Mark Leonidovich VERBA was born in 1935 in the family of geologists. His father Leonid Danilovich perished in combat in the break-through the Siege of Leningrad and was buried in a mass grave in Batetsky. Mother Ksenia MARTYNOVA for 50 years worked in geology and taught her son the basics of geological office and laboratory work while his step-father Mikhail Aleksandrovich starting from 1951 was teaching him how to handle field data related to rock outcrops, bassets and wells used for recovery of cement material in the Volga-Vyatsky Region and for recovery of optical grade quartz on Serpovidny Ridge on Kola Peninsular.

In 1953 M.L. Verba completed a course of secondary school studies with honours (silver medal) and entered the Leningrad Institute of Mining Engineering, oil engineering department headed by professor B.A. Alferov. In those years he was going in for sport, was the city champion in boat-racing (eight-oar class), the Spartak Sport Club; his hobby was photography and film-making. Had experience of field work in Bolshoi Balkan in Turkmenistan, Taas-Tumussky gas field on Viliujsk Syneclise, Zolnensky oil field in the Volga basin. Married his co-ed Valentina, graduated from the institute in 1958 majoring in geology and exploration of oil and gas fields, in the same year was admitted to work at the Research Institute of Arctic Geology and had a son.

The Research Institute of Arctic Geology was renamed and restructured several times; however, M.L. Verba continued to work there as: a geologist in the Enisej and Ust-Enisej Expeditions (1958 – 63), head of a party in the Norilsk Expedition (1963 – 69), chief geologist of the Polar Expedition (1969-1973), chief geologist of the Murmansk Expedition (1973-1983), head of the sector and department of the All-Union Research Institute Oceangeologia (1983-1994), chief geologist of the Sevmorgeo Company (1994 - 2000); at present works as chief researcher with this company.

Before 1969 M.L. Verba performed geological and geophysical surveys in the Norilsk, Ust-Enisej and Turukhansk regions on the Krasnoyarsk Territory. Participated in organization of the Norilsk Expedition and was its first trade union leader, made films about geologists’ work, took part in TV shows and had publications in local periodicals. In 1969 defended his dissertation for the degree of Candidate of Sciences in tectonics and oil and gas resources in North-Western part of the Siberian Platform; his official opponents being N.N. Urvantseva and P.S. Voronova. The main work achievement for all those years was establishment of regularity in formation of structural pre-Tungus variance in the palaeozoic cross-section of the Norilsk industrial region, regularity in impact of intrusions on oil-and-gas presence in palaeozoic rocks and, stemming from it, evaluation of the sediment potential for oil and fire gas.

After that M.L.Verba’s whole research and practical work has been linked with geological and geophysical surveys of water areas especially of Arctic off-shores. He was the first chief geologist of the Polar Expedition and in this position headed geological surveys on Chukotka and Koriakia off-shores as well as geophysical surveys on in the Anadyr Bay shelf. In cooperation with G.I. Gaponenko, S.S. Ivanov and E.N. Zatsepin he for the first time substantiated the tectonic structure of the Anadyr shelf and identified probable oil and gas reserves.

In 1968-1969 he was a part-time lecturer in the Institute of Mining Engineering.

In 1972 he and N.N. Trubyatchinsky organized the Murmansk Geophysical Expedition (KMAGE); M.L. Verba being appointed to the position of its chief geologist. Being in charge of the research trip he supervised seismic operations on Severo-Kildinsky, Oktyabrskaya and other parts of the Barents Sea shelf as well as on the Leningradskaya, Rusanovskaya, Skuratovskaya, Obruchevskaya and other parts of the Kara Sea shelf. Being chief geologist he supervised planning of the expedition field operations, organized work of the expedition geological service and was in charge of preparation of structures for long-hole drilling. M.L. Verba was directly involved in the discovery of the Barents Sea oil-and-gas province and preparation for identification of its separate oil and gas fields, namely Skuratovskoye, and Leningradskoye on the Kara Sea, and Severo-Kuldinskoye on the Barents Sea. He takes part in scientific generalization of collected data, authors articles and makes presentations at various conventions of Russia’s scientific community. It was he who in 1977 for the first time substantiated the concept of the rift origin of the Barentsovo-Severokarsky mega bending structure and developed its oil-generating model that predetermined subsequent efficient surveys in the region.

At the same time he participates in formulation of the concept of regional works in the ocean and controls geological and geophysical investigations on the Canary-Bahamian and Angola-Brasilian geo traverses in the Atlantics.

In 1983 M.L.Verba passes a competition for the position of the head of the sector of the Arctic geology and oil-and-gas potential at the Research Institute Oceanogeologia and organizes publication of the atlas of geology maps for the Barents Sea and of the first scientific data summary on the Barents shelf (1988) edited by academician I.S. Gramberg. He is involved in preparation of monographs “Geological Structure and Regularity of Mineral Product Spacing. Seas in Soviet Arctica” vol. 9 (1984), ”Physical Properties of Rock Formations in the Barents Sea Region” (1987), ” Geology and Petroleum Potential” (1993). Together with M.N. Grigoriev he is developing the structure for the first computer data bank for mineral resources of the Western Arctic shelf and organizes all-Russia conferences on this subject.

In 1993 in his dissertation he defended the concept of the rift origin of the Barents Sea structures and got the scientific degree “Doctor of Geological and Mineralogical Sciences”.

Starting from 1986 he has been conducting field geological investigations on Spitzbergen and organized testing of the first oil beds on this archipelago. In the course of this work (1986 – 1995) M.L. Verba discovered tufa physite formations in the region, was the first to describe hot contacts of intrusive and enclosing Paleozoic rocks, substantiated the absence of Caledonian folding in the region and defined high prospects for oil-and-gas presence in the Spitzbergen anteclise. In 1990 – 1991 he performed geological and geophysical surveys on Cuba and was the first to find good prospects for oil on the Kauto-Nipe bending.

In 1993 upon taking the position of the chief geologist in Sevmorgeo, M.L. Verba together with A.D. Shcheglov and Yu.M. Erinchek developed the concept for establishment of the state grid of reference profiles on the Arctic shelf, made up a business plan and work schedule; together with Yu. I. Matveev got funding for the work and subsequently kept control of the work. The work results were summed up by him in the monograph “Seismologic Model of the Lithosphere in Northern Europe: Barents Region” published in 1998 with F.P. Mitrofanov and N.V. Sharov as editors. His conclusions as to regularity of the Earth’s crust evolution are formulated in the monograph “Russian Arctic: Geological History, Mineragenia, Geoecology” edited by D.A. Dodin and V.S. Surkov and published in 2002.

Jointly with Yu. N. Grigorenko in 1998 he completed an analytic image of the geological structure and prospects for oil and gas presence in offshore transit zones on the Russian shelf territories and prepared it for publication. He authored the concept and methodology for ecological monitoring of the shelf geological environment and provided technologic forecasting of geological conditions safety for the nuclear power plant on Cuba.

The outcome of his 29 field expeditions is 250 scientific papers authored by him out of which 190 were included in foreign and Russian publications including 135 articles and 11 collective monographs. As a member of the Russian Geographical Society he spoke at various conventions making educational presentations. He authored essays and TV films. M.L. Verba and I.Shadkhan created the film ”Prospectors from Norilsk”. The newspaper “The Natural Resources News” published a geological study of biblical texts that he carried out in his off-work time.

M.L. Verba was presented with an honorary award “For Excellency in Resource Exploration”, the gold and bronze medals from the Exhibition of Economic Achievements, medals “For Heroic Labour” (1970), “Labour Veteran” (1990), “300 Anniversary of the Russian Fleet” (1997)