Looking inside the Continents from Space: Insights into Earthquake Hazard and Crustal Deformation

Lead Research Organisation: University of Leeds
Department Name: School of Earth and Environment

Abstract

As two tectonic plates move together or apart, any continent trapped between them deforms, causing major geological features such as mountain belts or sedimentary basins to develop. As the brittle, near-surface crust tries to accommodate the deformation, earthquakes occur on faults inside the earth. The need to understand how the continents deform, and where earthquakes will occur, is compelling - between 1.4 and 1.7 million people have died in earthquakes in the continental interiors since 1900.

We can measure the way the continents are actively deforming using satellites. GPS can provide very precise measurements of how individual points on the ground move, but such points are often sparsely distributed. Over the past two decades, satellites designed by the European Space Agency (ESA) have demonstrated the ability of satellite-borne radar to measure displacements of the earth's surface. The radar repeatedly sends out bursts of a microwave signal that scatters back from the surface and is measured when it returns to the spacecraft. We use differences in the radar returns acquired by the satellite at two different times to measure the displacement of that point over the intervening time interval. Displacements of a few millimeters or less can be measured in this way.

As the continental crust deforms, the rocks continue to bend, building up strain that will be released in future earthquakes. When assessing earthquake hazard, in addition to knowing where the faults are on which the earthquakes will occur, it is essential to know the rate at which this strain is growing. These rates are small, however, and not easy to measure using radar in the presence of noise caused by changes on the ground from which the radar scatters and in the properties of the atmosphere through which the radar signal passes. In addition, errors in our knowledge of the position of the satellites affect our measurements. Methods can be devised to counter these difficulties, but the opportunities to apply them has been limited with the current satellites by the irregular and infrequent acquisition of radar images over many parts of the seismic belts.

We are motivated to bring the efforts of a team of investigators to bear on these questions because of the planned launch by ESA in mid-to-late 2013 of Sentinel-1A, a new radar satellite. An identical partner, Sentinel-1B will be launched 18 months later. Each spacecraft will pass over a given point on the earth's surface every 6 days; once both are in orbit any point will be revisited every 3 days. This short time interval, plus the fact that observations will be made for every pass of the spacecraft and its position will be carefully controlled and well known, will mean a radical improvement in our ability to measure rates of motion and strain. By combining the measurements from all available satellite tracks, together with any GPS data available, we will be able to map in detail over large areas the rates at which strain is building up.

We plan to look at what happens inside the continents as they deform by using such observations to test and constrain physical models. Thus the displacements occurring in an earthquake measured by radar can be used to infer the movements that have taken place on the fault at depth. The way the earth's surface in the vicinity of an earthquake continues to move immediately after it tells us about the mechanical properties of the surrounding region, knowledge essential to understanding how the forces around a fault vary with time. On a larger scale, the spatial distribution of strain in the continents tells us about changes in the strength of the crust. With these constraints we can test competing hypotheses about how the continents deform and what are the major factors controlling where the deformation occurs.

Planned Impact

We have identified and engaged with a wide range of non-academic end users of our research, which will have wide-reaching economic and societal impact in several key areas:

1. Geospatial Service Providers.
The state-of-the-art, high-resolution deformation products that we will produce in this project have considerable commercial and societal value. We will use Sentinel-1 to provide near-real-time (rather than post-processed) deformation maps and time. Through the International Space Innovation Centre at Harwell (ISIC) we will actively engage with SMEs to develop and market targeted new geospatial services derived from our results, aimed at the end users in the public and private sector. Potential services could include real-time monitoring of landslides, volcanoes, and man-made subsidence. These impacts will be facilitated through existing links with ISIC and the National Centre for Earth Observation; NCEO aim to commit a member of their impact team to capitalise on the opportunities arising from this project.

2. Meteorological Agencies.
As a by-product, we will produce high-resolution maps of tropospheric path delay in near real time, which have the potential to be assimilated into numerical weather prediction (NWP) models. The data will improve knowledge of the spatial distribution of atmospheric water vapour, and the ability to forecast localised heavy rainfall events. We have engaged with the satellite applications group at the Met Office, which currently assimilates path delay measurements from GPS sites. Although the InSAR path delay maps are snapshots in time, they are effectively continuous in space, and so complement the data currently available from GPS.

3. Government Institutions responsible for earthquake hazard assessment.
One of the most significant outputs of our research will be improved earthquake hazard assessment for the Alpine-Himalayan Belt through the new strain-rate and fault maps of the region. This will have high societal value to government institutions responsible for earthquake hazard assessment. Several of the investigators on this project are also investigators on Earthquakes without Frontiers (EwF), a NERC/ESRC directed program aimed at Increasing Resilience to Natural Hazards. Through this project we are already heavily engaged with a wide partnership of end users from across the entire Alpine-Himalayan Belt, including local, regional, and national governments and NGOs working on disaster risk reduction. We expect these organisations to use our new hazard map and will encourage this through the EwF partnership.

4. The Global Earthquake Model (GEM) and insurance industry.
GEM is a "global collaborative effort with the aim to provide organisations and people with tools and resources for transparent assessment of earthquake risk anywhere in the world" (www.globalquakemodel.org), funded through a partnership of public and private organisations, including the global insurance and re-insurance industry. Our high-resolution strain data from InSAR will inform the next generation of strain models within GEM. Furthermore, our fault-mapping work will feed directly into the efforts of GEM to identify active faults.

5. Public understanding of science.
Earthquakes and tectonics provide a compelling subject with which to engage the public in science. The investigators have a very strong track record in public outreach, regularly providing solicited and unsolicited interviews and articles for the national and international media.

6. Capacity building in developing countries.
The investigators have a strong track record of working with scientists from developing countries to help build capacity. This is particularly critical for work on seismic hazard as it is local scientists who have most influence on their governments and decision makers in times of seismic crisis and will be facilitated in this project through a funded International Opportunities Fund project.

Publications

10 25 50

publication icon
Bekaert D (2015) Statistical comparison of InSAR tropospheric correction techniques in Remote Sensing of Environment

publication icon
Bekaert D (2016) A Network Inversion Filter combining GNSS and InSAR for tectonic slip modeling in Journal of Geophysical Research: Solid Earth

publication icon
Bekaert D (2015) A spatially variable power law tropospheric correction technique for InSAR data in Journal of Geophysical Research: Solid Earth

 
Description 2021 academic year entry:

This year we aimed to further develop the COMET-LiCSAR facility to complete the processing of the Alpine-Himalayan Belt, East African Rift and the volcanic priority zones. Considerable progress has been made toward these goals. For the current reporting period, we had a significant increase of 55,000 in the number of processed Sentinel-1 acquisitions and 203,000 in the number of generated interferograms.

Like any automatic system that provides services to the end-users, a quality check module is very important to make sure that the interferograms are correctly generated. In the past year, by using a large number of training samples, we were able to improve the quality check module. The module is mainly based on using some morphological image processing techniques and edge detection algorithms to identify the artefacts in the interferograms.

Over the last year, we have updated various parts of the system including visual representation of the COMET LiCSAR portal, interferogram previews generated by GMT using recommended scientific colour maps, automatised ingestion of GACOS data for correction of tropospheric delay, an improved Earthquake InSAR Data Provider (EIDP) for fast processing and delivery of especially co-seismic interferograms. From the technical side, we have improved our processing routines in various parts of the system. For example, we have significantly decreased both processing time and memory demands by optimising our phase unwrapping procedure. We have further optimised algorithms for an automatic check of the quality of generated LiCSAR products, used prior to their final ingestion to the CEDA Archive and EPOS system.

2020 academic year entry:

We have observed various land processes this year, mainly related to tectonics and volcanic deformation.

1. We developed a quality assessment module in the LiCSAR system. This module can automatically check the quality of the generated interferograms. It is based on the coherency and the percentage of unwrapped coverage. The script can also detect any geometrical artefact in the interferograms.

2. The long-term development of the COMET-LiCS Sentinel-1 InSAR processing facility at Jasmin/CEDA has continued over the last year. As of May 2020, the system had processed around 88,000 Sentinel-1 acquisitions and generated more than 270,000 interferograms. Figure 1 shows the number of generated interferograms from 2016 to present. A significant increase in the number of generated interferograms can be seen over the past year. We divided the whole Alpine-Himalayan (AH) belt into 3 priority tectonic zones. The first zone covers Turkey, west of Iran, East of Tibet and the east African Rift. The second priority zone includes east of Iran, Caucasus and west of Tibet and the third priority zone covers the rest of the AH belt. We have now completed the processing of Zone 1 and 2. The frames over these priority zones are currently being updated to a 'rolling' status so that they will be updated on a monthly basis. This is now operational for more than 300 frames. Among the 1507 LiCSAR frames, 470 frames are related to 1024 volcanoes. Frames covering active volcanoes are processed on a short-term basis (three updates per week), with specific processing structures being developed that should allow for the generation of interferograms over all active volcanoes as soon as Sentinel-1 SLC data are available (a 'live' status).

