Register HERE!

On Tuesday 20 October, Benoit Taisne, Associate Professor, and Associate Chair for research and graduate matters at the Earth Observatory of Singapore (EOS) will present the fourth casual French Lab Singapore meeting: AFTER LAB!

You: Hello! 

Me: Hello! 

You: So… what are you doing in Singapore? 

Me: Studying volcanoes. 

You: … 

Me:  

You: Wait…. what? You are studying volcanoes? In Singapore? But… I mean… How? Why? What? They don’t have volcanoes here… right? 

Me: Yes, you are correct, they do not have any active volcanoes in Singapore…. however…. in June 1991, volcanic ash was deposited on the ground in Singapore. This ash was from the eruption of Pinatubo in the Philippines, which is one of the hundreds of active volcanoes in the region. Can you picture the socio-economic impact if the same was to occur again today? Part of my research is focusing on finding ways to mitigate the long-range impact of volcanic eruptions. A lot of actions could be taken ahead of time, even if only a few hours, if you knew when and where the ash fall could be expected over densely populated areas or critical infrastructure. To achieve this, you need to have a good understanding of what is happening at the volcano to model where and when the ash will travel. To gain this precious knowledge, we combine social media analysis, satellite analysis, and infrasound analysis. Each of those data sets will provide a different type of information. From social media we could identify the start of an eruption or the area impacted in the direction of where the plume is traveling and depositing ash. From satellite, when cloud cover is reduced, we could estimate the height of the volcanic eruptive column. From infrasound, sounds bellow human hearing, we can also estimate the height of the volcanic column, but also the duration of the eruption. By combining this information, we can use ash dispersal modelling to forecast (in a probabilistic way), where and when the ash will be. When we have a reasonable level of certainty, we could communicate the information to the relevant person on the ground so that they can prepare and mitigate the impact! 

You: Cool… I didn’t realise! I have a lot of question now! Can you look at the pa[interrupted…] 

Me: Sorry I must go now… I enjoyed the chat! Do keep your questions for October 20^th I will be talking about this at the FrenchLab! Looking forward to cyber-seeing you there! 

Register HERE!

Benoit Taisne joined the EOS in 2012 as a Principal Investigator within the volcano group and the Asian School of the Environment (ASE) at Nanyang Technological University, where he is now an Associate Professor, and Associate Chair for research and graduate matters.

Benoit was educated in France where he received his BSc and MSc degrees in earth sciences at the University Pierre et Marie Curie and the École Normale Supérieure de Paris in 2004. He also holds an MSc in geophysics from the Institut de Physique du Globe de Paris, where he obtained his PhD in 2008. Prior to moving to Singapore, he was a post-doctoral researcher at the Montserrat Volcano Observatory and at the seismological laboratory of the Institut de Physique du Globe de Paris.

Most recently, Benoit received the 2018 Nanyang Education Award (School) presented in the highest recognition of his teaching contributions to the University.

Broadly speaking, Benoit is primarily interested in magmatic processes from depth to the atmosphere, with the aim of understanding and integrating the external and internal mechanisms that control the dynamics of magmatic systems. His current research interests include monitoring volcanoes and real-time processing, analogue experiments, and infrasound, with a focus on the volcanoes of Southeast Asia.

Within the ASE, Benoit established the magma transport and infrasound laboratories. He set up the very first infrasound-based monitoring network in Singapore and is collaborating with colleagues in and around Southeast Asia to develop infrasound capability in the region in order to further improve the potential to detect and characterise explosive volcanic eruptions.

Basics Information:
Date: Tuesday 20 October
Time: 5PM
Admission: Free ticket