Publications

This report presents a global dataset of site-specific surface-displacement data on faults. We have compiled estimates of successive displacements attributed to individual earthquakes, mainly paleoearthquakes, at sites where two or more events have been documented, as a basis for analyzing inter-event variability in surface displacement on continental faults. An earlier version of this composite

This report describes the results of ground-motion simulations of earthquakes using three-dimensional (3D) and one-dimensional (1D) crustal models conducted for the probabilistic seismic hazard assessment (PSHA) of the Hanford facility, Washington, under the Senior Seismic Hazard Analysis Committee (SSHAC) guidelines. The first portion of this report demonstrates that the 3D seismic velocity model

Over the past decade, several technological advances have allowed Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) receivers to have the capability to record displacements at high frequencies, with sampling rates approaching 100 samples per second (sps). In addition, communication and computer hardware and software have allowed various institutions, including the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), to retrie

The structured expert elicitation process proposed by Cooke (1991), hereafter referred to as Cooke's approach, is applied for the first time in the realm of structural collapse-fragility assessment for selected generic construction types. Cooke's approach works on the principle of objective calibration scoring of judgments couple with hypothesis testing used in classical statistics. The performanc

A large database of ground motions from shallow earthquakes occurring in active tectonic regions around the world, recently developed in the Pacific Earthquake Engineering Center’s NGA-West2 project, has been used to investigate what such a database can say about the properties and processes of crustal fault zones. There are a relatively small number of near-rupture records, implying that few reco

We investigated the influence of inter-annual and seasonal differences on the distribution of live and dead foraminifera, and the inter-annual variability of stable carbon isotopes (d13C), total organic carbon (TOC) values and carbon to nitrogen (C/N) ratios in bulk sediments from intertidal environments of Bandon Marsh (Oregon, USA). Living and dead foraminiferal species from 10 stations were ana

The Salt Lake City segment (SLCS) of the Wasatch fault zone (WFZ) and the West Valley fault zone (WVFZ) compromise Holocene-active normal faults that bound a large intrabasin graben in northern Salt Lake Valley and have evidence of recurrent, large-magnitude (M ~6-7) surface-faulting earthquakes. However, at the time of this investigation, questions remained regarding the timing, displacement, and

In southern California, where fast slip rates and sparse vegetation contribute to crisp expression of faults and microtopography, field and high‐resolution topographic data (

Earthquake prehistory of the southern Puget Lowland, in the north-south compressive regime of the migrating Cascadia forearc, reflects diverse earthquake rupture modes with variable recurrence. Stratigraphy and Bayesian analyses of previously reported and new 14C ages in trenches and cores along backthrust scarps in the Seattle fault zone restrict a large earthquake to 1040–910 cal yr B.P. (2σ), a

Active-source Love waves, recorded by the multi-channel analysis of surface wave (MASLW) technique, were recently analyzed in two site characterization projects. Between 2010 and 2012, the 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) funded GEOVision to conduct geophysical investigations at 191 seismographic stations in California and the Central Eastern U.S. (CEUS). The original project pla

According to the regulatory building codes in the United States (e.g., 2010 California Building Code), at least two horizontal ground motion components are required for three-dimensional (3D) response history analysis (RHA) of building structures. For sites within 5 km of an active fault, these records should be rotated to fault-normal/fault-parallel (FN/FP) directions, and two RHAs should be perf

A state-of-the-art seismic monitoring system comprising 36 accelerometers and a data-logger with real-time capability was recently installed at Building 54 on the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's (MIT) Cambridge, MA, campus. The system is designed to record translational, torsional, and rocking motions, and to facilitate the computation of drift between select pairs of floors. The cast-in-p