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 Gary Axen, Adjunct Associate Professor Structural Geology & Tectonics

Continental Tectonics:
My research interests are primarily in continental tectonics and fault mechanics. I am interested in extensional, convergent, and wrench settings.

My work in regional extensional tectonics is currently directed mainly toward the Gulf of California, which was chosen as one of two "focus sites" for the Rupturing Continental Lithosphere initiative of the NSF MARGINS Program (the Red Sea is the other site). Presently we are involved in a three-year study that combines onshore and marine seismology (vertical incidence and wide-angle reflection) from Baja California, across the gulf, and onto mainland Mexico, with structural studies in eastern Baja California . We aim to image the lithospheric architecture of the rift in three main transects in the southern, central and northern gulf. Our proposal can be found at the NSF MARGINS website. Recently, I have been thinking a lot about the San Andreas transform fault system, particularly as it relates to my research in the Gulf of California.

I have long-term interest in regions of large-magnitude extension and large-displacement, low-angle normal faults, such as those in the metamorphic core complexes of western North America. Much of my research is directed toward documenting and understanding these mechanically enigmatic faults, in regions including the central Basin and Range, the Salton trough, northeastern Baja California, and the European Alps. These faults are particularly interesting in light of the current hot debate about strong versus weak faults, and because they expose shear-zone rocks formed in the ductile-to-brittle transition.

In 1998 I began research into the continent-continent collision between the Saudi Arabian and Eurasian plates in Iran. Iran has recently "opened up" to western Earth scientists. We are currently working in northern Iran, in the transpressional Alborz Mountains immediately south of the Caspian Sea. Politics permitting, I hope to begin work in the Zagros Mountains, which comprise the suture zone and foreland fold and thrust belt of the collision. Iran probably contains the youngest continental collision on Earth, so provides exciting opportunities to study early collisional processes that are typically overprinted and obscured in other, older parts of the Alpine-Himalayan chain.

My research, and that of my students, typically includes diverse approaches. To date, these include structural analysis, sedimentology, mechanical analysis, metamorphic petrology, geo- and thermochronology, and fluid-inclusion analyses, among others.

B.S. & M.S., Geology, 1980, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Ph.D., Geology, 1991, Harvard University

CICESE

	Fletcher, Dr. John M., Investigador Asociado (Postdoctoral Researcher), Structural and metamorphic geology of the Sierra El Mayor and surroundings, Baja California. August 1994 – September, 1995.
	Romero-Espejel, Hector, M. S., Nature of faulting along the Sierra Juárez range front adjacent to Laguna Salada. Graduated 1996.
	Mendoza-Borunda, Ramón, M. S. candidate, Extensional and strike-slip deformation in the southern Sierra Juárez and northern Sierra las Tinajas. September, 1994 - September, 1995 (principal advisor initially; I remain on his committee).

Nothern Arizona University

	Sleeper, Kenneth G., Structural geology of the Black Canyon Range, The Bluffs, and southwestern Highland Range, Lincoln County, Nevada. Graduated 1989.
	Lewis, Patrick R., Structural geology of the northern Burnt Springs Range and Robber Roost Hills, Lincoln County, Nevada. Graduated 1987.
	Skelly, Michael F., The geology of the Moapa Peak area, southern Mormon Mountains, Clark and Lincoln Counties, Nevada. Graduated 1987.

Thesis Committee Member

Dan Eastmond (Ph.D., UCLA), José Romo Jones (Ph.D., CICESE), Michael Taylor (M.S., UCLA), Robert Johnston (M.S., UCLA), Timothy Wawrzyniec (PhD, Univ. of New Mexico), Sergio Vásquez-Hernández (M.S., CICESE), Manuel Arregon (M.S., CICESE), Kelly Burke (M.S., NAU)

Opportunities exist for graduate study with my group in structural geology and continental tectonics. Research topics of my grad students usually fall within the categories reflected in Current Research Interests and Publications, although research topics can be suggested by the student and all are fundamentally tailored to the individual student. I welcome applications from motivated, bright, enthusiastic, and energetic students, and encourage you to read a few of my publications that are of particular interest to you. Applicants are encouraged to visit UCLA for a day or two so we can meet and get to know each other.

The Department has a strong emphasis on tectonics and on interdisciplinary approaches to solving tectonic problems. Interactions with other graduate students, researchers, and faculty in related areas are common, fruitful, and encouraged. These areas include structural geology (e.g., Yin), sedimentology (Ingersoll and Horton), seismology and geodesy (Vidale, Peltzer, Houston, Jackson, and Davis), and dynamic modelling (e.g., Bird, Schubert, and Tackley). Several regularly scheduled seminars provide opportunities to hear visitors from around the world and from UCLA discuss their research. These seminars include the Department Colloquium, the IGPP Colloquium, Geocheminar, the Seismology Seminar, and a Tectonics Seminar.