IRIS/USGS Expand Museum Program

The IRIS/USGS seismology display is reported to be one of the most popular exhibits within the American Museum of Natural History's Hall of Planet Earth.

In partnership with the US Geological Survey, IRIS is expanding its museum program. In addition to the prototypes that are currently at IRIS headquarters in Washington, DC, the New Mexico Museum of Natural History in Albuquerque, NM, and the Franklin Institute Science Museum in Philadelphia, PA; additional exhibits are being developed at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Pittsburgh, PA, and the American Museum of Natural History in New York, NY. Within the next six months, we expect the display program to reach an audience of approximately 8.75 million each year. With expansion of the program to include two or three additional museums over the next few years, the total audience for the full program could be as high as 10 million per year.

Display Concept
Most people are amazed to learn that an earthquake occurred today; and they are astonished to discover that earthquakes are continually occurring. In general, the public views earthquakes as unusual events that result in cataclysmic destruction. We have developed exhibits with the above-mentioned museums to change the public perception of earthquakes. We present earthquakes not as destructive events, but rather as signals of the dynamic geological forces that build our mountains and create our ocean basins. In other words, we seek to develop an appreciation for earthquakes as nature's reminder that we are living on the thin, outer crust of a planet whose interior is still cooling.

By bringing live seismic data over the Internet and broadcasting it in museums, we provide visitors with evidence that the Earth's surface is in motion. The displays and accompanying educational materials show why earthquakes occur, how seismometers record earthquakes, how earthquakes relate to plate tectonics, and how we can use seismology to explore the Earth's interior. The displays use earthquakes to capture the visitor's attention, but they also use earthquakes as an introduction for a broad range of Geoscience concepts.

In addition to the new Hall of Planet Earth, IRIS and the USGS are developing exhibits and demonstrations for the teaching Halls at the American Museum of Natural History in New York.

In meeting with museums, we discovered that approximately 40% of their visitors arrive in groups, usually as part of a school trip. To host these groups, museums are creating "classrooms" and developing demonstrations. For such classrooms, we are including within the museum display the ability to playback famous earthquakes. Museums will, for example, be able to replay the Northridge earthquake and set the display to record ground motion as it would appear at different seismic stations across the United States. Visitors see, for example, that stations close to the earthquake record P-waves and S-waves in quick succession; but with increasing distance from the earthquake the time differences between the arrival of the P-waves and S waves increases. Accompanying handouts and classroom exercises will translate this observation into an understanding of how we are able to determine the location of an earthquake from seismic records.

A Launching Point for Further Interest in Geoscience
The museum display is designed as a launching point for further understanding of seismology and Geoscience. In fact, all of the educational content of the display can be "carried away" with the visitor. In addition to the one-pagers, posters, and teaching exercises, the electronic portions of the exhibit are accessible through accompanying websites that allow individuals or classes to continue to monitor global seismicity in their classrooms or homes. The website displays are interactive and allow viewers to find out more information about individual earthquakes, to access actual ground motion records from various seismic stations, and to electronically visit individual seismic stations around the world.

The "make-your-own-earthquake" display captures the attention of visitors, and prompts them to learn more about the relationship of earthquakes to plate tectonics.

Further expansion
The display concepts are continually evaluated through a variety of forums, including scientific conferences, Earth Science Week programs, and Congressional exhibits. We expect that most of our recommendations, however, will come from museums that have been testing the prototype that is touring across the country as part of the Franklin Institutes Power of Nature exhibit. Videotape records of viewer response and interview evaluations provided by the various museums will be used to improve the concepts of the display.

If you know of other museums that would be interested in developing real-time earthquake exhibits, please contact the IRIS Education and Outreach Program.

EarthScope News

There are exciting developments at the National Science Foundation (NSF) related to a major new facilities initiative called "EarthScope: a Look into our Continent". The Earth Science Division at NSF is working with a number of organizations representing the research community to develop a plan to be presented to the National Science Board later this year for consideration as a Major Research Equipment (MRE) initiative. The MRE account is an NSF-wide program to provide funding for the construction and acquisition of major facilities that are beyond the funding resources of any one Directorate.

Two of the components of EarthScope, USArray and the Plate Boundary Observatory (PBO) were described in the last IRIS Newsletter. SAFOD (San Andreas Fault Observatory at Depth) was described in the Fall 1993 issue of the IRIS Newsletter. USArray and SAFOD are included as the first two components of the EarthScope initiative which has received strong support as it begins to move through NSF. PBO and related facilities for satellite interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR) will be proposed as a future component of EarthScope.

The USArray component of EarthScope is being presented to NSF as a significant enhancement to facilities for portable seismic instrumentation for use in investigations of the structure, evolution and dynamics of the North American continent. At the same time, the Advanced National Seismic System (ANSS) has been authorized, as part of the National Earthquake Hazards Reduction Program, as a USGS initiative to improve facilities for permanent seismic networks for earthquake monitoring. IRIS and NSF are working closely with the USGS to coordinate the development and implementation of these two complementary facilities for a broad spectrum of seismological studies.

Information on EarthScope will be available through the IRIS website and www.EarthScope.org. Articles on USArray have been published in EOS (June, 1999) and GSA Today (November, 1999). Reports from recent workshops on USArray and PBO will be posted. A USGS report on ANSS is being published as USGS Circular 1188 and is also available through http://geohazards.cr.usgs.gov/pubs/circ.