The science behind earthquakes

Tiny movements in Earth’s outermost layer may provide a Rosetta Stone for deciphering the physics and warning signs of big quakes. New algorithms that work a little like human vision are now detecting these long-hidden microquakes in the growing mountain of seismic data.

Scientists are training machine learning algorithms to help shed light on earthquake hazards, volcanic eruptions, groundwater flow and longstanding mysteries about what goes on beneath the Earth’s surface.

Stanford geoscientists have devised a new algorithm for detecting thousands of faint, previously missed earthquakes triggered by hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking.”

Stanford geophysicist Biondo Biondi dreams of turning existing networks of buried optical fibers into an inexpensive “billion sensors” observatory for continuously monitoring and studying earthquakes

A study provides new evidence that the same optical fibers that deliver high-speed internet and HD video to our homes could one day provide an inexpensive observatory for monitoring and studying earthquakes.

An algorithm inspired by the song-matching app is helping Stanford scientists find previously overlooked earthquakes in large databases of ground motion measurements.

New research provides the first quantitative synthesis of faulting across the entire continent, as well as hundreds of measurements of the direction from which the greatest pressure occurs in the Earth’s crust.

Stanford geophysicist Simon Klemperer discusses how the 2015 Gorkha earthquake that shook Kathmandu in central Nepal gave researchers new information about where, why and how earthquakes occur

A new fault simulator maps out how interactions between pressure, friction and fluids rising through a fault zone can lead to slow-motion quakes and seismic swarms

Scientists have explained mysterious slow-moving earthquakes known as slow slip events with the help of computer simulations. The answer, they learned, is in rocks’ pores

An earthquake in Indonesia that cracked through the Earth at nearly 9,200 miles an hour offered a detailed look at supershear, which can create the geologic version of a sonic boom. Stanford geophysicist Eric Dunham told National Geographic the event could help researchers understand where and how super-fast quakes can happen.

“We’d like to think we know about all of the faults of that size and their prehistory, but here we missed it,” Ross Stein, an adjunct professor in geophysics at Stanford, told The New York Times. 

There are technologies available that could move us toward stronger, safer buildings, but a lack of political and economic will is holding us back. Stanford civil engineer Anne Kiremidjian says a culture of resilience can help cities bounce back from disaster stronger than ever.

A study found that economically disadvantaged children prenatally exposed to an environmental stressor had much lower cognitive abilities than their counterparts who didn’t experience the stress. No effect was found among children in upper- or middle-class families. The study used a strong earthquake in Chile to explore the impacts.

A Stanford doctor discusses his experience providing emergency medical response to earthquakes in Nepal and Haiti, and explains what leaders should know before the next natural disaster strikes.

Officials know how to account for deaths, injuries and property damages after the shaking stops, but a new study describes the first way to estimate the far greater financial fallout that such a disaster would have, especially on the poor.

Research shows that human-induced and naturally occurring earthquakes in the central U.S. share the same shaking potential and can thus cause similar damage.

A geothermal energy project triggered a damaging earthquake in 2017 in South Korea. A new analysis suggests flaws in some of the most common ways of trying to minimize the risk of such quakes when harnessing the Earth’s heat for energy.

In the course of his research for a book about the collapse of civilizations following earthquake storms – devastating sequences of seismic upheaval – Stanford geophysicist Amos Nur found that historians often overlook ancient earthquakes because written documentation of their occurrence is rare.

“Yet the physical ruins left behind these events testify to the presence of catastrophic forces lurking in the landscape,” Wired reported. “Nur’s unsettling conclusion is that earthquake damage throughout human history has been substantially underestimated.”

Read the full story: "Move over, San Andreas: There's an ominous new fault in town."

Data is reshaping our knowledge about many things, including earthquakes: how we measure them, what causes them and how we can better prepare for them.

Geophysicist Gregory Beroza discusses the culprits behind destructive aftershocks and why scientists are harnessing artificial intelligence to gain new insights into earthquake risks.

A study suggests foreshocks are just like other small quakes, not helpful warning signs as previously thought.

A Stanford-led research team is helping disaster response officials figure out where injuries are likeliest to occur, so survivors can get to the hospitals best able to treat them.

​After the 1906 quake the city built a water network dedicated to fire-fighting. A computer model suggests the best strategy to strengthen this system for another century.

Stanford civil engineers are working with the city to assess high-rise safety and mitigate any disruption, downtime or lost economic activity should downtown buildings be damaged.

Can pets predict earthquakes? Could climate change have a small effect on quakes? Why is the Richter scale falling out of fashion for measuring earthquakes? Stanford Earth professor Greg Beroza and Marine Denolle, Geophysics PhD ‘14, explain earthquakes and some of the latest science on measuring and predicting them. Read more at Vox.

Scientists have long held out hope that major earthquakes might be predictable from  the smaller tremors that often occur right before a major quake. But a study of a 1999 quake near Izmit, Turkey shows no connection. “We found that the foreshocks – the earthquakes that preceded it – were no different than ordinary earthquakes,” geophysicist William Ellsworth told KQED.

On the anniversary of the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, experts shared their perspectives on how the event impacted them and the Bay Area, and transformed earthquake science.

“As soon as it had stopped, I went down the hall to an old analog phone – all the others were computer phones and dead – to call Dr. Rob Wesson, PhD ’70, who was the head of the earthquake office at the USGS,” said geophysics professor William Ellsworth, who was working as a research geophysicist at the U.S. Geological Survey in his Menlo Park office at the time of the quake. “He was excited to hear me and wanted to talk baseball, at least until I told him that we had just experienced a major earthquake and our lives would be different from now on. How true that proved to be.”