Misplaced Pages

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Chaiten1 (talk | contribs) at 21:29, 13 January 2025 (created page; work in progress). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Frank Coles Phillips was a British crystallographer, mineralogist and petrologist. He wrote textbooks on crystallography and structural geology.

Early life

Phillips was born in Plymouth, Devon, on 19 March 1902. His mother was Kate Phillips (nee Salmon); his father, Nicholas Phillips, was a government tax officer. Phillips had an older brother and an older sister.

Education

Phillips went to Corpus Christi College, Cambridge in September 1920. He gained a First in Part 1 of the mathematical tripos in 1921. In 1922, he was appointed as temporary demonstrator in petrology in the Sedgwick Museum, Cambridge, where he worked under Alfred Harker. In 1923, Phillips gained his B.A., and completed part 1 in the natural sciences tripos with papers in geology, mineralogy, chemistry and physics. He graduated in geology in 1924. Phillips then began working towards a PhD thesis, with a study of the petrology of the igneous rocks of the Shetland islands. He was supervised by Harker for his PhD. Phillips was also student demonstrator in mineralogy for the period 1925 to 1928.

Career

After completing his PhD, Phillips remained in Cambridge, where he began to focus on the microscopic structure of metamorphic rocks. In 1928, he was appointed demonstrator in mineralogy, and in 1932 was appointed University lecturer in mineralogy and petrology in the new department of mineralogy and petrology, headed by Cecil Edgar Tilley. He remained in Cambridge until 1946.

In late 1946, Phillips applied for the George Herdman chair of geology at the University of Liverpool. This post had been unfilled since the incumbent, H H Read, had resigned to take up a chair at Imperial College, London. Phillips was duly appointed to this post, and took on this role. After a laboratory fire caused extensive damage to his research records, he retired on medical grounds and returned to Cambridge in late 1947 to convalesce. In 1948, Phillips was encouraged to apply for a lectureship in geology at the University of Bristol. He was offered the post, and then remained at Bristol until his retirement, in 1967.

Writings

Phillips wrote many research papers through his career, but was best known for his text books on crystallography and on structural geology. He also published several revised editions of Herbert Smith’s Gemstones.

• An Introduction to Crystallography (1946).
• The Use of Stereographic Projection in Structural Geology (1954).

Awards

Phillips was awarded the Murchison Fund of the Geological Society of London in 1938 ‘for his contributions to metamorphism and structural petrology’ . In 1962, he was awarded the William Bolitho Gold Medal of the Royal Geological Society of Cornwall.

Later life

In his retirement, Phillips moved to Brockenhurst, Hampshire. He died of pneumonia on 11 September 1982.

References

1. ^ Howarth, Richard J.; Leake, Bernard E. (2002). "The Life of Frank Coles Phillips (1902–1982) and the Structural Geology of the Moine Petrofabric Controversy". Geological Society of London, Memoir. 23: 1–91. doi:10.1144/GSL.MEM.2002.023.01.02. ISBN 9781862391024.
2. https://www.nature.com/articles/158782a0
3. https://www.nature.com/articles/158782a0
4. https://www.nature.com/articles/141154a0

• 1902 births
• 1982 deaths
• People from Plymouth
• Alumni of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge
• Academics of the University of Liverpool
• Academics of the University of Bristol