My name is Martha Savage. I received my PhD from University of Wisconsin-Madison. I am Associate Professor of Geophysics at Victoria University, Wellington. My main field of research is the study of seismic anisotropy. It is a rapidly growing field which is yielding information on the orientation of cracks in the crust and aligned minerals in the mantle. These can in turn be related to deformation within the Earth. Exciting developments are suggesting anisotropy may be used as a tool to study stress changes on volcanoes, which could lead to new methods of eruption forecasting. In New Zealand, saw changes of close to 90 degrees in the fast orientation on Mt. Ruapehu volcano, which correlated with an eruption episode. In my last visit to ERI in 2008 we found similar changes at an eruption on Asama volcano and were able to show that it correlated to GPS changes as well, confirming a relation between deformation and volcanic activity and seismic anisotropy. After that, we studied seven more active volcanoes. This time I will examine the latest eruption at Kirishima and summarize the results for all the volcanoes. We will also work with other researchers to apply new computer models we have developed to determine expected anisotropy measurements from dyke intrusions and to compare the modelled and measured results.

I am very happy to be able to come back here and continue my collaboration with the excellent researchers here at ERI. I think that the parallels in the tectonics of New Zealand and Japan make our countries have a natural affinity and I hope that we can continue such collaborations in the future.