| Geodesy and Tectonophysics Laboratory

GNSS site in the Natron Rift, Tanzania

GTL Vision: Our vision is to advance the theory of plate tectonics using geodesy and computational modeling while promoting inclusion, diversity, justice, equity, and accessibility in STEM education and research.

GTL Mission: The mission of GTL is to conduct research that entails measuring the Earth's surface motions with millimeter precision and using computational modeling to understand the physical processes driving the Earth's volcanoes, earthquakes, and continental deformation while training future leaders that are culturally effective to make both Virginia Tech and the world a safer and more inclusive place.

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Welcome new undergraduate researchers Jasmine Floyd, Saye Woodard, and Nicole Paredes! (Fall 2023)

Ms. Asenath Kwagalakwe has been awarded a summer internship with Minean SP Construction Corporation in Vancouver, Canada to investigate geothermal resources in Uganda (June 2023)

Welcome new undegraduate researcher Justin Dean! (May 2023)

Congratulations to Mr. Ntambila Daud for passing his preliminary exams! (April 2023)

Ms. Asenath Kwagalakwe gave a talk at the 10th East African Petroleum Conference and Exhibition 2023 in Kampala, Uganda.

5 papers published in 2023 so far:

     5) **Niinju E.A., D.S. Stamps, T. Rooney, E.A. Atekwana, T.A. Rajaonarison (in press) Instantaneous 3D tomography-based convection beneath the Rungwe Volcanic Province, East Africa: implications for melt generation, Geophysical Journal International  


     4) **Rajaonarison, T.A., Stamps, D.S., Naliboff, J., Nyblade, A. and **Njinju, E.A., 2023. A Geodynamic Investigation of Plume‐Lithosphere Interactions Beneath the East African Rift. Journal of Geophysical Research: Solid Earth, p.e2022JB025800, https://doi.org/10.1029/2022JB025800


     3) **Daud, N., Stamps, D.S., Battaglia, M., Huang, M.H., Saria, E. and Ji, K.H., 2023. Elucidating the magma plumbing system of Ol Doinyo Lengai (Natron Rift, Tanzania) using Satellite Geodesy and numerical modeling. Journal of Volcanology and Geothermal Research, p.107821, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jvolgeores.2023.107821


     2) **Niinju E.A., M. Moorkamp, D.S. Stamps (2023) Density Structure Beneath the Rungwe Volcanic Province and Surroundings, East Africa from Constrained Inversion, Frontiers in Earth Science, doi: 10.3389/feart.2023.1118566


     1) Brune, Sascha, Jean-Arthur Olive, D. Sarah Stamps, Folarin Kolawole, Susanne Buiter, Roger Buck, (2023), Geodynamics of Rift Initiation and Evolution, Nature Review Earth & Environment, https://doi.org/10.1038/s43017-023-00391-3


Welcome undergraduate researcher Ruben Ramirez! He was a CODE-GEO participant in 2022!

Dr. Sarah Stamps now leads the Virginia Tech College of Science Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, and Accessibility committee as chair.

Congratulations to Karen Williams for passing her preliminary defense! 12/2/2022

New publication alert! Troia, G. D.S. Stamps, R.R. Lotspeich, J. Duda, K.J. McCoy, W. Moore, P. Hensel, R. Hippenstiel, T. McKenna, D. Andreasen, C. Geoghegan, T.P. Ulizio, M. Kronebusch, J. Carr, D. Walters, N. Winn (accepted). GPS data from 2019 and 2020 campaigns in the Chesapeake Bay region towards vertical land motions, Scientific Data, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41597-022-01864-8

New e-Book published with Dr. Stamps as an editor with Frontiers called Advances in African Earth Science.

Congratulations to Ms. Jane Wambui for passing her Msc defense!

Welcome Msc student Ms. Jane Wambui! Dr. Stamps is co-advising her as she earns her Msc from the Univeristy of Nairobi, Kenya.

Welcome new laboratory assistant Reza Jian Najar!

Welcome new undergraduate researchers Holly Hughes and Anabelle Fry for Fall 2022!

