Hi, I'm Aisling and I am a final-year PhD student at the University of Cambridge. I use seismology, structural geology, geomorphology and dynamic modelling to assess continental deformation over varying temporal and spatial scales, from singular faults to entire mountain ranges. I collaborate with industry to utilise my unique skill set as a geologist with a technical understanding of infrastructure from industrial experience to approach earthquake engineering challenges. I use my research as a step towards mitigating the seismic hazard posed to communities around the world, with a particular focus on increasing the resilience of the built environment to ground shaking in earthquakes.


Hi, I'm Aisling,

Recently, I completed my PhD on the "active tectonics and earthquake hazards in continental mountain ranges and foreland basins" at the University of Cambridge, UK. This involved using seismology, structural geology, geomorphology and computational modelling to assess continental deformation over varying temporal and spatial scales, from singular faults to entire mountain ranges. I focussed on investigating the major controls of earthquake ground shaking along the margins of major mountain belts and forehand basins, as a step towards mitigating the seismic hazard posed to communities around the world, with a particular focus on increasing the resilience of the built environment to ground shaking in earthquakes. You can freely access my PhD thesis here: https://doi.org/10.17863/CAM.97007.

Since January 2023, I took up the position as a 'Resilience to Nature's Challenges' Postdoctoral Scientist at GNS Science and the University of Canterbury in New Zealand and I research next-generation approaches to improve Aotearoa New Zealand's tsunami hazard from regional and distant sources. I combine large-scale computational modelling, informed by geological and geophysical observations, to calculate the current slip deficits on the major subduction zones which pose a tsunami hazard to ANZ. I then simulate the vertical displacements that would result from a series of possible earthquake-generating tsunami sources, and perform tsunami modelling to estimate the possible tsunami wave heights at the coast, to identify our most vulnerable cities and pave the way for a national inundation model for ANZ.

Feel free to reach out if you are interested or you can check out my research here: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Aisling-Okane-2