Unusual Geophysics May Have Spared Iran Far Greater Damage

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Team Speeds Seismic Simulation Code Using GPUs

A team of researchers at the San Diego Supercomputer Center (SDSC) and the Department of Electronic and Computer Engineering at the University of California, San Diego, has developed a highly scalable computer code that promises to dramatically cut both research times and energy costs in simulating seismic hazards throughout California and elsewhere.

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Scripps Scientists Discover ‘Lubricant’ for Earth’s Tectonic Plates

Scientists at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego have found a layer of liquefied molten rock in Earth’s mantle that may be acting as a lubricant for the sliding motions of the planet’s massive tectonic plates. The discovery may carry far-reaching implications, from solving basic geological functions of the planet to a better understanding of volcanism and earthquakes.

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Quake Test: Can NYC’s Row Houses Handle an Earthquake?

Researchers will conduct a rare – if not unprecedented – large-scale earthquake simulation to determine how vulnerable New York’s unreinforced masonry buildings (row houses) are to temblors.

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The Deep Roots of Catastrophe

A University of Utah seismologist analyzed seismic waves that bombarded Earth’s core, and believes he got a look at the earliest roots of Earth’s most cataclysmic kind of volcanic eruption. But don’t worry. He says it won’t happen for perhaps 200 million years.

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Disasters Prompt Older Children to Be More Giving

A natural disaster can bring out the best in older children, prompting 9-year-olds to be more willing to share, while 6-year-olds become more selfish. Researchers made this finding in a rare natural experiment in China around the time of a horrific earthquake.

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Three Years After Quake, Haiti 'Aching' for Public Health Expertise

Lora Iannotti, PhD, assistant professor at the Brown School at Washington University in St. Louis, was working in Haiti when an earthquake devastated that country three years ago this week. She has been back to Haiti 10 times since Jan. 12, 2010, and says the country is "literally aching for public health expertise."

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Russian Far East Holds Seismic Hazards That Could Threaten Pacific Basin

Research shows that the Kamchatka Peninsula and Kuril Islands, long shrouded in secrecy by the Soviet government, are a seismic and volcanic hotbed with a potential to trigger tsunamis that pose a risk to the rest of the Pacific Basin.

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World’s Largest Subwoofer: Earthquakes ‘Pump’ Ground to Produce Infrasound

Earthquakes sway buildings, buckle terrain, and rumble – both audibly and in infrasound, frequencies below the threshold of human hearing. New computer modeling by a team of researchers indicates that most of the low-frequency infrasound comes from an unexpected source: the actual “pumping” of the Earth’s surface. The researchers confirmed their models by studying data from an actual earthquake.

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Geofoam Protects Pipelines From Earthquakes

Lightweight and stiff as a board, a plastic foam material is being used to protect Utah’s natural gas pipelines from rupturing during earthquakes, thanks to help from a University of Utah engineer.

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