Earthquake Seismology Center

Keiiti Aki

Researcher

💡 Co-authored the field-defining textbook 'Quantitative Seismology'; pioneered seismic coda-wave analysis and laid theoretical groundwork for ambient-noise-based imaging

Akitsune Imamura

Researcher

💡 Correctly warned of a major earthquake risk to Tokyo years before the devastating 1923 Great Kanto earthquake, and pioneered systematic earthquake forecasting/early-warning research in Japan

Adam Dziewonski

Researcher

💡 Co-founded the Harvard/Global Centroid Moment Tensor (CMT) catalogue (1981), the standard database of earthquake moment tensor solutions

Inge Lehmann

Researcher

💡 Discovered the solid inner core of the Earth (1936) by analyzing anomalous seismic wave arrivals

Bruce Bolt

Researcher

💡 Pioneer of engineering seismology and strong-motion instrumentation; advocated near-fault strong-motion sensor networks; authored the standard textbook 'Earthquakes'

Katsutada Sezawa

Researcher

💡 Founding theoretical work on seismic surface-wave propagation in layered media (Sezawa waves), the mathematical basis of modern site-amplification and Vs30 analysis

Jack H. Healy

Researcher

💡 Led USGS investigation of the Denver earthquakes and the Rangely, Colorado fluid-injection experiment (1976), providing the first controlled field proof that fluid injection triggers earthquakes

John Milne

Researcher

💡 Invented the modern horizontal-pendulum seismograph and established the first global network of seismological observatories

C. Allin Cornell

Researcher

💡 Founded probabilistic seismic hazard analysis (PSHA) with his 1968 paper 'Engineering Seismic Risk Analysis'

Harold Jeffreys

Researcher

💡 Co-developed the Jeffreys-Bullen seismic travel-time tables (1940), the foundational reference for earthquake location for decades

Leon Knopoff

Researcher

💡 Developed the theoretical 'double-couple' model of an earthquake source (1956) and, with Robert Burridge, the 1964 representation theorem foundational to modern rupture theory

J. Tuzo Wilson

Researcher

💡 Introduced the concept of transform faults (1965), explaining how earthquake-generating plate boundaries connect mid-ocean ridges and subduction zones, a cornerstone of plate tectonics

Fusakichi Omori

Researcher

💡 Discovered Omori's Law (1894) describing the power-law decay of aftershock frequency with time, the foundation of modern earthquake statistics

Jacques Angelier

Researcher

💡 Developed the fault-slip and focal-mechanism stress-tensor inversion methods (right-dihedral and INVD methods) that are the standard tools of seismotectonic stress analysis

Frank Press

Researcher

💡 Directed the Caltech Seismological Laboratory and contributed to free-oscillation seismology and tsunami-generating earthquake source studies underlying modern tsunami warning systems; later served as science advisor to the US President and President of the National Academy of Sciences

Thomas Jaggar

Researcher

💡 Founded the Hawaiian Volcano Observatory (1912) and pioneered continuous seismographic monitoring of active volcanoes