THE NEW SMART CLASSROOM IN GEOPHYSICS-SEISMOLOGY AT SUNY POTSDAM

The new smart classroom in geophysics-seismology provides the opportunity for students to observe earthquake traces in real time from the output of six broadband seismometers housed on a pier in the classroom. Students will also be able to observe traces from eight seismic field stations in northern New York. The laboratory houses a RefTek 130 recorder that can transmit the data via an RF transmitter or the Internet, as well as, writes all data to internal memory. The seismometers used for the recorder are the Geotech 3 component short period seismometer (S13J) and the Geotech long period, broadband seismometer (KS-2000). The laboratory also contains a PSI personal seismograph to detect local earthquakes and an ASI from IRIS for detection of teleseisms. A long period vertical Press-Ewing seismometer is also used to detect teleseisms and provide records for classroom exercises.

The classroom is also used for the reduction, analysis, and modeling of geophysical data. A podium to instruct students on the use of software to analyze and model gravity, magnetic, resistivity, and seismic data is available in the lab. The lab contains plotter and printer for the construction of maps and models. Students may also use the lab for learning the Geographic Information System. The laboratory also has facilities for showing VHS videos, CDs and DVDs. A primary goal of the classroom is to teach students how to run software and obtain information through the Internet. However, it is also available for students to use in their own free time.

Students can observe data from eight stations, but it is a future goal that we import data streams from an area known t have frequent seismic events (California possibly?). Students can analyze earthquakes that they hear about in the media. Currently, we both import and export data streams to Lamont Doherty Earth Observatory.

The software, Seisan integrated with Earthworm, has an automatic locator. Another future goal is to add a mail server. With a mail server in place, we could generate an e-mailing list of everyone interested in receiving notification of an earthquake and they would automatically receive an e-mail with the location, time and magnitude of the earthquake.

Another software that we are using is Swarm. Swarm allows students to see the real time data streams, as well as, provides electronic helicorders.