Currently Funded Projects

QRC members lead and participate in a wide range of disciplinary and interdisciplinary research projects from the study of past earth climates and glaciations to shifts in the geographic distributions and evolution of vegetation and faunal communities, to the evolution and dispersals of the genus Homo and the increasing scales of human modification of earth environments through the Holocene. QRC provides a venue for meeting and collaborating with scholars across Quaternary disciplines. We are also fortunate to be able to provide seed funding and small grants for member research projects. We are especially happy to support grad student and junior scholar research activities, much of which leads to larger, external funding from agencies like the National Science Foundation. Since the program’s launch in 2014, we have funded over 100 research projects.

1 project in Paleotsunami characterization & recurrence All Projects
  • 2025-26 | |
    • Carrie Garrison-Laney, Faculty

    Determining the maximum inland extent of paleotsunami inundation with diatoms at the southern end of the Cascadia subduction zone

    This study will use diatoms to study paleotsunamis at Lagoon Creek, Del Norte County, California. Diatoms will characterize the environment before, during, and after episodes of tsunami inundation, in addition to the inland extent of tsunami flow. The location, close to the southern terminus of the Cascadia subduction zone (CSZ) is important for understanding the earthquake and tsunami history at the southern end of the subduction zone, which has more frequent earthquakes than the northern end, and may also rupture simultaneously, or close in time with earthquakes on the San Andreas fault.

    The proposed diatom analysis, done in conjunction with the graduate work of Bering Tse who is refining the stratigraphy, inland extent, and chronology of at least 6 tsunami deposits, will yield important information including deposit sediment source area, changes to the pond during and after the incursion of marine water, and the inundation limits of past tsunamis beyond the deposition of sand by identifying traces of marine diatoms in disturbed sediments. Detailed analyses of tsunami sites lead to a better understanding of Cascadia earthquake and tsunami histories, including how tsunamis flooded coastal landscapes in the past, how large they were, potential areas of greatest earthquake slip offshore, and a better understanding of future hazards, tsunami recurrence, improved hazard and evacuation maps, and more accurate hazard assessments.

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