David Stegman, PhD

Dave Stegman is a Professor of Geophysics in the Cecil H. and Ida M. Green Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego. A driving curiosity of his research is "Why is Plate Tectonics unique to Earth?" To address this, Dr. Stegman uses high-performance computing and numerical simulations to investigate the dynamics of planetary interiors and the long term evolution of planetary tectonics, volcanism, and magnetic field generation. He has published numerous studies in Science and Nature, as well as many other top venues of his field, on topics relating to Earth, Venus, Mars, and the Saturnian moon Enceladus. His research has been supported by NASA, the Dept of Energy, Office of Naval Research, and the National Science Foundation, which included an NSF CAREER award in 2013. Prior to joining UC San Diego, he was the Centenary Research Fellow at the University of Melbourne and an ARC Australian Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Monash University. He graduated from Bowdoin College with a degree in Physics before he received his PhD from UC Berkeley.