Phone: (508) 289 2576
e-mail: jlin@whoi.edu

Mailing address:
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
Woods Hole, MA 02543

Jian Lin

My research focuses on the fascinating geological processes of the Earth's lithosphere both on land and under the oceans. I was a visiting scientist at USGS in 1987-88, working with Ross Stein on studying the surface deformation caused by the Whittier Narrows earthquake, which struck in the heart of Los Angeles in 1987, and the potential for future seismic hazard from similar blind thrust quakes under the city. I came to Menlo Park again in 1991-92 as a Visiting Fellow of the Southern California Earthquake Center. Since then I have visited USGS many times, working with Ross Stein and Geoffrey King, and later also with Shinji Toda and Andy Freed, to study how earthquakes and faults interact through stress transfer in space and time. The notable California events that we have studied together include the 1972 San Fernando, 1983 Coalinga, 1985 Kettleman Hills, 1992 Landers, 1994 Northridge, and 1999 Hector Mine quakes. We also investigated mechanisms of stress transfer and earthquake triggering of continental thrust faults and mega-earthquakes on oceanic subduction zones.

When not in Menlo Park, I spend time either at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, in Cape Cod, Massachusetts, or at sea, studying the equally fascinating volcanic and tectonic processes under the oceans. Together with my colleagues, post-docs, and graduate students at the MIT/WHOI Joint Program, we have conducted geophysical surveys, seismic experiments, and rock dredging programs in various oceans and seas. We investigated questions such as how the oceanic crust is created by mantle convection and vigorous submarine volcanism at mid-ocean ridges, how hotspots such as Iceland and Galapagos Island are formed, what control the characters of deep sea faults and abyssal hill terrains, how submarine quakes differ from those on land and what do they teach us about the fundamental earthquake mechanics. My most recent work at sea was conducted half way between South Africa and Antarctica, in the Indian Ocean, where we sailed passing mile-wide, drifting icebergs.

My research is funded by NSF Ocean Sciences Program, NSF Geophysics Program, Office of Naval Research, NASA, Ocean Drilling Program, US Geological Survey, US Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance, Southern California Earthquake Center, and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.

An interview with Jian Lin published at ISI Special Topics, November 2003.