January 14, 2021 is the 30th anniversary of the death of academician Gu Gongxu, an internationally renowned geophysicist and seismologist. 30 years later, his lofty moral demeanor and far-sighted academic ideas still deeply influence us.
Academician Gu Gongxu was born on June 25, 1908 in Jiashan, Zhejiang Province, is a member of the Jiusan Society, a member of the Communist Party of China, an internationally renowned geophysicist, one of the founders and pioneers of the exploration of geophysics in the mainland, one of the pioneers of earthquake forecasting research, the founder of the Chinese Geophysical Society and the Chinese Seismological Society, and a deputy to the First to Seventh National People's Congress.
Mr. Gu graduated from Datong University in Shanghai in 1929, received a master's degree in geophysical exploration from colorado Mining Institute in 1934, and was a researcher at the Institute of Physics of the Peking Research Institute. After liberation, he served as deputy director of the Department of Geology and Mineral Resources of the Ministry of Geology, chief engineer of geophysical exploration, deputy director of the bureau of geophysical exploration, researcher and honorary director of the Institute of Geophysics of the National Earthquake Administration. He has made important contributions to the discovery and development of China's geophysical exploration, petroleum and other mineral resources, and the promotion of seismic forecasting research on the mainland, and has been known as the "Three Musketeers" of the geophysical community together with Academician Weng Wenbo and Academician Fu Chengyi. For his outstanding contributions to the mainland's geological mining and petroleum undertakings, Gu Gongxu was commended at the National Science and Technology Awards Conference held in 1982 (49 Jiusan members were awarded at that time).
After the founding of the People's Republic of China, the state developed geological prospecting on a large scale. At that time, Mr. Gu was the chief engineer of the Geophysical Exploration Bureau of the Ministry of Geology, directing the geophysical census of metal mines, coalfields and oil areas. He led the large-scale geophysical exploration work, and made significant contributions to the exploration of petroleum and mineral resources required for national economic construction, especially the "Earth Science Work in the Discovery Process of Daqing Oilfield" that he participated in and led won the first prize of the National Invention Collective.
Mr. Gu attaches great importance to practice. In the mid-1950s, he led and directed the national petroleum census and exploration work by comprehensively using aeronautical magnetic survey, gravity measurement, large-pole distance electrical bathymetry and seismic methods, and successively discovered the Changyuan structure in Daqing and the Huanghua and Dongying structures in North China, shortening the exploration process by two or three years, and making the basins such as Songliao and North China soon become important oil bases on the mainland. At the end of the 1950s, in order to better play the role of geophysical exploration, he proposed to closely combine geophysical exploration work and geological work to carry out regional census, requiring geophysical exploration work to be ahead of geological work, and all stages of geological work should cooperate with corresponding geophysical exploration work.
In 1966, after the Xingtai earthquake in Hebei Province, in accordance with the instructions of Premier Zhou Enlai to geological and geophysical workers to strengthen the study of earthquake prediction and prevention, Mr. Gu shifted his main energy to earthquake prediction research. At that time, the scientific research of earthquake forecasting was still in its infancy, and there were too few achievements of academic significance and use value. Out of concern for the mainland's earthquake forecasting cause and a strong sense of responsibility, he braved difficulties and wrote a monograph of more than 300,000 words entitled "Earthquake Forecasting", which discussed the difficulties of accurately predicting the time, place, and intensity of earthquakes, which became a summary of the experience and lessons of earthquake forecasting in various countries in the world since 1966. He pointed out that it is necessary to proceed from the study of the nature of the earthquake occurrence process, realistically explore the internal relationship between earthquake prediction and earthquake precursors, and carry out strict basic research.
Mr. Gu has always stood at the forefront of the times, stood at the forefront of science and technology, and always kept in mind his responsibility as a scientist, the responsibility of the people's representative, and the responsibility of Chinese citizens. His footprints have traveled all over the motherland and many countries in the world, and his painstaking efforts and contributions have been highly praised by the country and the people, and have also been widely praised by scholars around the world.
Mr. Gu's lifelong pursuit of scientific truth, persistence, tenacity, rigor, hard work, never stopping, his words and deeds to cultivate generation after generation of outstanding scientific talents, and constantly expand the motherland's scientific team that dares to tackle key problems.
In 1950, Academician Gu Gongxu joined the Jiusan Society, which was the Institute of Geophysics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. In 1978, the overall restructuring of the Institute of Geophysics belonged to the National Seismological Administration, and the system belonging to the members of the Jiusan Society of the former Institute of Geophysics was transformed into the National Seismological Administration, in order to adapt to this change, on May 18, 1988, the National Seismological Bureau Group of the Jiusan Society was established, and Gu Gongxu and Qin Xinling, two academicians, became the first members of the Jiusan Society in the Earthquake Bureau. After more than 30 years of development, the Branch of the Jiusan Society of the Earthquake Bureau has become a grassroots organization with nearly 73 members.
After the establishment of the earthquake bureau branch, Mr. Gu actively participated in the organization of the society, although at that time he as a respected old scientist, already has a high social status and academic status, but he still holds a very serious and responsible attitude towards the organizational life of the Jiusan Society, as long as there is time, he must participate in the organization activities, and every time as an ordinary member to participate, if there are other important things can not come, must take leave. The spirit of the old scientists who are high-spirited and conscientious about organizational work is worth learning forever.
We will always miss Academician Gu Gongxu.
From left, they are: Weng Wenbo, Gu Gongxu, and Fu Chengyi
The 4th from the right in the front row is Academician Gu Gongxu
The inaugural meeting of the National Seismological Administration Group of the Jiusan Society
The author | Li Zongchao
The typography | xu xing
Editor| Yang Qian gao xiaohong
Audit | Zhao Guochun Dong Yicong