Stephan FJ Kempe

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Stephan Friedrich Johannes Kempe (born August 24, 1949 in Hamburg ) is a German geologist .

He works on the development of ocean chemistry (“soda ocean”), the biogeochemistry of rivers and lakes, and the development and exploration of caves . Kempe was the leader of numerous marine and limnic expeditions. He taught at both the University of Hamburg and the Technical University of Darmstadt and is the editor and author of numerous books and publications on geology and speleology .

Life

His father was the photographer, photo historian and publicist Fritz Kempe . His mother is the young adult author Erika Kempe . He is married to the teacher and school principal Christhild Ketz-Kempe . Kempe attended the humanistic branch of the Matthias-Claudius-Gymnasium in Hamburg-Wandsbek . In 1966/67 he was an exchange student with Youth For Understanding in the USA. Kempe studied geology and palaeontology at the University of Hamburg , where he received his doctorate under Egon T. Degens in 1976 and habilitation in 1983. Kempe was a scientist and since 1983 lecturer at the Geological-Paleontological Institute and the Institute for Biogeochemistry and Marine Chemistry founded by Degens. In 1994 he was appointed professor for general geology and material cycles at the Technical University of Darmstadt . He retired there in March 2015.

Scientific career

Kempe became interested in speleology from an early age . In 1968 he and schoolmates (Willi Twardoz, Peter Gürtler, Lutz Möller) examined the Jettenhöhle in Hainholz near Düna / Osterode ( southern Harz ) as part of the Jugend forscht competition. The group became Hamburg state winner and won a 3rd federal award. In 1969 Kempe took part again with a study on the genesis of plaster caves and was also the Hamburg state winner. Since the grove was threatened with gypsum mining, Kempe initiated the establishment of the Working Group for Lower Saxony Caves (later: Arge für Karstkunde in Niedersachsen eV, today: Working Group for Karstkunde Harz) and the Speleo group in the Hamburg section of the German Alpine Club . The groups organized signature campaigns (including at the 5th International Congress for Speleology of the Union Internationale de Spéléologie in Stuttgart , 1969), published newspaper articles and arranged for expert reports that helped to finally place the Hainholz / Beierstein gypsum karst area, which is unique in Germany, under nature protection and to allow gypsum mining prevent.

As a result of the youth research work, Kempe was accepted into the German National Academic Foundation , initially with book money, later with a doctoral scholarship . From the 1969 summer semester, Kempe studied geology and palaeontology, chemistry and zoology at the University of Hamburg , a. a. with Ehrhard Voigt , Ulrich Lehmann , Ida Valeton and Hans-Rudolf von Gaertner . He did his diploma thesis on metamorphic series in the Bleiburg Mountains , Carinthia , with Friedhelm Thiedig .

In 1976 he did his doctorate with Egon T. Degens . The dissertation dealt with the results of the Lake Van expedition to Turkey in 1974, in which he participated as a student.

As a postdoc, he supervised various projects for Egon T. Degens. He took part in the first carbon cycle conference in Germany (March 21-26, 1977 in Ratzeburg ) organized by Degens in March 1977 as part of the SCOPE ( Scientific Committee on Problems of the Environment ), attended by the world's leading biogeochemists, climatologists and Global change researchers participated. The conference not only led to the first comprehensive presentation of the global carbon cycle in 1979 ("The Global Carbon Cycle"), SCOPE Report 13, but also to the founding of the SCOPE / UNEP Carbon Unit at the University of Hamburg in 1977 . She mainly dealt with the global carbon cycle and its anthropogenic changes. Kempe served as “Communication Officer” at the Carbon Unit and from 1979 to 1991 as coordinator of the SCOPE-UNEP project “Transport of Carbon and Minerals in Major World Rivers”, which brought together river researchers from all over the world. As part of the project, he completed his habilitation in January 1983 with a thesis on CO 2 pressure in freshwater waters and received the Venia Legendi in the subjects of geology and paleontology. He co-edited six volumes of flow data from around the world. Finally (1991) another SCOPE report (No. 42) “Biogeochemistry of Major World Rivers” was published, the first textbook on this subject.

From 1984 to 1988, Kempe headed the BMBF- financed North Sea project "Biogeochemistry and Transport of Suspended Matter in the North Sea and Implications to Fisheries Biology". He also took part in research on the marine carbonate system and marine sedimentation with sediment traps. In this context and in the work of the North Sea project, he was chief scientist on numerous expeditions with the German research vessel Research vessel "Sonne" , Valdivia and the Turkish MV Piri Reis and took on the Dutch Snell II expedition in Indonesian waters and the BlackSea expedition in 1988 with the American RV Knorr .

