Analysis of topographic and river morphometric parameters was conducted using digital elevation models (DEMs) and field observations in order to determine the role of variable rock resistance on topographic relief, to examine how spatially and temporally variable rock uplift rates relate to river morphology, and to address the degree to...
The 1994 Northridge and 1987 Whittier Narrows earthquakes warned Los Angeles residents of the threat of earthquakes due to unmapped, blind reverse faults and emphasized the importance of identifying and characterizing blind reverse faults in assessing the seismic hazard to the region. The East and West Coyote Hills in the...
Oblique subduction of the Juan de Fuca plate beneath the North American plate characterizes the tectonic setting of the Pacific Northwest. North American plate deformation at the latitude of central Oregon consists of the clockwise-rotation of the Siletzia block in the forearc and the extensional Basin and Range province in...
The details of the 1700 Cascadia Subdction Zone earthquake and tsunami can be better constrained using data from tsunami sand sheets, provided knowledge of the waveform, estuary geometry and bed roughness controls on the deposition pattern of the sand sheet. In this study, we use the hydrodynamic and sediment transport...
This thesis synthesizes surficial structural data, a detailed analysis of an earthquake in 1944, and historical seismicity into a new model of crustal scale deformation in the eastern Precordillera in northwestern Argentina in the vicinity of San Juan. The eastern Precordillera was uplifted during previous thin-skinned deformation episodes, and is...
Normal faults characterizing extensional provinces may terminate along-strike at regions of zero extension, at zones of transform faults, or at triple junctions. Termination of the Basin and Range extensional province in southeastern Oregon is thought to occur by right-lateral transform motion distributed across the Brothers Fault zone (BFZ) in central...
Kinematic tectonic models constrained by Airy isostatic equilibrium demonstrate the crustal-scale evolution of the Brooks Range during ocean basin closure, arc-continent collision, and exhumation of the orogen. The Bouguer gravity anomaly low that develops across the orogen is related by wavelength to the amount of shortening during collision, and by...
The climatic and tectonic framework of the St. Elias orogen makes it an excellent place to study the interactions between tectonic processes such as deformation and erosive processes, in particular glacial erosion. One type of link between these processes, proposed by numerical models of orogenic development, is an effect of...
Growth strata geometries and deformed geomorphic surfaces reflect the shorttimescale growth of Sierra de Villicum (San Juan Province, Argentina). Accumulated deformation in repeated earthquakes is recorded by the structural geometry of deformed geomorphic surfaces. Through geologic mapping and topographic surveying, six strath terraces were identified on the eastern flank of...
Despite more than two centuries of exploration, including more than six million deep wellbores with depths exceeding 40,000 feet in some parts of the world, our ability to constrain subsurface processes and properties remains limited. Characteristics of the subsurface vary and can be analyzed on a variety of spatial scales....
