What do you do?
I use computers to simulate earth system. My current work involves making models of the earthquake faults in California. We try to simulate the earthquakes that occur on them over thousands of years so we can learn how to forecast or predict them.

Why should the general public be interested in what you do?
We hope one day soon to make earthquake forecasts similar to weather forecasts. These could be a year or two in advance, and within, say, a 50 km radius of a geographical location in California, for magnitudes M > 6. (i.e., the big earthquakes that people care about).

Why does it interest you?
Forecasting earthquakes accurately would allow people to plan for these events, by strenghthening their buildings, roads, and homes. It's a major unsolved problem with great human and economic consequences, as we saw this year in Sumatra and Pakistan.

What major advances/discoveries have occurred in your research field over the last 10 years?
Probably the biggest (tragic) impact in decades was from the M = 9.3 Sumatra earthquake and tsunami that killed 300,000 persons. One great technical advance that may produce highly useful data is satellite radar measurements, called interferograms, of the earth's surface. Like a big picture, these show where the ground is actively moving on a large scale due to the earthquake. You can even sometimes see the ground moving when there hasn't been a large earthquake, such as due to ground subsiding due to water well pumping.