James R. Rice awarded the Harry Fielding Reid Medal

 
            James R. Rice was awarded the Harry Fielding Reid Medal

James R. Rice was awarded the Harry Fielding Reid Medal

Award is the highest honor granted by the Seismological Society of America
Cambridge, Mass. - April 20, 2012 - James R. Rice has been awarded the Harry Fielding Reid Medal by the Seismological Society of America (SSA).

The medal, the highest honor granted by the SSA, is awarded no more than one a year for outstanding contributions in seismology and earthquake engineering.

Rice’s research investigates the mechanics of earth and environmental processes, involving problems in stressing, deformation, fracture, and flow in the world of in seismology and tectonophysics.

His studies focus on the part that fluids play in deformations arising from earthquakes, landslides, glacial movements, and tsunamis. Rice’s studies have highlighted the mechanical processes involved in seismic activity. Models of earthquake sequences and interactions along faults developed by Rice have had significant impact on the analysis of earthquakes cycles.

Rice received his B.Sc, M.Sc., and Ph.D. degree from Lehigh University.  Prior to coming to Harvard, Rice was a faculty member at Brown University. He has receive numerous previous honors, including the Louis Néel Medal (2012), the Panetti-Ferrari International Prize for Applied Mechanics (2008), and the Maurice A. Biot Medal (2007). He holds elected fellowships of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, and the American Geophysical Union, and memberships in the National Academy of Engineering and the National Academy of Sciences.

Rice will receive the medal at the SSA 2013 Annual meeting in Salt Lake City, Utah.