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Our Great Seal, which we dearly miss.
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6.25.24
Kitta Macpherson
kitta.macpherson@rutgers.edu
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Fault finders: James Bourke (right), a seismologist and postdoctoral associate, is leading an effort to gather the best measurements yet of the Ramapo Fault Zone. Roberto Masis Arce (left), a doctoral student in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, and Frederik Link (center), a postdoctoral associate from Yale University, assist in the installation of a seismometer at Backer Farm in Mendham, N.J.
New data gathered will aid predicting hazard levels and locations of future earthquakes.
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The Ramapo Fault zone is a system of faults between the northern Appalachian Mountains and Piedmont areas to the east. Spanning more than 185 miles (298 km) in New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania, it is perhaps the best known fault zone in the Mid-Atlantic region, and some small earthquakes have been known to occur in its vicinity. Recently, public knowledge about the fault has increased, especially after the 1970s, when the fault’s proximity to the Indian Point nuclear plant in New York was noted.
Some seismologists have argued that this fault has the potential to produce a major earthquake, but earthquakes are scattered throughout this region, with no particular concentration of activity along the Ramapo fault. Thus, others have argued that the Ramapo Fault has not been demonstrated to be any more active than any other fault zones in the greater New York City area.
The New York City area is part of the geologically complex structure of the Northern Appalachian Mountains. This complex structure was formed during the past half billion years when the Earth’s crust underlying the Northern Appalachians was the site of two major geological episodes, each of which has left its imprint on the NYC area bedrock. Between about 450 million years ago and about 250 million years ago, the Northern Appalachian region was affected by a continental collision, in which the ancient African continent collided with the ancient North American continent to form the supercontinent Pangaea.
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The last major episode of geological activity to affect the bedrock in the NYC area occurred about 100 million years ago, during the Mesozoic era, when continental rifting that led to the opening of the present-day Atlantic Ocean formed the Hartford and Newark Mesozoic rift basins.
Beginning about 200 million years ago, the present-day Atlantic Ocean began to form as plate tectonic forces began to rift apart the continent of Pangaea.
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Earthquake rates in the northeastern U.S. are only one percent of those in California, but the earthquakes that do occur in the northeastern U.S. are typically felt over a much broader region than earthquakes of the same magnitude in the western U.S. This means the area of damage from an earthquake in the northeastern U.S. could be larger than the area of damage caused by an earthquake of the same magnitude in the western U.S. The cooler rocks in the northeastern U.S. contribute to the seismic energy propagating as much as ten times further than in the warmer rocks of California. A magnitude 4.0 eastern U.S. earthquake typically can be felt as far as 100 km (60 mi) from its epicenter, but it infrequently causes damage near its source. A magnitude 5.5 eastern U.S. earthquake, although uncommon, can be felt as far as 500 km (300 mi) from its epicenter, and can cause damage as far away as 40 km (25 mi) from its epicenter. Earthquakes stronger than about magnitude 5.0 generate ground motions that are strong enough to be damaging in the epicentral area.
At well-studied plate boundaries like the San Andreas fault system in California, scientists can often make observations that allow them to identify the specific fault on which an earthquake took place.
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In contrast, east of the Rocky Mountains, this is rarely the case. The NYC area is far from the boundaries of the North American Plate which are in the center of the Atlantic Ocean, in the Caribbean Sea, and along the west coast of North America. The seismicity of the northeastern U.S. is generally considered to be due to ancient zones of weakness that are being reactivated in the present-day stress field. In this model, pre-existing faults that were formed during ancient geological episodes persist in the intraplate crust, and earthquakes occur when the present-day stress is released along these zones of weakness. The stress that causes the earthquakes is generally considered to be derived from present-day rifting at the Mid-Atlantic ridge.
The northeastern U.S. has many known faults, but numerous smaller or deeply buried faults probably remain undetected. Virtually all of the known faults have not been active for perhaps 90 million years or more. Also, the locations of the known faults are not well determined at earthquake depths. Accordingly, few earthquakes in the region can be unambiguously linked to known faults. Given the current geological and seismological data, it is difficult to determine if a known fault is still active today and could produce a modern earthquake. As in most other areas east of the Rocky Mountains, the best guide to earthquake hazard in the northeastern U.S. is probably the locations of past earthquakes themselves.
The Ramapo Fault has been blamed for several past earthquakes, but the specific association of any significant earthquake with this fault has yet to be demonstrated. A damaging earthquake affecting New York City in 1884 was incorrectly argued to be caused by the Ramapo fault, likely because it is the most prominent mapped fault in the greater New York City area. At the present, the relationship between faults and earthquakes in the New York City area is understood to be more complex than any simple association of a specific earthquake with a specific fault.