3. LiCSAR earthquake data provider: The rapid availability of Sentinel-1 data following acquisition (a few hours), together with the short revisit period of 6 days for many areas, provides a unique opportunity to develop an automatic Earthquake InSAR Data Provider (EIDP) system using the LiCSAR infrastructure. The main objective of EIDP is to form co-seismic interferometric pairs in a rapid manner, as well as pre- and post- seismic interferograms, and to make these data widely and freely available to the community. We anticipate that these products have applications for the scientific understanding of events as well as for operational crisis management and disaster mitigation.

We have developed routines for an early identification, download and processing of the first post-earthquake Sentinel-1 data within a few hours after the data appears available. These LiCSAR EIDP routines are activated for frames covering expected extent of earthquake events of at least Mw 5.5 (in case of depth of hypocentre at least 10 km), as identified by USGS Earthquake Catalog. We export co-seismic and post-seismic interferograms as KMZ files (Google Earth data format), in addition to standard LiCSAR outputs. We link the EIDP-generated interferogram products to our web based map and prepare structures for their automatic ingestion to other community systems (e.g. CEDA Archive, EPOS).

We aim towards integration of GACOS atmospheric phase screen correction estimates to the final interferograms, noting that GACOS data should be available with a 24 hour delay. We also plan to extend the system to respond to volcanic activity.

4. LiCSAR strip map processing module: We have incorporated processing functionality for Sentinel-1 StripMap images into the LiCSAR processing chain. StripMap images are acquired for islands that are not covered by the TOPS (Terrain Observation with Progressive Scan) acquisition mode, adding the volcanic islands of La Réunion (French territory, Indian Ocean), Fogo (Cabo Verde), Tristan da Cunha (British Overseas Territory, south Atlantic Ocean) and Marion Island (South Africa, sub-antarctic Indian Ocean) to the product database. The processing produces multi-looked interferograms at ~30x30 m resolution.

5. LiCSAR GACOS module: One of the major limiting factors of the use of the InSAR in most of tectonic and volcanic applications is the spatiotemporal variability of tropospheric properties. This is of importance especially in cases where deformation and topography are correlated. To address this limitation, we have developed tools for including products for an atmospheric correction, based on the COMET GACOS system developed at the University of Newcastle. GACOS uses an iterative tropospheric decomposition interpolation model that decouples the elevation and turbulent tropospheric delay components estimated from high-resolution ECMWF and GPS data. GACOS corrections are computed for each LiCSAR frame with the same image sizes to facilitate direct use.
GACOS tropospheric delay maps are provided per epoch in GeoTIFF format in the same resolution as the other LiCSAR products and in both vertical and LOS direction. It should allow the user to readily apply the correction to the LiCSAR phase products, using the LiCSBAS software. Additionally, we archive the original GACOS tropospheric delay map files. Currently only few frames have GACOS products generated during the testing phase.

2019 academic year entry:
1. Sentinel-1 data has been used to uncover why the Agung volcano in Bali erupted in November 2017 after 50 years of dormancy. Their findings, published in Nature Communications, could have important implications for forecasting future eruptions in the area. This research has provided the first geophysical evidence that Agung and Batur volcanoes may have a connected plumbing system, with important implications for eruption forecasting and potential to explain the occurrence of simultaneous eruptions such as those seen in 1963.
2. We are developing new methods for using artificial intelligence and satellite data to monitor and potentially help predict volcanic eruptions. An article published in Nature in March 2019 outlines how Juliet Bigg's team at Bristol is using machine learning alongside satellite imagery from ESA's Sentinel-1 mission to spot ground distortion around volcanoes. Their new neural network examined over 30,000 Sentinel-1 images of more than 900 volcanoes, flagging around 100 images for closer examination. Of these, at least 39 were accurate detections of ground distortion. By using an algorithm to initially sort through the vast amounts of data, researchers can better focus on key volcanoes and areas of interest. The team is also now using simulations of eruptions to improve the precision of the algorithm. Andy's team is using a technique that searches for changes in the satellite data. Where the ground around a volcano is deforming, their method can flag if the distortion speeds up, slows down, or changes in some other way, allowing researchers to detect even small ground alterations over long periods.
3. Our researchers designed the European Space Agency's (ESA) acquisition strategy for tectonics and volcanism, and continue to work with ESA to ensure that the Sentinel-1 data acquired are suitable. We have also built a system that maps ground deformation across large regions and identifies volcanic deformation anomalies. These Sentinel-1 data are now enabling us to produce global deformation datasets (see below).
4. The COMET-LiCS Sentinel-1 InSAR portal (http://comet.nerc.ac.uk/COMET-LiCS-portal/) is providing access to results from LiCSAR, a system developed to process the vast amounts of data generated daily by the EU's Sentinel-1 satellite constellation. Maps on the portal represent data processed within COMET-LiCS using the JASMIN-CEMS processing and storage facility at CEDA. New interferograms should be available within 2 weeks of acquisition. Following an initial focus on the Alpine-Himalayan tectonic belt, for which we are on track to produce high resolution strain rate maps covering the entire area within the next two years, we are working on processing the complete archive for tectonic and volcanic areas globally. Alongside this, we have developed methods for atmospheric corrections (GACOS).

2018 academic year entry:
1. LiCSAR is now providing high-resolution deformation data for the entire Alpine-Himalayan seismic belt, where most of the planet's deadly earthquakes occur. We are expanding LiCSAR to provide global coverage, as well as developing a system to allow rapid response to seismic and volcanic events.
2. We have tested and implemented unwrapping on the automated system, and have been producing unwrapped interferograms consistently since December 2017. Since this time, we have been testing time series and velocity estimation methods, and expect to integrate these into the system shortly. These products will be delivered through the EPOS and GTEP portals. We have also been in ongoing discussion with EPOS about data format, delivery and ingestion methods into their system.
3. We have also been working on a prototype fast response system, which allows rapid response to seismic and volcanic events. The
framework for this system is working, but requires better integration with the CEMS computing facility. We have been working with CEMS engineers to set up this integration.
4. Sentinel-1 line-of-sight (LOS) velocities from LiCSAR are being converted to East, North, and Up velocities by stitching together adjacent frames and jointly inverting LOS and GNSS information to create high-resolution velocity fields for large portions of the Alpine-Himalayan Belt and East African Rift. Results will be shared via the ESA GTEP and EPOS portal as they become available.
5. An evaluation of methods for deriving continuous velocity and strain rate fields were presented at the 2017 Fall AGU and work is ongoing towards making small improvements to the method of choice (VELMAP; e.g. Walters et al., 2014; Wang and Wright, 2012), which jointly inverts InSAR and GNSS measurements to construct high-resolution velocity and strain rate fields. These include introducing spatially dependent weighting to improve the interpolation and also implementing a Bayesian approach in the velocity field inversion to minimize the importance of Laplacian smoothing on the velocity and strain rate fields. Results will be shared via the ESA GTEP and EPOS portal as they become available. Strain rate maps for rapidly straining COMET priority areas across the Alpine-Himalayan belt and Ethiopia will be derived as Sentinel-1 line-of-sight velocities become available via the COMET/LiCS InSAR processing system, and the first strain rate map for the Alpine-Himalayan belt based on GNSS and InSAR will be presented at the 2018 Fall AGU Meeting
6. Our new system using Sentinel-1 to monitor volcano deformation, LiCSAR-volcano, is also now operational, allowing us to monitor ground deformation on 929 volcanoes worldwide, including Africa and Central and South America - regions with large explosive volcanoes currently only covered by limited ground surveys.

2017 academic year entry:
1. Further development of the LiCSAR service including adjustments to image slicing strategy.
2. Country-scale velocity and strain maps produced for parts of the Alpine-Himalayan belt.
3. Rates of strain accumulation along the entire North Anatolian Fault estimated by combining data from GNSS and InSAR, enabling strain rates to be sampled at times ranging from 1 month to 240 years after the most recent earthquake.

2016 academic year entry:
1. LiCSAR service launched December 2017.
2. Work on the Italy and New Zealand earthquakes using Sentinel-1 data.

