Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Determining The Motion And Location Of The Frenchman Mountain Fault, Las Vegas, Nevada: A Paired Basin Analysis And Structural Analysis, Laura Margaret Eaton

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Understanding the evolution of large-scale fault systems remains a challenge to geologists and is of critical importance in understanding the dynamics of larger plate tectonic interactions. I mapped the southwestern Frenchman Mountain Fault (FMF), conducted a basin analysis of units in the footwall of the fault, and measured kinematic indicators along the fault zone in order to constrain fault offset, magnitude, and timing in an attempt to further our understanding of these systems.

My findings include: 1) the presence of vertical and sub-vertical slickenlines on southwest dipping fault surfaces indicative of normal sense offset; 2) relatively little lateral variation in …

Paleoseismic Study Of The Stewart Valley And Northern Pahrump Segments Of The Stateline Fault System, Nevada, Jonathan Carter

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The Stateline fault system (SFS) is a ~200 km long zone of dextral faults running NW along the NV/CA border from Primm, Nevada to Amargosa Valley in the western Central Basin and Range province (CBR). Because of size and proximity, the SFS poses a hazard to the 2.5 million people, most of who live within 10 km, in Pahrump, Nevada and within 40 km, in Las Vegas, Nevada. The goals of this thesis are to (1) understand if the SFS is accommodating faulting slip change in the CBR; (2) test the along strike continuity of the SFS in Pahrump and …

Effects Of High-Impedance-Contrast Boundary Upon Multi-Modal Seismic Surface Wave Data, Prajwol Tamrakar

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Synthetic studies and analyses of an experimental dataset were conducted to address the use of Rayleigh-type surface waves for estimation of shear wave velocity (VS) profiles of shallow bedrock sites. The shallow bedrock presents a high impedance contrast boundary which causes surface wave energy to be partitioned to higher modes. Idealized studies of hypothetical datasets and root-mean-squared calculations of error surfaces showed that if reliable dispersion data are available over a broad frequency spectrum, the VS profile can be recovered using the fundamental mode alone. However, when dispersion data are limited to a relatively narrow frequency band representing what might …