Acquisition of Computational and Analytical Facilities for 3-Dimensional Imaging and Visualization in Geophysics, Petrology, and Hydrogeology

University Of Connecticut, Storrs CT

Investigators

Abstract

0236721 Cormier This grant provides support for the acquisition of a 16 processor cluster computer and related imaging hardware and software facilitate modeling studies of two- and three-dimensional structure of the earth's lower mantle and inner core and studies of the fabric of solidifying basalt. The increased processing power of the system will particularly aid in the seismic imaging of small scale (1-1000 km) heterogeneity of the earth. The small-scale structural fabric of the Earth is important to the understanding of the formation of oceanic crust, mantle convection, slab cycling, plume formation, and solidification of the inner core. The small-scale fabric of the inner core controls deformation of the inner core boundary and its relation to the differential rotation of the inner core and mantle and the earth's magnetic field. New constraints on the small-scale structures enabled by the acquisition can also aid in determining the origin of the heterogeneous structure in the lower mantle: remnant slabs, solid-solid phase transitions, pools of primitive mantle, partial melt, or core-mantle chemical reactions. ***