2015 academic year entry:
1. Work on the Napa earthquake, including a publication in EOS. This is the first earthquake to use data from Sentinel-1 and demonstrated the potential of this system
2. Several publications by PhD student David Bekaert on the atmospheric contribution to InSAR data. One result of this was the production of a software toolbox (TRAIN) that has already been downloaded more than 300 times by scientists across the world.
3. The development of an automatic InSAR processing system using Sentinel-1 data is now well underway, with a plan to launch a pilot system in 2016.


2014 academic year entry:
Key findings:
1. Paper on normal faulting in Tibet. Demonstrates that mapping the faults that you can see is not enough - there is hazard away from the mapped faults.
2. Paper on velocity field in eastern Turkey. As well as demonstrating the method of mapping crustal strain from space, we show that you cannot consider eastern Turkey to be a set of crustal blocks - there has to be some internal strain as well.
3. Paper on crustal shear zones. Here we develop a new model for the earthquake deformation cycle.
Exploitation Route The products we generate are shared publicly and can be use for understanding land processes.

Ultimately we will produce results that will provide seismic hazard information to governments, through developing a complete archive for tectonic and volcanic areas globally, as
well as development of an rapid event response facility.
Sectors Aerospace

Defence and Marine

Environment

Government

Democracy and Justice

Security and Diplomacy

Other

URL http://comet.nerc.ac.uk/COMET-LiCS-portal/
 
Description 2020 academic year update: To determine if a volcano has deviated from the behaviour observed during the baseline stage, we developed an algorithm and Python package termed LiCSAlert. This algorithm performs a simple inversion to fit each new interfeorgam using the spatial patterns learned by the ICASAR algorithm, and detects changes in the results of this inversion through time. When applied to a time series of interferograms imaging Sierra Negra, a change in rate of the intra-caldera inflation was detected approximately one year before the 2018 eruption. Should the algorithm have been running in real-time, it would have flagged this previously steady deformation as having accelerated, and indicated that the volcano had entered a period of unrest. 2019 academic year update: We continue to work with ESA to influence their acquisition policy for the new Sentinel-1 satellite, to ensure that they acquire data over all the tectonic and volcanic areas, for the benefit of all interested parties. This has included producing a density map of Sentinel-1 acquisitions prior to the launch of Sentinel-1B. This map also revealed where the ESA processor was affected by a possible rounding error in the slicing strategy which resulted in missing bursts between adjacent scenes. Although this issue was already known, information was passed to the Sentinel-1 Quality Control team to help identify which areas needed to be corrected. As larger areas are processed automatically, the coherence of the data can be examined and information fed back to ESA. We are also members of the advisory groups for two of the three missions chosen to compete as ESA's 10th Earth Explorer (STEREOID and G-Class), and we maintain a close relationship with the UK Space Agency and provide input on national and international consultations based on our research. We have used the results from Sentinel-1 in several international responses including the Gorkha (Nepal) 2015, Amatrice (Italy) 2016, and New Zealand 2016 events. Our work following the Nepal 2015 earthquake has had significant societal impact. 2018 academic year update: More than 900 volcanoes located on six different continents are covered by our volcano database of 32,681 interferograms. Such information is dedicated to Volcano Observatories as well as the scientific community. Our final goal is to develop an alert system which will activate each time a new ground deformation signal is detected in the InSAR database. To achieve this objective, we have started to use Machine Learning techniques (Convolutional Neural Network) to automatically detect ground deformation signals on unwrapped interferograms. LiCSAR, our processing system designed to handle the vast amounts of data from the Sentinel-1 satellites, is now providing high-resolution deformation data for the entire Alpine-Himalayan seismic belt, where most of the planet's deadly earthquakes occur. We are expanding LiCSAR to provide global coverage, as well as developing a system to allow rapid response to seismic and volcanic events. We are participants in the CEOS Geohazards Lab initiative, which is increasing the use of EO data on geohazards and their impacts. The initiative focuses on sharing EO resources for disaster risk reduction and response, including InSAR products from COMET's LiCSAR service. This should help to ensure that LiCSAR reaches more users, including volcano observatories, national disaster response agencies and other government bodies involved in planning for and mitigating risk. We have also influenced the EC/ESA to expand their acquisition strategy for Sentinel-1 data in earthquake and volcanic areas. A density map of Sentinel-1A acquisitions was presented to ESA prior to the launch of Sentinel-1B. The map showed where the ESA processor was affected by a possible rounding error in the slicing strategy which resulted in missing bursts between adjacent scenes. Although this issue was already known, information was passed to the Sentinel-1 Quality Control Team to help identify which areas needed to be corrected. As larger areas are processed automatically, the coherence of the data can be examined and information fed back to ESA. Following the February 2023 Türkiye earthquakes, the data have been used by local partners and responders as well as being used to brief the FCDO. 2024 update: COMET launched the COMET-LiCS Land Subsidence Portal to document ninety-nine subsiding regions across Iran identified using Sentinel-1 InSAR. The portal provides tools for the online analysis of automatically processed LiCSAR Sentinel-1 interferograms and subsequent LiCSBAS time-series on a region-by-region basis across the country. All explanatory text on the Portal pages is provided in both English and Farsi, the national language of Iran. Portal tools are designed to allow key stakeholders to search quickly through processed imagery and make critical assessments related to the extents and rates of basin subsidence.
First Year Of Impact 2018
Sector Aerospace, Defence and Marine,Environment
Impact Types Policy & public services

 
Description CEOS
Geographic Reach Multiple continents/international 
Policy Influence Type Membership of a guideline committee
Impact COMET contributes to the CEOS Working Group on Disasters, which increases and strengthens satellite Earth observation contributions to the various Disaster Risk Management (DRM) phases and informs politicians, decision-makers, and major stakeholders on the benefits of using satellite Earth Observations in each of those phases. projects. We used the CEOS seismic pilot to obtain vital high-resolution topographic data for the 2016 Amatrice, Italy earthquake. We have used data from the CEOS volcano pilot in collaboration with volcano observatories in Latin America to investigate the relationship between uplift and a moderate earthquake during unrest at Chiles-Cerro Negro volcanoes (Ecuador-Colombia), to investigate topographic change associated with the long-lived eruption of Monserrat (West Indies) and to study the decaying extrusion rate at Reventador (Ecuador).
URL http://ceos.org/ourwork/workinggroups/disasters/
 
Description COMET InSAR training course
Geographic Reach Europe 
Policy Influence Type Influenced training of practitioners or researchers
Impact This 3-day workshop, aimed at early postgraduate students and postdoctoral researchers, include a combination of informal lectures and practical exercises covering the following topics and aimed at improving InSAR processing and analysis capabilities: • InSAR theory • SAR data access and preprocessing • Differential interferometry • Interferogram creation and unwrapping • Atmospheric effects & corrections • Time series analysis • Displacement field modelling • InSAR-related pitfalls and caveats • Sentinel-1 data processing • GAMMA, ISCE, and StaMPS software.
 
Description COMET InSAR training workshop
Geographic Reach Europe 
Policy Influence Type Influenced training of practitioners or researchers
Impact Three-day workshop aimed at early postgraduate and postdoctoral researchers that will include a combination of lectures and practical exercises covering topics including but not limited to InSAR theory, SAR data preparation and processing, and displacement field modelling.
URL https://comet.nerc.ac.uk/comet-insar-training-workshop-2018/
 
Description ESA Advanced Land Training Course 2014
Geographic Reach Europe 
Policy Influence Type Influenced training of practitioners or researchers
Impact As part of the Scientific Exploitation of Operational Missions programme, ESA organises an advanced Land Training Course each year devoted to train the next generation of Earth observation scientists in the exploitation of satellite data for science and applications development. Tim Wright gave a session on Hazards: Earthquakes and Volcanoes.
URL http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Observing_the_Earth/Watch_live_Advanced_Land_Training_Course/(prin...
 
Description InSAR Theory & Processing with ISCE, GIAnT, and StaMPS
Geographic Reach Multiple continents/international 
Policy Influence Type Influenced training of practitioners or researchers
Impact Andy Hooper contributed to this training course which covered basic & advanced InSAR theories, InSAR processing with JPL/Caltech/Stanford InSAR Scientific Computing Environment (ISCE), time-series InSAR processing with Generic InSAR Analysis Toolbox (GIAnT), and StaMPS (Stanford Method for Persistent Scatterers) processing.
URL https://www.unavco.org/education/professional-development/short-courses/2016/insar-isce-giant/insar-...
 