On the basis of the Vansee work, Kempe developed the hypothesis of an early highly alkaline ocean ( soda ocean ). In order to underpin it, he not only undertook two further expeditions to Lake Van (1989, 1990), but also examined alkaline crater lakes. Expeditions led several times to the Indonesian volcanic island of Satonda and to the flooded volcanic vent on the Kalaupapa Peninsula (Lake Kauhako) on Molokai / Hawaii, as well as to the northernmost volcanic island Niuafo'ou of the Tonga chain and to the maar lake of Alchichica in Mexico in collaboration with colleagues mainly from the Polish Academy of Sciences. All lakes, as well as the alkaline Lake Van, support the growth of microbialites ( stromatolites , thrombolites ), fossil bio-induced textures, which are similarly found in the Precambrian deposits.

In 1994 Kempe was offered the professorship for general geology (later general geology and material cycles) at the Technical University (later Technical University) Darmstadt. At the Institute for Geology and Paleontology (now Institute for Applied Geosciences) he served as institute director and at the department as vice dean and dean. He not only supervised numerous diploma mappings, which covered almost the entire southern Harz, but also many diploma, bachelor and master theses as well as dissertations and a habilitation ( Jens Hartmann ). Kempe retired on March 31, 2015.

As a member of the Land-Ocean Interactions in the Coastal Zone (LOICZ) Core Project Planning Committee (1991–1992), Kempe was involved in the establishment of the IGBP's International Randmeer Program and wrote the first programmatic LOICZ report. He was then a member of the LOICZ Science Steering Committee (1993–1999) as well as a member of the Science Committee of IGBP (International Geosphere-Biosphere Program) from 1992 to 1999. He was also a member of the National Committee of the DFG and the BMBF to coordinate global change Research (1996-2002).

Kempe was a co-founder of the Hawaii Speleological Survey (1989) of the National Speleological Society , USA, and explored caves mainly in Germany, Hawaii and Jordan and mainly dealt with lava caves . It also dealt with the history of cave exploration , especially the Baumann cave and the Adelsberg cave ( Postojnska jama ) in Slovenia.

Participation in research expeditions

Kempe conducted or participated in the following hydrogeochemical lake surveys:

  • 1974: May: Alster in Hamburg (participation)
  • 1974–76: Hainholz cave waters (participation)
  • 1974: June – July: Lake Van, Eastern Turkey (participation, hydrochemistry, sediments)
  • 1979: June: Ratzeburger See (participation)
  • 1984: April and October: Plitvice, Croatia (management)
  • 1989: June 3 - July 9: Lake Van, Eastern Turkey (lead)
  • 1990: 8-22 June: Lake Van, Eastern Turkey (lead)
  • 1998: Niuafo'ou volcanic island, Tonga (lead)
  • 2000, 2001, 2002: Kaukako Crater Lake, Molokai (lead)
  • 2007: Alchichica Maar Lake, Mexico (participation)

And on these marine expeditions:

  • Research vessel Valdivia:
    • Valdivia (no number): 11. – 22. October 1981 (participant, chief scientist: Degens) (Elbe, Weser Ems estuary) (participation, dates for habilitation)
    • Project management BMBF North Sea project:
    • VALDIVIA 28: 1985 (Chief Scientist Kempe)
    • VALDIVIA 43: 16.-30. April 1986 (chief conductor Kempe and Liebezeit) (from April 23 chief chief J. Hülsemann)
    • VALDIVIA 50: 22-25. September 1986 (chief scientist Kempe) and 26 September - 5th October (chief scientist Wiesner)
    • VALDIVIA 57: 4th-16th May 1987 (chief scientist Kempe and Liebezeit)
    • VALDIVIA 65: 4th-16th October 1987 (chief scientist Liebezeit)

Presentation of the North Sea results in Bonn November 9, 1987 and 1988 in Prague

