Ruggero has travelled a tough PhD journey. Foraging for his last bits of energy to continue onward on the treacherous odyssey of academia, he murmurs: How can I (re)gain some confidence after it has been shattered during my PhD? Dear Ruggero, Ciao bello. Does that help? Never mind. Just kidding. I cannot imagine how badly your confidence was shattered during your PhD. That’s a pretty tough d ...[Read More]
Both earthquakes and research project directions can be hard to predict. This week Becky Fildes, a graduate student at UC Davis, takes us on a journey of how she came to study earthquake behavior in Hawaii during an active volcanic eruption and how our understanding of caldera collapses can be further improved. In my first year of graduate school in 2017, I had started studying earthquake statisti ...[Read More]
There are no stupid questions. How many times have we heard that from colleagues and in classrooms? Obviously an exceedingly sizeable chunk of our community does not receive stupid questions often enough. Even silly questions have their merits though, and obviously they deserve an answer, at least to avoid them being asked in the future. My very busy mailbox has recently seen a staggering increase ...[Read More]
Mechanisms for stab stagnation are essential for understanding the mantle circulation patterns. This week, Diandian Peng, a graduate student from University of Illinois explores how dynamic pressure gradients can pull the slabs sideways stagnating them at the Mantle Transition Zone. Seismic imaging provides critical constraints on the structure and evolution of subducted slabs. Numerous tomographi ...[Read More]
