Collaborative Research: REU Site: DEsigning Sedimentation and Tectonics Research Experiences for Student Success (DE-STRESS)

This new collaborative REU Site hosted by California State University San Bernardino and the University of Cincinnati aims to recruit junior-level university students and sophomore-level community college students into geosciences educational and career tracks through year-long, cohort-based, authentic geologic research experiences that also include professional development training. The research activities center on resolving the movement history of the southern San Andreas fault (SAF) system, providing a unique opportunity to both further scientific understanding of this significant and hazardous fault and increase awareness of the societal importance of geoscience research and careers.

Although much is known about the recent history (past 10,000-years) and the origin of the SAF system ~18-20 million years ago, less is known about its evolution during the intervening time. The goal of this REU is to help fill this knowledge gap by applying a combination of field-based and lab-based techniques in two-week field and lab components. This unconventional schedule will facilitate participation by students for whom a traditional summer research experience is not feasible.

The project plan as well as student recruitment activities will broaden awareness of geoscience research and careers and their significance for society, while strengthening connections between 2-yr and 4-yr geoscience programs in southern California and the Ohio-Kentucky-Indiana tristate area. The research will also contribute to a better understanding of the fault system and its influence on earthquake hazards and landscape evolution in southern California.

The overarching theme of the REU site is investigating the middle Miocene to latest Pleistocene spatial and temporal evolution of the southern San Andreas fault (SAF) system in the greater San Bernardino region. The SAF system in this region provides a natural laboratory for exploring the evolution of fault systems and their influences on landscapes, erosion, and sedimentation.

Mentored team projects will apply modern field data collection and laboratory analytical techniques (including LiDAR-based mapping and morphometric analysis, facies analysis, detrital zircon provenance analysis, and Quaternary dating methods) to displaced sedimentary basins, deposits, and geomorphic surfaces, providing students with a range of research and training experiences that cultivate abundant mentor-student and student-student interactions. The project also implements structured virtual workshops throughout the academic year to sustain cohort engagement and to provide professional development training in such areas as finding and securing geoscience internships and employment, applying for graduate school, communicating effectively, and data visualization and analysis.

The resulting data and analyses will contribute to an improved understanding of the space-time evolution of strain within the SAF system, which is important for understanding fault dynamics, kinematic partitioning, seismic hazards, and drivers of deformation and landscape evolution.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.