Springer has recently published the book Dynamic Tectonics and Karst in the series Cave and Karst Systems of the World, edited by our colleagues S. Shanov and K. Kostov. The book focusses on the influence of tectonic processes on the formation of karst and karst caves and one chapter is devoted to karst cave paleoseismology. The authors present studies from the Balkans, Cuba, and France.  more

A couple of new papers on paleoseismology and related fields have recently been published. They deal with active tectonics in China, coseismic uplift in Japan, seismites in Canada, turbidite and lake sediment paleoseismology, earthquake environmental effects in Greece, paleotsunami deposits in India, an earthquake and tsunami in 1531 in Lisbon, tsunamites in Malta, tectonic geomorphology, scaling relationships in the Med,  and the 2013 Balochistan earthquake and subsequent tsunami. If you miss recent studies here, drop us a mail. more

If you can’t find funding for attending the 5th Pata-Days in Busan, Korea, there is still the chance to see and present some good research on earthquake geology in Germany. There will be a session Active Tectonics and Earthquake Geology at the GeoFrankfurt 2014 meeting in late September, so don’t miss the deadline:

Dear colleagues,

Within the frame of the conference GeoFrankfurt 2014 we are organizing a session on Active Tectonics and Earthquake Geology (B13). The conference is held at the Goethe Universität at Frankfurt, 21-24 September 2014.

Conveners: Ioannis Koukouvelas, Kurt Decker and Klaus Reicherter

Deadline for abstract submission: 25 April, 2014 more

Quaternary shortening at the Andean orogenic front (31°-33°s), Argentina: Current issues and challenges

 Carlos Costa¹, Emilio Ahumada¹, Benjamin Brooks², Andrew Meigs³, Lewis Owen⁴, Thomas Rockwell⁵, Lindsay Schoenbohm⁶, Carlos Gardini¹, Héctor Cisneros¹, Fabricio Vázquez^{1, 7}

1. Universidad Nacional de San Luis, Argentina. costa@unsl.edu.ar
2. U.S. Geological Survey, USA
3. Oregon State University, USA
4. University of Cincinnati, USA
5. San Diego State University, USA
6. University of Toronto, Canada
7. CONICET

Outstanding exposures, new data, and novel hypotheses developed during the last decade have turned the frontal deformation zone of the Andes between 31°S and 33°S (Fig. 1) into one of the most promising areas worldwide for improving the understanding on mountain building processes and seismic hazards related to thrust tectonics.

Because the Andes are relatively narrow in these latitudes, the geodetic signal in the backarc is dominated by the subduction zone locking process at the Chile trench. Nonetheless the geodetic analysis provides some useful constraints on the location and rates of modern backarc shortening, though not necessarily on the vergence. It is currently understood that backarc shortening occurs at rates of ~4-5mm/yr over a zone that is ~30km wide (across-strike) (Brooks et al., 2003; Kendrick et al., 2006). In the north (31°- 32°10° S) this would imply that the west-vergent, Eastern Precordilleran structures are the most likely to be active, while south of 32°10° S the east-vergent structures in the Southern Precordillera belt are likely to be most active (Fig. 1).

more

A new paper was just published on Active faulting in the north-eastern Aegean Sea Islands. Our colleague Alex Chatzipetros and his co-authors investigated the distribution of seismicity and faulting pattern at the islands of Lemnos, Aghios Efstratios, Lesvos, Chios, Samos and Ikaria. From this data and field analyses they concluded on the effects of active faulting on the local geomorphology. more