Description InSAR Training Workshop
Geographic Reach Europe 
Policy Influence Type Influenced training of practitioners or researchers
Impact This three day workshop, held at Leeds, was aimed at training postgraduate and early career researchers in InSAR theory and processing, including interferogram creation and atmospheric corrections.
URL http://comet.nerc.ac.uk/comet-insar-training-workshop-2016/
 
Description Susi Ebeimer - workshop - Introduction to InSAR for Volcanologists
Geographic Reach National 
Policy Influence Type Influenced training of practitioners or researchers
URL https://vmsg2018.leeds.ac.uk/
 
Description CGS Flagship Grant Fund
Amount £7,500 (GBP)
Organisation University of Leeds 
Sector Academic/University
Country United Kingdom
Start 06/2013 
End 07/2015
 
Description DEVELOPING BUILDING INFORMATION MODELLING ("BIM") LEVEL 3 - ASSET MONITORING USING SATELLITE AND IOT TECHNOLOGY (AMSIT - 1 BRIDGES)
Amount £570,950 (GBP)
Funding ID 900049 
Organisation Innovate UK 
Sector Public
Country United Kingdom
Start 03/2017 
End 02/2018
 
Description Digital Environment: Dynamic Ground Motion Map of the UK
Amount £123,107 (GBP)
Funding ID NE/S016163/1 
Organisation Natural Environment Research Council 
Sector Public
Country United Kingdom
Start 02/2019 
End 02/2020
 
Description EPSRC Impact Acceleration Account
Amount £55,216 (GBP)
Organisation Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) 
Sector Public
Country United Kingdom
Start 09/2015 
End 03/2017
 
Description Integration of space based SAR (BIG) data with ground based information for an improved near real time assessment and monitoring of seismic hazard
Amount £1,639,000 (GBP)
Organisation British Council 
Sector Charity/Non Profit
Country United Kingdom
Start 03/2018 
End 03/2020
 
Description Royal Society Challenge Grants
Amount £100,000 (GBP)
Organisation The Royal Society 
Sector Charity/Non Profit
Country United Kingdom
Start 12/2016 
End 12/2017
 
Description Sentinel-1 - INSAR Performance Study with TOPS Data
Amount € 250,000 (EUR)
Funding ID INSARAP-B 
Organisation European Space Agency 
Sector Public
Country France
Start 03/2014 
End 12/2015
 
Description Wolfson Research Merit Award
Amount £35,000 (GBP)
Organisation The Royal Society 
Sector Charity/Non Profit
Country United Kingdom
Start 04/2015 
End 04/2020
 
Title Developing an automated InSAR system for tectonic and volcanic regions using data from Sentinel-1 
Description EU Copernicus Sentinel-1 InSAR products are now available for download from the COMET-LiCS Sentinel-1 InSAR portal. Interferograms and coherence maps have been produced automatically using the LiCSAR processor, which builds on the Gamma SAR and Interferometry software. Interferograms have been processed in overlapping "frames" defined within COMET-LiCS. Products are represented on this map by shapes that match these frames. The colour of each frame represents how many interferograms are available for that frame. Selecting a frame on the map allows you to obtain details about the frame ID and how many files exist, and to link to the downloadable data products. The map available on the LiCSAR portal represents the data that has been processed within COMET-LiCS using the JASMIN-CEMS processing and storage facility at CEDA. New interferograms should be available within 2 weeks of acquisition. We have also expanded our initial focus from the Alpine-Himalayan tectonic belt and are processing the complete archive for tectonic and volcanic areas globally. 
Type Of Material Improvements to research infrastructure 
Year Produced 2016 
Provided To Others? Yes  
Impact LiCSAR's high-resolution deformation data for the entire Alpine-Himalayan seismic belt, where most of the planet's deadly earthquakes occur, is being expanded to provide near-global coverage which will be critical in helping the scientific community and people on the ground to understand and manage geohazards. 
URL http://comet.nerc.ac.uk/COMET-LiCS-portal/
 
Title Geoinformatics and machine learning 
Description COMET has begun to develop and test prototype machine learning approaches for automatically interrogating data sets, for example with convolutional neural networks and blind source separation methods. We view this emerging area as vital, and plan to continue to develop such approaches, collaborating with experts including those in Bristol's Visual Information Laboratory. To date, we have worked on proof-of-concept studies applied retrospectively to relatively small data sets (<40,000 images). 
Type Of Material Improvements to research infrastructure 
Year Produced 2019 
Provided To Others? Yes  
Impact Still in development 
URL https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-00752-3
 
Title RapidSAR processing algorithm 
Description Development of RapidSAR processing algorithm as detailed in Spaans and Hooper 2016. This is a fast and flexible algorithm to estimate coherence and select points on an interferogram-by-interferogram basis, which overcomes limitations of the conventional boxcar ensemble method in areas of marginal coherence. 
Type Of Material Improvements to research infrastructure 
Year Produced 2016 
Provided To Others? Yes  
Impact N/A 
URL http://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/97001/1/Spaans_et_al-2016-Journal_of_Geophysical_Research-_Solid_Eart...
 
Title COMET Volcano Deformation Database 
Description LiCSAR-volcano - a system for automatic operating of ground deformation signals on Holocene active volcanoes - is now operational, enabling us to monitor ground deformation on 929 volcanoes. Since November 2017, 32,681 interferograms have been processed on different volcanic regions, and we are currently using Machine Learning techniques to detect ground deformation signals automatically. We have been working to develop the automatic processing of Sentinel-1 SAR data to deliver InSAR products for the all Holocene land-volcanoes (~1300). The raw data are processed through the LiCSAR system and available through the web portal24. At the time of writing, more than 900 volcanoes located on six different continents are covered and our database is composed of 32,681 interferograms. 
Type Of Material Database/Collection of data 
Year Produced 2015 
Provided To Others? Yes  
Impact The database, and in particular the quick-look interferograms, have been used by volcano observatory staff across Latin America to rapidly evaluate the presence or lack of measured deformation from space. 
URL https://comet.nerc.ac.uk/volcanoes/
 
Title COMET-LiCS Sentinel-1 InSAR portal (LiCSAR) 
Description During the last 5 years we have built systems to automate the production of interferograms (LiCSAR) and associated products using data from Sentinel-1. With cofunding from the LiCS project, we are on track to produce high-resolution strain rate maps for the entire Alpine-Himalayan Belt and East African Rift within the next two years. Further technical development work will enable us to fully exploit the opportunity offered by Sentinel-1.The initial focus on the Alpine-Himalayan tectonic belt is also being expanded with the aim of producing a complete archive for tectonic and volcanic areas globally, as well as development of an rapid event response facility. 
Type Of Material Database/Collection of data 
Year Produced 2016 
Provided To Others? Yes  
Impact LiCS is combining satellite data with ground-based observations to map tectonic strain throughout the Alpine-Himalayan Belt and East African Rift, using the results to inform new models of seismic hazard. 
URL https://comet.nerc.ac.uk/COMET-LiCS-portal/
 
Title Coseismic inteferogram of Kaikoura, New Zealand earthquake 
Description When a major magnitude 7.8 earthquake struck the north-eastern half of the South Island of New Zealand on 14th November 2016, the existence of two Sentinel-1 spacecraft in the constellation meant that COMET could generate a coseismic interferogram within two days of the event. We provided the interferogram to local partners in New Zealand, and to the wider community via twitter, around 5.5 hours after the satellite overpass. 
Type Of Material Database/Collection of data 
Year Produced 2016 
Provided To Others? Yes  
Impact Calculation of ground offset displacements in a relatively rapid timeframe revealed the dramatic breadth and number of fault segments involved in this complex rupture. By providing these timely data to GNS, New Zealand's research institute focusing on geology, geophysics and nuclear science, COMET was able to assist with decision making concerning deployment of field instruments and targeting of field observations, as well as input to the early fault slip models that led to one of the first publications on this event. 
URL https://comet.nerc.ac.uk/latest-earthquakes-and-eruptions/kaikoura-new-zealand-earthquake/
 
Title Digital Elevation Model of the Epicentral Area of the 2016 Amatrice Earthquake, Italy 
Description New Pleiades tri-stereo imagery of the epicentral area of the 2016 Amatrice, Italy, earthquake was acquired through the CEOS Seismic Pilot. It was used to construct a high-resolution (~1 m) digital elevation model. 
Type Of Material Database/Collection of data 
Year Produced 2016 
Provided To Others? Yes  
Impact The DEM was provided to groups at the Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia, Rome, and COMET, Leeds, to aid investigators working in the field in the epicentral area of the earthquake. Still sorting through licensing issues to make the DEM publicly available. 
 
