In my research group I promote a culture of collegiality, in which people support each other to achieve their goals. If you’re a student interested in researching these topics then get in touch or take a look at the Opportunities page.

My Research Group

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Samuel Clouston is starting his MSc research in February 2026. His thesis, “Numerical modelling insights into the cause of shallow tremor at Ruapehu”, is co-supervised by Oliver Lamb at Earth Sciences New Zealand.

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Ryota Shibuya is a current MSc research student. His thesis, “Local earthquake tomography of the Wairakei-Tauhara geothermal field”, is co-supervised by Sima Mousavi at the Australian National University.

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Henriette Bakkar is a current PhD researcher at Université Libre de Bruxelles. I am co-supervising her thesis, “Towards forecasting eruptions at volcanic lakes using seismo-acoustic and complementary data combined with numerical modeling”, with Corentin Caudron.

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El Mestel completed their PhD thesis, “Seismicity, sub-surface structure, and partnership with Tangata Whenua of Taupō volcano”, in 2023. Their PhD research has been published in Community Science. They are now a postdoctoral research fellow at VUW.

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Bethany Hughes finished her MSc thesis, “Characterising Seismicity at Wairakei-Tauhara Geothermal Field Using a Dense Nodal Array”, in 2025, co-supervised by John Townend and El Mestel. Her research has been published in Seismica and she is now a research assistant at JGU-Mainz.

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Liam Bramwell completed his MSc thesis, “Source Dynamics of Ruapehu’s 2022 Volcanic Unrest: Insights from drumbeat seismicity, tremor, and crater lake signals”, in 2024, co-supervised by Ery Hughes at Earth Sciences New Zealand. Liam’s research has been published in Bulletin of Volcanology, and he is now a PhD student at JGU-Mainz.

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Olivia Mark completed her MSc thesis, “Exploring the nature and influence of intermediate-depth seismicity beneath the Taupō Volcanic Zone”, in 2023. Her research is published in Journal of Geophysical Research, and she is now an engineering geologist.

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Jessie Schuler completed her MSc thesis, “Temporal velocity variations accompanying geodetically detected deformation at Taupō supervolcano”, in 2023. Her research is published in Journal of Geophysical Research, and she is now and engineering geologist.

Kristian Hansen completed his MSc thesis, “VolcanoVR: The visualisation of geological data in a 3D virtual reality environment as a multipurpose research, monitoring and education tool”, in 2023, co-supervised by Simon Barker and Craig Anslow. His research is published in Volcanica and he works for Trimble.

Ross McGregor completed his MSc thesis, “A study and interpretation of the distribution and kinematics of the 2001 Taupō Fault Belt seismic swarm using relative relocation techniques”, in 2022. His research is published in Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems, and he is now a consultant geoscientist.

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