UK e-Science project discovers new knowledge about earthquakes

A UK e-Science project has revealing new scientific insights into earthquakes. Technologies developed under the e-Science ‘Discovery Net’ project are enabling geophysicists to combine two different methods of studying earthquakes and so discover new information that would not have been revealed using one method alone.

One of the methods uses satellite images to reveal land movement on scales from tens of metres to hundreds of kilometres – the 'macro' view. The other uses finite element analysis to model the response of brick-sized volumes of rock to stresses and strains and then add them up to build a picture of likely land movement in the event of an earthquake – the 'micro' view. Finite element analysis is often used to predict earthquake damage to buildings.

Discovery Net researchers at Imperial College, London, have combined these two approaches using InforSense KDE, a workflow-based integrative analytics platform originally developed under Discovery Net and brought to the commercial market by InforSense, a spin-out company from the Department of Computer Science at Imperial College.

The Discovery Net technology for geohazard modelling could be used to build up a comprehensive geological fault line map of the earth, with areas of elevated tension detailed and annotated with models from research groups from all over the world, say the Discovery Net team.

•Date: 24th Nov 2005 • Region: UK/World • Type: Article •Topic: Emergency planning
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