The Institute of Geophysics, Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand announces PhD scholarship opportunities at our university.
We have several seismological projects of interest for which we would like to guide a PhD student:
1) Studies of the Sept. 4 2010, M=7.2 Darfield earthquake near Christchurch, New Zealand. An enormous amount of data has been collected and is being collected on this earthquake and its aftershock sequence. We will be studying aspects including the anisotropic velocity structure in the region and time varying seismic properties related to the earthquake. The project involves investigators in New Zealand and the United States.
2) We are in the early stages of an international collaborative project involving investigators from New Zealand, Japan and the United States to study the subduction zone structure under the Wellington region, North Island, New Zealand. The aim is to determine the material properties of interfaces (especially the subduction interface) at various depths, to try to understand the properties in a locked subduction zone. This project will combine active onshore-offshore seismic experiments (explosions and airgun sources) with passive (earthquake) recordings using short period and broadband recorders.
3) Ongoing studies of the Alpine Fault in the South Island are continuing, with recent success in funding for a project that will drill a 1 km deep borehole to study fault zone properties and their change with depth of exhumation.
If you are interested in any of these projects, please contact Martha Savage. The application deadline is 1 November 2010 and the application is free of charge. Successful scholarship students from any country will receive a NZ$21,000 stipend and will not have to pay tuition fees. Further details including grant proposals are available upon request to Professor Martha Savage, martha.savage@vuw.ac.nz.