The PIs propose to develop CIDER-II, (Cooperative Institute for Dynamic Earth Research) as an "Institute without Walls" enabling Earth Scientists of all disciplines to share their knowledge in studying the fundamental processes responsible for plate tectonics and associated natural hazards, in particular earthquakes. CIDER II will facilitate concerted multi-disciplinary investigations involving leading researchers across a broad range of Earth Science disciplines. It will: * Foster synergies between individuals and small groups of interdisciplinary researchers in tackling the most important and difficult unsolved problems in solid earth science; * Provide an environment for the development of new ideas that will help identify the next generation of critical experiments and observations, and to build appreciation and support for them; * Provide a venue for cross-disciplinary education of scientists at all career levels.
CIDER's goals are to help improve fundamental understanding of the Earth's evolution and present dynamics through a multi-disciplinary approach. It has been 40 years since the acceptance of plate tectonics theory, but no definitive agreement has yet been reached among geoscientists on the fundamental nature of the global dynamic processes that drive plate motions. The indication that a transformative approach is needed and is likely to be successful comes from new interpretation of global seismic tomographic models, indicating the existence of multiple depth domains in the Earth that show different properties of heterogeneity as a function of wavelength and depth. This suggests each depth domain has its own dynamics, but with some degree of coupling among them. Generally, a much more complex problem than has been considered until now.
Meanwhile, a new generation of disciplinary tools is becoming available that are providing unprecedented views of the Earth's interior. Major infrastructure efforts are currently under way: Earthscope's USArray (www.earthscope.org) provides seismologists with a high resolution "window" into the lithosphere, deep mantle and core over the North American continent; COMPRES (http://compres.us) allows mineral physicists to perform advanced measurements on mineral properties at the high P-T conditions relevant to the Earth's deep interior, and to compare them with results of "first principles" calculations. CIG (www.geodynamics.org) provides geodynamicists and seismologists with a unified, state of the art framework for computations of mantle and core convection and seismic wave propagation. Extensive GPS networks and satellite observations are revolutionizing the fields of geodesy and geomagnetism (e.g. EarthScope's Plate Boundary Observatory, Oersted, Champ, GRACE and Swarm). Paleomagnetic data are being assembled into the MagIC database (earthref.org/MAGIC/). In geochemistry, the enormous volumes of high quality chemical and isotopic data gathered over the past 25 years are now part of systematic and broadly accessible databases (PETDB:www.petdb.org, GEOROC georoc.mpch-mainz.gwdg.de/georoc), and ever-improving analytical techniques are providing new perspectives on mantle processes at scales from micrometers to thousands of kilometers. Given the enormous amount and diversity of observations becoming available, a significant leap in the understanding of the constitution and evolution of our planet can be expected, if we can identify and focus on the key issues that necessarily span across disciplines, and build effective inter-disciplinary bridges to solve them.
The role of CIDER-II will be to provide mechanisms for community evaluation, validation, problem reconciliation and consensus building. In each year, the activities of this "Center without walls" will be organized around a principal multi-disciplinary theme. The kick-off for each CIDER-II "theme" will be a 6-week summer program aimed at bringing together in one place researchers across disciplines, and across career levels, to define key questions that are ripe for synthesis and/or for a concerted multi-disciplinary research effort. CIDER-II will also provide support for working groups formed to address particular practical issues identified as ripe for synthesis. CIDER is inherently a broad impact program: it facilitates cross-education of earth scientists at any level in their career; it aims at educating a new generation of Earth scientists with a breadth of competence across disciplines required to make progress in understanding the dynamic earth. CIDER's web resources, including posting and webcasting of lectures given during the summer programs, as well as planned web forums and open publications, is designed to reach the entire community of earth scientists. CIDER will impact undergraduate education by producing a more broadly knowledgeable faculty cohort.
