SCEC Award Number 13173 View PDF
Proposal Category Individual Proposal (Data Gathering and Products)
Proposal Title The SCEC Portable Instrument Center
Investigator(s)
Name Organization
Jamison Steidl University of California, Santa Barbara
Other Participants Matthew Cook, Francesco Civilini, Val Gorbunov
SCEC Priorities 1, 5, 6 SCEC Groups Seismology, EEII
Report Due Date 03/15/2014 Date Report Submitted N/A
Project Abstract
 The ability for SCEC to respond rapidly to a major southern California earthquake with the deployment of seismographs in the near-source region was a catalyst for the creation of the PBIC and remains an important asset of SCEC seismology infrastructure. The ability to conduct individual PI driven research experiments in between these major earthquake sequences using PBIC equipment is another very important component of the PBIC program.
The PBIC was established over 20 years ago through funding from SCEC to provide a "pool" of digital seismic recording equipment for use in post earthquake response and in individual PI driven research experiments within southern California. The PBIC is now slowly in the process of phasing out the older generation of data acquisition equipment and modernizing it’s instrument pool.
This year, we propose to continue the upgrade of the PBIC instrumentation as we phase out the older equipment. The Portable Instrument Center is upgrading the data acquisition technology to current real-time systems, capable of integrating directly with the SCSN operations. Over the course of SCEC3, and now at the start of SCEC4, using its newer real-time stations, the PBIC has demonstrated the capability to deploy and integrate it’s stations into the regional network, providing high-quality observations that are being used for earthquake locations and shake map applications. These stations have proven to be dependable and require very little maintenance.
Intellectual Merit The portable instrument center contributes to the SCEC research priorities in many ways. It provides researchers with equipment to search for and improve the imaging capability of tremor activity. It provides the ability to examine fault damage and healing through trapped wave experimental deployments. It helps improve the accuracy of locations by densification of the regional network, providing data that will lead to improvements in the community velocity model and community fault models. It improves our understanding of strong ground motions, including the variability and causes of damage during the aftershock sequences of large earthquakes, by providing a pool of RAMP instruments that can be deployed within 24 hours of a significant earthquake in southern California.
Broader Impacts The educational impact of the PBIC is demonstrated by the number of undergraduate and graduate student participants in field deployments, and in the routine maintenance and operations of the PBIC. UCSB continues to use undergraduate and graduate students in the deployment and maintenance of the stations, many at UCSB, but also at other institutions within California. Giving the students hands-on experience in how the data is collected is an important part of the education of future geophysicists, especially in a time when data is so readily available via the Internet without any knowledge of what is involved in the data collection process. In addition, the number of women and minority students previously and currently involved in the PBIC program is significant. Outreach to K-12 students has always been an important part of the PBIC program, with the “make your own earthquake” (MYOE) demonstration being a hit year after year with all K-12 age groups. This year we have also expanded our involvement to the UCSB Givertz Graduate School of Education, training future science educators on the QCN sensor and the MYOE software for use in classroom activities.
Exemplary Figure Figure 1. Left: UCSB’s “Make Your Own Earthquake” (MYOE) activity at a April 22, 2013 Foothill Elementary School Outreach Activity where the whole 6th grade class makes an earthquake. Right: April 3, 2013 Open house for science teachers at the Givertz Graduate School of Education at UCSB. Training on the use of MYOE as a classroom activity.