Geologically minded geophysics
About HERNAN
Dr. Hernan Ugalde started his career in the Geological Survey of Chile (SERNAGEOMIN) in 1995,where he completed his M.Sc. (Geophysics) thesis work under the supervision of Dr. Gonzalo Yañez. In 1997 he moved to the newly created South America office of Paterson, Grant & Watson Limited (PGW) in Santiago, where he stayed until 2001.
In 2001 Hernan moved to Canada to engage in doctoral studies at the University of Toronto. He completed his Ph.D. under the supervision of Dr. Bernd Milkereit in 2006. Meanwhile, he kept his links to PGW, where he worked part-time and among other things, in 2003 coded the first version of the Neural Net application that was subsequently marketted by Geosoft as "Predictive Targeting". The PhD in impact craters involved field work in Chile (Monturaqui impact crater), Ghana (Lake Bosumtwi), Mexico (Chicxulub, in Yucatan peninsula) and Lake Wanapitei (northeast of Sudbury, Ontario), and marked the start of research collaboration with Dr. Bill Morris (McMaster University).
In 2006 Hernan started a postdoc with Bill Morris at McMaster University. This triggered the quest for understanding data from a geological point of view. With Bill, Hernan started working in 3D modelling, and developing workflows for the understanding of remanent magnetization and how to model it, geologically. It was an amazing time, and in Hernan's words "Bill told me everything I know...except for Matlab". However, by 2011 the MAGGIC lab ran out of funds and Hernan decided to go back to PGW.
2011 to 2015 was an exciting time in PGW. Hernan moved from small processing and interpretation projects into country scale ones like the aeromagnetic compilation and interpretation of all the existing aeromagnetic data in Ecuador, for the Ecuador Geological Survey (INIGEMM). It also meant the migration from the standard "manual GIS approach" (paper maps over a light table) to on-screen interpretations using GIS software. It also meant the shift to more geological interpretations with the hire of PGW's first structural geologist.
In 2015 Hernan became Vice-President of PGW. By then he also started teaching geophysics at Brock University. By September 2018, the thirst for teaching and research was strong enough to make Hernan leave PGW to spend more time teaching and working on research with Bill.
DIP Geosciences came to life, and the journey is just beginning...Hernan now teaches Advanced Structural Geology and Exploration Geophysics at Brock University. He has active research projects with Bill on remanence, full tensor magnetics and geological understanding of geophysical data. He collaborates with Tensor Research from Australia provincial geological surveys in Canada and research institutes in Europe.
Constantly learning, and always happy to teach and try new ideas.
