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Current and Future Challenges in Engineering Seismology

Date: 4/25/2019

Time: 8:30 AM to 3:00 PM

Room: Pine

The impressive ongoing densification of modern high-quality earthquake monitoring networks in most earthquake prone countries means that near-field strong ground motions—which dominate earthquake hazard—are increasingly recorded worldwide. Earthquake records are then made available to the seismological and engineering communities through open access databases and associated, state-of-the art web services. These high-quality earthquake waveforms are typically acquired at a variety of recording sites, ranging from rocklike ground to very soft sediments, with well characterized geotechnical and geophysical properties. This allows novel, physically sound representations of site terms in empirical ground-motion models and for reliably constraining reference rock ground motions. At the same time, tremendous advances in computational seismology allow physics-based numerical simulations of strong ground motions to reliably complement and further constrain ground-motion prediction efforts and hazard studies, by providing opportunities to model and test the impacts of complex source characteristics on expected ground motions. Ground-motion models are one of the key ingredients of seismic hazard assessments for tectonic and induced earthquakes, increasingly implemented also in real-time or rapid fashion to promptly identify potential associated impacts and losses and to optimize emergency response. Earthquake impact mitigation, that chiefly relies on modern earthquake resistant construction practice, requires effective translation of scientific investigation into building codes and requires continuous dialogue between the seismological and engineering communities. With this background, this session welcomes novel and multi-disciplinary contributions focusing on the current "grand challenges" in engineering seismology like: (a) prediction of near-field strong ground motions; (b) prediction of reference rock ground motions; (c) new approaches to empirical and computational ground motion modelling (including novel functional forms and predictors and attempts to reduce prediction uncertainties); (d) advanced site characterization (beyond the use of Vs,30 and site classes); (e) real-time/rapid earthquake hazard and impact assessment; and (f) translation of seismological science into building codes. We aim at a rich discussion that brings together experiences and ideas from the operational and research communities, and from empirical and numerical modelers. Students and early career seismologists are encouraged to present their ongoing and recent works.

Conveners

Carlo Cauzzi, Swiss Seismological Service at ETH Zurich & ORFEUS (carlo.cauzzi@sed.ethz.ch)
Ralph Archuleta, University of California, Santa Barbara (ralph.archuleta@ucsb.edu)
Fabrice Cotton, GFZ Research Center for Geosciences (fcotton@gfz-potsdam.de)
Nicolas Luco, U.S. Geological Survey (nluco@usgs.gov)
Alberto Michelini, Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia (alberto.michelini@ingv.it)
Stefano Parolai, Istituto Nazionale di Oceanografia e di Geofisica Sperimentale (sparolai@inogs.it)
Ellen Rathje, University of Texas at Austin (e.rathje@mail.utexas.edu)
David Wald, U.S. Geological Survey (wald@usgs.gov)

Oral Presentations