Regional setting
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USGS cross-section of the Newark Basin.
30 January 2011
Source http://3dparks.wr.usgs.gov/nyc/mesozoic/newarkbasin.htm
Author USGS
New Jersey, eastern Pennsylvania, and southeastern New York are divided geologically into four physiographic provinces, each distinctive in their structure. Westernmost is the Valley and Ridge Province, made up of layers of Cambrian-Devonian sedimentary limestone, sandstone, and shale remaining from ancient sea sediment, sand, and mud. East of this province are the Highlands. This province is composed of the oldest rocks in the region—gneiss, granite, and Precambrian marble – formed by melting sedimentary rock which recrystallized in a deformed state. Paleozoic rock belts are also present in the area.
East of the Highlands is the Piedmont, specifically the Newark Basin. The Ramapo Fault forms the boundary between the Newark Basin and the Highlands, running from Haverstraw, New York to near Schaefferstown, Pennsylvania. The Newark Basin, an aborted rift valley created during the breakup of Pangaea, consists of sedimentary and volcanic rocks from the Triassic and early Jurassic. Smaller extensions of the Ramapo Fault, including the Hopewell, Flemington-Furlong, and Chalfont faults, are present within the basin.
To the east of the Newark Basin are varying geologic provinces. In southeastern New York, from Westchester County south to Staten Island, are the Manhattan Prong Highlands and the Staten Island Serpentine belt (part of the New England province). From the southern tip of Staten Island to Trenton, New Jersey is the Atlantic Coastal Plain. South of Trenton, a low relief extension of the Reading Prong Highlands in the eastern part of the Pennsylvania Piedmont borders the Newark Basin to its southern terminus southwest of Reading.
Fault zone
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USGS’s map of the w:Ramapo Fault.
“The drive westward along Route 23 north of I-80 passes through residential neighborhoods sprawling across the rolling lowlands of the Passaic River Valley. Just west of Pompton Lakes the land rises steeply along the eastern front of the Ramapo Mountains. This mountain front reveals a hidden structure in the region: the Ramapo Fault. This fault is the boundary between the western edge of the Newark Basin and the northern New Jersey Highlands.” Public Domain.
The fault system, part of a series of north-east striking, southeast-dipping faults, is probably inactive for the most part. Numerous 5 to 10 mile-long faults branch off the main fault.
With initial activity in the Late Precambrian – Early Paleozoic age, specifically the Cambrian-Ordovician period, the fault has seen six to seven major periods of seismic activity. The last period of heightened earthquake activity probably took place during the Triassic, 200 million years ago. During this time, the Ramapo fault, originally a thrust fault active during the creation of the Appalachian Mountains, was reactivated as the Atlantic Ocean was opening and the supercontinent of Pangaea was being torn apart. The fault became integrally involved in a period of intense rifting, slowly lowering the land to its east by more than nine kilometers to create the Newark Basin. Magma was able to seep through linear fractures along the fault during the late Triassic and early Jurassic, producing episodic flood basalts responsible for the creation of the Watchung Mountains.
Despite the rarity of strong East Coast earthquakes in the United States, they do sometimes occur. Furthermore, when these rare eastern U.S. events do occur, the areas affected by them are, on average ten times as large as western ones for events of the same magnitude. Thus, earthquakes represent at least a moderate hazard to East Coast cities.
Earthquakes in the greater New York City area affect most of New Jersey, the most densely populated state in the United States, as well as New York City. It is difficult to discern the extent to which the Ramapo fault itself (or any other specific mapped fault in the area) might be any more of a source of future earthquakes than any other parts of the region. A 2008 study [not presented here] argued that a magnitude 6 or 7 earthquake was destined to originate from the Ramapo fault zone, which would almost definitely spawn hundreds or even thousands of fatalities and billions of dollars in damage. Studying around 400 earthquakes over the past 300 years, the study also argued that there was an additional fault zone extending from the Ramapo Fault Zone into southwestern Connecticut. On the other hand, other seismologists have argued that neither the Ramapo Fault nor any hypothesized fault zone extending into southwestern Connecticut has been demonstrated to be any more active than any other parts of the greater New York City area.
