Fiber Optic Seismology for Earthquake Hazards Research, Monitoring and Early Warning

A revolution is underway in seismology that transforms fiber-optic cables into arrays of thousands of seismic sensors. Compared to the traditional monitoring networks using inertial seismometers, the fiber-optic approach can increase the spatial data density by orders of magnitude and enable data processing methodologies that require a high-fidelity wavefield. The Working Group aims to advance the USGS, along with several academic and industry partners, towards effective utilization of fiber-optic sensing techniques to understand earthquake hazards and improve monitoring and real-time warning systems.  We will conduct synthesis studies that demonstrate the potential gains for various applications, including earthquake early warning, urban and offshore fault characterization, and monitoring of induced seismicity. We will engage with key entities to better understand their concerns and explore various models of working with the telecommunication industry to gain access to readily available but unused fiber-optic cables (dark fiber). We will develop a database of potentially accessible fibers of scientific interest.  Combined, we hope these activities will accelerate the USGS’s efforts in areas of earthquake science that can benefit from this new approach.

Principal Investigators
Jeffrey J. McGuire (USGS Earthquake Science Center)
Zhongwen Zhan (Caltech Seismological Laboratory)
Andy Barbour (USGS Earthquake Science Center)
Veronica Rodriguez Tribaldos (Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory)
Zack J. Spica (Earth and Environmental Sciences)

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• Atterholt, J., McGuire, J.J., Barbour, A.J., and Moschetti, M.P., 2026b, Sharp structural variability of the Gorda slab imaged by a fiber array: Nature Communications, v. 17, no. 1, p. 9072, accessed October 1, 2026, at https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-026-76002-8.
• Atterholt, J., McGuire, J.J., Barbour, A.J., Stewart, C., and Moschetti, M.P., 2025, Fiber-imaged supershear dynamics in the 2024 M_w 7 Mendocino Fault earthquake: Science, v. 389, no. 6767, p. 1361–1365, accessed January 28, 2026, at https://doi.org/10.1126/science.adx6858.
• Barbour, A.J., McGuire, J.J., Karrenbach, M., McPherson, R.C., Hemphill-Haley, M.A., and Stewart, C., 2026, Earthquake Magnitude and Source Parameter Estimation with a Distributed Acoustic Sensing Dataset in the Gorda Subduction Zone: Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America, v. 116, no. 1, p. 355–374, accessed February 18, 2026, at https://doi.org/10.1785/0120250077.
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• McGuire, J.J., Barbour, A.J., Stewart, C., Yartsev, V., Karrenbach, M., Hemphill-Haley, M., McPherson, R.C., Stockdale, K., Yoon, C., and Sawi, T., 2025b, The GorDAS Distributed Acoustic Sensing Experiment Above the Cascadia Locked Zone and Subducted Gorda Slab: Seismological Research Letters, v. 96, no. 4, p. 2489–2503, accessed February 18, 2026, at https://doi.org/10.1785/0220240415.
• Sawi, T.M., McGuire, J.J., Barbour, A.J., Yoon, C.E., Karrenbach, M., and Stewart, C., 2026, Rapid earthquake magnitude classification via P-wave strains from borehole strainmeters and Distributed Acoustic Sensing: Nature Communications, v. 17, no. 1, p. 4776, accessed July 1, 2026, at https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-026-72223-z.
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