  • Research ship sun:
    • SONNE 4: May 6th - July 1st 1978 Bremerhaven-Panama-Galapagos-Honolulu ("maiden voyage"; expedition leader Kempe; geochemical cross-section of the Atlantic, Pacific, manganese nodules peasant basin)
    • SONNE 45b: October 1986 Den Pasar-Den Pasar, The Sea off Tambora, Indonesia (participation, Satonda country party)
    • SONNE 50D: 5th - 12th September 1987 Hong Kong-Singapore (expedition leader Kempe; sediment traps South China Sea)
    • SONNE 54B: April 4-14 April 1988 Singapore-Hong Kong (expedition leader Kempe; sediment traps South China Sea)
    • SONNE 59B: November 6 - December 1, 1988 Singapore-Honolulu (Chief Scientist Kempe; Sediment Traps W-Pacific)
    • SONNE 69A: June 26th - July 7th 1990 Port-Morsby - Saipan (Chief Scientist Kempe; Sediment Traps W-Pacific) BMFT Project 03 R 402 A
    • SONNE 74: January 31 - February 2, 1991 Port-Said - Rhodes (trip was canceled due to the 1st Gulf War) (Chief Scientist Kempe) BMFT Project 03 R 407 A
    • SONNE 76A: November 30th - December 18th 1991 Funchal-Panama (Kempe project management) BMFT project 03 F 00 15D
  • Trips on other research vessels:
    • RV METEOR 36: February 1975 upwelling areas off West Africa (participation)
    • RV PIRI REIS (Turkey): October 1982; May 1983; October 1983; April 1984; October 1984; May 1986; October 1988 (Leadership Kempe, Black Sea, sediment traps)
    • RV PIRI REIS (Turkey) 1992: (Project management Kempe, Rhodes basin trap lost) BMFT Project 03 F 0080 A
    • RV TYRO (Netherlands): November 1984 Snellius II Expedition, Lake Flores, Indonesia (participation, alkalinity)
    • RV KNORR (USA): April 11 - May 9, 1988 Black Sea (participation)
    • RV DISCOVERY (GB): June 1990 “CO2 in the ocean” DFG Ke 287 / 5-1 (Kempe project leader; participant Kai Pegler)
    • RV Prof. VOIDJANITSKY (Ukraine): 1994 (Leader Kempe, Donaufächer, Black Sea)

Services

Kempe has published and co-edited 17 books and published approximately 500 articles and abstracts, many of them in leading scientific journals. In his doctoral thesis on Lake Van, he published the longest continuous varven chronology known to date . In the two subsequent expeditions, 1989 and 1990, these counts were made more precise by his doctoral students Günter Landmann and Andreas Reimer and paralleled with the ice core counts . In addition, the largest known, active stromatolites underwater were discovered in Lake Van . The alkaline geochemistry of Lake Van serves as an example of a recent “soda ocean”. Volcanic, easily weatherable silicates, CO2 and water automatically lead to alkaline solutions, from which calcium and magnesium carbonates are forced out of the solution. These conditions are quickly established geologically, as was shown in the further expeditions to the alkaline crater lakes. Previously unknown microbialites were discovered in the crater lakes of Satonda , Niuafo'ou , and Kauhako and examined for the first time in the Maar lake of Alchichica. By Jozef Kazmierczak of the Polish Academy of Sciences participated in Warsaw, also on the Lake Van expedition carbonate textures were discovered with those of the famous Mars meteorite directly ALH 84001 are comparable and suggest that early Mars Ocean alkaline was.

Honors

Publications (books)

