Emily Elizabeth Brodsky

About

Emily Elizabeth Brodsky is a professor of Earth and planetary sciences at the University of California, Santa Cruz, specializing in earthquake physics. Her research focuses on studying the mechanics underlying earthquakes, including the processes that trigger earthquakes and the forces and processes occurring inside fault zones during slip. Her expertise spans multiple geoscience disciplines such as seismology, hydrogeology, structural geology, and rock mechanics. Brodsky has contributed to understanding earthquake mechanics through significant studies, including organizing and leading an international expedition to study the fault after the 2011 Tohoku earthquake off Japan. Her recent work includes important findings about earthquakes induced by human activities involving underground fluid injections, such as hydraulic fracturing, wastewater disposal, and geothermal wells. She has published over 130 peer-reviewed articles and has been recognized with numerous awards, including election to the National Academy of Sciences in 2023, the Price Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society in 2021, and the Gutenberg Lectureship of the American Geophysical Union in 2019. Brodsky has served on various scientific boards and has been a distinguished lecturer for multiple programs, reflecting her leadership and influence in the field of geophysics.

Research topics

• Seismology
• Geology
• Computer Science
• History
• Physics
• Archaeology
• Art history
• Library science

Selected publications

• What Controls Variations in Aftershock Productivity?

  Journal of Geophysical Research Solid Earth · 2020 · 85 citations

  Abstract The number of aftershocks increases with mainshock size following a well‐defined scaling law. However, excursions from the average behavior are common. This variability is particularly concerning for large earthquakes where the number of aftershocks varies by factors of 100 for mainshocks of comparable magnitude. Do observable factors lead to differences in aftershock behavior? We examine aftershock productivity relative to the global average for all mainshocks ( ) from 1990 to 2019. A…

  DOI

• Two Foreshock Sequences Post Gulia and Wiemer (2019)

  Seismological Research Letters · 2020 · 51 citations

  Senior authorCorresponding

  Abstract Recognizing earthquakes as foreshocks in real time would provide a valuable forecasting capability. In a recent study, Gulia and Wiemer (2019) proposed a traffic-light system that relies on abrupt changes in b-values relative to background values. The approach utilizes high-resolution earthquake catalogs to monitor localized regions around the largest events and distinguish foreshock sequences (reduced b-values) from aftershock sequences (increased b-values). The recent well-recorded ea…

  DOI

• New Opportunities to Study Earthquake Precursors

  Seismological Research Letters · 2020 · 48 citations

  The topic of earthquake prediction has a long history, littered with failed attempts. Part of the challenge is that possible precursory signals are usually reported after the event, and the systematic relationships between potential precursors and main events, should they exist, are unclear. Several recent studies have shown the potential of new approaches to simultaneously detect earthquake foreshocks and slow‐slip phenomena through ground deformation, seismic, and gravitational transients—week…

  DOI

• Using Deep Learning for Flexible and Scalable Earthquake Forecasting

  Geophysical Research Letters · 2023-08-31 · 40 citations

  articleOpen access

  Abstract Seismology is witnessing explosive growth in the diversity and scale of earthquake catalogs. A key motivation for this community effort is that more data should translate into better earthquake forecasts. Such improvements are yet to be seen. Here, we introduce the Recurrent Earthquake foreCAST (RECAST), a deep‐learning model based on recent developments in neural temporal point processes. The model enables access to a greater volume and diversity of earthquake observations, overcoming…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Seismological Indicators of Geologically Inferred Fault Maturity

  Journal of Geophysical Research Solid Earth · 2023-09-22 · 24 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  Abstract Variations in fault zone maturity have intermittently been invoked to explain variations in some seismological observations for large earthquakes. However, the lack of a unified geological definition of fault maturity makes quantitative assessment of its importance difficult. We evaluate the degree of empirical correlation between geological and geometric measurements commonly invoked as indicative of fault zone maturity and remotely measured seismological source parameters of 34 M W ≥…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

Recent grants

• Instrumentation for Rapid Temperature Measurement at Depth on the Wenchuan Fault

  NSF · $39k · 2009–2011

• Three Windows in Stress from the Geology of Faults

  NSF · $320k · 2010–2012

• Using Temperature to Measure Fault Stress: Analysis of Data from the Fault Zone of the Mw 7.9 Wenchuan Earthquake

  NSF · $254k · 2012–2016

Frequent coauthors

• P. M. Fulton

  34 shared

• Thibault Candela

  Netherlands Organisation for Applied Scientific Research

  30 shared

• J. D. Kirkpatrick

  McGill University

  24 shared

• Christopher A. Thom

  University of California, Santa Cruz

  22 shared

• N. van der Elst

  United States Geological Survey

  21 shared

• James Mori

  Kyoto University

  20 shared

• Thorne Lay

  University of California, Santa Cruz

  20 shared

• H. M. Savage

  University of California, Santa Cruz

  19 shared

Labs

• UC Santa Cruz Seismo LabPI

Awards & honors

• Charles Richter Early Career Award from the Seismological So…
• James Macelwane Medal from the American Geophysical Union (2…
• Woollard Award from the Geological Society of America (2019)
• Gutenberg Lectureship from the American Geophysical Union (2…
• Price Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society (2021)

Similar researchers at University of California, Santa Cruz

• Paul L Kochh-80
• Francis Nimmoh-79
• Andrew T Fisherh-60