History
Victor Moritz Goldschmidt (1888–1947) is considered the founder of modern geochemistry, establishing its general laws and principles and making it a new discipline in Earth Sciences. Among his works, there are researches about mineral metamorphic associations and thermodynamic equilibrium; the laws which determine distribution of the chemical elements on the Earth and their classification as litho- (rock-loving), sidero- (iron-loving), and chalco-phile (sulfur-loving); the ionic substitution in mineral; the process of fractional crystallization; and the substitution laws of ions of rare elements. He systematized the use of X-rays in study of composition and structure of crystals. Goldschmidt wrote a manuscript about geochemical aspects of the origin of complex organic molecules on the Earth.
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© 2011 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
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Savaton, P. (2011). Goldschmidt, Viktor Moritz. In: Gargaud, M., et al. Encyclopedia of Astrobiology. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-11274-4_661
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-11274-4_661
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