Title East Helashan Fault, northern China 
Description This dataset contains a 100 km long section of the East Helanshan Fault on the western side of the Yinchuan Graben in northern China. This fault was the site of the devastating 1739 Yinchuan earthquake. Surface fault scarps are visible in the point cloud for much of the fault length. The point cloud data were constructed via photogrammetric methods from data acquired by Airbus Defence and Space (Pleiades 1A) and funded by the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC), UK. For further details see: Middleton, T. A., R. T. Walker, B. Parsons, Q. Lei, Y. Zhou, and Z. Ren (2016), A major, intraplate, normal-faulting earthquake: The 1739 Yinchuan event in northern China, J. Geophys. Res. Solid Earth, 121, 293-320, doi: 10.1002/2015JB012355. 
Type Of Material Database/Collection of data 
Year Produced 2016 
Provided To Others? Yes  
Impact n/a 
URL http://opentopo.sdsc.edu/lidarDataset?opentopoID=OTLAS.062016.32648.1
 
Title El Mayor-Cucapah earthquake, Mexico 
Description Point cloud data (in 2 sections) from 2 tri-stereo data sets of 0.5 m resolution, panchromatic Pleiades 1B images acquired by Airbus on 17 March 2014 and funded by the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC), UK through the Looking inside the Continents from Space (LiCS) large grant (NE/K011006/1). The images were processed using the LPS module of the ERDAS Imagine 2013 software (version 13.00.00, Build 281). A pixel-by-pixel matching procedure was implemented with a window size of 5-by-5 pixels and a correlation coefficient of 0.3 to 0.7. The point cloud covers an approximately 45 km long section of the epicentral area of the 2010 El Mayor-Cucapah earthquake in Mexico. Vertical displacements were determined by differencing the Pleiades topography and the pre-earthquake LiDAR DEM. For further details see: Zhou, Y., B. Parsons, J. R. Elliott, I. Barisin, and R. T. Walker (2015), Assessing the ability of Pleiades stereo imagery to determine height changes in earthquakes: A case study for the El Mayor-Cucapah epicentral area, J. Geophys. Res. Solid Earth, 120, 8793â€"8808, doi:10.1002/2015JB012358. 
Type Of Material Database/Collection of data 
Year Produced 2015 
Provided To Others? Yes  
Impact n/a 
URL http://opentopo.sdsc.edu/lidarDataset?opentopoID=OTLAS.082016.32611.1
 
Title InSAR Time Series Analysis (2018-2021) for Volcanic Monitoring in Northern Chile 
Description This dataset is for the paper "First onset of unrest captured at Socompa: A Recent Geodetic Survey at Central Andean volcanoes in Northern Chile" which is published in GRL: https://doi.org/10.1029/2022GL102480. InSAR Data: The folder of InSAR_149A.rar stores the InSAR time series analysis dataset on ascending track 149. The 'Imagedate' folder stores the empty *.rslc files to indicate the date of each SLCs. Data_Asc.mat stores the main InSAR time series data, which includes the UTC time of the acquisition (for accurate time calculation), the length of perpendicular baselines (unit is meter), the number of days counting from the first epoch, the unwrapped time series data (ifg), the unwrapped time series data with GACOS correction (ifg_aps), the look angles (la, unit is rad), and lat&lon. parms.mat stores the parameters used during the data processing by StaMPS. semi_fit.mat stores the results of the semi-variogram fitting of each interferogram on time series. It provides two versions for the original dataset (semi) and the GACOS-corrected dataset (semi_aps). This file is mainly used to weight the data during the time series fitting. runTSA.m, the main function to run the InSAR time series fitting. See more details in the Code part. The folder of InSAR_156D.rar stores the same content as the InSAR_149A.rar but for descending track 156. Code: This folder contains the codes of the InSAR time series fitting for this dataset, and the GBIS software. TSA_findref.m, this function is used to search the reference point of the InSAR data. TSA_EQ_fit.m, is the main function to perform InSAR time series fitting. rb_pixel_fit.m, is the robust way to fit the linear model. TSA_EQ_pixel.m, is the function used to plot the results. To perform the InSAR time series fitting, you need to put these four functions under your Matlab path, and then run the runTSA.m function in the data folder. The GBIS folder stores the updated version of the GBIS software, which allows you to perform the pCDM, CDM, and pECM. The core functions of these models are provided by Dr. Mehdi Nikkhoo, and you could find them here: https://www.volcanodeformation.com/software GBIS_Modelling_Results: This folder stores the data of InSAR and GPS joint inversion for Socompa Uplift. The folder Socompa stores the modelling results using the models of Okada(D), pECM(E), Mogi(M), pCDM(N), and Yang(Y), respectively. GPS_data.txt stores the cumulative displacements and the uncertainties of the SOCM station in three directions. Socompa.inp is the configuration file for GBIS running. Vol_asc.mat and Vol_asc_ds.mat stores the original and the downsampled ascending data, while Vol_dsc.mat and Vol_dsc_ds.mat store those of descending. Many thanks for using our dataset and please let me know if you have any further questions! 
Type Of Material Database/Collection of data 
Year Produced 2023 
Provided To Others? Yes  
URL https://zenodo.org/record/7416236
 
Description COMET-BGS partnership 
Organisation British Geological Survey
Country United Kingdom 
Sector Academic/University 
PI Contribution COMET and BGS have formalised their close working relationship with a Memorandum of Understanding, setting out terms and understanding for collaboration and aiming to work to the strength of both partners. This will be built upon in the next phase of COMET.
Collaborator Contribution As above
Impact The strategic partnership with BGS underpins all COMET activities, in particular event response and scientific advice to UK Government. BGS can initiate the International Charter for Space and Major Disasters and has worked with COMET to provide emergency advice for the Scientific Advisory Group in Emergencies (SAGE) and Cabinet Office Briefing Room (COBR), for example for the 2015 Nepal earthquake and the 2018 eruption of Volcán de Fuego (Guatamala). BGS uses COMET outputs when providing weekly advice on volcanic hazards/impacts to DfID, GO Science and other UK Government departments10. Similar multi-hazard weekly advice is also provided at a European level to the Emergency Response and Coordination Centre. COMET and BGS have long-standing relationships with partners in countries at risk from geohazards, many of which are on the DAC list of countries eligible for ODA assistance, where our long-term collaboration and support has been influential in setting national agendas and long-term plans for geohazards, for example in Iran, Kazakhstan and Ethiopia.
Start Year 2017
 
Description Collaboration with USGS 
Organisation US Geological Survey
Country United States 
Sector Public 
PI Contribution We are developing links to the USGS in volcano and seismic hazard; they hope to ingest COMET's results into their models for earthquake shaking and damage. Also, COMET scientists represent the international community for the USGS Powell Centre Working Groups on volcano and seismic hazard (Biggs, Ebmeier, Werner).
Collaborator Contribution See https://www.usgs.gov/ for a description of USGS activity.
Impact COMET scientists represent the international community for the USGS Powell Centre Working Groups on volcano and seismic hazard (Biggs, Ebmeier, Werner).
Start Year 2014
 
Description Copernicus Academy 
Organisation European Space Agency
Department Centre for Earth Observation
Country Italy 
Sector Charity/Non Profit 
PI Contribution Membership of and participation in Copernicus Academy activities.
Collaborator Contribution The Copernicus Academy connects European universities, research institutions, business schools, both private and non-profit organisations. The goal of the network is to link research & academic institutions with authorities & service providers, facilitate collaborative research, develop lectures, training sessions, traineeships as well as educational and training material to empower the next generation of researchers, scientists, and entrepreneurs with suitable skill sets to use Copernicus data and information services to their full potential.
Impact Participation in events, communication of Academy activities to the broader COMET membership.
Start Year 2017
 
