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A LOOK BACK
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By MARLAN DOWNEY

Gussow's Work Alive, Ready for Next Step

 

Perhaps a review -- and awareness -- of the past may make us better geologists in the future.

I was privileged to meet Bill Gussow a few years ago when the AAPG presented him with its Pioneer Award. Fifty-one years ago, he published his classic AAPG paper on Differential Entrapment of Oil and Gas.

Less well known, but equally impressive, is his 1955 AAPG publication on Time of Migration of Oil and Gas. It will reward careful rereading.

Gussow's tools for recognizing time of migration by time of formation of trap and by cementation evidence have been widely used for a half-century. His analysis of the significance of bubble-point pressures of oils (pressure at which dissolved gas begins to escape from solution in oil) seems to yet be underappreciated.

I look forward to a great Ph.D. dissertation updating and extending his work. I even have a title ready: "Treading in a Pioneers' Footsteps."

 

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