Cornell University professors Muawia Barazangi of geological sciences and Thomas D. O'Rourke of civil engineering are available to comment on the recent earthquake in Turkey.

Barazangi is engaged in a study of earthquake data produced by the national seismic networks of Syria, Turkey and Morocco, in joint research projects with Syrian, Turkish and Moroccan scientists.

He currently is involved in a detailed study of the crust and upper mantle of eastern Turkey (the Turkish plateau) with Turkish colleagues at Kandilli Observatory and Earthquake Research Institute (Istanbul). The aim is to understand the mechanism of convergence between the Arabian plate and the Turkish crustal blocks in one of the youngest continental collision zones on earth. The results will also be of direct relevance to earthquake hazard assessment in eastern Turkey.

The current earthquake, he explains, is just the most recent in a sequence of events occurring on the North Anatolian fault, which runs eastward from Istanbul for about 1,000 kilometers. Beginning in the 1930s, a sequence of major earthquakes has moved westward along this fault; the most recent was in 1967 just east of Istanbul. The region lies at the junction between the Arabian and Eurasian crustal plates, and the movement of these plates across one another builds pressure that is released through earthquakes.

Barazangi is associate director of the Institute for the Study of the Continents (INSTOC) at Cornell. He is a member of the American Association of Petroleum Geologists, the American Geophysical Union, the Seismological Society of America and the Geological Society of America.

O'Rourke is an expert in earthquake engineering research, with a focus on predicting and reducing the vulnerability of structures and lifeline systems during an earthquake.

Prior to the Loma Prieta earthquake in California in 1989 -- which struck minutes before a World Series game between the San Francisco Giants and the Oakland Athletics -- O'Rourke and Mircea Grigoriu, Cornell professor of civil and environmental engineering, had studied the effects of the water pipelines in the San Francisco area and determined that parts of the water systems were vulnerable to devastating damage. Their study was used by the fire department for effective emergency operations.

O'Rourke also visited Kobe, Japan, immediately after the 1995 earthquake as part of a National Science Foundation (NSF) and a National Institute of Standards and Technology effort to study geotechnical aspects and the performance of lifelines during and after an earthquake. Following the 1994 Northridge, Calif., earthquake, O'Rourke worked with the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power to develop a "digitized" water pipeline network. O'Rourke and his engineering students helped to create a Geographic Information System (GIS) for more than 11,000 kilometers of water pipelines so that if another earthquake strikes, the company can quickly identify trouble spots in the network.

Two years ago, O'Rourke was instrumental in securing a $10 million grant awarded by the NSF for the State University of New York at Buffalo's National Center for Earthquake Engineering Research, of which Cornell is a major partner. Cornell's portion of the funding is supporting O'Rourke's research for the Center for Advanced Technologies in Earthquake Loss Reduction, a center also located in Buffalo.