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Speaker: Erik Fredrickson, Distinguished Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Texas Institute for Geophysics

Host: Laura Wallace

Title: Seafloor Pressure Geodesy for Observing Transient Slip Processes in Offshore Subduction Systems

Abstract: Tectonic plate boundaries host a range of solid-Earth physical processes of scientific and societal interest, including the majority of the world’s volcanism and earthquakes. However, their location primarily beneath the oceans poses significant challenges for observation and study. There is currently a major push in the tectonics and hazards scientific communities to expand seafloor geodetic efforts and instrument the offshore segments of subduction zones. I’ll present an overview of seafloor pressure geodesy in the context of slow slip earthquakes and discuss the techniques developed from my thesis work in the Cascadia and Alaska margins for parsing out centimeter-scale tectonic signals amidst a sea of oceanographic noise. I’ll also talk about my ongoing work here at UTIG using offshore geodesy to characterize slow slip earthquakes in the Hikurangi margin.