Frontier Research Institute for Interdisciplinary Sciences
Tohoku University

Japanese people live over the most active and violent place of the planet. The Pacific ocean crust sinks below the Japanese islands removing part of their geological roots in a process known as tectonic erosion.Such process has shape the geological and human history of Japan.It is crucial to understand the mechanisms of tectonic erosion to better asses geohazards (earthquakes and tsunamis) and the history of Japan. My research will show how tectonic erosion shaped the geology of Japan over the past 500 million years and how it has controlled the development of Japanese civilization. The process controlling tectonic erosion is the same that controls the major geohazards happening in Japan, and my research provides a framework to understand the relationships between subduction, tectonic erosion and megathrust earthquakes. To achieve my goals I will work in an interdisciplinary environment sharing my geological and geophysical knowledge with the expertise of several researchers at Tohoku University in risk evaluation and geohazard assessment and antropology and history of Japan.