DRIAR team website is published! Visit the site by clicking here.

New publication alert! Dye, M., Stamps, D. S., Mason, M., & Saria, E. (2022). Toward autonomous detection of anomalous GNSS data via applied unsupervised artificial intelligence. International Journal of Semantic Computing, 1-17.

Welcome 2022 undergraduate researcher Isabella Paolucci! She is a Virginia Tech Department of Geosciences student working on the volcanic plumbing system of Ol Doinyo Lengai.

Welcome 2022 undergraduate researcher Madeline Kronebusch! She is a Virginia Tech Department of Geosciences student working on GNSS data analysis for the Chesapeake Bay project.

Dr. Stamps is excited to be a keynote speaker at the upcoming 2022 CSDMS Workshop in May!

Welcome 2021 undergraduate researcher Crystal Lee! She is a Virginia Tech student working on GNSS data analysis for the DRIAR project.

Dr. Stamps presented virtually for Stony Brook University in October 2021. See the presentation at this YouTube link.

Dr. Stamps presented virtually for the University of Alaska in September 2021. See the presentation at this YouTube link.

Welcome 2021 undergraduate researcher Liam O'Hanlon! They are a Virginia Tech student working on volcano-tectonic interactions using PyLith.

Dr. Stamps had a great visit at the University of Maryland in September 2021 to give their departmental colloquium on "Clues about the break-up of the African continent"

Welcome 2021 undergraduate researchers Deja Celestine! She is a USGS student contractor working with Dr. Maurizio Battaglia of the USGS Volcano Disaster Assistance Program and Dr. Stamps to develop a manual for dMODELS and improve the code.  

Dr. Stamps has been promoted to associate professor!

Welcome 2021 summer undergraduate researchers Abdullah Rizwan and Rami Gorle!

Congratulations recent PhD graduate Joshua Robert Jones! So thrilled he will be joining the National Geodetic Survey as a geodesist!

New publication by postdoctoral scholar Dr. Emmanuel Njinju in the Journal of Geophysical Research! Njinju, E., D.S. Stamps, K. Neumiller, J. Gallagher (2021), Lithospheric Control of Melt Generation Beneath the Rungwe Volcanic Province, East Africa: Implications for a Plume Source, Journal of Geophysical Research, doi:10.1029/2020JB020728

Welcome new undergraduate researcher Esha Islam!

The Virginia Tech Geosciences URGE Pod has begun! Dr. Stamps is excited to be leading our Pod at Virginia Tech with several members of GTL joining the group.

New publication is out! Rajaonarison et al. (2021), Role of Lithospheric Buoyancy Forces in Driving Deformation in East Africa from 3D Geodynamic Modeling, Geophysical Research Letters.

Happy to be leading our Virginia Tech Geosciences URGE pod!

Welcome new PhD students Daud Ntambila and Asenath Kwagalakwe, new undergraduate resesarcher Kelsey Popolizio, and new Postdoctoral Associate Dr. Emmanuel Njinju!

Congratulations Tahiry Rajaonarison and Emmanul Njinju for passing your defenses!

New NSF grant funded through the Frontiers in Earth Science Resesarch program on Dry Rifting In the Albertine-Rhino Graben, Uganda (DRIAR).

Welcome new laboratory assistant Rufus Hinton IV!

Geology paper in press on Redefining the Kinematics of the East African Rift System.

New publication from the GTL group: Glerum, A., Brune, S., Stamps, D.S. et al. Victoria continental microplate dynamics controlled by the lithospheric strength distribution of the East African Rift. Nat Commun 11, 2881 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-020-16176-x

We are excited about Karen Williams joining our lab in Fall 2020 as a new PhD student!

Stamps has been awarded her CAREER grant entitled Volcano-Tectonic Interactions During Early Phases of Continental Rifting!

Congratulations Roberto Gorjon-Andujar on earning your Bachelors degree in Geosciences!

