My interests and skills in extensional tectonic analysis principally developed during my post-doctoral work on North Sea tectonics. I continue this line of query through work in the Basin and Range with the support of the Center for Nuclear Waste Regulatory Analyses at the Southwest Research Institute. I have been conducting microstructural analyses on fault zones in the Micocene tuffs of Yucca Mountain in an effort to charaterize, among other things, the deformation history of potentially seismically active fault zones in Yucca Mountain. My primary interests lie in spatial and temporal aspects of progressive deformation and rate-controlling deformation mechanisms in mountain belts.
Fluids can simultaneously control and record parameters of deformation.
I have analyzed fluid inclusions in veins of known structural timing in an effort to learn about space-time changes in deformation conditions. I have supervised externally-funded undergraduate research on this topic. Center for Nuclear Waste Regulatory Analyses , Southwest Research Institute, San Antonio, Texas. Center for Nuclear Waste Regulatory Analyses , Southwest Research Institute, San Antonio, Texas. B.E. Hill, D.A. Ferrill, P. LaFemina, D.W. Sims, C.B. Connor, and M.B. Gray, in press , Tectonic evolution of the Crater Flat Basin, Nevada.