Publications

Megathrust earthquakes and their associated tsunamis cause some of the worst natural disasters. In addition to earthquakes, a wide range of slip behaviors are present at subduction zones, including slow earthquakes that span multiple orders of spatial and temporal scales. Understanding these events may shed light on the stress or strength conditions of the megathrust fault. Out of all types of slo

Landslides in Minnesota have caused loss of life, damaged infrastructure, and negatively affected Minnesota’s natural resources. Landslides increase the amount of sediment contributed to lakes and rivers, with negative consequences for water quality and aquatic habitats. Recent mapping reveals that landslide susceptible areas within Minnesota primarily occur on steep slopes adjacent to rivers, lak

Magnetotelluric models spanning the Pacific–Australian Plate boundary in New Zealand’s South Island indicate a localized zone of low electrical resistivity that is spatially coincident with theductile mid-crustal part of the Alpine Fault Zone (AFZ). We explored the source of this anomaly bymeasuring the electrical properties of samples collected from surface outcrops approaching the AFZthat have a

Standard approaches to probabilistic seismic‐hazard assessment (PSHA) assume that earthquakes are random, independent events that follow a Poisson distribution of occurrences in a given time period (Cornell, 1968). To overcome the limitations of the Poisson assumption, such as ignoring earthquake clustering, we introduce an analytic method for PSHA that uses order statistics to allow for arbitrary

To investigate the sensitivity of slip inversions to station distribution and choice of empirical Green’s function (EGF), we examine three microearthquakes that occurred within the high‐density LArge‐n Seismic Survey in Oklahoma (LASSO) nodal seismic array. The LASSO array’s dense distribution of 1825 geophones provides an exceptional level of spatial and azimuthal coverage, allowing for more accu

The San Andreas Fault (SAF) showcases the breadth of possible earthquake sizes and occurrence behavior; in particular, the central SAF is a microcosm of such diversity. This section also exhibits the spectrum of fault coupling from locked to creeping. Here, we show that the observations of aseismic slip, temporal clustering of seismicity, and spatial variations in earthquake size distributions are

We introduce procedures to validate site response in sedimentary basins as predicted using ground motion simulations. These procedures aim to isolate contributions of site response to computed intensity measures relative to those from seismic source and path effects. In one of the validation procedures, simulated motions are analyzed in the same manner as earthquake recordings to derive non-ergodi

Rapid estimation of earthquake ground shaking and proper accounting of associated uncertainties in such estimates when conditioned on strong‐motion station data or macroseismic intensity observations are crucial for downstream applications such as ground failure and loss estimation. The U.S. Geological Survey ShakeMap system is called upon to fulfill this objective in light of increased near‐real‐

From 2017 to 2019, three destructive earthquakes (27 January 2017 Mw 4.7, 16 December 2018 Mw 5.2, and 3 January 2019 Mw 4.8) occurred in the Changning shale gas field in the southwest Sichuan Basin, China. Previous seismological studies attributed these events to hydraulic fracturing (HF), but were unable to identify the causative seismogenic faults and their slip behaviors. Here, we use Sentinel

In the Gulf of California, Mexico, the relative motion across the North America-Pacific boundary is accommodated by a series of marine transform faults and spreading centers. About 40 M>6 earthquakes have occurred in the region since 1960. On 3 August 2009, an Mw 6.9 earthquake occurred near Canal de Ballenas in the region. The earthquake was a strike-slip event with a shallow hypocenter that is l

Understanding mechanical conditions that lead to complexity in earthquakes is important to seismic hazard analysis. In this study, we simulate physics-based multicycle dynamic models of the San Andreas fault (Carrizo through San Bernardino sections) and the San Jacinto fault (Claremont and Clark strands). We focus on a complex fault geometry based on the Southern California Earthquake Center Commu

Reactivated shear fractures contribute to the creation of pervasive fracture networks in geothermal systems. The creation, reactivation, and sustainability of fracture networks depend on complex coupling among thermal, hydraulic, mechanical, and chemical (THMC) processes. However, most laboratory experiments focus either solely on how fluid transport properties evolve in stationary fractures at el