Description Global Earthquake Model (GEM) 
Organisation British Geological Survey
Country United Kingdom 
Sector Academic/University 
PI Contribution COMET is developing a formal partnership with the Global Earthquake Model, who are end users of COMET data sets on faulting and strain, and also add value through enabling us to move beyond hazard into riskThis has included COMET staff secondments and on work on developing methodologies for incorporating InSAR data into the Global Strain Rate Model (GSRM), which currently only uses GNSS data, on simulations of the impact of earthquake scenarios, and on the incorporation of COMET's fault data from Central Asia. Further discussions are planned.
Collaborator Contribution GEM is a collaboration between public and private international organisations from around the world that play an active role in earthquake risk assessment and management.
Impact COMET has provided GEM with updates from work on the LiCS and EwF projects, including detailed information on work to map active faulting in Central Asia, measuring tectonic strain with InSAR and developing strain rate models using InSAR and GNSS. This is the first step in building a closer relationship with GEM and investigating opportunities for new collaborations. Our collaboration continues to develop methods for incorporating InSAR data into the Global Strain Rate Model (GSRM), simulating the impact of earthquake scenarios, and incorporating COMET's fault data from Central Asia. A 2017 joint meeting with BGS and GEM established the collaboration along with best practice in developing a regional fault model. COMET and GEM are now collaborating on a regional seismic hazard model, based on our growing set of observations in this complex deforming region. In addition, COMET postdoc Ekbal Hussain spent a week at GEM learning how to create damage predictions for realistic earthquake scenarios.
Start Year 2017
 
Description Global Earthquake Model (GEM) 
Organisation Global Earthquake Model Foundation
Country Italy 
Sector Charity/Non Profit 
PI Contribution COMET is developing a formal partnership with the Global Earthquake Model, who are end users of COMET data sets on faulting and strain, and also add value through enabling us to move beyond hazard into riskThis has included COMET staff secondments and on work on developing methodologies for incorporating InSAR data into the Global Strain Rate Model (GSRM), which currently only uses GNSS data, on simulations of the impact of earthquake scenarios, and on the incorporation of COMET's fault data from Central Asia. Further discussions are planned.
Collaborator Contribution GEM is a collaboration between public and private international organisations from around the world that play an active role in earthquake risk assessment and management.
Impact COMET has provided GEM with updates from work on the LiCS and EwF projects, including detailed information on work to map active faulting in Central Asia, measuring tectonic strain with InSAR and developing strain rate models using InSAR and GNSS. This is the first step in building a closer relationship with GEM and investigating opportunities for new collaborations. Our collaboration continues to develop methods for incorporating InSAR data into the Global Strain Rate Model (GSRM), simulating the impact of earthquake scenarios, and incorporating COMET's fault data from Central Asia. A 2017 joint meeting with BGS and GEM established the collaboration along with best practice in developing a regional fault model. COMET and GEM are now collaborating on a regional seismic hazard model, based on our growing set of observations in this complex deforming region. In addition, COMET postdoc Ekbal Hussain spent a week at GEM learning how to create damage predictions for realistic earthquake scenarios.
Start Year 2017
 
Description InSAR GSRM 
Organisation University of Nevada
Country United States 
Sector Academic/University 
PI Contribution We provided access to InSAR data, and the expertise in working with these data, to the Global Earthquake Model (GEM) for input to the Global Strain Rate Model (GSRM). A postdoc from COMET (Walters) visited the University of Reno to further the collaboration. We have met with the Global Earthquake Model team and a COMET postdoc (Hussain) spent time with GEM to further the collaboration. Additional meetings are planned to develop the LiCS-COMET-GEM-BGS relationship.
Collaborator Contribution UNR provided access to global GPS data and the expertise in working with these data. UNR hosted COMET PDRA Walters for an extended visit. GEM hosted COMET PDRA Hussain for a visit.
Impact Outputs will be forthcoming, as this work is still in progress. The aim is to integrate InSAR data into the Global Strain Rate Model, which feeds into widely-used models of seismic hazard.
Start Year 2014
 
Title Generic Atmospheric Correction Online Service for InSAR (GACOS) 
Description GACOS utilises the Iterative Tropospheric Decomposition (ITD) model (Yu et al., 2017) to separate stratified and turbulent signals from tropospheric total delays, and generate high spatial resolution zenith total delay maps to be used for correcting InSAR measurements and other applications. GACOS has the following key features: (i) globally available; (ii) operational in a near real time mode; (iii) easy to implement; and (iv) users to be informed how the model performs and whether the correction is recommended. 
Type Of Technology Webtool/Application 
Year Produced 2017 
Impact GACOS was launched in the ESA FRINGE workshop in Helsinki, Finland on 6 June 2017, and has been widely used for correcting atmospheric effects on SAR intereferograms in the InSAR community - over 100k correction maps have been freely generated up to 28 Feb 2018. 
 
Title TRAIN - Toolbox for Reducing Atmospheric InSAR Noise 
Description One of the main challenges in InSAR processing is related to atmospheric delays, especially tropospheric delays. Different correction methods are applied today based on auxiliary data, including GNSS, weather models (e.g. ECMWF ERA-I, WRF, NARR, etc), spectrometer data (MERIS and MODIS), or combinations of different sources. Alternative methods exist to estimate the tropospheric delays from the radar data themselves. The success rate of the different techniques is dependant on multiple factors like temporal and spatial resolution, cloud cover, signal contamination, local topography, etc. TRAIN provides a set of MATLAB tools that can be used to correct for tropospheric delays in InSAR data. Once set-up for one correction method, the toolbox allows for easy comparison with other methods, as all are formatted in the same way. The toolbox is fully compatible, but not limited, to the Doris and StaMPS software. Initial debugging has been done for ROI_PAC and PI-rate processed data, but user feedback and reporting will allow for further development. The toolbox includes the correction methods provided below, with a full descriptive manual on the input parameters, and tips/hints in case of problems. Version 2beta has now been released. 
Type Of Technology Software 
Year Produced 2015 
Open Source License? Yes  
Impact The software has been downloaded 586 times by groups all over the world, with the methods paper cited 20 times since 2015. 
URL http://davidbekaert.com/
 
Company Name Satsense 
Description Satsense develops software that uses satellite technology to measure subsidence rates. 
Year Established 2017 
Impact tbc
Website https://satsense.com/
 
Description Austin Elliott - Webinar 
Form Of Engagement Activity A talk or presentation
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact COMET host specialist webinars every 2/3 months and use speakers throughout the COMET community.
30th July 2019 - Austin Elliott, University of Oxford - title 'New Insights from Old Earthquakes using Photogrammetry and Early Seismograms'.
The webinar enabled the audience to engage and ask questions.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2019
URL https://comet.nerc.ac.uk/comet-webinar-series/
 
Description Blog post: Launch of Sentinel 1-A 
Form Of Engagement Activity A magazine, newsletter or online publication
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Public/other audiences
Results and Impact TBC
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2014
URL http://satellitegeodesy.wordpress.com/
 
Description Blog post: Tectonics from above - RAS discussion meeting 
Form Of Engagement Activity Engagement focused website, blog or social media channel
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact Christoph Gruetzner blogged on the Palaeoseismicity website about the RAS meeting Tectonics from Above: Recent Advances in the Use of High-resolution Topography and Imagery. The meeting was supported by NERC, COMET and LICS.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2015
URL http://paleoseismicity.org/tectonics-from-above-ras-discussion-meeting/
 
Description CEDA JASMIN User Seminar Series 4 - ML/YM 
Form Of Engagement Activity A talk or presentation
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach National
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact talk at a public (online) CEDA JASMIN User Seminar Series 4: Lazecky, M., Maghsoudi, Y. COMET LiCSAR system for measuring tectonic and volcanic deformation by Sentinel-1 interferometry, 7th May 2021. Communication and collaboration with non-COMET expert users, primarily of academic sector, to support outreach of LiCSAR data and tools (e.g. LiCSBAS)
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2021
 
Description COMET - GEM workshop 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact 5-6 September 2019 - workshop involving talks and discussion with GEM (Global Earthquake Model) Foundation, a private, non-profit company based in Pavia Italy. GEM is an international organization devoted to openly developing and disseminating earthquake hazard and risk models and information globally.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2019
 
Description Geology for Global Development Himalaya 2014 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Policymakers/politicians
Results and Impact Professor Tim Wright and COMET PhD student Ekbal Hussein participated in the GfGD Himalaya project which brought together scientists from the Himalayan nations and around the world, to discuss with policy-makers and community representatives how to sustainably develop the resources of the Himalaya in a way that benefits the local communities and nations.

The conference will have a practical legacy, as well as advancing scientific understanding. Policy briefings are being produced on the main themes and conclusions of the conference, and government representatives have expressed their wish to continue a dialogue about these issues with those involved in the conference. The conference will also lead to publication of scientific papers.

