Project Description:
This project investigates how remote sensing observations of the Earth's surface can be linked with geophysical models to improve our understanding of the causes and mechanisms of uplift processes. The focus is on surface movements associated with flow in the Earth's mantle.
Uplift processes of the continental lithosphere occur over large spatial and temporal scales and leave characteristic signals at the Earth's surface. While such movements have long been studied primarily in the context of tectonic processes and isostatic adjustment mechanisms, it has become evident that mantle dynamics can also exert a significant influence on large-scale uplift processes.
Consequently, the observation and analysis of uplift rates can provide valuable insights into processes occurring deep beneath the lithosphere. The aim of our research is to precisely quantify recent uplift rates and investigate to what extent they are related to mantle dynamics.
The project focuses on deformation measurements using InSAR (Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar) and on the integration of surface motion rates derived from high-frequency GNSS time series.
Objectives:
- Evaluation of the detectability of potential mantle-related uplift signals through the integration of InSAR and GNSS.
- Development of spatiotemporal analysis methods for the characterization of crustal deformation associated with mantle processes.
Investigation of the separability of mantle-related uplift signals from other causes of surface deformation using remote sensing and time-series analysis.
This project is part of the DFG Research Training Group UPLIFT, which aims to investigate these processes through an interdisciplinary approach.