GATE Geology Syllabus 2023 – Download PDF
By BYJU'S Exam Prep
Updated on: October 17th, 2023

The GATE Geology syllabus 2023 will be released by the conducting authority IIT Kanpur on its official website. It is very important to understand and analyze the GATE Geology syllabus before starting the preparation of the examination in a strategic manner. If you are planning to prepare for the exam, you must check the GATE Geology syllabus 2023 provided below.
GATE Geology syllabus 2023 is highly difficult to prepare and score good marks in the Graduate Aptitude Test in Engineering. This page provides extensive information on the GATE syllabus for Geology so that you do not encounter any difficulties when studying for the exam.
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Detailed GATE Geology Syllabus 2023
The GATE Geology syllabus 2023 is divided into various sections as per the exam pattern. Understanding the syllabus is essential to strategize your preparation level to get through the exam. The Geology syllabus carries various important topics such as Geological time scale, Igneous petrology, Crystallography, and a lot more.
The syllabus for GATE Geology constitutes three sections which are as follows:
- Section 1: Common Section
- Section 2: Geology
- Section 3: Geophysics
By referring to the GATE Geology syllabus 2023, you can get clarity about the important topics you need to cover for the examination. Hence, below you will find the section-wise syllabus in detail.
GATE Geology Syllabus- Common Section
The common section of the syllabus consists of various topics such as mineralogy, petrology, remote sensing, etc. Let us discuss the GATE Geology Syllabus 2023 for the common section of Geophysics and Geology in detail.
- Earth and planetary system: terrestrial planets and moons of the solar system, size, shape, internal structure and composition of the earth, the concept of isostasy, elements of seismology – body and surface waves, propagation of body waves in the earth’s interior, Heat flow within the earth, Gravitational field of the Earth, geomagnetism and palaeomagnetism, continental drift, plate tectonics – relationship with earthquakes, volcanism and mountain building, continental and oceanic crust– composition, structure, and thickness.
- Weathering and soil formation, landforms created by rivers, wind, glaciers, oceans, and volcanoes.
- Basic structural geology
- Crystallography: basic crystal symmetry and concept of point groups.
- Mineralogy
- Petrology of common rocks
- Geological time scale, Geochronology and absolute time and major stratigraphic divisions of India.
- Mineral, coal, and petroleum resources of India.
- Introduction to remote sensing
- Engineering properties of rocks and soils
- Elements of hydrogeology.
- Principles and applications of gravity, magnetic, electrical, electromagnetic, seismic and radiometric methods of prospecting for oil, mineral and groundwater, and introductory good logging.
GATE Geology Syllabus- Geology
The Geology section of the GATE Geology syllabus 2023 consists of topics like Geomorphology, Geochemistry, Stratigraphy, etc. Let us discuss the important topics of the Geology section in detail given in the table below.
Geomorphology | Structural geology |
Crystallography and Mineralogy | Geochemistry |
Igneous petrology | Sedimentology |
Important sedimentary basins of India | Metamorphic petrology |
Paleobiology | Stratigraphy |
Resource geology | Ore dressing and mineral economics |
Global tectonics | Applied geology |
Hydrogeology | Basic principles of remote sensing |
GATE Geology Syllabus- Geophysics
The Geophysics section of the GATE Geology syllabus 2023 consists of topics like Gravity Methods, Seismology, Geodesy, etc. Let us discuss the important topics of the Geophysics section in detail given below.
- Solid-Earth Geophysics- The earth as a planet, different motions of the earth, gravity field of the earth, Clairaut’s theorem, size and shape of earth, geomagnetic field, paleomagnetism, Geothermics and heat flow, seismology and interior of the earth, variation of density, velocity, pressure, temperature, electrical and magnetic properties of the earth.
- Geodesy
- Earthquake Seismology: Elements of elasticity theory- stress and strain tensors, Generalized Hooke’s Law, Body and Surface Waves, Rotational, dilatational, irrational and equi-volumnal waves. Reflection and refraction of elastic waves, Homogeneous and evanescent waves and bounded waves, Eikonal Equation and Ray theory, Elements of Seismic Tomography.
- Potential and Time-Varying Fields
- Gravity Methods
- Magnetic Methods- Elements of Earth’s magnetic field, units of measurement, magnetic susceptibility of rocks and measurements, magnetometers and magnetic gradiometers, Land, airborne and marine magnetic and magnetic gradiometer surveys, Various corrections applied to magnetic data, IGRF, Reduction to Pole transformation, Poisson’s relation of gravity and magnetic potential field, preparation of magnetic maps, upward and downward continuation, magnetic anomalies due to geometrical and irregular shaped bodies, Image processing concepts in the processing of magnetic anomaly maps
- Electrical Methods parameters, reduction of layers, Triangle of anisotropy, interpretation of resistivity field data, Principles of equivalence and suppression, self-potential method and its origin, Electrical Resistivity Tomography (ERT), Induced polarization, time and frequency domain IP measurements.
- Electromagnetic Methods- Geo-electromagnetic spectrum, Biot Savart’s Law, Maxwell’s Equation, Helmholtz Equation, Basic concept of EM induction in the earth, Skin-depth, elliptic polarization, in-phase and quadrature components, phasor diagrams, Response function and response parameters, Ground and Airborne Methods, measurements in different source-receiver configurations, Earth’s natural electromagnetic methods-telluric, geomagnetic depth sounding and magnetotellurics.
- Seismic methods- Elastic properties of earth materials, Reflection, refraction and CDP surveys, land and marine seismic sources, generation and propagation of elastic waves, velocity–depth models, geophones, hydrophones, digital recording systems, digital formats, field layouts, seismic noise and noise profile analysis, optimum geophone grouping, noise cancellation by shot and geophone arrays, 2D, 3D and 4D seismic data acquisition, processing and interpretation.
- Geophysical Survey Design.
- Geophysical signal processing
- Geophysical Well Logging
- Radioactive Methods- Prospecting and assaying of mineral (radioactive and non-radioactive) deposits, half-life, decay constant, radioactive equilibrium, G M counter, scintillation detector, semiconductor devices, application of radiometric for exploration, assaying, and radioactive waste disposal.
- Geophysical Inversion
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