Booklets in English covering the course content of the related schools programme were provided to participating schools and students. Basic useful information for local communities, written in their own language, will also be developed.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2014
URL http://www.geolsoc.org.uk/himalaya14#outputs
 
Description InSAR training workshop 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact November 2019 - InSAR training workshop - The three day workshop aimed at early post graduate students and post doctoral researchers involving a combination of informal lectures and practical exercises.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2019
URL https://gqzvi1nt5j82vl48b1568uq1-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/flyer2019.jpg
 
Description Jonathan Weiss - InSAR training workshop 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact November 2018 - InSAR training workshop held at the University of Leeds - Three-day workshop aimed at early postgraduate and postdoctoral researchers that will include a combination of lectures and practical exercises covering topics including but not limited to InSAR theory, SAR data preparation and processing, and displacement field modelling.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2017
URL http://gqzvi1nt5j82vl48b1568uq1.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/COMET_InSAR_Works...
 
Description Leeds Geological Society Lecture - When Continents Collide 
Form Of Engagement Activity A talk or presentation
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach Regional
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact Tim Wright gave the above lecture at the LGA January 2016 meeting. The LGA aims to promote and further interest in the geological sciences, both amongst its members and within the wider community. Particular emphasis is placed on the geology of the region and its relationship to landscape and scenery.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2016
URL http://www.leedsga.org.uk/
 
Description Media coverage (Phys.Org): Earthquakes on thrust faults can spread 10 times farther to a second nearby thrust fault than previously thought 
Form Of Engagement Activity A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact This article describes work published in Nature Geoscience, by a team including COMET members John Elliott, Tim Craig, Barry Parsons and Tim Wright, who showed that earthquake ruptures can jump much further than previously thought, a finding that could have severe implications on the Los Angeles area and other regions in the world.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2016
URL http://phys.org/news/2016-02-dose-bad-earthquake-news.html
 
Description Media engagement (BBC Radio Berkshire) 
Form Of Engagement Activity A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach Regional
Primary Audience Public/other audiences
Results and Impact Professor Tim Wright was interviewed about the 2015 Nepal earthquake by BBC Radio Berkshire.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2015
URL http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02qd9g4#playt=0h07m40s
 
Description Media engagement (BBC Radio Leeds): Nepal earthquake 
Form Of Engagement Activity A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach Regional
Primary Audience Public/other audiences
Results and Impact Professor Andy Hooper was interviewed on BBC Radio Leeds about the 2015 Nepal earthquake.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2015
URL http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02qf1kv#auto
 
Description Media engagement (BBC Science Hour): Nepal earthquake 
Form Of Engagement Activity A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Public/other audiences
Results and Impact Professor Tim Wright described COMET's work on the Nepal earthquake in the BBC World Service programme, a weekly review of scientific developments.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2015
URL http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02pzp4x
 
Description Media engagement (BBC TV) 
Form Of Engagement Activity A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach National
Primary Audience Public/other audiences
Results and Impact Professor Andy Hooper was interviewed by BBC News about the 2015 Nepal earthquake.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2015
 
Description Media engagement (BBC World Service): Nepal earthquake 
Form Of Engagement Activity A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Public/other audiences
Results and Impact Professor Tim Wright was interviewed for the BBC World Service about the Nepal 2015 earthquake.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2015
 
Description Media engagement (BBC website): Himalayan drop off after Nepal quake 
Form Of Engagement Activity A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Public/other audiences
Results and Impact Professor Tim Wright features in this article which describes initial results from analysis of satellite images of the Nepal earthquake.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2015
URL http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-32625431
 
Description Media engagement (BBC website): Nepal quake: Why are some tremors so deadly? 
Form Of Engagement Activity A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Public/other audiences
Results and Impact COMET's work on the Nepal 2015 earthquake was featured on the BBC website in the context of earthquake prediction.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2015
URL http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/32549706
 
Description Media engagement (BBC website): Satellites dissect Nepal quake 
Form Of Engagement Activity A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Public/other audiences
Results and Impact Work by Drs John Elliott and Pablo Gonzales was featured in an article by BBC science correspondent Jonathan Amos. It describes the results of their Nature Geoscience paper which reveals the deep anatomy of the Nepal earthquake.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2016
URL http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-35286798
 
Description Media engagement (BBC website): Sentinel satellite reveals Nepal quake movement 
Form Of Engagement Activity A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Public/other audiences
Results and Impact COMET's rapid response to the Nepal 2015 earthquake was featured by science correspondent Jonathan Amos on the BBC website.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2015
URL http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-32515059?SThisFB&fb_ref=Default
 
Description Media engagement (BBC website): Sentinel system pictures Napa quake 
Form Of Engagement Activity A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach National
Primary Audience Media (as a channel to the public)
Results and Impact COMET scientist Dr John Elliot worked with BBC journalist Jonathan Amos to develop a news story on the 2014 Napa Valley earthquake. The article, which also explained how satellite data can be used to map earthquakes appeared on the BBC website on 2.10.2014.

As well as sharing information, the article stimulated a number of online comments (21) on the BBC site.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2014
URL http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-29012588
 
Description Media engagement (BBC website): Unsettled Earth continues to rattle Nepal 
Form Of Engagement Activity A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach National
Primary Audience Public/other audiences
Results and Impact BBC Science correspondent featured work by John Elliott on the Nepal 2015 aftershock.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2015
URL http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-32708779
 
Description Media engagement (Channel 4): Terror on Everest - surviving the Nepal quake 
Form Of Engagement Activity A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach National
Primary Audience Public/other audiences
Results and Impact Professor Andy Hooper contributed to this Channel 4 documentary on the Nepal earthquake.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2015
URL http://www.channel4.com/programmes/terror-on-everest-surviving-the-nepal-quake/
 
Description Media engagement (Cosmos Magazine): Kathmandu's earthquake nightmare 
Form Of Engagement Activity A magazine, newsletter or online publication
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Media (as a channel to the public)
Results and Impact Interview with Richard Walters, describing how new satellite radar data can be used to assess seismic hazard, as part of a feature article on seismic hazard in Nepal.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2014
URL https://cosmosmagazine.com/earth-sciences/kathmandus-earthquake-nightmare
 
Description Media engagement (Discovery Channel): Nepal earthquake 
Form Of Engagement Activity A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Public/other audiences
Results and Impact Professor Tim Wright was interviewed about the Nepal earthquake by the Discovery Channel.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2015
 
Description Media engagement (ESA website): Fogo volcano on Sentinel's radar 
Form Of Engagement Activity Engagement focused website, blog or social media channel
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact ESA's web article described COMET's work on using radar images from the Sentinel-1A satellite to monitor ground movements of the recently erupted Fogo volcano.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2014
URL http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Observing_the_Earth/Copernicus/Sentinel-1/Fogo_volcano_on_Sentinel...
 
Description Media engagement (ESA website): Nepal earthquake 
Form Of Engagement Activity Engagement focused website, blog or social media channel
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact COMET's work on the Nepal earthquake and associated interferogram was featured as one of ESA's regular "Space in Images".
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2015
URL http://www.esa.int/spaceinimages/Images/2015/04/Nepal_earthquake
 
Description Media engagement (ESA website): Radar vision maps Napa Valley quake 
Form Of Engagement Activity A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact The ESA website featured work by John Elliott and other COMET members on the 2014 Napa Valley earthquake, demonstrating for the first time how radar images from Sentinel-1 can been used to map ruptures.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2014
URL http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Observing_the_Earth/Copernicus/Sentinel-1/Radar_vision_maps_Napa_V...
 
Description Media engagement (Wall Street Journal): Nepal Hit by New Earthquakes 
Form Of Engagement Activity A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Media (as a channel to the public)
Results and Impact Interview comment by Richard Walters on the 2nd Nepal earthquake and its relationship to the mainshock
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2015
URL http://www.wsj.com/articles/nepal-hit-by-another-major-earthquake-1431416952
 
Description News article - Sentinels map Earth's slow surface warping 
Form Of Engagement Activity A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach National
Primary Audience Public/other audiences
Results and Impact BBC Science correspondent featured work by Rich Walters/Tim Wright on 'sentinels map Earth's slow surface warping', the LiCSAR launch.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2016
URL http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-38323832
 
Description Press release: A kink in the fault line explains why the Himalayas keep growing 
Form Of Engagement Activity A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach National
Primary Audience Public/other audiences
Results and Impact Drs John Elliott and Pablo Gonzales' work on the Nepal 2015 earthquake, published in Nature Geoscience, featured as a press release on the Universities of Leeds and Oxford's websites. Their study show that a kink in the regional fault line below Nepal explains why the highest mountains in the Himalayas are seen to grow between earthquakes.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2016
URL http://www.leeds.ac.uk/news/article/3812/a_kink_in_the_fault_line_explains_why_the_himalayas_keep_gr...
 
