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1. Fault-tip damage zone development during normal fault propagation within the Sevier Fault Zone, southern Utah

   https://doi.org/10.18277/AKRSG.2025.37.06  

   Ryter, Lila (July 2025, Keck Geology Consortium)
2. Impact of fault damage on eastern Tibet topography

   https://doi.org/10.1130/G48179.1  

   Kirkpatrick, Heather M.; Moon, Seulgi; Yin, An; Harrison, T. Mark (August 2020, Geology)

   null (Ed.)

   Tectonic deformation can influence spatiotemporal patterns of erosion by changing both base level and the mechanical state of bedrock. Although base-level change and the resulting erosion are well understood, the impact of tectonic damage on bedrock erodibility has rarely been quantified. Eastern Tibet, a tectonically active region with diverse lithologies and multiple active fault zones, provides a suitable field site to understand how tectonic deformation controls erosion and topography. In this study, we quantified erosion coefficients using the relationship between millennial erosion rates and the corresponding channel steepness. Our work shows a twofold increase in erosion coefficients between basins within 15 km of major faults compared to those beyond 15 km, suggesting that tectonic deformation through seismic shaking and rock damage significantly affects eastern Tibet erosion and topography. This work demonstrates a field-based, quantitative relationship between rock erodibility and fault damage, which has important implications for improving landscape evolution models. 

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3. THE EVOLUTION OF FAULT DAMAGE ZONES WITHIN THE SEVIER NORMAL FAULT SYSTEM, UTAH

   https://doi.org/10.1130/abs/2023AM-390693  

   Sharp, Morgan; Surpless, Benjamin; Pogue, Kevin (January 2023, Geological Society of America Abstracts with Programs)
4. Normal fault-tip damage zone structures and geometries from the Sevier fault, Utah

   https://doi.org/10.18277/AKRSG.2023.35.04  

   Nishimoto, Michelle; Surpless, Benjamin (July 2023, Keck Geology Consortium)

   Davidson, Cam; Wirth, Karl (Ed.)

   Fault-tip damage zones develop in response to fault propagation and displacement and are caused by the local amplification of stresses at the fault tip. Understanding the geometry and intensity of damage zones is crucial for evaluating earthquake hazards and assessing the potentials of oil and gas production, geothermal energy, and groundwater resources. Fractures initiate as a result of stresses exceeding rock strength and propagate based on the stress field at the fault tip. We investigate the damage zone of a fault segment within the Sevier normal fault zone near Orderville, Utah, focusing on fractures that developed within the Jurassic Navajo Sandstone, the Temple Cap Formation, and the oldest beds of the Carmel Formation. Because normal faults grow laterally as slip and displacement increase, we focus on the tip zone of a fault segment where fracturing is well-exposed. We executed a series of unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) flights to capture high-resolution imagery of inaccessible rock exposures. We use these images to construct structure-from-motion (SfM) virtual outcrop models (VOMs) that we georeference and analyze using Agisoft Metashape. We collected and analyzed fracture orientation and intensity data in the field and with VOMs. Both types of data reveal a distribution of fracture intensity that is consistent with inner and outer damage zones similar to previous studies of other fault systems. Adjacent to the tip, the inner damage zone has a higher fracture intensity on the hanging wall compared to the footwall. This high fracture intensity on the hanging wall ends 30 meters over from the fault core where the intensity of the outer damage zone of the hanging wall becomes similar to that within the inner damage zone of the footwall. Laterally, along strike of the fault tip, intense fracturing ends 60 meters to the south and all fracturing ends 350 meters from the fault tip. Our results have implications for the spatial distribution of fracturing and related permeability in similar normal fault systems. 

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5. CONSTRAINING FAULT DAMAGE ZONE EVOLUTION WITHIN THE SEVIER NORMAL FAULT SYSTEM, SOUTHERN UTAH

   https://doi.org/10.1130/abs/2024AM-400976  

   Costa, Sydney; Montalvo, Ariel; Ryter, Lila; Surpless, Benjamin (September 2024, Geological Society of America Abstracts with Programs)