Quaking, Shaking and Supercomputing in Alaska
by Carl Tape
Saturday, January 5, 2013 at 2 p.m.
Schaible Auditorium, University of Alaska Fairbanks
Lecture Summary:
Alaska has had several of the world’s largest earthquakes of the past 100 years. Large earthquakes pose a hazard to all three main population centers in Alaska: Anchorage, Fairbanks, and Juneau. This hazard can be quantified by using supercomputers to simulate how seismic waves travel through the complex crustal structure of Alaska. Animations reveal how seismic waves propagate in Alaska for different possible earthquakes. These simulations are computed at the Arctic Region Supercomputing Center. This lecture will show how state-of-the-art modeling and computing are being used to improve our understanding of earthquakes and structural variations in Alaska.
Presenter Biography:
Carl Tape is an assistant professor of geophysics at the University of Alaska Fairbanks in the Department of Geology and Geophysics. The lifelong Fairbanksan graduated from West Valley High School and went on to double-major in physics and geology at Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota. Tape earned his master’s degree in earth sciences as a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University and his doctoral degree in geophysics at the California Institute of Technology. Prior to his position at UAF, Tape was a post-doctoral fellow for the National Science Foundation at Harvard University. Tape’s research interests include seismic tomography and seismic wave propagation using two- and three-dimensional modeling on super computers.