Tectonophysics
Elvira Mulyukova and her research group investigate the role of grain-level physics on the rheology and dynamics of the Earth's mantle and its outer rigid shell, the lithosphere, and by extension, tectonic plates. Most of their work is theoretical and computational and has provided hypotheses the initiation of a plate's subduction. This work is not limited to Earth and has fascinating applications to the tectonics of other terrestrial planets and icy moons in the solar system.
Suzan van der Lee and her research group investigate how plate tectonics has been and will be sustained over billions of years, primarily through seismically imaging the structure of the Earth's deep interior and unraveling the dynamics between these structures and the dynamics of the Earth's lithosphere at the surface. In addition they investigate intraplate deformation, including continental rifting. Her group's work on the western branch of the East-African Rift is funded by NSF and is a collaboration with Earth scientists in Uganda and the USA. Her group's previous work on the North-American Mid-continent Rift revealed deep roots beneath the rift valley containing at least as much magma as in and on the upper crust. This evidence of magmatism has been preserved for more than one billion years. They hypothesized that the magma caused the rifting and was generated by a deep water cycle, driven by subduction of oceanic lithosphere dozens to hundreds of millions of years earlier.