Rob van der Hilst received his PhD in Geophysics from Utrecht University in 1990. After postdoctoral research at the University of Leeds (1990-1992) and the Australian National University (1992-1995) he joined the faculty of MIT’s Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences (EAPS) in 1996. Rob was the Director of the Earth Resources Laboratory (ERL) between 2004 and June of 2012. In January of 2012 Rob took on the role as Department Head of the Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences. In addition to his work at MIT, Rob has been a Visiting Professor at the University of Utrecht (The Netherlands) and the Institut de Physique de Globe de Paris (France). Rob’s research interests include: Seismic imaging of the Earth’s interior structure from reservoir to planetary scales (travel time and waveform tomography; inverse scattering); Geodynamics of convergent plate boundaries and the mode of mantle convection; Heterogeneity and anisotropy of Earth’s crust and upper mantle; Continental evolution.