Earthquake Alert: Harnessing BIG data to satisfy societal needs (and facilitate new science)

Richard Allen
(UCB Seismology)


Today, 50 people get an alert before earthquakes in California. Recent legislation says everyone should get a warning. In the future, your phone will detect earthquakes. In the era of BIG data and the Internet of Things, how can seismology harness new technologies both for the purpose of science, and to reduce the impact of future disasters around the world? In this seminar, we will discuss the current status of real-time earthquake information using existing seismic and emerging geodetic networks. We will also speculate on what might be possible in the near future as the quality and number of sensors in consumer electronics increase by orders of magnitude.