Description Press release: New satellite maps out Napa Valley earthquake 
Form Of Engagement Activity A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach National
Primary Audience Public/other audiences
Results and Impact Demonstration of how satellite data can be used to map earthquakes from space, highlighting how in this case it was used to confirm that the West Napa Fault was responsible for the Napa Valley earthquake. This fault had not been identified as being particularly hazardous prior to the event.

TBC
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2014
URL http://www.leeds.ac.uk/news/article/3576/new_satellite_maps_out_napa_valley_earthquake
 
Description Public lecture: When Continents Collide 
Form Of Engagement Activity A talk or presentation
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach National
Primary Audience Public/other audiences
Results and Impact Professor Tim Wright gave a public lecture at the Geological Society on how COMET is using the latest satellites to make extraordinarily accurate measurements of how continents deform, how we can use this information to understand where damaging earthquakes are likely to occur, and how the results can be used to reduce the devastating impacts of earthquakes. The talk was given twice at different times of day to reach, and was also broadcast live and made available on the web to reach a maximum audience.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2015
URL https://www.geolsoc.org.uk/continentscollide
 
Description Radio Aire interview: Nepal earthquake 
Form Of Engagement Activity A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach Regional
Primary Audience Public/other audiences
Results and Impact Professor Tim Wright was interviewed on Radio Aire (Leeds) about the 2015 Nepal earthquake.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2015
 
Description Radio Broadcast - NZ Earthquake 
Form Of Engagement Activity A broadcast e.g. TV/radio/film/podcast (other than news/press)
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach National
Primary Audience Public/other audiences
Results and Impact BBC Radio 4 Science hour broadcast featured work by Tim Wright on the New Zealand earthquake.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2016
URL http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p04g1d8x
 
Description Room Space Journal: Motion capture (Napa earthquake) 
Form Of Engagement Activity A magazine, newsletter or online publication
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Industry/Business
Results and Impact Professor Tim Wright wrote an article for Room, the international journal featuring leading space scientists and industry representatives, describing how Earth observation satellites can measure how the ground deforms around earthquake faults and volcanoes.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2014
URL http://room.eu.com/article/Motion_capture
 
Description Tamsin Mather/Tim Wright/Andy Hooper - Taking Earth's pulse: How to predict eruptions from space 
Form Of Engagement Activity A magazine, newsletter or online publication
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact Tamsin Mather/Tim Wright/Andy Hooper - Taking Earth's pulse: How to predict eruptions from space - all comment on Sentinel-1 satellites, dedicated to continuous InSAR measurements.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2017
URL https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg23531410-500-earths-pulse-how-to-predict-disasters-by-watchin...
 
Description Tim Wright - Catalyst Magazine 
Form Of Engagement Activity A magazine, newsletter or online publication
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach National
Primary Audience Schools
Results and Impact Tim Wright wrote an article for the STEM Catalyst magazine called 'Monitoring our dynamic planet from space'. Catalyst magazine is packed with interesting articles on cutting edge science, interviews and new research written by leading academics.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2017
URL http://magazines.stem.org.uk/catalyst-edition-30.html?b=1&p=18
 
Description Tim Wright - Kaikoura earthquake 
Form Of Engagement Activity A broadcast e.g. TV/radio/film/podcast (other than news/press)
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Public/other audiences
Results and Impact Tim Wright describes Satellite radar scans of last year's earthquake in New Zealand are changing the way we are thinking about earthquake hazards in regions where our planet's tectonic plates meet. 24 March 2017. BBC World Service OS - http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p04x2zx2#playt=33m50s, BBC World Service Science in Action -
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2017
URL http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p04x2zx2#playt=33m50s
 
Description Tim Wright - Kaikoura earthquake 
Form Of Engagement Activity A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Public/other audiences
Results and Impact http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p04x05qw#playt=48s, BBC website -http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-39373846, ESA website - http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Observing_the_Earth/Copernicus/Sentinel-1/Satellites_shed_new_light_on_earthquakes
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2017
URL http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p04x05qw#playt=48s
 
Description Tim Wright - RAS HAROLD JEFFREYS LECTURE 
Form Of Engagement Activity A talk or presentation
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach National
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact RAS HAROLD JEFFREYS LECTURE
Professor Tim Wright, University of Leeds
Monitoring our dynamic planet using satellite geodesy
'Astronomy & Geophysics' (A&G) meetings, also called Ordinary Meetings, have more diverse programmes of talks, at a level accessible to a general audience of scientists (and advanced amateurs).
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2017
URL http://www.ras.org.uk/component/gem/?id=496
 
Description Tim Wright - The British Interplanetary Society 
Form Of Engagement Activity A talk or presentation
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach National
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact Satellite Earth Observation technology has transformed the way we respond to and prepare for earthquakes and volcanic eruptions. In this lecture, I will discuss the ways that scientists within the Centre for the Observation and Modelling of Earthquakes, Volcanoes and Tectonics (COMET: http://comet.nerc.ac.uk) use satellite technology. I will show examples from recent earthquakes in Nepal and New Zealand, and eruptions in Ethiopia and South America. I will take you beneath the Earth's surface into the plumbing systems of volcanoes and the deep roots of fault zones, showing how satellite are changing our views of how the Earth works. I will end by discussing the future for this technology and the role of scientists in helping society become more resilient to our hazardous planet.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2017
URL https://www.bis-space.com/2017/02/13/18376/monitoring-our-hazardous-earth-from-space
 
Description Tim Wright/ Andy Hooper - Satsense press release 
Form Of Engagement Activity A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach Regional
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact 31.5.18 - 03.06.18 - £750,000 seed funding for University of Leeds spin-out Tim Wright and Andy Hooper
Andy and Tim have developed software that detects subsidence using satellite data, have launched a new spin-out company supported by £750,000 in seed funding.
The investment in SatSense has been provided by NPIF - Mercia Equity Finance which is part of the Northern Powerhouse Investment Fund, Unipart Rail and the University of Leeds.
Ongoing collaboration.
Press release appeared in:
Insider Media Limited
Business Quarter - http://www.bqlive.co.uk/yorkshire/2018/05/30/news/750k-funding-signals-lift-off-for-satellite-data-firm-32494/
Bdaily - https://bdaily.co.uk/articles/2018/05/30/university-of-leeds-satellite-data-spin-out-firm-secures-750k-investment
Business Cloud - http://www.businesscloud.co.uk/news/750k-funding-signals-lift-off-for-satellite-data-firm
Yorkshire Post - https://www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/news/professors-land-750k-investment-funding-1-9191307
Business Up North - https://www.businessupnorth.co.uk/750k-funding-signals-lift-off-satellite-data-firm/
Yorkshire Evening Post - https://article.signalmedia.co/919b2f1e-372a-3c62-8ba6-33267fb871af?secondary=true&u=f9157888-8859-4dec-89cc-3ce73fc5de40?igin=news-monitoring-app
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2018
URL https://www.insidermedia.com/insider/yorkshire/750000-seed-funding-for-university-of-leeds-spin-out
 
Description Web article (AGU Eos): 2014 Pico do Fogo eruption 
Form Of Engagement Activity A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact Work on the 2014 Pico do Fogo eruption, led by COMET member Pablo Gonzales and involving Tim Wright, Andrew Hooper and Marco Bagnardi, was featured as a research highlight in the EGU's Eos online magazine. The article describes how Sentinel-1 was used to map small movements of terrain. This marked the first time a significant ground deformation event was imaged with Sentinel-1's new InSAR technique-terrain observation by progressive scans (TOPS)-in which the radar beam is carefully steered to improve image quality.

The TOPS InSAR images revealed changes in the volcano's surface topography, allowing the researchers to model magma flow underneath. They found that the magma likely rose rapidly under the cone and then veered to the southwest flank of the volcano, where it erupted from an elongated crack, or fissure.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2016
URL https://eos.org/research-spotlights/radar-technique-shows-magma-flow-in-2014-cape-verde-eruption
 
Description Webinar - Chris Collins and Jonathan Weiss 
Form Of Engagement Activity A talk or presentation
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Professional Practitioners
Results and Impact COMET host specialist webinars every 2/3 months and use speakers throughout the COMET community.
10.2.2020 - Jonathan Weiss and Chris Collins - High resolution velocity, strain, and earthquake hazard models in Anatolia from InSAR, GNSS and seismicity
The webinar enabled the audience to engage and ask questions.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2020
URL https://comet.nerc.ac.uk/comet-webinar-series/