News
The 2025 Applied Geodynamics Laboratory Annual Meeting be held on Thursday–Friday, November 13-14, 2025.
Slide Set 43 from the 2024 Applied Geodynamics Laboratory Annual Meeting is available in the Member's Area.
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December
Tim Dooley’s poster presentation "Assessing Carbopol as a mobile-shale analog in the laboratory: preliminary results under contraction", has been selected as IMAGE’s Best Poster for Geological Technology presented at IMAGE 2024. Congratulations Tim!
November
Juan I. Soto together with Tim Dooley, Mike Hudec, and the contribution of several colleagues from Spain, Greece, and Albania, has given a MSL (Multi-Scale Laboratories) webinar on salt tectonics in fold–thrust belts on 26 November: SALT TECTONICS IN FOLD-AND-THRUST BELTS: From the Betics to the Hellenides-Albanides
EPOS Multi-Scale Laboratories has invited AGL to participate in its 2024-25 seminars. The talks from this MSL webinar series can be viewed on their YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCVNQFVql_TwcSBqgt3IR7mQ
Some 100 delegates from 19 AGL member companies attended the 36th AGL Annual Review Meeting, held on November 7–8, 2024. Delegates were treated to 17 presentations from AGL scientists – Gillian Apps, Tim Dooley, Mahdi Heidari, Mike Hudec, Maria Nikolinakou, Frank Peel, Juan Soto, A. Kurt Tollestrup – and collaborators – Hala Chebli, Xuesong Ding, Antonio Teixell, Chris Willacy – on a variety of topics concerning salt tectonics, salt in the energy transition, shale tectonics, and mixed salt-shale systems. The meeting ended with tours of the physical modeling laboratories led by Tim Dooley and Mike Hudec, and informal discussions with delegates from various companies.
October
AGL is now hiring!
We are looking for someone with experience in seismic interpretation and salt tectonics, hiring at the level of a Research Assistant Professor. To find out more information or apply for the position, go to https://apply.interfolio.com/156278.
New Publication:
Juan I. Soto, Tim P. Dooley, Michael R. Hudec, Frank J. Peel, and Gillian M. Apps (2024). Shortening a mixed salt and mobile shale system: A case study from East Breaks, northwest Gulf of Mexico. Interpretation, v. 12, no. 4, SF77–SF103, http://dx.doi.org/10.1190/INT-2024-0049.1.
August
New Publication:
Tim P. Dooley, Juan I. Soto, Jacqueline E. Reber, Michael R. Hudec, Frank J. Peel, and Gillian M. Apps, (2024), "Modeling mobile shales under contraction: Critical analyses of new analog simulations of shale tectonics and comparison with salt-bearing systems", Interpretation, Volume 12, Issue 4, https://doi.org/10.1190/INT-2024-0025.1
July
On July 10, Juan I. Soto visited HEREMA's offices in Athens to progress future collaborations in the offshore region of western Greece. The collaboration will focus on the study of the structure of the Hellenides orogenic front and the role of salt tectonics in the region.
Outstanding Issues in Salt Tectonics:
A conference and field meeting, held in Sivas, Turkey, July 2nd – 8th 2024
Three members of the AGL team (Juan Soto, Gillian Apps and Frank Peel) recently attended this meeting in person, which combined two days of presentations and discussions on current issues in salt tectonics with five days in the field on the world-class outcrops of the Sivas Basin. All AGL representatives contributed presentations: Juan Soto spoke on the mechanics of mobile shale, Gillian Apps on the modern depositional systems in an active salt basin, and Frank Peel on diapir-margin structures in Iran.
The meeting was organized by Ritske Huismans and Leo Pichel (University of Bergen, Norway), Jean-Claude Ringenbach (TotalEnergies), and Jean-Paul Callot (Université de Pau).
24 participants from around the world represented universities, minerals exploration, and energy companies, including four representatives of the MTA (the Directorate of Mineral Research and Exploration of Turkey, based in Ankara), among whom we were honored by the attendance of Yavuz Cubuk, who was first to recognize the presence of salt-withdrawal basins and diapirs in Sivas, in his doctorate thesis 30 years ago.
