Douwe van Hinsbergen
@vanhinsbergen
Geology - Plate tectonics - Mountain building - Paleogeography - Mantle dynamics - Paleomagnetism - Whole-Earth System Science - Science communication - @GeoTdF.bsky.social - cyclist with a taste for ITTs - Professor at Utrecht University
Especially for @janeikelboom.bsky.social ! Eclipse in Aliaga, Spain. With @ingeloes.bsky.social, as announced in @volkskrant.nl 😂.
I climbed the epic Mont Ventoux today, with colleague Niko Wanders. I will not lightly forget the sheer happiness of riding in the barren limestones at the top 6 km of the climb. It was fantastic.
The other is True Polar Wander: the tilt of the whole Earth relative to its spin axis and equator. This is due tochanges in Earth's density structure. The maximum average density of Earth aligns with the equator. If the density structure changes, due to changes in subduction zones, Earth tilts.
@berndandeweg.bsky.social in action at #ExpeditionNext in #Enkhuizen!
Links to the GPlates files of the Utrecht Paleogeography Model are given in the Supplementary Information linked in the preprint! eartharxiv.org/repository/v...
This is a spectacular finding in the recent paper of Wagenaar et al in JGR: in a minimum-continent-motion reference frame, the plumes of the Indo-Atlantic hotspots move parallel to the edges of the LLSVP, in a counterclockwise fashion. A signal of lowermost mantle flow?
This is the reconstruction that comes with our new Nature Communications Earth & Environment paper on Caribbean biogeography. With Leny Montheil, Mélody Philippon, Franck Audemard, Lydian Boschman, Richard Wessels, Sylvie Leroy et al #UtrechtPaleogeographicModel www.nature.com/articles/s43...
Made this figure for a book chapter on tectonic reconstructions that I'm writing with Jonny Wu, using a fantastic field photograph of Joao C. Duarte, of the Telheiro Beach section in SW Portugal. The formation, heydays, and breakup of the supercontinent Pangea caught in one photograph.
📆 MASTER'S OPEN DAY | 8 October 2025 Are you looking for a Master's in Earth Science? We offers 4 different Masters to choose from. Join our upcoming Online Master's Open Day on the 8th of October to learn more about your options at Utrecht University. Sign up here ➡️ www.uu.nl/en/node/1189...
And the prize for best title of the year goes to Fabrice Cordey 😂😂
The quake took place just east of the Kabul Block, which is a part of the Indian Plate that got squeezed northward into Asia. The quake seems to occur around the Shyok Suture, between the Kohistan and Nurestan blocks. Tens of million years old faults that became reactivated?
L-tectonite. A metamorphic rock, in this case of magmatic origin, with a pure linear fabric. Loose pebble, derived from the Ivrea body’s magmatic crust, NW Italy.
Good to be back in Le Pompidou for our first-year mapping fieldwork! #massifcentral #vivelafrance @uugeo.bsky.social
This image cannot be shared enough. This is what our country would look like if we stop pumping water out of our polders. And in the meantime, we have closed all but one earth science departments, because it’s a little but more expensive than the average study. What could possibly go wrong.
Hornblende megacrystals? In metabasalt, Maryland eastcoast, Chesapeak Bay.
One of the biggest earthquake hazards of Europe is in the sea of Marmara, the sea south of the major city of Istanbul. We've been expecting earthquakes there since the 1999 Izmit quake. Today's 6.2 Earthquake occurred on the edge of the fault zone making that sea. So far, no major damage reported.
Visiting an old German iron mine. Really impressive. Mining of a tilted stratigraphic horizon of iron oolite.
In between all the madness, there’s still time for a geological excursion! Some good things don’t change 🤠