9306190 Bilham The northward movement of India is responsible both for the Great height of the Himalayan peaks and for the recurrence of devastating earthquakes in Asia from northern India to Mongolia. Yet the collision rate and the distribution of slip among tectonic units in Asia remains to be measured directly. The PI has established a network of control points in India, Nepal and China whose remeasurement and analysis will provide velocity estimates of the large scale processes of north-south convergence and east- west extension. These numbers will constrain the kinematics of the Tibetan Plateau, and the rate of strain development responsible for great earthquakes in the Himalaya. In 1993/4 he plans to measure a small geodetic network across the Altyn Tagh fault, the largest on-land strike slop fault outside California, which will further constrain deformation rates in Tibet and the Kun Lun Mountains. Elsewhere, by operating GPS receivers in Nepal and inviting colleagues in India and China to operate receivers simultaneously on key tectonic units in their countries he is able to undertake cost effective measurements of large scale Asian tectonics. ***
