Sean Regan
University of Alaska Fairbanks, AK·Earth & Environmental Science
Western North America was built over hundreds of millions of years as separate blocks of crust collided with and stuck to the continent. The faults along the boundaries between these blocks still shape earthquakes and landscapes from California to Alaska.
- Fields
Earth & Environmental Science
- Topics
Denali fault
strike-slip faults
sutures
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Jul 2027
What they work on
- Reconstruct how rocks along the Valdez Creek shear zone were deformed and in which direction they moved, using structural and kinematic analysis along two transects through the Denali Fault Zone suture in Alaska.
- Determine the pressure, temperature and timing histories (P-T-t paths) of deep-crust gneiss in the Maclaren Glacier metamorphic belt, using thermobarometry and petrochronology, which dates minerals that grew during metamorphism.
- Date when upper-crust rocks above the suture cooled and were uplifted, using thermochronology, to link shallow and deep crustal histories across the fault zone.
- Combine the deformation and rock-history data to explain how a moderately dipping collisional suture turned into the near-vertical, right-lateral Denali strike-slip fault.
More about the research
Yet it is not well understood how these boundary faults change over very long periods after they form. A central puzzle is how a gently sloping fault, formed when two plates collided, can turn into a near-vertical fault where the blocks slide sideways past each other (a strike-slip fault).
Why it matters
The Denali fault is seismically active near the Trans-Alaska Pipeline, the Richardson Highway and Denali National Park and Preserve. A better understanding of how it evolved could improve assessments of regional earthquake hazard. The work could also clarify how mineral deposits formed and where they occur, such as those in the Valdez Creek mining district and the Juneau Gold Belt. More broadly, it could explain how sutures evolve into major strike-slip faults worldwide.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Alexandra Pye
Arizona State University Campus Immersion, AZ·Earth & Environmental Science
Reconstruct the tectonic and thermal history of mountains near the California–Arizona border by combining field observations, laboratory analyses of rock samples, and structural and thermal modeling.
Chelsea Mackaman-Lofland
University of Tennessee-Knoxville, TN·Earth & Environmental Science
Test whether high mountains in western Anatolia delayed hominoid migration from Africa into Eurasia. Reconstruct basin history, crustal thickness from zircon geochemistry, and past elevation using proxy-based paleoaltimetry.
Francis Sousa
Oregon State University, OR·Earth & Environmental Science
Test whether the ancient Tyee river drained a large continental interior from western Idaho or began in the Klamath Mountains, using U-Pb and Lu-Hf analysis of zircon sand grains to trace sediment sources.
The school
University of Alaska Fairbanks: 7 labs on PI Pages, $246M a year on research, 31 research doctorates a year.
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