Just off the northern terminus of the Ramapo fault is the Indian Point Nuclear Power Plant. Built between 1956 and 1960 by Consolidated Edison Company, the plant began operating in 1963, but concerns have been raised that an earthquake from the Ramapo Fault will affect the plant. Whether or not the Ramapo fault actually does pose a threat to this nuclear power plant remains an open question. In Pennsylvania, the fault descends to an area approximately to the west of Pottstown, near the Limerick Nuclear Power Plant, before making its transverse turn west to its southern terminus near Schaefferstown.
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A Rutgers University–New Brunswick-led team of geologists has launched a comprehensive effort to analyze and record the seismicity of the area near the epicenter of the April 5 earthquake near Tewksbury Township, N.J.
When completed, the project is expected to yield the clearest measurements yet of the geometries of the subterranean geological conditions of portions of the Ramapo Fault Zone, a 20-mile-wide area lying adjacent to and west of the Ramapo Fault. Most New Jersey earthquakes have occurred in this fault area.
Creating this “highly detailed map of seismicity” will help scientists better understand the hazards associated with the zone and enable them to more accurately predict where future earthquakes are likely to occur, said James Bourke, a postdoctoral associate in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences in the School of Arts and Sciences.
Central to the project are 110 advanced seismometers – sensors that capture the severity, distribution and frequency of shaking and ground noises – that, now installed, are actively recording data at carefully chosen spots mainly in Hunterdon County, but also in Middlesex, Morris and Somerset counties. The seismometers will gather data for varying periods, from as short as a month to several years, depending on the installation. In a second phase of the project, the research team is planning to install up to 500 more devices at areas along the broader Ramapo Fault region.
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More than 100 seismometers are collecting seismology data at sites across New Jersey. The seismometers are buried 2 feet below ground and are powered by a boat battery connected to an above-ground solar cell and a computer that records the ground motion. J. Bourke
“We’ll be studying the earthquake and its aftershocks,” said Bourke, a seismologist who has led the installations. “But we can also align the instrument array to ask other science questions at the same time.”
Faults are fractures within bedrock, usually miles deep. Earthquakes mainly occur when accumulated strain in the Earth’s crust is suddenly released and creates a fault or leads to movement along an existing fault. The energy that is set free travels as seismic waves both along the Earth’s surface and below it. With a magnitude of 4.8, the earthquake centered near Tewksbury was felt by more than 42 million people along the East Coast, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.
Close to 200 aftershocks have occurred in the earthquake’s aftermath. Seismic activity in the area is likely to continue for months.
“The rock in that area is acting a bit like Jell-O,” said Kenneth Miller, a geologist and distinguished professor in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences. “After the first big shock, it shook a lot. And now it will shake just a little bit for a long time.”
It isn’t easy for scientists to find recently active faults east of the Rocky Mountains because, unlike what is seen with West Coast earthquakes, East Coast earthquakes that break the surface don’t happen very often, said Lauren Neitzke Adamo, a geologist and associate professor in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences. East Coast fault line locations have long been determined through the interpretation of seismological records, meaning that scientists have relied on earthquakes to point them to faults.
“On the East Coast, if there is any evidence of an earthquake, it’s likely to have been eroded away,” Adamo said. “So, the only chance of us really figuring out where these faults go is by looking at the data coming from a project like this one.”
Researchers know the urban corridor stretching from Boston to Virginia is littered with underground faults. Many smaller faults, however, remain undetected. The inaccessibility of the geological structures poses a challenge to seismologists seeking to determine if a known fault is still active and could cause an earthquake.
The installed seismometers won’t only collect data about aftershocks. In a process similar to sonar, they also will capture images of the contours of underground rock formations to pinpoint where the faults are.
The devices are powered by a boat battery connected to an above-ground solar cell and a computer that records the ground motion. The instruments are buried in holes that are about 2 feet deep. The collected information is sent to the U.S. Geological Survey’s National Earthquake Information Center in Colorado, where it will be analyzed.
The first results from the data-gathering effort are being put together by the U.S. Geological Survey for a research paper that will be submitted to a peer-reviewed science journal, Bourke said. “More in-depth analysis will take place over the next year or so for better understanding of the structures beneath the stations,” Bourke said.
To install the devices, Bourke received permission from officials managing the properties, including those in Hunterdon County at the Raritan Headwaters Association and the Tewksbury Land Trust.
Many of the prime installation sites were covered with thick foliage and Bourke, teamed with fellow seismologist Frederik Link of Yale University, were aided by Rutgers students clearing brush and digging holes. The equipment is on loan from a research consortium supported by the National Science Foundation and the U.S. Geological Survey.
