Bio
Dr. Iain Stewart is a British Lecturer in Geology in the School of Earth, Ocean and Environmental Sciences at the University of Plymouth.
He is best known to television audiences for hosting the documentary series Journeys from the Centre of the Earth (2004) and Earth: The Power of the Planet (2007).
He graduated in 1986 with a degree in Geology & Geography from Strathclyde University in Glasgow and moved to the University of Bristol to carry out doctoral research on the geology of earthquakes in Greece and Turkey.
After finishing his PhD in 1990, Iain taught geology and earth sciences at Brunel University in west London. He left there in 2002 to take up an honorary Research Fellow post at the Centre for Geosciences at Glasgow University while getting the various television projects off the ground.
He joined the University of Plymouth in 2004.
Iain’s main research interests are in the broad area of recent crustal movements (neotectonics) and geo-hazards, particularly in terms of identifying ancient earthquakes, tsunamis and volcanic eruptions in the geological and archaeological record.
The majority of his field research has been in the Mediterranean region, hence the focus of his first BBC2/4 television series (2004), Journeys From The Centre Of The Earth, was geological travels through the architecture, art, food, climate, dangers and culture of the Mediterranean world.
Iain's geological research has featured in two BBC Horizon specials - The Search of Ancient Helike and Earthquake Storms - and he was the first geologist on the science team in the fourth BBC Two series Rough Science.
Other geoscience television appearances include Inside the Ultimate Earthquake, Inside the Ultimate Volcano, 10 Things You Didn’t Know About Volcanoes, and Climate Catastrophe or Global Conspiracy.
The follow-up to the award-winning Journeys From the Centre of the Earth was on the geology and culture around the Pacific Rim, a 4-part series called Journeys Into The Ring of Fire which aired on BBC2/BBC4 in 2006.
In 2007 Iain hosted Earth: The Power of the Planet, which aired in South Africa on SABC2 from April-May, 2008.