GG5330

Earthquake Seismology and Hazard Assessment

Spring 2006

Time

3 credit hours
Two lectures:	Monday, 5:00 PM-6:30 PM WBB 711, lecture
	Wed: 2:00 PM-4:00 PM WBB 711, 717 recitation and laboratory

Instructor

Robert B. Smith
702 Browning Bldg
email: rbsmith@mines.utah.edu
phone: 1-7129
office hours by appointment

Teaching Assistants

Wu-Lung Chang, Jamie Farrell, Bonnie Pickering, and Christine Puskas
706 Browning Bldg
email: wchang@mines.utah.edu
email: jfarrell@mines.utah.edu
email: bpickering@mines.utah.edu
email: cmpuskas@mines.utah.edu
office phone: 1-7856
office hours by appointment

Prerequisites

GG5210, differential equations and partial differential equations recommended or consent of instructor. Experience with MatLab and/or Maple as well as UNIX and FORTRAN programming preferred.

Description

Earthquake seismology, earthquake mechanics, wave propagation, earth structure, instrumentation, interpretation of seismograms, focal mechanisms, faults, paleoseismology, seismotectonics, earthquake locations and magnitudes, etc.

Note that a special 1 credit hour section will be taught in the last 6 weeks of the course that can be taken separately without the main course and focuses on the applied aspects of earthquake seismology. This component will emphasize engineering seismology, strong ground motions, deterministic and probabilistic earthquake hazard assessment including use of fault and earthquake history, strong ground motion, attenuation, and related information.

The hazard component is planned as a parallel course to geotechnical engineering courses in engineering and hazards courses in geography. It will cover the first 5 chapters and parts of chapter 7 from: Kramer, 1996, Geotechnical earthquake engineering, Prentice Hall, 653 pages.

Prerequisite for hazard section

Upper level undergraduate standing in such fields as engineering, geography, geology, etc. Also practicing professionals, etc. are welcome.

Scope of Course

Current topics in earthquake seismology such as inverse methods for tomographic images of whole earth structure, probabilistic and deterministic hazards analyses, and earthquake locations, and the use of high grequency and broadband seismic data recorded on modern digital networks will be discussed. Readings, labs, a term project, and homework will emphasize computational methods (primarily using MatLab) and journal articles.

Special analyses will emphasize the seismotectonics and hazards of the San Andreas fault, the Yellowstone hotspot, the Wasatch fault, and recent large global earthquakes (Turkey, Hector Mine, Taiwan).

Class Resources

Class Syllabus

Class Outline

Class Schedule

Lecture Handouts

Dr. Smith's Lecture Notes

Problem Sets

Labs

Labs will focus on the interpretation and analyses of digital earthquake data using digital and analog seismograms, analyses of local earthquake data on a workstation, plotting and interpretation of earthquake record sections, interpretation of paper record seismograms, and spectral analyses of strong ground motion records and probabilistic risk assessment.

Term Project

Each student or teams of students will do a term project that will be written up as a term paper and will be due the last week of class with a presentation the last week of the course. Topics should include applications that can be completed in one quarter.

Readings

Assigned readings will be made from the current literature. Emphasis will be made on timely topics in mechanisms of earthquakes and earthquake hazard analyses, strong ground motion, attenuation, and time series analyses for engineering applications will be given.

Special Lectures

Invited speakers will provide timely lectures on such topics as earthquake time series, affects of 3-D structure on earthquake locations, basin amplification, probabilistic earthquake hazards of hazardous waste sites and Yucca Mtn repository.

Digital Analyses

Most homework will be assigned that will require computations on SUN workstations and Mac/PC in Matlab and Excel macros. Note: In order to use the Sun workstations you must have an account on the College of Mines and Earth Sciences computer facility.

Hand-On Experience

A hands-on and individual project of reviewing earthquake data recorded in the University seismograph recording laboratory will be done one student at a time for a two-week long perid. This will entail a student spending about 1 hr per week for two weeks learning how to analyze local UUSS recorded earthquakes and keeping track of teleseisms and viewing them on the Antelope system.

