Sedimentary processes on sandy coasts in southern Australia. This project aims to reconstruct sedimentary processes and evolution of key coastal plains in southern Australia. These low-lying coasts, and the settlements and infrastructure on them, are vulnerable to inundation and shoreline erosion. Past behaviour of different types of coasts will be determined by combining innovative geospatial techniques to map morphology and past changes, geophysical imaging of stratigraphy and geochronology. T ....Sedimentary processes on sandy coasts in southern Australia. This project aims to reconstruct sedimentary processes and evolution of key coastal plains in southern Australia. These low-lying coasts, and the settlements and infrastructure on them, are vulnerable to inundation and shoreline erosion. Past behaviour of different types of coasts will be determined by combining innovative geospatial techniques to map morphology and past changes, geophysical imaging of stratigraphy and geochronology. The outcome will be models that explain responses to sediment availability, past storm history and sea-level changes. This will benefit sustainable coastal planning and management, providing geomorphological evidence to support erosion hazard assessments of these and adjacent coasts.Read moreRead less
Exploring past climates, volcanic disasters and earthquakes in Australasia. This project aims to combine cutting-edge geochemical microanalysis of precisely dated cave deposits and corals to generate fundamental knowledge of Australasian earth hazards and environmental turning points over the past 500,000 years. These novel long-term perspectives of society’s most challenging environmental threats will provide the scientific basis required for informed decision-making and sustainable development ....Exploring past climates, volcanic disasters and earthquakes in Australasia. This project aims to combine cutting-edge geochemical microanalysis of precisely dated cave deposits and corals to generate fundamental knowledge of Australasian earth hazards and environmental turning points over the past 500,000 years. These novel long-term perspectives of society’s most challenging environmental threats will provide the scientific basis required for informed decision-making and sustainable development in Australasia.Read moreRead less
Understanding the Origin and Development of Extreme and Mega Bushfires. Extreme and megafires result in significant damage to property and infrastructure and are associated with large suppression costs. These events form when separate fires Merge. Their increase occurrence in recent seasons highlights the importance of developing tools and technologies that better predict extreme events to aid fire response and inform strategies for greater resilience. This project combines fire field experiment ....Understanding the Origin and Development of Extreme and Mega Bushfires. Extreme and megafires result in significant damage to property and infrastructure and are associated with large suppression costs. These events form when separate fires Merge. Their increase occurrence in recent seasons highlights the importance of developing tools and technologies that better predict extreme events to aid fire response and inform strategies for greater resilience. This project combines fire field experiments with computer modelling to determine factors driving extreme fire development, and develop new knowledge and models. These enable better prediction of active fires, enhance the knowledge base of fire managers for critical decision making and to improve risk modelling and mitigation planning for fire-prone communities.Read moreRead less
Mega spatial-scale, multi time-scale, ensemble assessment of climate change driven coastal change in South Eastern Australia. Climate change driven variations in mean sea level, storm surges, and waves will change the world's coastline. This project will, for the first time, develop innovative modelling methods to quantify the integrated impact of these climate drivers on coastal erosion along Australia's most developed and populated coastline: Sydney to Brisbane.
The big flood: will it happen again? If we could better predict the frequency of extreme flood events, would we be better prepared to safeguard human lives and settlements? This project provides a time-line of flood activity in the south east Queensland region extending back thousands of years using state-of-the-art dating techniques and seeks to identifiy those settlements most at risk.
