Short Biography
Darrel Cowan
Professor
Office: JHN-334
ESS Mailing Address
Phone: 206-543-4033, 543-2924
Fax: 206-543-0489 (shared)
E-Mail: cowan@ess.washington.edu
Homepage: http://www.ess.washington.edu/cowan
Research Groups: Structural Geology, Tectonics and Geodynamics
Areas of Interest:
Structural Geology, Tectonics
Current Research Interests:
My graduate students and I are currently working on two general projects. In 1996, former post-doctoral associates Trenton Cladouhos and Julia Morgan and I began a comprehensive field and theoretical study of the kinematics and mechanisms of deformation in fault rocks formed along low-angle normal faults in Death Valley, California. Eliza Nemser is continuing our research on the origin and evolution of faults and shear zones and associated damage in the brittle domain of the crust.
I am also a co-PI on a collaborative project, funded by a five-year grant from the Continental Dynamics Program at NSF, called RETREAT: an interdisciplinary study of syn-convergence extension in the northern Apennines in Italy. With UW graduate students Gabriele Casale and Andrew Gendaszek and colleagues at the University of Arizona, we are broadening our research to address the Neogene to present-day history of subduction of the Adria microplate beneath Croatia (ADVANCE). The UW component focuses on the structural geology and the evolution of karst in the Dinaride orogenic wedge.
In earlier research projects, several graduate students and UW colleagues and I investigated how diverse rock units and terranes in the northwest Cordillera were accreted and displaced in Cretaceous to early Tertiary time. Our findings bear on the current controversy about Baja British Columbia (pdf).
Graduate Students:
Gabriele Casale: Restorations of cross sections across the Dinarides, and determination of large-scale properties of the Dinaric orogenic wedge
Andrew Gendaszek: Quaternary to present kinematic history of the external Dinarides (Croatia) revealed through the geomorphic evolution of karst landforms
Eliza Nemser: Evolution of damage-zone deformation along small-displacement oblique-slip faults, Borrego Mountain, southern California
Selected Publications:
Cowan, D. S., Brandon, M.T., and Garver, J. I., 1997, Geologic tests of hypotheses for large coastwise Displacements-A critique illustrated by the Baja British Columbia controversy: American Journal of Science, v. 297, p. 117-173.
Cowan, D.S., 1999, Do faults preserve a record of seismic slip? A field geologist's opinion: Journal of Structural Geology Twentieth Anniversary Issue, v. 21, p. 995-1001.
Cowan, D.S., and Pini, G.A., 2001, Disrupted and chaotic rock units, in Vai, G.B., and Martini, I.P., eds., Anatomy of an Orogen-The Apennines and Adjacent Mediterranean Basins: Dordrecht, Kluwer Academic Publishers, p. 165-176.
Hayman, N. W., Knott, J.R., Cowan, D.S., Nemser, E., and Sarna-Wojcicki, A.M., 2003, Quaternary low-angle slip on detachment faults in death valley, California: Geology, v. 31.
Cowan, D.S., Cladouhos, T.T. and Morgan, J.K., 2003, Structural geology and kinematic history of rocks formed along low-angle normal faults, Death Valley, California: Geological Society of America Bulletin, v. 155, p. 1230-1248.
Cowan, D.S., 2003, Revisiting the Baranof-Leech River hypothesis for early Tertiary coastwise transport of the Chugach-Prince William terrane: Earth and Planetary Science Letters, v. 213, p. 463-475.
Bennett, R.A., Hreinsdottir, S., Buble, G., Basic, T., Marjanovic, M., Casale, G., Gendaszek, A., and Cowan, D.S., 2008, Eocene to present subduction of southern Adria mantle lithosphere beneath the Dinarides: Geology, v.36, p. 3-6.