Abstract: Beginning from the second decade of 19th century, there were some Russian geologists,either dispatched or supported by then Czar 's Russian government, who started geological investigations in Xinjiang. In that early stage, the investigations are most limited in pure geography field, seldom dealing with petroleum geology. During the period from the end of 19th century till the second decade of 20th century,the conducted investigations were basically reconnaissance survey, starting to attach importance to petroleum deposits, and some important oil deposit areas had been described and studied. Among those people, whom he contributed most ought to be then geologist and geographer Obuluchev. During the period of 1935-1943,the Soviet Union's geologists conducted geological reconnaissance survey in Xinjiang, petroleum deposits were placed as one of the key targets, hence accumulating certain amount of related data,then the Dushanzi oilfield was discovered by drilling exploration and put into development.

Key words: petroleum geology, reconnaissance survey, China, Xinjiang, Soviet Union, Russia, geologist