“We’re really excited to be doing this work,” Bourke said. “This is an adventure, for sure.”
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Please help promote STEM in your local schools.
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Rutgers-The State University of New Jersey, is a leading national research university and the state’s preeminent, comprehensive public institution of higher education. Rutgers is dedicated to teaching that meets the highest standards of excellence; to conducting research that breaks new ground; and to providing services, solutions, and clinical care that help individuals and the local, national, and global communities where they live.
Founded in 1766, Rutgers teaches across the full educational spectrum: preschool to precollege; undergraduate to graduate; postdoctoral fellowships to residencies; and continuing education for professional and personal advancement.
Rutgers University is a public land-grant research university based in New Brunswick, New Jersey. Chartered in 1766, Rutgers was originally called Queen’s College, and today it is the eighth-oldest university in the United States, the second-oldest in New Jersey (after Princeton University), and one of the nine U.S. colonial colleges that were chartered before the American War of Independence. In 1825, Queen’s College was renamed Rutgers College in honor of Colonel Henry Rutgers, whose substantial gift to the school had stabilized its finances during a period of uncertainty. For most of its existence, Rutgers was a private liberal arts university but it has evolved into a coeducational public research university after being designated The State University of New Jersey by the New Jersey Legislature via laws enacted in 1945 and 1956.
Rutgers has four distinct campuses: Rutgers University–New Brunswick, including grounds in adjacent Piscataway; Rutgers University–Newark; Rutgers University–Camden; and Rutgers Biomedical and Health Sciences. The university has additional facilities elsewhere in the state, including oceanographic research facilities at the New Jersey shore. Rutgers is also a land-grant university, a sea-grant university, and the largest university in the state. Instruction is offered by over 9,000 faculty members in 175 academic departments to over 45,000 undergraduate students and more than 20,000 graduate and professional students.
The university is accredited by the Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools and is a member of the Big Ten Academic Alliance, the Association of American Universities and the Universities Research Association. Over the years, Rutgers has been considered a “Public Ivy”.
Rutgers University became the land-grant college of New Jersey in 1864 under the Morrill Act of 1862, resulting in the establishment of the Rutgers Scientific School, featuring departments of agriculture, engineering, and chemistry. The Rutgers Scientific School would expand over the years to grow into the New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station (1880) and divide into the College of Engineering (1914) and the College of Agriculture (1921). Rutgers created the New Jersey College for Women in 1918, and the School of Education in 1924.
With the development of graduate education, and the continued expansion of the institution, the collection of schools became Rutgers University in 1924. Rutgers College continued as a liberal arts college within the university. Later, University College (1945) was founded to serve part-time, commuting students and Livingston College (1969) was created by the Rutgers Trustees, ensuring that the interests of ethnically diverse New Jersey students were met.
The newly-designated state university absorbed the University of Newark (1935) in 1946 and then the College of South Jersey and South Jersey Law School, in 1950. These two institutions became Rutgers University–Newark and Rutgers University–Camden, respectively. On September 10, 1970, after much debate, the board of governors voted to admit women into Rutgers College.
In 1970, the newly formed Rutgers Medical School hired major faculty members from other institutions. In 1971, the governor’s office separated Rutgers Medical School from Rutgers University and made it part of New Jersey College of Medicine and Dentistry, and many faculty left the medical school, including the dean of the medical school, Dewitt Stetten, who later became the director of the National Institutes of Health. As a result of the separation of the medical school from Rutgers University, Ph.D. programs that had been started in the medical center were lost, and students had to seek other institutions to finish their degrees. After the dissolution of the University of Medicine and Dentistry in 2013, the medical school again became part of the university.
Before 1982, separate liberal arts faculties existed in the several separate “residential colleges” (Rutgers, Douglass, Livingston, University, and Cook colleges) at Rutgers–New Brunswick.
In 2007, Rutgers New Brunswick, Douglass, Livingston, and University Colleges, along with the Faculty of Arts and Sciences were merged into the new “School of Arts and Sciences” with one set of admissions criteria, curriculum, and graduation requirements. At this time, the liberal arts components of Cook College were absorbed into the School of Arts and Sciences as well, while the other aspects of that college remained, but as the School of Environmental and Biological Sciences. These changes in 2007 ended the 241-year history of Rutgers College as a distinct institution.
In 2013, most of the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey was integrated with Rutgers University and, along with several existing Rutgers units, was reformed as Rutgers Biomedical and Health Sciences. This merger attached the New Jersey Medical School and Robert Wood Johnson Medical School to Rutgers University.