Congratulations Tahiry Rajaonarison on his first-author publication at JGR!: Rajaonarison, T.A., D.S. Stamps, S. Fishwick, S. Brune, A. Glerun, J. Hu, (2020), Numerical Modeling of Mantle Flow Beneath Madagascar to Constrain Upper Mantle Rheology Beneath Continental Regions, Journal of Geophysical Research

Stamps became a 2019-2020 NSF Computational Infrastructure for Geodynamics Distinguished Lecturer with talks at Michigan State University, Grand Valley State University, and the University of Alaska, Fairbanks.

10 new GNSS datasets from Uganda and Kenya made publically accessible with doi's at UNAVCO (www.unavco.org)

Emmanuel Njinju's paper is now published in Tectonics! Lithospheric Structure of the Malawi Rift: Implications for Magma-Poor Rifting Processes. Congratulations!

Welcome new Fall 2019 Undergraduate Reserchers Gabbi Troia, Myles Mason, and Rebecca Plosay!

Welcome new Laboratory Assistant Siria Aparicio!

Great field season in Tanzania and Kenya in August-September 2019. A video crew joined us for a new CBS documentary!

2019 Journal of Geophysical Research Paper: Strain accommodation in the Daliangshan Mountain area, southeastern margin of the Tibetan Plateau, Rui and Stamps

PhD student Emmanuel Njinju published his first article in the Journal of Volcanology and Geothermal Research! Terrestrial heat flow in the Malawi Rifted Zone, East Africa: Implications for tectono-thermal inheritance in continental rift basins.

Welcome undergraduate researcher Israel Mamo!

Josh Jones passed his preliminary exams! Congratulations new PhD candidate!

D. Sarah Stamps had a great visit to Penn State over Spring Break 2019 and the University of Memphis in April 2019.

Josh R. Jones published his first paper in G-Cubed! Evidence for slip on a border fault triggered by magmatic processes in an immature continental rift

2019 G-Cubed: A geodetic strain rate field and tectonic velocity model for China, Rui and Stamps

Congratulations Emmanuel Njinju, PhD student, for receiving the AGU GeoPRISMS student award honorable mention!

GTL members represented the laboratory in the Virginia Tech ICAT Science Day 2018.

Congratulations Jessica Schobelock for earning your Msc degree! She's now a software engineer at Capitol One.

Congratulations Laboratory Assistant Lidia Guerra for getting a summer semester program in DC this summer (2018)!

Congratulations Undergraduate Researcher Sean Malloy for obtaining a UNAVCO summer internship and a job as a field engineer at UNAVCO.

Congratulations PhD student Josh Jones for obtaining a UCAR summer internship for the summer of 2018.

Msc student Jessica Schobelock presented a poster at the 2018 Seismological Society of America meeting in Miami, FL. Good job earning the SSA travel scholarhip!

Stamps gave a CIG Distinguished Lecturer presentation at Hampton University.

2018 Nature: Scientific Reports paper on a Geodetic Strain Rate Model for the East African Rift System, Stamps et al.

Welcome undergraduate researchers Sarah Morgan and Ryan Roane Spring 2018!

GTL welcomes Jared Guzman as an undergraduate researcher until the end of Fall semester 2017!

Welcome Research Scholar Dr. Rui Xu from the Sichuan Earthquake Bureau, China (2017-2018).

GTL members represented the laboratory in the 2017, 2018, and 2019 Virginia Tech Department of Geosciences, GeoFair and Mineral Sale.

GTL researchers presented at the 2017 and 2018 Virginia Tech Undergraduate Research Mixer

Research featured in National Geographic Society story 'Mountain of God' preparing to Erupt'.

Virginia Tech Department of Geosciences welcomes new Department Chair Professor Steve Holbrook 2017

The Geodesy and Tectonophysics Laboratory welcomes new PhD student Emmanuel Njinju Fall 2017

Stamps became a 2017-2018 NSF Computational Infrastructure for Geodynamics Distinguished Lecturer

Stamps awarded 2016-2017 EarthCube Community Service and Leadership Award

$1.4 million transdisciplinary NSF EarthCube Integration project approved for funding and led by our group