Posts in the category »  Paper «  ( 282 Posts )

This months we have a lot of studies on Mediterranean tectonics, first of all from Italy, and many papers on China and the US. Besides, there are some interesting methodological studies and research from areas that had recent seismic crises such as Puerto Rico and Thessaly. Enjoy reading!

A new Special Issue has just been published in the Journal of South American Earth Sciences: Hazardous Faults in Latin America. The issue contains 16 research papers and an editorial. It was edited by Carlos Costa and Laurence Audin. The issue collects highly interesting contributions from all across the continent. Although subduction megaquakes on the Chilean Trench come with the highest magnitudes, onshore faults pose a significant hazard and historical events have had catastrophic consequences. Also, studying crustal earthquakes and faults is a pre-requisite for understanding crustal deformation, mountain building, and the landscape response to tectonics. Read the Special Issue now, because all papers are free to access via ScienceDirect until 20 Jan 2022.

A new special issue has been published in MDPI’s Geosciences. The collection “New Perspectives in the Definition/Evaluation of Seismic Hazard through Analysis of the Environmental Effects Induced by Earthquakes” collects five review papers, 13 research articles, and an editorial. The SI was edited by Sabina Porfido, Giuliana Alessio, Germana Gaudiosi, and Rosa Nappi. The volume is also available as a book. Download the flyer as a pdf here.

Western Slovenia hosts well-known active strike-slip faults, which accommodate the northward motion of the Adriatic Plate. So far, very little was known about large earthquakes on those faults. This is mainly due to the low slip rates. In a new paper we present geomorphological, geophysical, and paleoseismological data from the Idrija and Predjama Faults, which are among the longest faults in the area. We show that tectonic geomorphology and paleoseismology are really complicated in this kind of geological setting, but we also present data that indicate strong earthquakes during the Holocene. Here’s a short summary of what we did and what we found:

Only one month has gone and the list of new papers is again quite long. We have classic paleoseismology, a number of studies on historical earthquakes, some cool tsunami stuff, and a few more general papers on earthquake geology; plus: an inspiring article by Jim and Eldon on the science and the business of paleoseismology. Enjoy reading!

For most of us the summer break is over and teaching, field work, and office work is starting again or has already started. Time to catch up with the latest papers I suppose! This time we have quite a lot of “classical” paleoseismology in our list, but also plenty of interesting remote sensing and tsunami stuff. Enjoy reading!

In a recently published open access paper in TECTONICS, Zebari et al. report for the first time fault slip rates from Iraqi Kurdistan in the NW Zagros Fold-Thrust Belt. This area is challenging when it comes to narrowing down the distribution of S-N shortening and the associated fault slip rates, because in general, faults don’t reach the surface there. For this reason, we used a proxy: we dated uplifted river terraces with stimulated luminescence and used kinematic modelling of the Zagros fold belt. With this approach we can show that slip rate of the Mountain Front Fault is about 1.5 mm/a. Detachment folds take up another ~1.6 mm/a.

Today’s paper list contains a lot of interesting studies on Asian tectonics, a few articles on the Ridgecrest Earthquake, and a number of papers that I was involved in (sorry for the shameless self-promotion). Enjoy reading and let me know if I have missed something.
UPDATE 2021-08-03: Yes, I missed something. I added the last three papers by Rimando & Peace, Kempf & Moernaut, Amey et al., DePaolis et al., & Wils et al.

A recent study investigated seismogenic mass failure deposits that were preserved in a 457-m deep ICDP drilling (220-0 ka) from the Dead Sea depocenter. The study conducted a critical assessment and testing of the links between the occurrence of seismogenic mass failure, changes in water-level, and sedimentation rate driven by a changing climate.

1. Key Points:
• At the orbital- and millennial-scale, variable sedimentation rates are not a preconditioning factor for earthquake-triggered mass failures
• At the centennial- to decadal-scale, earthquake-triggered mass failures are not statistically correlated with lake-level state
• At the orbital- and millennial-scale, the mass failures are more frequent during lake-level high-stands with large-amplitude fluctuations

The Bolivian Amazon is a vast plain with almost zero topography. It hosts a huge and dynamic river system on the east side of the Andes. So far, little was known about the active tectonics of the area. In a new paper, Umberto Lombardo and I show that there are active faults parallel to the Andes, and also perpendicular to the mountain front. We used the TanDEM-X DEM and geomorphological analyses of the fluvial system to investigate the faults and their impact on river dynamics. We show that in such a low-relief setting, dip-slip earthquakes can catastrophically change river courses. If you don’t have the time to read the full paper, here’s a short summary.