About Us
Caltech's Seismological Laboratory, an arm of the Division of Geological and Planetary Sciences (GPS), was established in 1921. It has a distinguished history of leadership in science and serving the public interest. Internationally recognized for excellence in geophysical research and academics while also having outstanding facilities in seismic networks, high performance computing, and mineral physics, makes the Seismo Lab an ideal place for study and research. The Lab serves as a focal point for earthquake information in Southern California and the world.
Spotlight
Earthquake Early Warning
Scientists and engineers at Caltech, UC Berkeley, the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH), and the University of Southern California (USC) started in 2007 to develop and implement an earthquake early warning (EEW) demonstration system for California, called CISN ShakeAlert. ShakeAlert makes use of the existing infrastructure of the California Integrated Seismic Network (CISN), including waveform data streams from ~380 broadband and strong-motion stations throughout California. The objective of EEW is to provide a few to a few tens of seconds of warning before strong shaking arrives. The research and development at Caltech addresses various aspects of EEW, ranging from algorithms for fast earthquake detection, over the rapid communication of alert messages to real-time engineering applications.
Seismo Lab Students Present at 2012 AGU Fall Meeting
December 3-7, Seismo Lab students presented their research at the American Geophysical Union (AGU) annual Fall meeting. They reported their findings on a range of topics, reflecting the diversity of studies undertaken in the Seismo Lab and the collaborative approach to addressing research questions.
Asaf Inbal
I use a wide range of seismic and geodetic observations to investigate the March 11, 2011, M9.0 Tohoku-Oki earthquake. I am mainly focusing on details of high-frequency energy radiation during the earthquake rupture and the spatio-temporal distribution of early post-seismic slip and aftershocks.
Learn more about Asaf's research here
Yihe Huang
Yihe Huang presented an observation- based dynamic model of the 2011 Mw9.0 Tohoku-Oki Earthquake. The model explains the physics behind the anomalous slip in the shallower region and high-frequency radiation in the deeper region. This research sheds some light on the mechanism of other megathrust earthquakes.
Learn more about Yihe's research here
Hilary Martens
Hilary R. Martens presented observations and modeled predictions of Earth's response to ocean tidal loading in South America. The material properties of the underlying crust and mantle determine the spatial and temporal characteristics of the response for a given load; hence, matching predictions to observations can provide insight into the elastic structure of the Amazonian craton.
Learn more about Hilary's research here
The AGU annual Fall meeting, held in San Francisco, is the largest gathering of Earth scientists in the World and the premier conference for geophysics. Each year Seismo Lab students, post-docs and faculty showcase their research through invited talks, oral presentations, and poster sessions.
