About the project
The project aims to use and combine the latest techniques in seismology, structural geology, and geodesy to understand interaction of geological faults and volatile phase fluids in space and time during active extension of continents. The research will target the Corinth rift of Greece, where earthquakes are a significant hazard.
Rifting is an integral part of plate tectonics, causing continents to divide and new oceans to form. Despite the importance of faulting in crustal extension, there remain significant questions on when fault geometries become established, how behaviour of faults varies in space and time, and how faulting interacts with flow of volatile-rich fluids.
The University of Southampton is a global leader in probing past and present rift processes in active continental rifts such as East Africa and Corinth (e.g. Nixon et al., 2024) and have on-going strong links with academic partners and seismic monitoring agencies in Greece (e.g. National Observatory of Athens).
A core aim of the project is to record and analyse local earthquake data from the active Corinth rift to determine the locations and styles of earthquake rupture, and whether faulting is linked to subsurface volatile-rich fluid motions. To do this, cutting edge techniques including waveform analysis using machine learning will be used to detect and locate microseismicity to high resolution (e.g. Cianetti et al., 2021). Earthquake back-projections can be conducted to image seismic source areas.
Focal mechanisms and seismic anisotropy will be computed to better understand fault kinematics and the crustal fracture network. The variability of seismic parameters in space and time will aid interpretation of fluid control. In addition, there will be the opportunity to conduct field geology, satellite geodesy (InSAR and GNSS) (e.g. La Rosa et al., 2023), and potentially seismic reflection-based studies to quantify active fault networks and better understand the rift system.
Supervisors
You will also be supervised by organisations other than the University of Southampton, including Dr. Christos Evangelidis from the National Observatory of Athens and Carolina Pagli from the University of Pisa.