Discovery Early Career Researcher Award - Grant ID: DE190100062
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$404,000.00
Summary
What's shaking down under? This project aims to determine the underlying cause of recent earthquake activity in central Australia. Of all the stable continents, Australia is surprisingly seismically active, with intra-plate earthquakes occurring relatively frequently. However, these are unpredictable, placing lives and infrastructure at risk. This project offers the opportunity to use a new seismic experiment to improve detection of small events that may warn of a more dangerous earthquake to co ....What's shaking down under? This project aims to determine the underlying cause of recent earthquake activity in central Australia. Of all the stable continents, Australia is surprisingly seismically active, with intra-plate earthquakes occurring relatively frequently. However, these are unpredictable, placing lives and infrastructure at risk. This project offers the opportunity to use a new seismic experiment to improve detection of small events that may warn of a more dangerous earthquake to come, and provide sub-surface imaging of the hidden crustal boundaries and faults that are ultimately responsible. Benefits will include improved hazard assessment, and a new predictive model for exploration that relates regional seismicity, crustal faults, and mineral systems.Read moreRead less
Discovery Early Career Researcher Award - Grant ID: DE190101389
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$325,000.00
Summary
Imaging, analysing and forecasting Australian hazards with satellites. This project aims to improve Australia’s ability to anticipate geophysical hazards. It will generate a new national capability in the use of satellite radar imagery to monitor and manage geohazards, benefiting all communities. By producing high-resolution maps of ground displacements, the project will assess the controls upon where and why these events occur, and whether they exhibit precursory behaviour. This is the first st ....Imaging, analysing and forecasting Australian hazards with satellites. This project aims to improve Australia’s ability to anticipate geophysical hazards. It will generate a new national capability in the use of satellite radar imagery to monitor and manage geohazards, benefiting all communities. By producing high-resolution maps of ground displacements, the project will assess the controls upon where and why these events occur, and whether they exhibit precursory behaviour. This is the first step towards accurate hazard forecasting and in building Australia's capability for near-real-time geophysical hazard monitoring on a national scale. The outputs will impact upon future recommendations for national earthquake and landslide monitoring and deliver new tools to underpin regulation of resource extraction and inform construction codes.Read moreRead less
Has it always burned so hot? Fuel and fire in southeast Australian forests. Indigenous cultural burning has been raised as a way of mitigating against climate-driven catastrophic bushfires in southeast Australian forests. It is argued that returning an Indigenous style fire regime will keep landscape fuel loads low, thus reducing the frequency and intensity of bushfires and mitigating against large catastrophic bushfires. While based on enormous reservoirs of traditional fire knowledge in Indige ....Has it always burned so hot? Fuel and fire in southeast Australian forests. Indigenous cultural burning has been raised as a way of mitigating against climate-driven catastrophic bushfires in southeast Australian forests. It is argued that returning an Indigenous style fire regime will keep landscape fuel loads low, thus reducing the frequency and intensity of bushfires and mitigating against large catastrophic bushfires. While based on enormous reservoirs of traditional fire knowledge in Indigenous communities, this assertion needs empirical testing within these highly flammable forests. This project aims to empirically test how fuel loads, fuel type, fire frequency and fire intensity have changed over the past 500 years in southeast Australian forests, spanning the period of indigenous to British management.Read moreRead less
Origins and distributions of intraplate earthquakes. This project aims to investigate the behaviour and origin of intraplate earthquakes in Australia by developing a multi-million-year record of earthquakes using geological, geochronological, geospatial, seismological, statistical and numerical modelling data. It will use maximum credible magnitudes, maximum shaking intensities of intraplate earthquakes and spatiotemporal relationships between large prehistoric and contemporary earthquakes to im ....Origins and distributions of intraplate earthquakes. This project aims to investigate the behaviour and origin of intraplate earthquakes in Australia by developing a multi-million-year record of earthquakes using geological, geochronological, geospatial, seismological, statistical and numerical modelling data. It will use maximum credible magnitudes, maximum shaking intensities of intraplate earthquakes and spatiotemporal relationships between large prehistoric and contemporary earthquakes to improve models of future seismic hazard in Australia and globally. This will lead to improved predictions of future earthquake impacts in urban and natural environments and development of new paleoseismic techniques.Read moreRead less
Forecasting drought impacts months ahead using satellite data. Skillful seasonal water and crop forecasts could do much to help cope with drought and water-related food crises. Recent advances in hydrological modelling and satellite remote sensing of surface soil moisture, landscape water storage and vegetation biomass have created a great opportunity to produce such forecasts over large areas. This project will exploit that opportunity by assimilating the satellite observations into a global wa ....Forecasting drought impacts months ahead using satellite data. Skillful seasonal water and crop forecasts could do much to help cope with drought and water-related food crises. Recent advances in hydrological modelling and satellite remote sensing of surface soil moisture, landscape water storage and vegetation biomass have created a great opportunity to produce such forecasts over large areas. This project will exploit that opportunity by assimilating the satellite observations into a global water and vegetation forecasting model. The resulting improvement in seasonal forecasts of stream flow, soil moisture and crop production will be quantified and compared to the limited forecasts that are currently available.Read moreRead less