Presentations covered the most critical issues of today, including numerical modelling of continental margins (Ritske Huismans, Leo Pichel, Thomas Theunissen), salt tectonics of the North Sea (Mar Moragas, Harya Nugraha, Umut Isikalp, Ann Døsen; all with Zechtek, Bergen & Barcelona), Austrian Alps (Oscar Fernandez), Iran (Frank Peel) and the Pyrenees (Josep Anton Munoz, Merce Estiarte I Ruiz); salt and sediment deposition on salt basins (Gillian Apps, Jean Paul Callot, Alexandre Pichat). There were talks on analog modeling on the internal structure of salt diapirs, with a view to imaging salt diapir heterogeneity on seismic (Naïm Celini); the effect of base salt relief on suprasalt structures (Manel Ramos); and megaflaps (Oriol Ferrer); salt and the energy transition (Olly Duffy). Shale tectonics were addressed: Nigeria (Jean-Claude Ringenbach); shale rheology and Tim Dooley’s carbopol analog models (Juan Soto). Both these authors compared shale and salt tectonics, and highlighted the differences, particularly in shale diapirs, where better seismic often reveals complex stacked, and multi-scale, thrust structures forming the bulk of the shale mass, and the role of thrust faults in the upward migration of fluidized mud.
Jean-Paul Callot and Yavuz Çubuk introduced the Sivas basin geology during the workshop. Jean-Paul credited and highlighted the work of the four PhD students Charlotte Ribes, Charlie Kergaravat, Alexandre Pichat and Etienne Legeay (the first three are now at TotalEnergies) in documenting the understanding of the foreland basin development through time and defining the paleogeographic setting and evolution of the Sivas salt minibasins.
Our field guides were Jean-Claude Ringenbach, Jean-Paul Callot, and Yavuz Çubuk in the field for five days, and we were shown all the aspects from regional setting to the outstanding salt structures that are used as analog for the complex salt tectonic structures and salt minibasin geometries, and the stratigraphic architecture of their fill, observed on seismic lines and drilled in the US and Mexican Gulf of Mexico and Angola, for example.
Our hosts and the local population of Sivas in Turkey treated us well, with delicious food (kebabs, baklavas dried fruit and nuts were plentiful!) both in restaurants and in the field. We shared so many good experiences, and also Covid!
Thank you to the University of Bergen, TotalEnergies, the General Directorate of Mineral Research and Exploration (Maden Tetkik ve Arama Genel Müdürlüğü, aka MTA), and the University of Pau for making the workshop and field trip possible.
Our particular thanks to our logistics coordinator and translator throughout the workshop and in the field, Özlem Çömez (from the MTA), who made everything run smoothly and enabled us all to communicate complex geoscience and share life stories!
New publications:
Chris Willacy and Tim P. Dooley, (2024), "Seismic modeling using pseudo-impedance derived from physical models," The Leading Edge 43: 444–452. https://doi.org/10.1190/tle43070444.1
Hardt, J., Dooley, T. P., and Hudec, M. R., 2024, Physical modeling of ice-sheet-induced salt movements using the example of northern Germany: Earth Surface Dynamics, v. 12, no. 2, p. 559-579, http://doi.org/10.5194/esurf-12-559-2024.
June
From June 1 to June 8, Juan Soto was visiting different examples of mud volcanoes in the SW region of Taiwan, studying with colleagues from the Graduate Institute of Applied Geology from the National Central University, the Academia Sinica, the National Cheng Kung University, and the Université Grenoble Alpes (France), various tectonic processes associated to mobile shales, with examples of active deformations involving these systems.
May
On May 28, 2024, Juan Soto gave a lecture in Tapiei (Taiwan) invited by the Institute of Earth Sciences of the Academia Sinica, with the title of “Mobile Shales in Compressional Settings: Mechanical Behavior and Structural Styles”.
Additionally, on May 31, he gave another lecture in Taoyuan (Taiwan) invited by the College of Earth Sciences of the National Central University, entitled “What we Know About Mobile Shales? Seismic Expression and Processes”.
On May 14, 2024 at 10 AM, Gillian Apps gave a talk at the Bureau's Friday Seminar Series entitled "Sediment Transport over Complex Salt Topography: Fill & Spill Revisited".
April
In combination with colleagues from Albania, Juan I. Soto has carried out a week of field work in the External Zones of the Albanides, also visiting The National Agency of Natural Resources (AKBN) in Tirana to discuss future collaborations on salt tectonic processes in the country.
