The Earth's crust stretches and thins in a process called rifting, raising heat from deep within the planet closer to the surface. Rock fractures created during rifting enable hot fluids to circulate underground, making many rift systems ideal for harnessing geothermal energy used for electricity or heating.
To address the transition to low-carbon energy sources, we simulate long-term deformation and shorter-term reservoir and rock mechanics to evaluate the geothermal potential within the Upper Rhine Graben, France–Germany.
See projectOn geological time scales, the Earth undergoes cycles of continental assembly and breakup, forming supercontinents like Pangaea. This cycle of opening and closing oceans is referred to as the Wilson Cycle. Although many new oceans develop along existing mountain belts, this is not always the case.
The North Atlantic Ocean opened about 60 million years ago, and somehow a sliver of Greenland's crust ended up on the Canadian side. We simulated the breakup process in supercomputers, showing how ancient mountains contribute to the final breakup geometry.
See publicationLooking around the world, we realized that these fragments are far more common than previously thought. By examining how tectonic history shapes their formation, we searched for the underlying “recipe” that controls their geometry.
We conducted nearly 100 rift models and analyzed them using an automated workflow. Our results identify that pre-existing weaknesses due to previous subduction and collision control fragment width, while the temperature during rifting determines if the rift is narrow or wide.
See publicationAround 10,000 years ago, much of North America was covered by massive ice sheets. As these glaciers retreated, they left behind glacial lakes that preserve records of environmental change during deglaciation, or even ancient earthquakes.
Western Quebec is earthquake-prone, but modern records are too short to capture long-term risk. We analyzed seismic reflection data from an ancient glacial lake and identified sediment layers that track environmental change as the ice sheet retreated. We also found disturbed layers that may record either past earthquakes or pulses of glacial meltwater and sediment.
See publicationGlaciers are powerful agents of erosion and sediment transport. Depending on the surface hardness, they leave behind a wide range of landforms.
Large grooves carved into bedrock preserve a clear record of past ice motion. We mapped and measured these features in Odessa, Canada, to reconstruct regional glacier flow. Their orientation indicates a southwestward advance of the Ontario Lobe during the last glacial cycle, followed by a later northwestward retreat.
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