Rachel E. Abercrombie
Research Associate Professor
Office: CAS 131D
Phone: 617.358.2571
E-mail: rea@bu.edu
Rachel’s Homepage
Educational Background
| Ph.D. |
1991 |
University of Reading, England |
| B.A. |
1987 |
Trinity Hall, Cambridge University |
Research
Rachel Abercrombie investigates all aspects of the earthquake rupture process, for example, how earthquakes start and grow, what factors govern the size and location of slip, and how one earthquake affects another. She has studied earthquakes over a wide range of magnitudes and frequencies in many tectonic environments. In particular she has focused on earthquake scaling and nucleation. Prof. Abercrombie has also worked on attenuation and site effects. Her aim is to understand the factors controlling seismic slip by studying earthquakes under a wide range of conditions (for example, on the San Andreas System, in subduction zones, in the oceans, and also very deep earthquakes).
Geophysics research group
Solid Earth and Tectonics research group
Recent Students
- Gisela Viegas Fernandes; PhD (2009); Earthquake source properties and wave propagation in Eastern North America
- Maya El Hariri; MA (2008); Seismicity Patterns and Fluid-flow Observations from Reservoir Induced Earthquakes
- Katherine Murphy; MA (2005); The 23 December 2004 M8.1 Macquarie Ridge Earthquake
- Jelena Tomic; MA (2004); Empirical Green’s Function Analysis of Small Reservoir Induced Earthquakes
Selected Publications (*=student)
- *Tomic, J., R. E. Abercrombie, and Do Nascimento, A. (2009), Source parameters and rupture velocity of small M≤2.2 reservoir induced earthquakes, Geophys. J. Int., doi:10.1111/j.1365-246X.2009.04233.x.
- Yamada,T., J. J. Mori, S. Ide, R. E. Abercrombie, H. Kawakata, M. Nakatani, Y. Iio, and H. Ogasawara (2007), Stress drops and radiated seismic energies of microearthquakes in a South African gold mine, J. Geophys. Res., 112, B03305, doi:10.1029/2006JB004553.
- Sonley, E., and R. E. Abercrombie (2006), Effects of methods of attenuation correction on source parameter determination, American Geophysical Union Monograph, EARTHQUAKES Radiated energy and the physics of faulting, eds. Abercrombie, McGarr, Di Toro and Kanamori.
- Antolik, M., R. E. Abercrombie, Pan, and G. Ekström (2006), Rupture characteristics of the 2003 Mw7.6 Mid-Indian ocean earthquake, J. Geophys. Res., 111, B04302, doi:10.1029/2005JB003785.
- Abercrombie, R. E., and J. R. Rice (2005), Can observations of earthquake sealing constrain slip weakening?, Geophys. J. Int., 162, 406-424.
- Antolik, M., R. E. Abercrombie, and G. Ekström (2004), The 14 November, 2001 Kokoxili (Kunlunshan), Tibet earthquake: rupture transfer through a large externsional step-over, Bull. Seism. Soc. Am., 94, 1173-1194.
