Professor Yaakov Ben-Tor was born in 1910 in Germany. Following the rise of the Nazis to power, he immigrated to Palestine in 1933 and was involved in the establishment of the Department of Geology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, along with Professor Leo Picard.

In 1945, he was awarded the first doctorate in geology from the Hebrew University.

Professor Ben-Tor made significant contributions to the geological research of Israel. Among his notable achievements was the geological survey and mapping of the Negev, for which he, together with Akiva Fromman, was awarded the Israel Prize in Natural Sciences for the year 1955.

He served as the president of the Geological Society of Israel and as the head of the Department of Geology at the Hebrew University. In 1977, he retired from the university and worked at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego. The mineral Ben- torite, discovered in 1980 by the geologist Shulamit Gross, was named after him. Ben-Tor passed away in 2002, and his numerous research contributions and influence on the field of geology are still evident today.