Profile of Jean-Philippe Avouac

Jean-Philippe Avouac, elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 2025, explores deformations in Earth's surface in an effort to understand the formation and behavior of earthquakes. Using geology, satellite data, radar imagery, and modeling, Avouac has characterized the strain along the Himalayan Arc and at other faults. In his Inaugural Article, Avouac characterizes the magnitude 7.7 earthquake along the Sagaing fault in Myanmar in 2025. The enormous 510 km rupture traversed a section of the fault assumed to be under strain since it had not erupted since 1839. However, the rupture also included sections of the fault that were not part of this seismic gap.