SCEC Award Number 10062 View PDF
Proposal Category Individual Proposal (Integration and Theory)
Proposal Title Spatial Variability in Geotechnical Velocities and Effects on Ground Motions
Investigator(s)
Name Organization
John Louie University of Nevada, Reno
Other Participants Ph.D. student, one semester
SCEC Priorities B3, B4, B2 SCEC Groups Seismology, GMP, USR
Report Due Date 02/28/2011 Date Report Submitted N/A
Project Abstract
 N/A
Intellectual Merit So far the one issue that has been examined is the effect of the variability of closely-spaced measurements on deterministic simulations of earthquake ground motions at relatively long-wavelengths. We demonstrate the effects of the Clark County Parcel Map on ground shaking at 0.1 and 0.5 Hz. The Clark County Parcel Map is a set of 10,721 geotechnical measurements across 450 square miles of Las Vegas Valley, recently completed by Clark County and the City of Henderson, Nevada. The typical spacing of the measurements is 400 m. In sum, the fine details of the Parcel Map have surprisingly large effects on wave propagation in this frequency range.
Broader Impacts Undergraduate interns (not SCEC interns) have completed most of the work to date, and intern William Savran wrote one of the papers resulting from this project and accepted for presentation at the March 2011 Symposium on Engineering Geology and Geotechnical Engineering in Las Vegas.
Exemplary Figure N/A
Linked Publications

Add missing publication or edit citation shown. Enter the SCEC project ID to link publication.
  • Louie, J. N., Simpson, A. R., & Ortega, J. (2020, 08). Database of geotechnical shear-wave seismic-velocity profile measurements for California and Nevada. Poster Presentation at 2020 SCEC Annual Meeting. SCEC Contribution Number 10493