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My name is Tobgay and I come from the Kingdom of Bhutan. I am a geologist working for
the Geological Survey of Bhutan (GSB). I joined GSB in 2000 after completing
my Undergraduation from the University of Wollongong, Australia. The GSB has
shared meaningful collaboration with Professor Lincoln
Hollister (Princeton University) and his colleagues for many years. The inclusion of
the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP) in our geoscientific collaboration led to the inception of
seismic project in Bhutan and also paved way for several GSB geologists for graduate studies at UTEP. I was one of them.
Also, I was the focal person for the seismic project (servicing seismometers, acquiring data, and offloading
data for analysis at UTEP). While at UTEP, I studied the tectonic geomorphology of
the Bhutan Himalaya that involved looking at the geometry of topography in the
context of neotectonics. This study was important considering the
impending seismic hazards as well as improving our understanding of why
along-strike topographic and geologic differences exist. Many
inspirational individuals introduced me to the forefront of geosciences
including Drs. Jose M. Hurtado, Chris Andronicos, Lincoln
Hollister, and ofcourse my advisor Dr. Nadine McQuarrie stimulated to follow their footsteps even though they know it
is impossible.
Of late, the “channel flow model”
to explain the Himalayan orogenesis has gained popularity. The Bhutan
Himalaya has been a natural laboratory for the development and testing of
this model. Professor Lincoln Hollister and his colleagues have done
extensive research in the Bhutan Himalaya, a region of compression, to
recognize and explain ductile extrusion as the dominant mountain bulding process. Inspired by their work, I am here at the Princeton University to do more work on the
tectonometamorphic evolution of the Bhutan Himalaya in an attempt to connect
the missing link in Himalayan tectonics.
Geology of
Bhutan
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