los yacimientos minerales y hidrocarburos de Bolivia (with Schneider-Scherbina, 1964)
  • Geografía física de Bolivia (1968)

Honors

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ unpublished. Manuscript, Vollmer archive.
personal data
SURNAME Ahlfeld, Friedrich
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Ahlfeld, Federico
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German-Bolivian mining engineer and geologist. "Father of Bolivian Geology"
DATE OF BIRTH October 6, 1892
PLACE OF BIRTH Marburg , Germany
DATE OF DEATH January 9, 1982
Place of death Cochabamba , Bolivia