In this paper, we outline the key insights from decision-making research about how, when faced with uncertainty, humans constrain decisions through the use of heuristics (rules of thumb), making them vulnerable to systematic and suboptimal decision biases. We also review existing strategies to debias decision-making that have applicability in the geosciences, giving special attention to strategies that make use of information technology and artificial intelligence.

Using state-of-the-art geomorphic techniques, we quantified a 2-order of magnitude discrepancy between annual, decadal, and millennial sediment fluxes of a landslide-affected mountainous river catchment in the Swiss Alps. Our results illustrate that the impact of a single sediment pulse is strongly attenuated at larger spatial and temporal scales by sediment transport. The accumulation of multiple sediment pulses has rather a measurable impact on the regional pattern of sediment fluxes.

Earthquake aftershocks display spatiotemporal correlations arising from their self-organized critical behavior. Stochastical models such as the fiber bundle (FBM) permit the use of an analog of the physical model that produces a statistical behavior with many similarities to real series. In this work, a new model based on FBM that includes geometrical faults systems is proposed. Our analysis focuses on aftershock statistics, and as a study case we modeled the Northridge sequence.

Considering all mapped faults in Italy, empirical scaling laws between fault dimensions and earthquake magnitude are used at the national scale. Results are compared with earthquake catalogues. The consistency between our results and the catalogues gives credibility to the method. Some large differences between the two datasets suggest the validation of this experiment elsewhere.

The Aar and Mont Blanc regions in the Alps are large granitoid massifs characterized by high topography. We analyse when these granitoids were first exhumed to the surface. We test this by tracking specific garnet grains, which are exclusively found in the granitoid massifs, in the sediments contained in the alpine foreland basin. This research ties in with ongoing debates on the timing and mechanisms of mountain building.

This paper improves the Monte Carlo simulation for uncertainty propagation (MCUP) method for 3-D geological modeling. Topological heterogeneity is observed in the model suite. The study demonstrates that such heterogeneity arises from piecewise nonlinearity inherent to 3-D geological models and contraindicates use of global uncertainty estimation methods. Topological-clustering-driven uncertainty estimation is proposed as a demonstrated alternative to address plausible model heterogeneity.

Land–river reflection seismic, hydrogeological modelling, and magnetic investigations in an area prone to quick-clay landslides in SW Sweden provide a detailed description of the subsurface structures, such as undulating fractured bedrock, a sedimentary sequence of intercalating leached and unleached clay, and coarse-grained deposits. Hydrological properties of the coarse-grained layer help us understand its role in the leaching process that leads to the formation of quick clays in the area.

Carbon capture and storage is a technology for the mitigation of industrial CO₂ emissions. Most subsurface storage capacity is in rocks for which there is relatively little information. A group of experts estimated the storage capacity of seven units, producing a wide range of estimates for each unit due to a combination of using different published values for some variables and differences in their judgements of average values. Hence, there is significant uncertainty in such estimates.

Prediction of rock permeability is of crucial importance for several research areas in geoscience. In this study, we enhance the finite difference code LaMEM to compute fluid flow on the pore scale using Newtonian and non-Newtonian rheologies. The accuracy of the code is demonstrated using several analytical solutions as well as experimental data. Our results show good agreement with analytical solutions and recent numerical studies.

This study sheds light on the mineral-scale mechanisms controlling the progressive deformation of sheared amphibolites from the Oman metamorphic sole during subduction initiation and unravels how strain is localized and accommodated in hydrated mafic rocks at high temperature conditions. Our results indicate how metamorphic reactions and pore-fluid pressures driven by changes in pressure–temperature conditions and/or water activity control the rheology of mafic rocks.

We use drones to study surface geometries of massively dilatant faults (MDFs) in Iceland, with apertures up to tens of meters at the surface. Based on throw, aperture and structures, we define three geometrically different endmembers of the surface expression of MDFs and show that they belong to one continuum. The transition between the endmembers is fluent and can change at one fault over short distances, implying less distinct control of deeper structures on surface geometries than expected.

Three-dimensional numerical modelling of geodynamic processes may benefit strongly from using realistic 3-D starting models that approximate, e.g. natural subduction settings in the geological past or at present. To this end, we developed the Geodynamic World Builder (GWB), which enables relatively straightforward parameterization of complex 3-D geometric structures associated with geodynamic processes. The GWB is an open-source community code designed to easily interface with geodynamic codes.