prof. Thomas Rockwell, Ph.D.

Muž
Department of Neotectonics and Thermochronology
E-mail: rockwell@irsm.cas.cz
Office:room No.: 408, building: C, floor: 4
Institute of Rock Structure and Mechanics of the CAS, v.v.i.
V Holešovičkách 41
182 09, Prague 8
Czech Republic
 
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About Me

Dr. Thomas Rockwell is a nationally and internationally renowned paleoseismologist and structural geologist who has published over 160 articles in major international journals, coauthored a number of book chapters, published over 40 papers in conference proceedings and guidebooks, and coauthored several hundred papers presented at professional meetings. He is a professor at San Diego State University in Geological Sciences, having joined the faculty in 1983. He served as Geology Group Leader and on the Planning Committee for the Southern California Earthquake Center for many years, and is now on the Board of Directors. He is an expert on the tectonics and earthquake hazards of southern California and Baja California, has conducted extensive trenching programs to date earthquakes on faults in the western U.S., South and Central America, Europe, the Middle East and Asia, and routinely uses soil stratigraphy and geomorphology combined with various radiometric dating techniques to assess rates of fault activity, determine recency of faulting, and date past earthquakes. In the past decade, he has initiated a number of ground-breaking studies on fault zone architecture and processes in southern California and Baja California. New work on fault zone damage, pulverization, and fluid processes has resulted in over a dozen well-cited papers on this topic since 2006. His other research focuses on understanding earthquake occurrence in time and space. Current projects include the characterization of fault systems behavior by understanding patterns of past recurrence of large earthquakes on faults in southern California, northern Mexico, Portugal, Spain, the Czech Republic, and Israel. This work includes resolving information on slip per event, as it relates to understanding the controls on segmentation and rupture termination. Current work on fault zone processes initially focused on damage characteristics, but has shifted to the role of fluids and the processes that produce the damage. He has also worked extensively on the affects of tectonism on the landscape, and using geomorphology to constrain rates and timing of tectonic events. Included in this latter aspect is detailed mapping and dating of marine terraces along the west coast of North America and assessment of paleosea level during the late Quaternary. As a consultant, he has worked on numerous critical facilities worldwide, including seismic hazard characterization studies of dams, LNG facilities, nuclear power plants, the Panama Canal Expansion project, and US Government facilities (LANL). He has served on the PPRP for several SSHAC3 SSC (Diablo Canyon, Palo Verde, Korea) and one GMC studies (SWUS), and worked with the IAEA in evaluation of nuclear sites in Turkey, Armenia and Chile. He serves on the Board of Consultants for utility companies in Califrornia, including Pacific Gas & Electric and Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, and has joined the Advisory Panel for Geotechnical Extreme Events Reconnaisance (GEER) Association, which coordinates National Science Foundation repsonses to extreme events, such as earthquakes.