Geology

Earthquake early warning, live in California, aims to send user alerts before ground shaking arrives at their location. Work directly with a USGS team in implementing a ground-motion based early warning algorithm, and develop novel station-specific adjustment factors to improve the accuracy of ground-shaking estimates, a critical step in sending the most useful user alerts.

Develop cutting-edge computational tools that provide 3D views of Earth’s crust using gravity and magnetic fields. Results of these efforts will have a wide range of applications from mapping natural resources to evaluating natural hazards. These tools will be applied to airborne geophysical data, especially those collected for the USGS Earth MRI effort.

This opportunity focuses on integration of geophysical modeling with constraints on alteration mineralogy from spectral measurements on drill core and hyperspectral remote sensing data.

Earthquakes, such as the 2011 M5.7 Prague, Oklahoma, and recent northern Texas M4 event, demonstrate the need for improved understanding of site amplification and seismic hazards in the central United States. The intern will be trained by USGS scientists to use the state-of-the-art site investigation methods at seismic station sites in California before applying the methods in Oklahoma and Texas.

The advent of national geophysical initiatives (e.g. EarthScope, AusLamp, SinoProbe) has started the race to develop regional- and national-scale geophysical models. In parallel, the need for such models is on the rise within the natural-hazard and resource sectors. This internship focuses on development of three-dimensional electrical resistivity models derived from magnetotelluric (MT) data.

As a leading team in stream sensor application, we welcome a GRIP intern to help expand our focus on DOC quality. The intern will have free experimental reign in an established research watershed with great opportunities to publish. This position is set in a beautiful small town /rural setting with plenty of outdoor recreational activities.

Help improve models of coastal erosion and morphologic change! This project offers an opportunity to collect and process various kinds of oceanographic and morphologic data using instruments and images recorded with our beach cam and drones. Or it can be a chance to develop and test numerical models. In either case, the results will help the USGS make forecasts of coastal erosion during storms.

Spend a summer on the shore of Lake Michigan, investigating the role that dynamic dune disturbance and successional processes play in the spatial metapopulation dynamics of Pitcher’s thistle, a federally threatened plant. This project will provide a basis for developing spatial population models that can indicate the present and future conditions for the species in the Great Lakes.

Exploring for the critical platinum-group elements (PGEs) relies upon understanding the geophysical signature of the entire magmatic system in which they form, from bottom to top. The USGS is applying a range of geophysical techniques to investigate the internal architecture of layered mafic intrusions.

Subduction zone earthquakes, can generate ground shaking that lasts several minutes. Typical earthquake risk assessments do not account for such long-duration ground shaking. Earthquake engineers and scientists at the USGS and elsewhere are colllaborating to change this.