Juan I. Soto held a meeting with Aristofanis Stefatos (CEO), Efthimios Tartaras (Head of Geoscience & Advisor to the CEO), and other HEREMA colleagues in Athens, discussing possible collaborations on salt tectonic processes in Greece. HEREMA is the national company dedicated to licensing and managing the development of energy resources in Greece.
March
On March 1, 2024 at 9 AM, Mike Hudec gave a talk at the Bureau's Friday Seminar Series entitled "Salt-Detached Thrusting near the Eratosthenes “Seamount”, Eastern Mediterranean – Seismic Interpretation and Physical Modeling"
February
Piotr Krzywiec (from the Institute of Geological Sciences, Warsaw and member of the Polish Academy of Sciences) was visiting Juan I. Soto in Granada (February, 25 to 28) to discuss the internal structure and the seismic expression of some mobile-shale structures in Poland.
Juan I. Soto and Michael Hudec concluded their Asian tour on February 2 by visiting Nanjing University. Juan and Mike gave presentations on shale tectonics, and discussed opportunities for collaborative research with NJU staff.
On February 1, Juan I. Soto and Michael Hudec visited the Wuxi Institute of Petroleum Geology. Juan and Mike gave several presentations on mobile shales, and were given a tour of the Institute's extensive laboratories.
January
Juan I. Soto and Mike Hudec participated with various colleagues from ExxonMobil in a conference organized by The Geological Society in London, from January 31 to February 1, 2024. The ExxonMobil colleagues gave a talk presenting some of the results on shale mobility and salt structures in the Levant Basin. More information about the event can be seen here and here.
Juan I. Soto and Michael Hudec visited the Sinopec offices in Beijing on January 30. While there, Juan and Mike gave several presentations on mobile shale, and were treated to a tour of the Sinopec laboratories.
New publication:
Tim P. Dooley, Michael R. Hudec, Evaluating controls on deformation patterns and styles in the salt-detached Sureste Basin, southern gulf of Mexico: Insights from physical models, Journal of Structural Geology, Volume 179, 2024,105046, ISSN 0191-8141, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jsg.2023.105046.
Michael Hudec and Juan I. Soto visited CNOOC International in Beijing on January 26. Mike and Juan gave a series of lectures on salt and shale tectonics, and then discussed salt and mobile-shale interpretations in the South Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico.
Michael Hudec and Juan I. Soto visited RIPED (the research company for China National Petroleum Corporation) in Beijing on January 22-25. They discussed salt and shale detachments in the Sichuan basin, and Mike taught a short course in salt tectonics.
Michael Hudec and Juan I. Soto visited PTTEP in Bangkok, Thailand on January 18-19 to discuss salt tectonics and shale tectonics in several basins. PTTEP is in the process of joining the AGL consortium, and we welcome our newest member company!
Michael Hudec and Juan I. Soto recently completed AGL's first-ever visit to Vietnam, working with PetroVietnam on January 15-16. While there, Mike and Juan discussed mobile shales in the Song Hong basin, offshore Vietnam.
Mike Hudec visited Petronas in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia on January 11 and 12. The group discussed salt tectonics in the Campos basin, Brazil and shale tectonics in the Sabah basin, offshore Borneo.
Michael Hudec visited the offices of Geoscience Australia in Canberra, Australia on January 9 to discuss ideas for collaboration on salt tectonics and hydrogen storage in Australia salt basins.
On January 5, Mike Hudec visited Central Petroleum in Brisbane, Australia, to discuss ideas for joint research on salt tectonics in the Amadeus Basin, central Australia.
New publication:
2024 | Soto, J.I., M.D. Tranos, Z. Bega, T.P. Dooley, P. Hernández, M.R. Hudec, P.A. Konstantopoulos, E. Lula, K. Nikolaou, R. Pérez, J.P. Pita, J.A. Titos, C. Tzimeas, and A. Herra Sánchez de Movellán, Contrasting styles of salt-tectonic processes in the Ionian Zone (Greece and Albania): Integrating surface geology, subsurface data, and experimental models. Tectonics, 43/1, e2023TC008104, doi:10.1029/2023TC008104.