  • Stephan Kempe, Erich Mattern, Fritz Reinboth, Martin Seeger & Firouz Vladi: “The Jetten Cave near Düna and its surroundings.” Dep. Karst- u. Speleology A6, 63 pp, Herzberg, 1972.
  • Egon T. Degens, Bert Bolin, Stephan Kempe and Pieter Ketner (Eds.): The Global Carbon Cycle, SCOPE Report 13. John Wiley & Sons, Chichester 1979.
  • Kempe, S. (Ed.): “Höhlen in Deutschland.” Bildatlas Spezial 4, 114 pp., HB-Verlag, Hamburg, 1982.
  • Egon T. Degens, Stephan Kempe and Hassan Soliman (Eds.): Transport of Carbon and Minerals in Major World Rivers, Part 2. Messages from the Geological-Paleontological Institute of the University of Hamburg, Volume 55, SOPE / UNEP special volume, 1983.
  • Egon T. Degens, Stephan Kempe and Rafael Herrera (Eds.): Transport of Carbon and Minerals in Major World Rivers, Part 3. Messages from the Geological-Paleontological Institute of the University of Hamburg, Volume 58, SCOPE / UNEP special volume, 1985.
  • Stephan Kempe, Fritz Reinboth & Friedhart Knolle (Red.): "The Iberg stalactite cave near Bad Grund (Harz)". Bad Grund: 58 pp., 1985.
  • Egon T. Degens, Stephan Kempe and Gan Weibin (Eds.): Transport of Carbon and Minerals in Major World Rivers, Part 4 . Messages from the Geological-Palaeontological Institute of the University of Hamburg, Volume 64, SCOPE / UNEP special volume, 1987.
  • Stephan Kempe, Gerd Liebezeit, Volker Dethlefsen & Uwe Harms (Eds.): "Biogeochemistry and Distribution of Suspended Matter in the North Sea and Implications to Fisheries Biology." Mitt. Geol.-Paleont. Inst. Univ. Hamburg, SCOPE / UNEP special volume 65: 547 pp., 1988.
  • Egon T. Degens, Stephan Kempe and S. Naidu (Eds.): Transport of Carbon and Minerals in Major World Rivers, Part 5 . Messages from the Geological-Palaeontological Institute of the University of Hamburg, Volume 66, SCOPE / UNEP special volume, 1988.
  • Venugopalan Ittekkot, Stephan Kempe, Walter Michaelis & Alejandro Spitzy (Eds.): “Facets of Modern Biogeochemistry. Festschrift for ET Degens on the occasion of his 60th birthday ". Berlin, Heidelberg, New York, London, Paris, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Springer-Verlag: 433 pp., 1990.
  • Egon T. Degens, Stephan Kempe and Jeffrey E. Richey (Eds.): Biogeochemistry of Major World Rivers, SCOPE Report 42. John Wiley & Sons, Chichester, 1991.
  • Egon T. Degens, Stephan Kempe, A. Lein and Y. Sorokin (Eds.): Interactions of Biogeochemical Cycles in Aqueous Systems, Part 7. Messages from the Geological-Palaeontological Institute of the University of Hamburg, Volume 72, SCOPE / UNEP special volume, 1992.
  • Stephan Kempe, SD Eisma and Egon T. Degens (Eds.): Transport of Carbon and Minerals in Rivers, Lakes, Estuaries and Coastal Seas, Part 6. Messages from the Geological-Paleontological Institute of the University of Hamburg, Volume 74, SCOPE / UNEP Special volume, 1993.
  • Stephan Kempe (Ed.): "Caves, World Full of Secrets." HB Bildatlas special edition 17, 114 pp., HB-Verlag, Hamburg, 1997.
  • Stephan Kempe (German text), Kranji, A. (Ed.): "The Postojna Cave, tourist guide." Tourismus AG, Postojna, 95 pp., 2007.
  • Horst-Volker Henschel & Stephan Kempe: "Darmstadt's" Underworld "." Justus-Liebig Verlag, Darmstadt, 120 pp., 2nd edition 2009 124 pp., 2007.
  • Stephan Kempe & Wilfried Rosendahl (Eds.): "Caves: Hidden Worlds." Scientific Book Society Darmstadt, Darmstadt, 168 pp., 2008.
  • Arnold Hanslmeier, Stephan Kempe & Josef Seckbach (Eds.): "Life on Earth and Other Planetary Bodies." Cellular Origin, Life in Extreme Habitats and Astrobiology Volume 24, 533pp, Springer: Dortrecht, Heidelberg, New York London. 2012. doi : 10.1007 / 978-94-007-4966-5 . ISBN 9789400749665 .
  • Stephan Kempe, Herbert W. Franke, Günter Stummer, D. Weber, R. Schmittner & Andreas Pflitsch (narrators): Glück deep, cave explorers tell: Sander, K. & Schmundt, H. (conception / direction), supposé verlag, 2 CDs + 40pp booklet. 2015.

literature

  • Friedhard Knolle (Editor of the Association of German Cave and Karst Researchers): Prof. Dr. Stephan Kempe retires. Announcements of the Association of German Cave and Karst Researchers, Volume 2015, Issue 2: 63–68.

Archival material

  • Correspondence, research documents: Archive of the Technical University of Darmstadt.
  • Expedition leader documents of RV Sonne and Valdivia: Archive of the German Maritime Museum, Bremerhaven.
  • Mikrobialith collection and research documents: Collections of the State Museum Darmstadt
  • Documents on Hainholz: Archive Museum Osterode

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. Archived copy ( Memento from March 20, 2013 in the Internet Archive )
  2. Archived copy ( Memento from May 18, 2014 in the Internet Archive )
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