Grades

Final grade will be based upon homework, laboratories, readings, one 1-hour exam, and a term project (in place of a final exam).

Textbooks

Kramer, S. L., 1996, Geotechnical earthquake engineering, Prentice Hall, 653pp.

Smith, R.B. 1997, Tectonophysics and Earthquake Seismology lecture notes, chapters 14-22 on earthquake seismology on our web site.

Stein, S. and M. Wysession, 2002, Introduction to Seismology, Earthquakes and Earth Structure, Blackwell Publishing: Oxford, UK, 498 pp.

Books can be purchased at the University Bookstore or through the following online book sales: bestbookbuys.com (compares prices from several online retailers), varsitybooks.com, barnesandnoble.com, borders.com and amazon.com.

General earthquake references

On reserve in Marriott library or from the instructor:

Aki, K. and P. Richards, 1980, Quantitative seismology, W.F. Freeman and Co.

Das, S. and Kostrov, B.V., 1988, Principles of earthquake source mechanics, Cambridge University Press.

Kennett, B. L. N., 1991, IASPEI 1991, Seismological tables, Research School of Earth Sciences, Australian National University, Canberra.

Lay, T. and T. Wallace, 1995, Modern Global Seismology (International Geophysics Series), Vol 58, Academic Press.

Scholz, C.H., 1990, The mechanics of earthquakes and faulting, Cambridge University Press.

Shearer, P., 1999, Introduction to seismology, Cambridge University Press, 260 pp.

Wallace, R. E.(editor), 1990, Seismicity, 1980-86, in the San Andreas Fault System, U. S. Geol. Surv. Professional Paper.

Reference texts in earthquake hazards

McCalpin, J.P., editor, J., 1996, Paleoseismology, Academic Press.

Krinitsky, E. L., and D. B. Slemmons, 1990, Neotectonics in earthquake evaluation, Geological Soc. of America, Reviews in Engineering Geology, V. VIII.

Keller, E. A. And N. Pinter., 1966, Active Tectonics: Earthquakes, Uplift and Landscape, Prentice-Hall, Inc.

Pinter, N., 1996, Exercises In Active Tectonics, Prentice Hall, Inc.

Reiter, L, 1990, Earthquake hazard analysis, Issues and insights, Colombia University Press.

Yeats, R.S., K. Sieh, and C.R. Allen, 1997, The geology of earthquakes, Oxford Univ. Press.

Web Links on Seismology

General Online documents on plate tectonics and earthquakes

Kious, W. J. and R. I. Tilling, 1997, This Dynamic Earth: the story of Plate Tectonics, U.S. Geol. Surv. 77p.

Shedlock, K. and L. Pakiser, 1997, Earthquakes, Online document

Frankel, A., 1996, US National Earthquake Hazard Maps

SCEC Education Module: Investigating Earthquakes through Regional Seismicity

Plate tectonics, earthquakes and GPS

Earthquake location methods

General Online documents on Probability

Example of the Central Limit Theorem

Another example of the Central Limit Theorem

A proof of the Central Limit Theorem

General Books on Geologic Hazards

Abbot, Patrick L., 1998, Natural Disasters, McGraw-Hill.

Bolt, B., 1993, Earthquakes and geological discovery, Academic Press (available in bookstore).

Bolt, B., 1993, Earthquakes, W. H. Freeman and Company, 331 p.

McGuire, W., 1999, Apocalypse, A natural history of global disasters, Cassel, London, 256 pp.

Murck, B., B. Skinner, and S. Porter, 1997, Dangerous Earth: An Introduction to Geologic Hazards, John Wiley & Sons, 300 pp.

Entertaining bedtime reading

McPhee, J., 1990, The Control of Nature, Farrar, Straus, how volcanos, earthquakes and river control affects mankind.

McPhee, J., 1990, Basin and Range, Noonday Press -- A field trip across the Great Basin, its evolution and mineralization.

McPhee, J., 1991, Rising From The Plains, Noonday Press -- The geology of Wyoming which tells the story of the origin of the Rocky Mountains.