Irving Friedman

Irving Friedman (January 12, 1920 – June 28, 2005) was a U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) scientist and a pioneer in geochemistry.

[1] Friedman was a member of the famed group of post doctoral researchers in Nobel laureate Harold Urey’s laboratory at the Institute for Nuclear Studies at the University of Chicago.

There, Friedman built the first mass spectrometer for routine measurement of the hydrogen isotope composition of water.

Throughout his career, he studied water in oceans, rivers, lakes, glaciers, the atmosphere, magmas, minerals, rocks, meteorites, plants, animals and the moon.

Friedman also made significant contributions to the development of instruments to detect helium in exploring uranium, thorium, petroleum and natural gas and in predicting earthquakes.