Workshop: New Departures in Structural Geology and Tectonics, September 2002, Denver

Stanford University, Stanford CA

Investigators

Abstract

Recognition of new opportunities for research in structural geology and tectonics, brought into focus by recent technological developments, new quantitative data sets, and both conceptual and theoretical advances, motivate a workshop to consider the future directions of science in this field. These new opportunities also bring into focus long standing questions in this area of research about the relative merits of descriptive versus quantitative methods, case studies of particular regions versus experimental studies of particular mechanisms, kinematic versus mechanical modeling, and historical versus process-oriented objectives. Funding is requested to organize and carry out the workshop, and to prepare and distribute a white paper summarizing new departures for research in structural geology and tectonics. Participants in the workshop, who will prepare the white paper, represent the community of scholars in this field in the broadest disciplinary sense. They will solicit input and comments from peers and colleagues to seek balanced and representative statements about future scientific directions in this field. It is anticipated that the white paper will help to set the course of research in structural geology and tectonics in the next decade, that it will provide criteria to help evaluate the intellectual merits of proposed research in this area, that it will help identify areas of investigation and methodologies ripe for the most rapid advances and scientific breakthroughs, and that it will provide guidance to instructors for the selection of topics and the discussion of methodologies in the classroom. The white paper will be distributed in hard copy form to the NSF EAR Division professional personnel, and to appropriate professional personnel in charge of research grants at the USGS and the DoE. The white paper will be made available to members of the Structural Geology and Tectonics Division of the GSA, and to members of appropriate divisions of the AGU through a website.