The university offers more than 100 distinct bachelor, 100 masters, and 80 doctoral and professional degree programs across 175 academic departments, 29 degree-granting schools, and colleges, 16 of which offer graduate programs of study.
It is accredited by the Commission on Higher Education of the Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools (1921), and in 1989, became a member of the Association of American Universities, an organization of the 71 leading research universities in North America. Rutgers–New Brunswick is classified among “R1: Doctoral Universities – Very high research activity”. Rutgers–Newark and Rutgers–Camden are classified by the same organization as “R2: Doctoral Universities – High research activity”.
Under the New Jersey Medical and Health Sciences Education Restructuring Act of 2012, the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey was dissolved. Most of its schools, including Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, New Jersey Medical School, and New Jersey Dental School, were merged into the new Rutgers Biomedical and Health Sciences, formed in 2013.
The Rutgers Scarlet Knights are members of the Big Ten Conference, a collegiate athletic conference consisting of 14 colleges and universities from the Midwestern and East Coast regions of the United States. The Big Ten Conference is a member of the Bowl Championship Series. Rutgers currently fields 27 intercollegiate sports programs and is a Division I school as sanctioned by the National Collegiate Athletic Association. Rutgers fields thirty teams in NCAA Division I sanctioned sports.
Many members of the faculty have received the highest awards in their fields, including Guggenheim and MacArthur “Genius Award” fellowships, Pulitzer Prize winners, National Medal of Science and National Medal of Technology recipients, a National Endowment for the Arts “Jazz Master,” amongst others. Science, engineering, and medical faculty are members of the four “National Academies”—the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering, the Institute of Medicine, and the National Research Council.
Rutgers is home to the Rutgers University Center for Cognitive Science, also known as RUCCS. This research center hosts researchers in psychology, linguistics, computer science, philosophy, electrical engineering, and anthropology.
It was at Rutgers that Selman Waksman (1888–1973) discovered several antibiotics, including actinomycin, clavacin, streptothricin, grisein, neomycin, fradicin, candicidin, candidin, and others. Waksman, along with graduate student Albert Schatz (1920–2005), discovered streptomycin—a versatile antibiotic that was to be the first applied to cure tuberculosis. For this discovery, Waksman received the Nobel Prize for Medicine in 1952.
Rutgers developed water-soluble sustained release polymers, tetraploids, robotic hands, artificial bovine insemination, and the ceramic tiles for the heat shield on the Space Shuttle. In health-related field, Rutgers has the Environmental & Occupational Health Science Institute (EOHSI).
Rutgers is also home to the RCSB Protein Data bank, “…an information portal to Biological Macromolecular Structures’ cohosted with the San Diego Supercomputer Center. This database is the authoritative research tool for bioinformaticists using protein primary, secondary and tertiary structures worldwide….”
Rutgers is home to the Rutgers Cooperative Research & Extension office, which is run by the Agricultural and Experiment Station with the support of local government. The institution provides research & education to the local farming and agro industrial community in 19 of the 21 counties of the state and educational outreach programs offered through the New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station Office of Continuing Professional Education.
Rutgers University Cell and DNA Repository (RUCDR) is the largest university- based repository in the world and has received awards worth more than $57.8 million from the National Institutes of Health. One will fund genetic studies of mental disorders and the other will support investigations into the causes of digestive, liver and kidney diseases, and diabetes. RUCDR activities will enable gene discovery leading to diagnoses, treatments and, eventually, cures for these diseases. RUCDR assists researchers throughout the world by providing the highest quality biomaterials, technical consultation, and logistical support.
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Rutgers–Camden is home to the nation’s PhD granting Department of Childhood Studies. This department, in conjunction with the Center for Children and Childhood Studies, also on the Camden campus, conducts interdisciplinary research which combines methodologies and research practices of sociology, psychology, literature, anthropology and other disciplines into the study of childhoods internationally.
Rutgers is home to several National Science Foundation IGERT fellowships that support interdisciplinary scientific research at the graduate-level. Highly selective fellowships are available in the following areas: Perceptual Science, Stem Cell Science and Engineering, Nanotechnology for Clean Energy, Renewable and Sustainable Fuels Solutions, and Nanopharmaceutical Engineering.
Rutgers also maintains the Office of Research Alliances that focuses on working with companies to increase engagement with the university’s faculty members, staff and extensive resources on the four campuses.
As a ’67 graduate of University College I am proud to be a member of
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A Σ Λ, National Honor Society of non-traditional students.